My workshop at Green Party

The URL of this document, to which the above QR code links, is:

https://www.pdrboston.org/my-workshop-at-green-party

Notes for my Green Party USA Convention Workshop July 23, 2026:

"Building a Grassroots Democracy"

presented by John Spritzler, editor of PDRBoston.org, who can be contacted at spritzler@comcast.net

Photos of my 500+ egalitarian revolutionary zip code neighbors:

https://www.flickr.com/photos/182436693@N06/

These are more than 500 of my neighbors in my zip code, saying they want an egalitarian revolution. They are each proudly displaying a sign that says: "We the People want affordable housing for ALL. To get it we aim to remove the rich from power to have real, not fake, democracy with no rich and no poor."

https://www.pdrboston.org/attn-allston-brighton-residents

1021 residents of my zip code and the adjoining one (referred to as the Allston-Brighton neighborhood) signed (and also provided their printed name and street address, and optionally their email address and phone number) the following WONDERFUL statement:

NO RICH AND NO POOR

We the undersigned joined (or are hereby joining) the Brighton Allston Community Coalition (BACC) because its goals, including adequate affordable housing and good public transportation and an end to gentrification, are part of our larger goal: removing the rich from power to have real, not fake, democracy with no rich and no poor. We hope that the BACC will declare that it also aims for this larger goal; that would make us be even more enthusiastic members of it.

There is nothing special about my neighborhood. Unless you live in Beverly Hills or a rich gated community your neighbors probably want the same thing mine do. You can find out by doing in your neighborhood what I have been doing in my neighborhood, as described here.

Note that I did not have to persuade any of these people to pose for the photo or sign the No Rich and No Poor statement. They agreed from the git go. I merely provided them an opportunity to express their egalitarian revolutionary aspiration.

The vast majority of Americans clearly do not merely want to make the dictatorship of the rich--which they know we now live under--a little less oppressive; they do not want to live under a dictatorship of the rich; they want to have real democracy, not fake democracy with no rich and no poor.

And this includes pro-Trumpers, as I discovered by talking with them at a pro-Trump rally. 86% of the 50 random people there I spoke to--almost all wearing the red MAGA cap--said the idea of "removing the rich from power to have real, not fake, democracy with no rich and no poor" was a good idea, or a great idea, and they gladly took the button with those words when I handed it to them and many pinned it on their shirt right on the spot.

This workshop is about a proposal for how we can build a movement to unite all of the people who want to remove the rich from power and win genuine grassroots democracy, and build a movement large enough and confident enough and determined enough to succeed.

The proposal has two parts.

One part is to add a “Radical Democracy Plank” to the Green Party USA platform. I will read this plank verbatim shortly.

The second part is for Green Party members to create Local Assemblies of Egalitarians where they live, consisting of people like my neighbors who want to remove the rich from power to have real, not fake, democracy with no rich and no poor, with these local assemblies open to all such people--and only such people!--who live or work in the local community regardless of for whom they may have voted in the past or intend to vote for in the future.

This Democracy plank calls for principles that may at first seem to you to be strange or wrong, so I would like to put some historical facts on the table to put these principles in perspective.

Regarding the idea that only egalitarians are allowed to participate in the government (discussed here):

#1. When the U.S. Constitution Was Ratified by Voters, Did the Founding Fathers Allow Tories to Vote? (Before searching on Google, what do you think?) https://open.substack.com/pub/johnspritzler/p/when-the-us-constitution-was-ratified?r=1iggn&utm_campaign=post-expanded-share&utm_medium=web

#2. Racists Were Properly Denied the Right to Vote by the 1865 Missouri State Constitution at https://www.pdrboston.org/1865-missouri-racists-can-t-vote. The Abraham Lincoln administration pushed through the 13th Amendment abolishing slavery and made swearing an oath, that one will "faithfully support" the Emancipation Proclamation and acts of Congress that freed the slaves, a requirement for whites to be able to vote and form a state government in the former Confederate states.

[ https://www.freedmen.umd.edu/procamn.htm ]

The conflict between those who wanted slavery abolished and those who wanted it maintained was a fundamental conflict, about which there could be no compromise acceptable to both sides. It was a fundamental conflict like that between those who wanted people in the British North American colonies to not be subjects of the Crown and those who wanted them to remain subjects of the Crown. Wars had to be fought to resolve these conflicts. This is why it was common sense and right for the winning side not to allow their avowed enemy to vote and participate in the new government.

Likewise, today there is a fundamental conflict between those who want to abolish class inequality and those who want to keep it. It is common sense and right for those of us who want to abolish class inequality not to allow those who want to maintain it to vote and participate in our genuine democracy government.

Regarding the idea that LOCAL assemblies of egalitarians are sovereign—the only lawmaking body for the given local community (discussed here) with order on a larger scale achieved by voluntary federation of the sovereign local assemblies:

#3. Real life voluntary federation today:

https://www.pdrboston.org/real-live-voluntary-federation

NFL

Universal Postal Union

The Defining Feature of Voluntary Federation

The defining feature of voluntary federation is that the federation only has authority over those who voluntarily join and voluntarily remain in it. In contrast a central government has authority over everyone in the nation whether or not they voluntarily join or voluntarily remain in the nation and regardless of whether they are a citizen of the nation in question. (The Union victory in the U.S. Civil War established forcibly that the United States was not a voluntary federation of states: secession was not permitted!)

The rules determined by voluntary federation are mutual agreements by virtue of the fact that those who disagree may leave the federation. In contrast, those who disagree with a central government law may not leave the nation.

#4. Real life USA government based on a central national law-making government has obviously made it easy for the oppressive rich class to gain control over 350 million Americans merely by using their wealth to control the mere several hundred people who constitute the central law-making government:

https://www.pdrboston.org/proof-we-have-a-fake-democracy .

Radical Democracy Plank: https://www.pdrboston.org/radical-democracy-plank

Radical Democracy Plank

proposed for the Green Party USA Platform

The Green Party is opposed to class inequality; it is opposed to there being a small class of very rich people who, because money is power, have the real power and use it to keep their unjust enormous wealth, power and privilege, and use it to treat regular people like dirt to keep them at the bottom of a very unequal society, and use it to pit people against each other for divide-and-rule with lies and manipulation. The Green Party is for making our society one that is not based on class inequality.

Therefore:

Greens will insist that only those who oppose class inequality and who say there should be no rich and no poor and who want society to be shaped by the values of mutual aid and fairness and truth (henceforth referred to as egalitarians) should have the right to participate in government because the aim of government is to shape society by these egalitarian values and aims; that allowing people with the opposite values and aims to partake in government would be as foolish as allowing arsonists to be employed by a fire department. This is the way to have real, not fake, democracy.

Greens will insist that sovereign authority in any given local community rest in a local assembly that democratically makes the only laws that all people in the local community must obey, and that all adult egalitarians living or working in the local community, and only they, have the right to participate as equals in the local assembly.

Greens will insist that the economy be based not on buying and selling things and services nor on wage labor nor on any labor except labor performed by people with equal formal decision-making status in the enterprise, with wealth shared on the principle of “From each according to reasonable ability, to each according to need or reasonable desire with scarce things equitably rationed according to need” and with the local assembly of egalitarians having the final say regarding the use of resources in the local community.

Greens will insist that order and cooperation on a larger than local scale be based on voluntary federation of local communities, i.e., mutual agreements between local assemblies and not on commands from any non-local authority.

Supporting articles:

“Why Have No Rich and No Poor? To Stop the Rich from Treating Us, the Have-Nots, Like Dirt.”

“Why Only Egalitarians Can Make Laws”

“Why Should Laws Only Be Made By Local Assemblies?”

“Real Life Voluntary Federation”

“What Is an Egalitarian Economy?”

“Why Abolish the Use of Money?”

“What Makes a Government Legitimate?”

“How Can Abuse of Power Be Prevented?”

"Racists Were Properly Denied the Right to Vote by the 1865 Missouri State Constitution"

Can we vote the rich out of power?

No, we can’t vote the rich out of power. But the more organizations—be they electoral parties or labor unions or athletic associations or churches or even knitting circles or choirs—that explicitly advocate egalitarian revolution, the more it will help the vast majority of people who already today would love an egalitarian revolution gain confidence that they ARE the vast majority in this aspiration and not the hopelessly tiny minority that the ruling class works so hard (read how here) to make us believe we are. This is what will make it possible to remove the rich from power despite the military forces the ruling class uses to stay in power, as I discuss in “How We CAN Remove the Rich from Power.”

The obstacle today to creating local assemblies of egalitarians is hopelessness. We can change that to hopefulness.

The obstacle—and it is a big one!--to persuading people to join and be active members of the local assembly of egalitarians is hopelessness: people don’t think the purpose of joining the local assembly of egalitarians is possible, namely the goal of removing the rich from power to have real, not fake, democracy with no rich and no poor.

The chief way to make people hopeful about the possibility of egalitarian revolution is to do things that let people see that they are actually in the vast majority in wanting this goal. For example, ask people to pose for a photo displaying a sign saying that want this goal, and display these photos to others. I displayed a banner with 500 such photos in my local branch library, as you can see in the photo of it here: https://johnspritzler.substack.com/p/revolutionary-movement-building-101?r=1iggn .

Hopefulness requires people having an inspiring vision of HOW to have real, not fake, democracy. People are rightfully cynical about so-called “representative government” and a sovereign national government that can veto what people want in their local communities. The idea of sovereign local assemblies of egalitarians using voluntary federation is the necessary inspiring vision; when people hear about it they LOVE the idea. So let’s start talking about this idea.

Hopefulness also requires the understanding that we CAN remove the rich from power despite the existence of the U.S. military forces, the proverbial 82nd Airborne Division. The key to this is understanding that a sufficiently large and determined egalitarian revolutionary movement can persuade a critical mass of members of the armed forces that if they refuse orders to attack the revolutionary movement and go over to its side with their weapons, then they will be going over to the winning side and the rich will indeed be removed from power and not able to inflict on them the severe discipline--perhaps even execution for treason--that they otherwise would be able to inflict on soldiers who don't follow orders.

This discipline is the reason why soldiers who support egalitarian revolution (as most do, just like civilians) currently still will obey orders (when given) to attack the revolutionary movement; it's because that movement is currently too small to have a chance of prevailing. But things change dramatically when the movement is sufficiently large and determined. This is how the Czar of Russia along with his aristocratic class was removed from power in February of 1917, and it is how the Shah of Iran and his class was removed from power in 1979. I discuss this in detail in my "How We CAN Remove the Rich from Power."

We need to do what it takes to change hopelessness to hopefulness, and in that way build a sufficiently large and determined egalitarian revolutionary movement that CAN prevail, despite the proverbial 82nd Airborne Division. We absolutely should not use the current hopelessness as an excuse for not talking about the goal of removing the rich from power to have real, not fake, democracy with no rich and no poor. If we self-censor on this question we are simply helping the rich to remain in power.

I propose Local Assemblies of egalitarians do this:

I propose that they arm We the People with the confidence:

a) confidence that We the People are right in aiming to remove the rich from power to have real, not fake, democracy with no rich and no poor because this is both morally right and perfectly possible and practical and desirable; and

b) confidence that We the People are the VAST MAJORITY in having this aim (which entails showing how conflicts over issues such as illegal immigration and Israel/Palestine and Critical Race Theory, etc. are orchestrated by the ruling class with key lies and censored truths to make it seem (wrongly) to half the have-nots in each camp that the have-nots in the opposing camp are despicable people who are their enemy); and

c) confidence that our current rulers (the billionaires behind the scene) and their politicians and pundits and media are as morally wrong in defending the class inequality (some rich and some poor) status quo of our society as were those in the past who defended chattel slavery when that "peculiar" institution was the status quo.

To accomplish this, I propose that the Local Assemblies of egalitarians devote a substantial part of their meetings to a discussion about why, exactly, the above points are all true, in order for Assembly members, themselves, to gain maximum confidence in these points.

I propose that the Assemblies figure out and implement ways to spread this confidence, that Assembly members are developing, to the wider public, to We the People. The more we do this, the more We the People will be able to refute all of the arguments that our rulers use to make us accept, even if grudgingly, their imposition of class inequality on us in the form of things such as building luxury instead of affordable housing and making good health care unaffordable and on and on and on.

The Assembly can thus arm We the People with the confidence, and with the vision of how our society OUGHT to be, that will make it possible for We the People one day actually to remove the rich from power to have real, not fake, democracy with no rich and no poor.

I believe that if this is what we do at Assembly meetings, then more and more people will want to join the Assemblies and attend them.

How will doing all of this help grow the Green Party?

I suggest that the appropriate question is not how to grow the Green Party but rather how Green Party members can build the egalitarian revolutionary movement to win real, not fake, democracy. That is the question I, and I hope you, want to answer.

Sources regarding egalitarianism in the past

Read here about the anarchists in Spain who made the egalitarian revolution in 1936-9

Read here how egalitarianism in Spain out-produced the capitalist economy it replaced

Read here a detailed eyewitness account of a genuinely democratic local assembly meeting in egalitarian-revolutionary Spain around 1937

Read "INDUSTRIAL PRODUCTION THE EGALITARIAN WAY: HOW SPANISH EGALITARIANS DID IT 1936-9"

Read here and also here about the key mistakes the egalitarians (aka anarchists) in Spain (and elsewhere) made that led to their defeat by the fascist General Franco

Read here what made the revolution in Spain possible

Not just Spain

People have created egalitarian societies elsewhere in the past; click on the linked articles about them:

Brazil 17th century

In a Mexican town recently

In Mexico 300 AD

In an Ethiopian village recently

In a part of Syria recently

In Europe 6,000 years ago

England in the 17th century (PDF)

(England 1381 they fought for egalitarianism)

Pirates and egalitarianism