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From the Archives 98: Underground (1976)
Students for a Democratic Society (SDS) is a leftist student organization. It was founded in 1960, but originated in the Intercollegiate Socialist Society, which was founded in 1905. SDS rapidly grew and had more than 300 chapters in 1969, when it fractured into factions. Among other things, members of the organization disagreed about whether it should prioritize feminism, or anti-racist and anti-war activities. SDS still exists today, albeit in a much diminished form.
One of the more radical elements of SDS was the Revolutionary Youth Movement (RYM), which split from SDS in 1969, and renamed itself "Weatherman," based on a line from the Bob Dylan song "Subterranean Homesick Blues": "You don't need a Weatherman to know which way the wind blows." Weatherman soon renamed itself the Weather Underground Organization and pursued increasingly radical and violent actions with the stated goal of Communist revolution. Among other things, the Weather Underground staged a riot in Chicago on October 8, 1969, which they dubbed "Days of Rage," broke Timothy Leary out of prison in 1970, and a string of bombings from 1969 through the 1970s, including a bombing of the Pentagon. Unsurprisingly, the FBI considered the Weather Underground a domestic terrorist organization, and the members of the group went underground in order to avoid arrest.
By 1975, the Weather Underground was beginning to unravel. The radical documentary filmmaker Emile de Antonio convinced cinematographer Haskell Wexler and editor Mary Lampson to co-direct a documentary film about the Weather Underground. The result was Underground (1976), an 87 minute documentary in which members of the Weather Underground explains their ideas and political philosophy. Notably, Wexler filmed them from behind or through a screen, in order to conceal their identities. The members of the Weather Underground featured in the film include: Bill Ayers, Kathy Boudin, Bernardine Dohrn, Jeff Jones, and Cathy Wilkerson. Notably, De Antonio was relatively critical of the organization and its tactics.
When the film was finished, the FBI tried to subpoena all of the material, but after considerable litigation, the subpoena was quashed, primarily on First Amendment grounds.
Later in 1976, Folkways Records released the "soundtrack" of Underground as a 2xLP set. Here is the track list:
A1 Statement By The Underground
A2 Violence Is Necessary - H. Rap Brown, Malcolm X, M. L. King Jr., F. Castro
A3 The Viet War - Ho Chi Minh, N.T.Dinh, J. Ford
A4 SDS, Chicago 1969, Days Of Rage
B1 Attitudes Of The Underground
B2 Self Criticism
B3 Puerto Rico - "Mongo Affair" (Miguel Algarin)
B4 Making The Film
B5 We Are Professional Revolutionaries
B6 The West 11th Street Explosion
C1 Capitol Bombing - Returning Medals
C2 Fear And Commitment
C3 Class Origin And Class Stance
C4 The Publication Of The Praire Fire
D1 Make Up Of Capitalistic Power & The New Revolution
D2 The Prison Movement And Attica
D3 It Is The People Who Make The Change
D4 We Are A Small Organization
D5 Interview At A L.A. Unemployment Center
D6 Why We Are Communists & Speak Collectively
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