Proletarian Unity League

The Proletarian Unity League was a Boston-based Maoist organization formed in 1975. Its founders were ex-Students for a Democratic Society (SDS) members who had been associated with the Revolutionary Youth Movement II: one of three factions (the others being Progressive Labor and the Weathermen) to emerge from the split in SDS that occurred at its June 1969 National Convention.^[1][2]

The Proletarian Unity League (PUL) arose as part of the New Communist Movement (NCM) in the early 1970s.^[3] The PUL members rejected the Communist Party USA for its alleged revisionism; they also rejected the Socialist Workers Party and other Trotskyist sects for their opposition to Maoism and Chinese foreign policy.^[4]

In surveying the proliferation of "self-proclaimed 'communist parties'" in the U.S.,^[5] the PUL criticized what it saw as a tendency toward ultra-leftism, a critique articulated in its 1977 book Two, Three, Many Parties of a New Type? Against the Ultra-Left Line.^[6] As Max Elbaum writes:

Two, Three, Many Parties went on to provide numerous examples of how sectarianism and infantile left tactics had afflicted the movement since its earliest days. Further, the book offered a comprehensive analysis of the roots of these problems in the voluntarist and semi-anarchist ideas prevalent in the late-1960s movements, and in the attraction of those ideas to the students and former students who disproportionately made up the Marxist-Leninist ranks.^[7]

Throughout its ten-year span, the PUL differentiated itself from most other Maoist organizations by:

1. Battling what it characterized as white supremacy in the American labor movement and its damaging effects on the development of class consciousness.^[8]
2. Advocating an anti-sectarian approach and arguing that there is not "one true party".^[9][10]
3. Supporting gays and lesbians,^[11] in contrast to the homophobia found in some NCM groups.^[12][13]

In February 1979, the PUL was one of six U.S. Maoist organizations^[14] to send a representative in a delegation to China. The visit's stated purpose was to "strengthen the unity between the U.S. Marxist-Leninists and the Communist Party of China" and to "promote the prospects for unity among the U.S. Marxist-Leninists."^[15] The delegation held a series of meetings with Chinese Communist Party leaders, including Vice-Premier Geng Biao.^[15]

In 1985 the PUL merged with the Revolutionary Workers Headquarters (RWH) to form the Freedom Road Socialist Organization (FRSO). The FRSO vowed to avoid the dogmatism that had been a defining feature of Maoism in the U.S.^[16] Over the next decade, several more groups joined the FRSO, which split in 1999.

In addition to its Forward Motion newsletter—started in 1982 and published 4-6 times a year^[17]—the PUL's publications included:

• "It's Not the Bus! Busing and the Democratic Struggle in Boston, 1974-1975". September 1975.
• On the October League's Call for a New Communist Party – A Response. New York: United Labor Press. 1976. OCLC 80292029.
• Bring Home the Struggle against 'Left' Sectarianism: A Further Reply to the Committee of Five. New York: United Labor Press. November 1977.
• Mitchell, Roxanne; Weiss, Frank (1977). Two, Three, Many Parties of a New Type? Against the Ultra-Left Line. New York: United Labor Press. LCCN 77154452.
• "The Ultra-Left Danger and How to Fight It: Three Articles on 'Anti-Dogmatism'". January 1978.
• "On the 'Progressive Role' of the Soviet Union and Other Dogmas. A Further Reply to the PWOC and the Committee of Five". September 1978.
• "Party Building and the Main Danger: An Exchange Between the Proletarian Unity League and the Committee of Five (Detroit Marxist-Leninist Organization, El Comite-M.I.N.P., Philadelphia Workers Organizing Committee, Potomac Socialist Organization, Socialist Union of Baltimore)". 1978.
• "Kampuchea, Self-Determination, and the 'Boat People': The Challenge for Socialism" (PDF). January 1980.
• "The Left and the Challenge of the '80s" – via Bibliomania. First delivered as a speech at the National Lawyers Guild convention in Boston, August 1980.
• "Losing and Learning How to Win: Observations on the Campaign Against Proposition 2 1/2 in Massachusetts". 1980 – via Bibliomania.
• Mitchell, Roxanne; Weiss, Frank (1981). A House Divided: Labor and White Supremacy. New York: United Labor Press. OCLC 8110706. The book's back matter includes "A Comment by Harry Haywood" and the authors' response.
• A False Orthodoxy: Some Disagreements with the League of Revolutionary Struggle. New York: United Labor Press. 1981. OCLC 83718937.
• "The Proletarian Unity League: Where We Came From, What We Look Like, What We Do". January 1982.
• Dubrovsky, Ruth; Niles, Lorna (1982). Lesbian and Gay Exclusion: The Policy That Dares Not Speak Its Name. New York: United Labor Press. OCLC 47628552.
• Cummings, Susan; Hoffman, Jonathan, eds. (1982). Labor's Survival/Labor's Revival: Working Papers on the Trade Unions. New York: United Labor Press. OCLC 8762930.
• Sarkis, Charles, ed. (1982). What Went Wrong? Articles and Letters on the U.S. Communist Left in the 1970's. New York: United Labor Press. LCCN 82050349.

• PUL documents in the Special Collections Research Center at George Washington University