New Evidence of FBI “Disruption” Program

Abstract

'J NCE again, striking proof of the U.S. rulers' hatred and deep fear of even minimal gains in the black freedom struggle has come to light. The new information is contained in previously-secret FBI disruption documents released in March of this year as part of a farreaching civil liberties suit. Filed in 1973 by the Socialist Workers party (SWP) and the Young Socialist Alliance (YSA), the suit seeks an end to all illegal government spying, harassment, and disruption. It is being handled by the Political Rights Defense Fund, a civil liberties group. The 3,100 pages of secret memos outline the FBI Cointelpro (Counterintelligence program) operation against the socialists that began in 1961. At that time FBI chief J. Edgar Hoover, in motivating Cointelpro against the socialists, wrote in a memo that the SWP has, over the past several years, been openly espousing its line on a local and national basis through running candidates for public office and strongly directing and/or supporting such causes as Castro's Cuba and integration problems arising in the South. The new memos present only the outlines of the FBI's operation against the socialists because many of the pages, like in other documents forced loose from the FBI, are