In Memory and Appreciation
Arthur Kinoy
Statement by CCDS, 10/08/03

Arthur Kinoy passed away on September 19, and the U.S. progressive
movement lost one of its finest soldiers.He was 82 years old. His was
a life of activism as a "people's lawyer," a lawyer who believed that
battles on the turf of the ruling class could only succeed if he
worked jointly with people and organizations fighting for an end to
poverty, racism and political repression.

We in the Committees of Correspondence for Democracy and Socialism
(CCDS) mourn the passing of our comrade. Arthur was a founding member
of the CCDS and from our founding until ill health forced a cutback in
his activities he was an elected member of our National Coordinating
Committee.A native New Yorker, Arthur's influence was felt nationally,
over many decades.

Arthur graduated magna cum laude from Harvard University, and was
editor of Columbia University's Law Review.He argued a number of very
significant cases before the U.S. Supreme Court.

As attorney for the UE (United Electrical, Radio and Machine Workers
Union), Arthur fought the government's witch-hunt of its leaders
during the McCarthy/Cold War period.He was an attorney for Julius and
Ethel Rosenberg, the framed so-called betrayers of the secret of the
atomic bomb to the Soviet Union.

Arthur was heavily involved in the Civil Rights Movement of the 1950's
and 1960's, in Mississippi and elsewhere.He was one of the legal
strategists, along with William Kunstler, George Crockett, Ben Smith,
Ernest Goodman and others, of various court challenges to racial
segregation, apartheid made-in-the-U.S.A.

Our comrade successfully defended before the Supreme Court Jim
Dombrowski, executive director of the Southern Conference Educational
Fund (SCEF), thereby preventing enforcement of laws that would have a
"chilling effect" on free speech.

"Surely one of his happiest moments," says his wife, Barbara Webster,
"was when he learned of the (Supreme Court) victory against (President
Richard) Nixon's wiretapping.But the NY Times (obituary) got the
essence of the case wrong.The Supreme Court narrowed the ability of
the president to suspend the Constitution in the name of 'national
security,' without a court warrant. "

In 1966 Arthur, along with William Kunstler, Morton Stavis and Ben
Smith, founded the Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR), a powerful
voice opposing domestic interference by the U.S., state and city
governments in progressive political activity, and illegal U.S.
interference in domestic affairs of other countries.

Arthur's vision of a "mass party of the people," about which he
authored a paper in the 1970's, guided his views concerning
independent political action for the rest of his life.He was a founder
of the National Committee for Independent Political Action (NCIPA),
which later transmogrified into the Independent Progressive Politics
Network (IPPN).

Arthur felt for many years that affirmative action was a most critical
and essential civil rights legal arena.He addressed two plenaries of
the National Lawyers Guild on this subject.

The hundreds, more likely thousands, of people Arthur influenced
included his former students Wade Henderson of the Leadership
Conference on Civil Rights, and Ida Castro, former head of the EEOC.

Space does not permit more than mention of two among his other battles
royal: the Chicago Seven--anti-Vietnam War protesters at the
Democratic national Convention in Chicago in 1968, and his war with
Rutgers University, when they forced him to retire for being "too old"
to teach.Many of his political adventures are detailed in Arthur's
autobiography, Rights On Trial:The Odyssey of a People's Lawyer.

Arthur brought his knowledge of legal strategy together with his
political vision of a better world - a world free of racism, war and
exploitation. Arthur was a democrat, constantly fighting for the
fullest expansion of democracy and what was possible under current
circumstances, and he was a visionary, a socialist.

We, the Committees of Correspondence (CCDS), offer our condolences to
Arthur's wife, Barbara Webster, and his children.We will honor his
memory by continuing Arthur's and our fight for racial justice, an end
to political repression, and a society where people, not profits, are
the core concerns.

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Arthur Kinoy Memorial - Sunday, Nov. 16 - New York City

Friends,

The family of Arthur Kinoy invites you to a celebration of the life of
Arthur Kinoy on Sunday, November 16th in New York City. The
celebration will take place at the Synod Hall of St. John the Divine
Episcopal Church, 110th and Amsterdam Avenue in Manhattan. It will
begin at 2:00 P.M.