Paul Booth

Paul R. Booth

Template:TOCnestleft Paul R. Booth is a Executive Assistant to the President of AFSCME, Gerald McEntee. He is the husband of Heather Booth.

SDS leader

Paul Booth was a leader in the 1960s at the beginning of the student movement as National Secretary of Students for a Democratic Society, the largest organization of the emerging youth movement. In 1965 he directed the first march on Washington, D.C against the War in Vietnam and issued the statement to "build not burn" and organized the first sit-in at the Chase Manhattan Bank exposing it as a "partner in Apartheid”.

Hyde Park-Kenwood Voices

In January 1969, the Chicago radical newspaper, Hyde Park-Kenwood Voices, listed those who had helped produce its first 16 monthly issues as "writers, researchers, photographers, artists and clerical workers".

The list included Paul Booth.

Labor movement

Booth joined the labor movement in 1966 as Research Director for the United Packinghouse Workers of America under communist Jesse Prosten and then joined the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME) in 1974, working to build Illinois AFSCME (Council 31) and then moving to the International as Organizing Director for 10 years and now as Executive Assistant to President Gerald McEntee.

Citizens Action

Former Students for a Democratic Society members Paul and Heather Booth and Steve Max, were all leading activists in Citizens Action.

GI Civil Liberties Defense Committee

Circa 1969, Paul Booth, Voters Committed for Change, Chicago , was listed as a sponsor of the Socialist Workers Party led GI Civil Liberties Defense Committee .

NAM

In May 1973, Paul Booth contributed an article to the New American Movement Discussion Bulletin "Organizing around state issues", in which he advocates Revenue Sharing as a means of advancing revolution.

In a public forum, it seems to me that NAM has two separable and distinct tasks the articulation of an explicitly socialist analysis of Revenue Sharing, and the advocacy of a program for action that many diverse groups could unite around. An analysis of the program could draw the obvious links,to social service cutbacks and imperialist foreign policy, to productivity pressure eon workers, etc. It could explain Revenue Sharing in terms of ruling class plans, and could sketch a socialist vision of social services and a long range plan for future struggle.

Yet such an analysis as necessary as it is to articulate -- will not become the effective basis for joint action with other groups. For that, NAM needs to advance a concrete program for action...

Revenue Sharing represents a future trend toward greater decision making on local levels. And it is a trend that should give us real cause for optimism the more real decisions are made at levels accessible to the, observation and protest of working people, including ourselves, the more we as revolutionary socialists will be able to link roots into real life struggles -- and thus begin to build the base for a mass revolutionary movement.

New Mayor and New Politics

On May 17 1983 Paul Booth was a Panelist on A New Mayor and New Politics forum at Chicago State University Auditorium.

The election of Harold Washington as Mayor of Chicago was more than one man's victory. It was a progressive people's declaration. The Black community and progressive Latinos and whites formed an unbetable force in a campaign for justice and equality.

Panelist were Paul Booth, Juanita Bratcher, David Cantor, Slim Coleman, Danny Davis, Keith Davis, Ron Davis, Ishmael Flory, Rev Harry Gibson, Nancy Jefferson, Richard Newhouse, Lu Palmer, Art Vasquez, Conrad Worrill sponsored by Black Press Institute and Independent Citizens Alliance.

Comprand

In 1987 Paul Booth was on the Board of Directors of Chicago based Comprand (Comprehensive Research and Development).

Socialist Scholars Conference 1990

The Socialist Scholars Conference 1990, held September 6-8, at the Hotel Commodore, New York, included panels such as:

Labor Resurgency?

• Sponsor: Democratic Socialists of America
• Paul Booth, Field Service Department, AFSCME
• Jo-Ann Mort, ACTWU Communications Director
• Paul Garver, Rutgers Labor Education Center
• Paul Baichich, International Assoc. of Machinists at Eastern Airlines

DSA member

In 1986, several Chicago Democratic Socialists of America members, including Roberta Lynch, Steve Culen, Paul Booth, Nancy Shier, Hank Scheff and Bob Lawson were involved in AFCSME's contract negotiations with the City of Chicago, which included an "historic breakthrough on the issue of comparable worth".

In 1990, Paul Booth was a member of Democratic Socialists of America.

Chicago Area Friends of SNCC

In 2005 Chicago Area Friends of SNCC organized the "Tell the Story: The Chicago SNCC History Project, 1960-1965" Chicago Area Friends of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee and the Chicago Civil Rights Movement, c. 1960-1965. The event was held October 21-22, 2005 Roosevelt University, Chicago, Illinois.

Members of the advisory committee included Paul Booth.

Jobs with Justice

In 2009 Paul Booth served as a Board Member for Jobs with Justice Union. AFSCME International

Midwest Academy

The 2009 Midwest Academy board of directors consisted of;

• Heather Booth President

• Nancy Shier Treasurer

• Alicia Ybarra SEIU

• Cathy Hurwit (Rep. Jan Schakowsky)

• Paul Booth AFSCME

• Jacky Grimshaw, Center for Neighborhood Technology

• Jackie Kendall Executive Director Midwest Academy

References

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