Celia Sánchez—an Organizer of the Cuban Revolution

She was raised in Pilón,

a small town in the province

of Oriente, Cuba.

Her mother died when she was a child.

Her father, Manuel Sánchez,

came from an affluent family

and became a medical doctor.

He also raised Celia, her brothers and sisters.

Unlike most doctors in Cuba at that time,

Dr. Manuel Sánchez treated

those who could not pay.

Many of these were the ones who cut sugar cane.

His patients suffered from having bad teeth,

to tuberculosis, to malnutrition,

to gunshot or knife wounds, or the effects of alcoholism.

He also delivered the babies.

Celia became her father’s assistant.

She learned the names, illnesses, and problems of all the patients.

She joined her father making house calls

on horseback riding into the mountains.

She made sure that on the day of the Kings holiday,

that every child had a present.

This became her mission,

and the people loved her.

She liked to read the fashion magazines,

and wore bright red lipstick.

Even after the Revolution triumphed

she wore high heels with her fatigues.

Her father taught Celia about Cuban history

He taught her to appreciate the beauty of the mountains.

He taught her how to do deep-sea fishing.

At night, on the beech, with her friends, she ate her catch of the day under the stars. 

Where she lived, the rural guards had absolute power.

They could take whatever they wanted.

They raped women,

and resistance was met with torture or death.

Celia had supported political campaigns

aimed at making meaningful change.

These efforts failed,

Then, Celia discovered the July 26 Movement.

She learned that she needed to change

from being an independent woman,

into a disciplined revolutionary,

who strictly followed orders.

Initially her leader was Frank País.

But life in the city became increasingly dangerous

and government forces murdered País.

Sixty-thousand attended his funeral in Santiago.

These forces arrested Celia.

Her fate would have been almost certain torture and death.

But she saw an opportunity and escaped,

hiding in the cover of the marabu

Celia then joined Fidel and the revolutionaries in the Sierra Maestra.

She was a small woman,

but managed to march

for many miles each day in the mountains.

Then, she looked for the children who needed medical attention.

She spoke with the patents asking for their permission,

so revolutionary doctors could treat the young ones.

She also asked the revolutionary priests to preside over weddings.

The forces of repression had tremendous resources.

They used aircraft in a relentless effort

to find the revolutionaries.

But they failed.

Celia organized the construction of a small town in the mountains,

that served the needs of the revolution.

The town was hidden by a canopy of trees.

From this base, the revolution advanced.

Although the army of the people was outnumbered

and had fewer resources,

their spirit became more powerful

than those who were motivated by money.

One of her first acts as a leader of

the revolutionary Cuban government

was to airlift toys to the children of the Sierra.

She had not forgotten them.

When Cuba was attacked by mercenaries

supported by the United States at Playa Girón,

Celia played a prominent role

in defending the island.

She brought many of the campesinos

from the Sierra to Havana

where they learned skills

and improved their lives.

The women received new clothes,

makeup, and hairdos

at the beauty parlors.

Yes, this was a new day.

From the beginning Celia and the revolutionaries

understood the importance of health care and education.

Today, Cuba probably has more doctors and teachers

per capita than any other nation in the world.

We might consider that the United Nations

estimates that about 29,000 children die every day

due to preventable diseases.

Cuba has one of the lowest infant mortality rates in the world.

Celia Sánchez, along with Vilma Espin, and Haydee Santamaria

are examples of how women

have the potential to organize

to transform the world.

Today, more and more working people

see instability of the world.

Celia Sánchez taught us that we can work to build

a world where human needs are more important than profits.

Ida Wells, An Uncompromising Struggle for Human Dignity

She was born

in Holly Springs, Mississippi

into the world

of chattel slavery.

350,000 Union soldiers died in the Civil War.

President Lincoln said they did not “die in vain”,

and the Thirteenth Amendment said,

slavery was abolished.

Black people learned to read,

they voted, and held public office.

But the federal government abandoned reconstruction,

and the Ku Klux Klan took political power.

Her mother was a cook.

Her father was a carpenter,

and they managed to support

Ida and her seven siblings.

Then the yellow fever took

the lives of her parents.

Her first struggle, at the age of sixteen,

was to keep the family together.

She taught school,

and cared for the entire family.

Eventually she earned money

as a journalist.

People who had power said that Black people weren’t supposed

to sit where white people sat on rail cars.

Ida was asked to vacate her “first class” seat.

She refused and several white men forced her to move.

She sued and won her case.

But there was an appeal,

and the judges ruled that Ida’s case

was not “reasonable.”

Ida was an independent minded woman

who found it difficult to make many friends.

Thomas Moss, a letter carrier, was her friend.

He owned a grocery, had a wife and a child, with another on the way.

There were white people who resented Moss because he had money.

He was arrested for a crime he didn’t commit.

Seventy five racists took Moss, Calvin McDowell, and Will Stewart

out of a jail and lynched them.

Ida was so incensed by the horror of this reality,

that she made the campaign

against lynching her life’s work.

Unlike many others, she would never back down.

While many understood that lynching was wrong,

many also argued that Black men

raped white women.

Therefore they argued that white women needed to be protected.

Ida Wells wrote, “The Truth About Lynching.”

She argued that, at times, some white women had

consensual relationships with Black men,

but segregationists didn’t feel this was possible.

She said that Black women were oftentimes

raped by white men who went unpunished.

Lynchings took place in order to intimidate

Black people so they would continue to work the worst jobs.

Ida learned from these lynchings that

“a Winchester rifle should

have a place of honor in every black home.”

“for protection the law refuses to give.”

She also advised Black people to take Thomas Moss’ advice,

and move out of their homes in the south,

to new homes in the west.

Thousands took this advice.

This was too much for the racists,

and Ida’s life was threatened in Memphis.

She needed to abandon her business,

and did not return for thirty years.

Some people said that Ida preached hatred

against white people who lived in the South.

They attempted to isolated her,

so powerful forces in this country might be accommodated.

But thousands of Black men,

women and children were lynched.

They were beaten, tortured, hanged,

shot, and burned to death.

Their body parts were cut off,

collected, and even sold as souvenirs.

But the government chose

not to prosecute the known murderers.

How was she to fight against a government

that refused to prosecute murderers?

She did this by introducing her readers

to the individuals who had been lynched.

She wrote about Frazier Baker,

who was the Post Master of Lake City, South Carolina.

After his enemies burned the Post Office to the ground,

Baker used his home as a Post Office.

Hundreds of racists surrounded his home and set it on fire.

When Baker and his family came out of the home,

He and his infant daughter were murdered,

His wife and children suffered life-changing injuries.

The government made an investigation.

When no one was prosecuted,

The government that claims to represent, “liberty and justice for all”

became an accomplice in the murder of Frazier Baker.

No reason was given for this murder.

Ida Wells understood that Frazier Baker was murdered

because he was a Black man,

who attempted to get a descent job in the United States of America.

Ida gave the facts showing how people

were victimized oftentimes for merely defending themselves

against hysterical mobs whose only concern

was to keep Black people in their place.

Anyone could read about these

lynchings in the newspapers.

Ida Wells collected these stories

and even made her own investigations.

The Twenty-fourth U.S. infantry of Black soldiers

had risked their lives in wars abroad.

In Houston, Texas those soldiers

attempted to defend their comrades from a racist mob.

Sergeant Vida Henry gave the order engage a racist mob.

After the battle, Henry committed suicide,

rather than face execution from the government

he valiantly served for thirteen years. 

Ida distributed buttons that supported

the Black soldiers

who had been sentenced to death

by a court which pretended to represent justice.

“Intelligence officers” threatened to

arrest her on charges of treason.

Ida countered that it would be an

“honor” to go to prison under such circumstances.

Ida would go on to mobilize

women to support the

Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters,

who overcame seemingly insurmountable odds to gain union recognition.

She wrote the pamphlets:

The Requirements of Southern Journalism,

United States Atrocities: Lynch Law,

Mob Rule in New Orleans: Robert Charles and His fight to the Death,

The Arkansas Race Riot,

The East St. Louis Massacre: The Greatest Outrage of the Century

Lynch Law in Georgia,

and Colored Women of Chicago.

Some of the bravest leaders for human dignity

respected her work, That list includes:

Frederick Douglass, Susan B. Anthony,

Marcus Garvey, and W.E.B. Du Bois.

However, those who pretended to be leaders of the movement

attempted to marginalize her accomplishments,

but she will be remembered as someone who

never compromised her struggle for human dignity.

Cuba and a world capitalist system that’s falling apart

Recently, the news media in Philadelphia has, in effect, reported that there is an escalation in the international crisis of capitalism. The owners of both Hahnemann Hospital and a Philadelphia oil refinery have announced their facilities will be shut down. The federal government has announced that there will be raids aimed at arresting thousands of our neighbors, who happen to have been born outside this country. The President threatened war against both Venezuela and Iran if those nations don’t do exactly what he tells them to do. There is a national drive to prevent women from having the right to decide if and when they will have children.

I believe that when we look at the totality of these events, and how they have emerged just a few months apart, we can see that there are profound underlying problems. If we lived in a secure world, why would the owners of a hospital and an oil refinery shut down those facilities?

When we know that immigrants routinely work at some of the worst and least desirable jobs, why is the government making it their top priority to deport many of these workers? Why did the President threaten wars and implement economic sanctions against nations that never threatened this country? Before abortion became a woman’s right, thousands of women died or were mutilated because of back alley abortions. Why is the government determined to go back to those days?

Before I attempt to answer those questions, perhaps it is useful to contrast the policies of this country, with the routine policies of the revolutionary government of Cuba. We can start with the closing of Hahnemann Hospital.

Health care

One effect of the closing of Hahnemann will be the closing of its maternity ward. In the year 1997 there were about 18 maternity wards in Philadelphia. After the closing of Hahnemann Hospital there will be five maternity wards in the city. As a result, the infant mortality rate in the city has increased.

Hahnemann Hospital cared for about 50,000 patients in their emergency room. I have spoken to nurses and patients who tell me that wait times today in the city emergency rooms can surpass twelve hours. Closing down Hahnemann will only make this situation worse.

Cuba

Nicholas Kristof had a column in a January 18, 2019 issue of the New York Times, where he reported on Cuban health care. According to Kristof, Cuba has three times more doctors per capita as the United States. Cuba also has a significantly lower rate of infant mortality than this country. As a result, Kristof speculates that about 7,500 children die every year in this country because we don’t have Cuban health care.

Clearly Cuba doesn’t have the advanced technology that doctors in this country. However, the reason for the lower rate of infant mortality in Cuba has to do with the fact that every pregnant woman and child receives regular check ups. This routine policy prevents serious conditions relating to pregnancy, as well as childhood diseases. We might also consider that Cuba is a nation that is 100% Latino and about 40% Afro-Cuban. These populations in the United States have a higher rate of infant mortality.   

Oil Refineries

There have been several explosions at the Philadelphia oil refinery that is scheduled to close. This is a reflection of the fact that the owners of the refinery (Philadelphia Energy Solutions Inc.) refused to pay for proper maintenance of the facility. The government refused to adequately enforce the safety regulations that are supposed to oversee oil refineries.

As a result, the latest explosion at this refinery could have caused a leak of hydrogen fluoride. The Philadelphia Inquirer reported that this kind of leak could have affected over one million inhabitants of the Philadelphia area. Hydrogen fluoride is potentially lethal and can cause injuries that can last a lifetime.

Cuba

After the Cuban Revolution, the United States government worked diligently to overthrow the revolutionary government. History has shown that the government in this country has had a routine policy of working to overthrow governments that it doesn’t like.

The wars against Korea, Vietnam, Iraq, and Afghanistan are just a few examples of this policy. Today we also know that the U.S. government worked to overthrow governments in the Congo, Guatemala, Iran, Chile, and Panama. One method the United States used in their attempt to bring down these governments was to use their influence to isolate the economies of these nations.

Because the U.S. declared a trade embargo against Cuba, the revolutionary government came to an agreement with the Soviet Union to import oil from that nation. Ernesto Che Guevara was the minister of the economy in Cuba, and he had a meeting with the managers of the oil refineries in Cuba.

He asked them to refine oil from the Soviet Union. Those managers said they would talk to Washington to see if this was possible. When there was no response to Che, Cuba nationalized all the oil refineries on the island. Eventually Cuba offered to pay for those refineries, but the oil corporations refused to accept the money.

We might think about the aftermath to the revolution of the thirteen colonies that created the nation known as the United States of America. After this revolution, many of those who supported the British, known as Tories, left the country. The revolutionary government confiscated the vast land holdings of those Tories. After over 200 years, the United States government never offered to pay the descendants of the Tories for the land this nation confiscated.

We might also consider that Bernie Sanders came to Philadelphia to speak in opposition to the closing of Hahnemann Hospital. Sanders favors using billions of dollars in taxpayer money to rescue hospitals like Hahnemann.

No government official has argued that the assets of the owners of Hahnemann or the Philadelphia Energy Solutions Corporation need to be confiscated. In my opinion, those facilities need to be placed under workers control, so they can operate to serve the needs of the community, and not to maximize profits of corporations.

Immigrants

Every year, the Fourth of July is a national holiday in this country. This is a celebration of the signing of the Declaration of Independence. This Declaration was a list of grievances against the British royal government that sparked the revolution. Included in this Declaration is a statement critical of the British for restricting immigration to this part of the world.

We also might consider that the First Nations of this part of the world are among the least affluent citizens of this country. Most of the immigrants in this country come from Mexico or Central America. The people who live in this area are descendants of Native Americans who trace their ancestors to this land for over 20,000 years.

No one has the power to control where we are born in the world. While capitalists profit from their international investments, I believe that working people need to view ourselves as one international class. All capitalist governments disagree with this perspective.

Presidents Clinton, Bush, Obama, and Trump have been deporting literally hundreds of immigrants every day. All of these Presidents have separated thousands of children from their parents. In the past, the government deported immigrants, and sent their U.S. born children into foster care.

Today children are separated from their parents at the border and placed in concentration camps. While President Obama deported more immigrants than President Trump, the current President is working to accelerate his deportation program. Just the other day there were about 800 demonstrations throughout this country, protesting raids on our neighbors who happen to be immigrants.

Cuba

Because Cuba has three times more doctors per capita than this country, they have many more doctors to send to other nations to treat some of the poorest patients in the world. In the United States there are some doctors who spend a few weeks going to other nations to treat patients who need medical care.

In Cuba there are thousands of doctors who treat the most indigent patients from around the world for years at a time. Cuba is also proud of the fact that students from around the world learn to become medical doctors in Cuban medical schools.

Clearly Cuba doesn’t have many of the conveniences of this country. However, the revolutionary government makes it their priority to mobilize and give aid to people from around the world who need it.

War

The routine policy of the United States has been to go to war, or institute economic sanctions on any nation in the world that doesn’t follow their orders. Workers who attempt to escape conditions where the wages are two dollars per day are willing to do some of the worst jobs in this country. The government has responded by making it their top priority to deport hundreds of these workers every day.

When we study the history of the United States, we see that there was one war after another. Then, after the Vietnamese people defeated the armed forces of this country, there were a few years when the military was so demoralized that the government didn’t feel war was a possibility. Then, the United States invaded Grenada and there have been continuous wars since that time.

While the United States government argues that it is defending freedom and democracy in the world, the facts tell another story. The wars, as well as the huge military budget, have been about maintaining the position of the super-power status of the United States in the world.

Cuba

Clearly, Cuba isn’t a pacifist nation. The Cuban government came to power because of an armed revolution. Every Cuban spends time in the military and learns how to use firearms. The United States government understands that an invasion of Cuba, would be met with an armed resistance from the entire population.

Because of Cuba’s international perspective, thousands of Cuban soldiers went to Angola to defend that nation against an invasion supported by the apartheid regime of South Africa. Eventually the Cubans and Angolans succeeded in defeating the invasion of that country.

This defeat of the apartheid forces in Angola set in motion the freeing of Nelson Mandela from prison. The apartheid regime understood that it needed to change, and Mandela became the President of a completely different South Africa.

Abortion

Back in the 1970s a mass movement in this country demanded the right of women to have an abortion. At that time, thousands of women died or were mutilated every year because they were unable to get safe abortions. We might also consider that affluent women always had the means to do what was necessary, so they had access to abortion. Because of this mass movement, the Supreme Court legalized abortion.

Ever since that time, there has been a sustained and well-financed movement to prevent women from having access to abortion. As a result, it is much more difficult today for women to have the right to control their own bodies.

We might also consider that today there are many more women in government, as well as on the governing boards of major corporations. This reality has not stopped state governments from passing laws that prevent women from having the right to decide if and when they become mothers.

Cuba

Ever since the Cuban Revolution, abortion has been legal in that country. Since medical care is a right for everyone, there is no charge for this procedure.

We might also think about the women who have been leaders of the Cuban Revolution. These leaders include: Celia Sanchez, Vilma Espin, Haydee Santamaria, and Melba Hernandez. These leaders joined in the effort to make the Cuban government responsible for the lives of every Cuban.

As a result, today Cuban women have equal representation in the government as well as in the professions. These changes didn’t happen because of an improvement in the capitalist government. No, these changes came about because of the revolutionary transformation of Cuba.

Today, in Cuba human needs are more important than profits. I believe that this is an example that working people all over the world can learn from.

When we see the enormous difference in the priorities of Cuba and this country, we might begin to understand why workers and capitalists have completely different interests. While the U.S. government has had an economic embargo against Cuba for sixty years, working people have no interest in restricting our relations with the Cuban people.

So, one conclusion that we can draw from this reality is to demand: End the blockage against Cuba now!!!