Purpose of the Movement

It is for State social control and political repression. Thus it must be opposed at every turn and ultimately destroyed altogether. The abolition of prisons, the system of Laws, and the Capitalist State is the ultimate objective of every true Anarchist, yet there seems to be no clear agreement by the Anarchist movement to put active effort to that anti-authoritarian desire. We must organize our resources to support all political/class war prisoners if we truly wish to be their ally, and we must give something more than lip service.

Organizing against the enemy legal and penal system is both offensive and defensive. It is carried on with individuals, groups and among the masses in the community. We must inform the people on a large scale of the atrocities and inhumanity of the prisons, the righteousness of our struggle, and the necessity of their full and support. We must organize our communities to attack the prison system as a moral and social abomination, and we must fight to free all political/class war prisoners.

Defensive work involves meeting the needs of the prisoners: whether those needs stem from the daily oppression of the prisons, police, courts, or the intensive repression by State/Class authorities of prison organizers. The prison support group meets these needs in two primary ways:

1. by educating the community about the class/racist nature of the prisons and the legal system and how to fight against it;
2. by forming outside support groups on a local and national basis in order to ensure prisoners' defense and survival from enemy attack and from inhuman prison conditions. There should be Anarchist Black Cross Groups all over the continent.

We must do this in order to expose, embarrass, isolate, confuse and demoralize the enemy's legal and penal system, and also to win community people over to support prisoners' struggles.

Some of our protest activities include this 15 point program:

1. Organizing Political Prisoner Defense Committees on behalf of prisoners framed or railroaded through the Capitalist courts for their political and social beliefs or prison organizing. For a prisoner in the hands of the State on political frame-up charges, the Defense Committee is the most effective instrument to fight for their freedom!
2. Holding protest rallies, marches and street demonstrations in support of prisoners' rights and against the repressive actions of State/Class authorities. Such protests can be held in and around prisons, Departments of "Corrections," Courthouses (where political prisoners' cases are being tried or prisoners' rights lawsuits are being heard), at the White House, US Congress, State Legislatures, Governors' Mansions and other symbols of class rule and prisoner oppression.
3. Writing press releases and holding news conferences for the Black, alternative and radical news media (and sometimes the Capitalist news media) appearing on television and radio news and/or talk shows to discuss prisons. Priority should also be given to starting a Prisoners' newsletter or newspaper with an Anarchist focus . In fact, the old BLACK FLAG, formerly the organ of the anarchist Black Cross Group in London, England (which has stopped publishing), should be started up again. (I remember what the HAPOTOC newsletter and the Black Flag did to publicize and politicize my case when I was in prison.)
4. Securing Anarchist and other revolutionary materials for prisoners to read, and fight for their right to receive this literature if prison officials try to ban or prohibit such literature for any reason.
5. Sending the prison officials and other State/Class authorities all over the continent a flood of telegrams, letters and petitions about the mistreatment of prisoners, and especially political prisoners and prison activists (who are 'dangerous' in the eyes of the prison officials). Let them know that there is someone who is watching their every move and that the prisoners are not alone!
6. Organize a TELEPHONE BRIGADE to continually call "corrections" and other authorities about the treatment of prisoners. This is especially important if there is an enemy attack upon a political prisoner or an ongoing prison protest.
7. Organize a Legal Defense Fund to raise funds for legal fees and to secure the services of an attorney, where necessary, to assist prisoners with criminal or disciplinary cases growing out of their prison organizing or the harassment by prison officials.
8. Organizing and/or participating in coalitions with poor people's movements, prison support, Black, Women's rights, Gay, Church, Left-wing, and other diverse groups, so as to win them over and to integrate the prison struggle into the general movement for social change in North America.
9. Assist prisoners in getting parole, probation or a pardon by securing them a place to stay, a job, some references or names on a petition demanding their freedom when they become eligible for parole or are seeking executive clemency. It may be necessary to hold demonstrations and other protest actions to compel the release of certain prisoners whom officials are continuing to hold even though they should have been legally released.
10. Organize a Correspondence Committee of people to write to prisoners and find out about prison conditions and to show their solidarity and human concern. Also to write protest letters to prison officials, politicians, the news media, prison support groups, professional or legal organizations and other persons, about prison conditions. Also have the ABC's to function as an Observer Committee to go into the prisons, visit the prisoners, investigate their complaints, question the officials and monitor the prison for violation of prisoners' rights.
11. Work against the death penalty and expose it as an instrument of racial genocide and class and political repression. Never forget the Haymarket martyrs, Sacco and Vanzetti, and so many others put to death "legally" by the State, as well as those like Mumia Abu-Jamal, who have been sentenced to death.
12. Expose the fallacy of the Capitalist system of cops, laws and prisons being for the protection of society or as a social necessity. We should hold community forums on crime, the prison system, racism and Capitalism, to expose the system itself as the crime, and to show that there is another way to social peace and harmony: the Anarchist way.
13. Set up Black Cross Amnesty Committees all over the Continent to demand the freedom and amnesty of political/class war prisoners, and the abolition of prisons. Especially demand the immediate release of prisoners who have served unnecessarily lengthy sentences.
14. Demand the immediate closing of all Control Units in federal and state prisons. We should have mass marches at the prisons, in front of politicians offices, and at the "corrections" offices. We should make the issue of Control Units in North American prisons an international human rights issue, and in addition work to try to free all such prisoners on a strict timetable.
15. Those outside the prison support movement (and especially in underground units) must be willing to engage in armed support actions. Where the lives of political/class war prisoners are in immediate jeopardy, they must be forcibly liberated. This is an extreme measure for extreme conditions of repression. It cannot be taken lightly and without full understanding of the consequences. But because of the State's bloody war against innocent victims it must be considered and done.