Marc Lendler Revolutionary Union / Revolutionary Communist Party Collection
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Abstract
Marc Lendler was a member of the Revoultionary (RU) and Revolutionary Communist Party (RCP) from 1970-1979. His collection contains materials related to his involvement in RU-RCP activities including internal party documents and notes from party meetings. It also contains materials related to Lendler's personal activisim and reflections on his RU-RCP involvement after he left the party.
Historical/Biographical Note
Marc Lendler graduated from Antioch College in 1970. During the 1960s, Lendler had been involved in student activism and following the break-up of Students for a Democratic Society (SDS) he became a member of the Revolutionary Union (RU). The summer following his graduation Lendler joined the RU when he and 20 other Antioch students attended a meeting led by several RU national representatives. The meeting's participants were divided into groups and sent to Springfield, Dayton, and Cincinnati as well as some who stayed at Antioch. Lendler went to Cincinnati where he remained an active member in the RU, which later became the Revolutionary Communist Party (RCP), from 1970 to 1979.
During his involvement with the RU, Lendler was at times a member of local leadership and at others a regular member of the collective. He spent approximately three years in local leadership, at which time he was not employed. After that, however, he worked in several blue collar jobs, with the longest being at Diamond International paper plant. While at Diamond, Lendler brought a case against the company to the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) and won. Several documents regarding this case are included in Lendler's collection. Lendler was removed from leadership shortly before the RU became the RCP. One of the reasons he cites for his removal was his opposition to the RU's position on school busing. In 1979, Lendler participated in a demonstration against Teng Hsiao-ping in Washington where he was arrested and spent two days in jail, but was never indicted.
Lendler left the RCP in October 1979, and stated that following the May Day demonstration of 1980, he no longer believed in the principles of the party. Two years later he moved to the East coast with his family, where he pursued graduate studies in political science. Lendler taught for four years at Bennington College, but was fired along with a third of the faculty as part of a controversial budgetary overhaul. He currently teaches American politics in the Government Department at Smith College.
Arrangement
The donor arranged the collection in to thematic groupings around 2011-2013 in preparation for donation.
Scope and Contents
This collection contains the files of Marc Lendler who was a member of the Revolutionary Union (RU), later the Revolutionary Communist Party (RCP) from 1970 to 1979. His collection is largely comprised of materials relating to his RU-RCP involvement and personal activism. It contains five notebooks from 1971-1979; internal documents from local and national RU-RCP meetings; leaflets and propaganda; and several copies from the Revolutionary Worker regarding the 1980 May Day demonstration. Also included in the collection are documents relating to a case Lendler brought against Diamond International to the National Relations Labor Board (NLRB).
A note on abbreviations: In his notebooks, "City" refers to the Cincinnati executive committee, "District" was a leadership body that included Dayton, Springfield, and Antioch, and "Region" (or REC) means a larger area sometimes including Cleveland and Detroit.
Donor added annotations to many documents circa 2011-2013; these are marked with -ML
Subjects
People
Donors
Conditions Governing Access
Materials are open without restrictions.
Conditions Governing Use
Any rights (including copyright and related rights to publicity and privacy) held by Marc Lendler were transferred to New York University in 2012 by Marc Lendler. Permission to publish or reproduce materials in this collection must be secured from the Tamiment Library and Robert F. Wagner Labor Archive. Please contact tamiment.wagner@nyu.edu.
Immediate Source of Acquisition
Donated by Marc Lendler in 2013. The accession number associated with this gift is 2013.011
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Processing Information
Many items were rehoused in archival folders