C.l.p. Candidate Calls For "jobs, Peace & Equality"

General Baker 's campaign for the state legislature in the 9th District, encompassing parts of Detroit and Highland Park, may make him the first communist elected to public office in his country in almost 40 years.

Baker, who helped form the Communist Labor Party (CLP) on Labor Day 1974, has been active i in civil rights struggles and in the workers' movement since the earlv sixties.

Could you give us an idea of your history in the left?

I was active in the civil rights struggles in the early sixties. I spent a month in Cuba in 1964 and then I refused the draft in '65. I've been organizing in the shops since then.

I was one of the organizers of the Dodge Revolutionary Movement (DRUM) and later helped to begin the League of Revolutionary Black Workers.

I was also involved in the antiwar movement, and 1 was a full-time staff member of the Inner City Voice.

I've been living in Highland Park for the last nine years, participating in various community struggles while working at the Ford River Rouge Plant.

How does your campaign relate to the strategy of the CLP?

We think the struggle for reforms will push the struggle for socialism forward. Our platform, which calls for "jobs, peace and equality," is important for the working class as a whole.

At the same time, however, we have been building a party in the course of this election.

The best way to educate people is to win- then we can use the office as a podium to raise issues central to the working class.

What have you and the CLP been doing in the 9th district and in Detroit for "jobs, peace and equality?"

We played a major role in the public hearings on 'CETA (Comprehensive Employment and Training Act) in January of '75 and did most of the organizing work to build unemployed committees throughout Detroit. We also supported busing actively through a massive leaflet campaign, because peaceful integration is an important tactic in achieving working class unity throughout the country.

And then, in the summer of 1975, we drove the Nazis out of downtown Detroit after a few fistfights. The only solution for the problems of Detroit is the struggle for socialism. But we have been concentrating our efforts on the fight for skilled jobs for youth. While all the major companies are announcing their biggest profits in history, they are doing nothing to provide jobs.

The corporations are on the offensive now. They are squeezing as much profit as possible from every worker. And the auto companies have already decided to abandon Detroit while trying to make it a recreational center instead of an industrial center. They are moving south to escape the unions.

There are 21,000 people on lay off but at the same time the army, which used to be the alternative, is in total bankruptcy after being dealt a death b.low over Vietnam. Youth are turning to crime and dropping out of school because they lose their incentive when they see their older brothers and sisters out of work.

What are the major struggles in the 9th District?

This district has the highest infant mortality rate in the state. We are therefore waging a fight to reopen Highland Park General Hospital, which has been closed for nine months.

Our platform calls for free universal health care and an end to all Medicaid cuts. In addition,' Chrysler Corporation has destroyed acres of housing, much of which has remained undeveloped for over five years.

The government must expand public housing.

In the meantime Highland Park is collapsing as a city, and we believe that some of the proposals for mass transit are aimed at continuing that process. We were leading the fight to declare. Detroit an economic disaster area. But the. UAW took over the demand, tried to turn it into a Democratic Party issue, and the campaign lost whatever momentum it had.

Do you think that a communist can actually be elected to the state legislature?

I think we have a real good chance of winning. People don't mind voting for a communist--getting them to the polls is the hard part.

Next week The Sun looks into the campaign of General Baker's opponent, incumbent state representative George Edwards.