Ian Ocx and Svetlana Hagan | Red Phoenix correspondents | Texas–

On Monday, April 15, 2024 the Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) announced that it would be refusing to hear McKesson v. Doe, a case that centers around the democratic right to organize mass protests in three US states: Texas, Louisiana, and Mississippi.

The Mckesson v. Doe case originates from 2016 when Black Lives Matter activist DeRay McKesson organized a demonstration against police brutality in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, after the murder of Alton Sterling at the hands of local police. Sometime during the demonstration organized by McKesson, a police officer known only as “Officer John Doe” was struck in the head with a brick by an unknown individual. This act and the future lawsuit were pinned on McKesson even though it is “[agreed] that this rock was not thrown by McKesson” by everyone involved with the court case. 

Holding McKesson responsible for another unknown individual’s act of assaulting a police officer is an attempt by the reactionary bourgeois state-level governments to silence and halt the growing number of demonstrations against police brutality and other injustices and oppressions that are faced by the multinational and multicultural working class of the US. By refusing to hear the McKesson v. Doe case SCOTUS is allowing the decision of the lower Fifth Circuit Court, one of the most reactionary court circuits in the US, to stand; which in turn allows for the organizer or organizers of a protest to “be held liable for the illegal actions of someone else who attended the protest.”

Not only is this a blatant violation of and an attack against our constitutional First Amendment rights, it also violates the previous ruling in NAACP v. Claiborne Hardware Co. in which the Supreme Court determined that protest and event organizers were not responsible for damages caused by others that may have occurred at the event. This effectively lets the Fifth Circuit Court bypass these previous federal laws and precedents, dictating federal law until SCOTUS decides to eventually hear the case, if that is ever decided in the coming months or years.

Outside of the immediate and direct negative impact of SCOTUS’ refusal to hear McKesson v. Doe and its refusal to uphold its own precedent in NAACP v. Claiborne Hardware Co. on the democratic right to organize protests and demonstrations within states represented by the Fifth Circut Court of Appeals (Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi), this act is also another example of the continued fascistization of political life within the US. It’s clear that SCOTUS is attempting to quell the rise of class consciousness among the working class and is trying to make it dangerous or impossible for workers to organize for their own goals and their own class interests. 

Since the reactionary presidency of Donald Trump, who appointed three of the most reactionary current members of the Supreme Court, the US has seen an increase in reactionary and proto-fascist laws and court decisions that are beginning to signal the march toward fascism within the United States. The overturning of Roe v. Wade stripped the previous guarantees that women could seek out reproductive care nationwide; twenty-one bills have already been passed in 2024 so far that attack transgender, gender-nonconforming, and gender-queer people; the militarization of police forces across the US continues; immigrant rights are under severe threat in states like Texas where reactionary bourgeois and petty-bourgeois elements are trying to eradicate sanctuary cities; Florida and Texas both have passed legislation to end diversity programs in education in their states; and massive trillion-dollar companies like Amazon are attacking the rights of workers to organize labor unions. It is also worth noting that in 2023, Fifth Circuit Court judge Matthew Kacsmaryk of Texas restricted access to medical abortion services such as Mifeprex in the continued assault against reproductive care in our country.

This does not even begin to account for the rise in individualist far-right terror and extra-legal attacks against various minority and marginalized sections of the working class that have become so commonplace in today’s American society. As the struggle intensifies in the coming weeks, months, and years to not only defend but to expand the democratic and civil rights of all sections of the population, combating the fascistization of US society will become paramount to the workers’ struggle.

As the reactionary, proto-fascist, and anti-democratic forces within US political life continue their march against the working class all progressive, revolutionary, and communist forces must do all they can to organize to resist the onslaught against the hard-won democratic and civil rights of the American workers. With reactionary SCOTUS positions refusing to uphold even the basic rights protected in bourgeois-democratic society, as shown with their refusal to hear McKesson v. Doe, more proof comes that American bourgeois institutions will not protect the workers from anti-democratic measures, and that for the American working class to truly be free from the threat of fascism and to secure democratic rights, it must build a new world that serves its interests alone. Only through socialism will the rights of the American workers thrive, and we will only see socialism if we continue to organize, fight, and struggle against all anti-people measures that the bourgeoisie bring.

Defend Democratic Rights!

Defend Workers’ Rights!

Ever Forward! 

Categories: Government, U.S. News, Workers Struggle

Tags: Police Brutality