Vito Marcantonio Forum to Honor Melissa Mark-Viverito

And yet, there is a legacy.

Melissa Mark-Viverito.

Destroyed politically by his enemies, shunted into historical anonymity by the same forces, Vito Marcantonio's efforts resisted complete erasure. Concrete structures and subtler traces of Marc's presence testify to his having lived and been democratically chosen to lead.

Vito Marcantonio's influence on those who came after him embody the continued projection of his values.

Melissa Mark-Viverito, outgoing president of New York's city council, is one such projection of those values and on Feb. 5, the Vito Marcantonio Forum (VMF) will honor her service to East Harlem and to the memory of its favorite congressman during a First Annual Awards Luncheon.

The blacklist and the victims of the Red witch hunt that possessed America in the 1940s and '50s destroyed lives, not just in the moment, but going forward for decades thereafter. Defeated in his own time, Marc was defeated in perpetuity as well.

Almost.

It has never been easy to come out for Marcantonio in New York City or beyond, but Mark-Viverito enthusiastically embraced the hopes and aspirations he had for their shared constituency.

Guided by her mentor, activist Gloria Quinones, she never ran from the legacy Marc left in the northeast corner of Manhattan Island, instead worked to restore and build on it.

Significantly, over its five-year labor to recuperate the forgotten Marcantonio, the VMF has been able to count upon the support of the city council president's office.

VMF co-chair Gerald Meyer has called Melissa Mark-Viverito, “A great hero who follows in the footsteps of Vito Marcantonio.”

It is her track record of actions and collaboration which made Ms. Mark-Viverito the obvious choice for the Vito Marcantonio Award.

At Woodlawn Cemetery.

On Aug. 9, 2014, the councilwoman joined the VMF beside Marc's grave site at Woodlawn Cemetery.

She honored Meyer and the group for its passion in keeping the memory of Marcantonio – whose name she pronounes with a Castilian clip – alive.

“We all know that too often, it is the brave and those that stand up for their ideals that are overlooked in the history books,” she told the gathered that day.

“As a Puertoriqueña, I am even more grateful, because he was a true ally for Puerto Rico and for the independence of the island at a time when many were afraid to speak up. He was our voice, he was our congressman. He stood up against the repression of the nationalist movement at time when it was very difficult to do that.

“So we, as a community, are very grateful,” she continued, “and I think that aspect of his advocacy and what he represents needs to be learned, because there are many in Puerto Rico who don't even know who Vito Marcantonio was.”

In 2016, she enthusiastically joined the VMF on its “People's Procession: A Walking Tour of East Harlem,” which she deemed a great way to honor, “A voice for disadvantaged individuals who really fought hard on behalf of many issues that we still care about today, in terms of living wage, in terms of immigrants and empowerment in general. I feel proud to represent a district that was represented by Vito Marcantonio.”

During the People's Procession.

During last year's Aug. 28 commemoration at the downtown Manhattan location where Marcantonio's remarkable, yet untold, story came to an untimely end, Mark-Viverito said (minute 18:40), “He could fight across communities, he was an ally to us as Boricuos – as Puertoriqueños – an ally to immigrant communities. That is how I look at the work that I do: If I want equality and justice for myself as a woman and Latina I have to fight as hard as hell for equality and justice in the LBGT community, immigrant communities, for our African-American brothers and sisters. Vito did that well and strongly.”

Melissa Mark-Viverito was born in San Juan, Puerto Rico and raised in Bayamon. She came to New York as college student and graduated from Columbia University in 1991.

She earned a masters from Baruch College and went on to organize for Local 1199, Service Employees International Union, a long-time progressive force in New York politics. She was elected on a second try to represent Council District 8, which includes Marc's old East Harlem bailiwick.

Her office is located on 116^th Street in East Harlem, just as Marcantonio's was, and La Guardia before him.

Mark-Viverito was elected Speaker of the City Council in 2014 at the age of 44, the first member of that body's Black, Latino and Asian Caucus to assume the position. She is co-chair of the Progressive Caucus, which counts 16 of 51 city councilmembers among its number.

In 2016, she introduced the Justice Reform Act, which reduced the penalty for petty offenses such as violating park rules, public urination, and littering.

In mid-October 2016, following Donald Trump's remarks on “Access Hollywood,” Mark Viverito announced that she had been sexually abused as a child.

She held a press conference providing the particulars of that abuse during which the “New York Times” quoted her thusly:

“When you have an individual,” she told the press, “who is boasting about violating, and taking from, a woman something without her consent, I just couldn't anymore. And to have someone laughing and goading it and enabling it is just, it is very painful for me and it triggered things that I hadn't felt in a long time.”

“The Times,” reported her as citing Trump's revealed behavior as triggering the announcement.

A lifelong spokeswoman for domestic violence awareness, she has admonished local baseball teams for signing men accused of beating on women (Aroldis Chapman, Jose Reyes, Josh Brown).

A long-time advocate for the release of imprisoned Puerto Rican nationalist Oscar Lopez-Rivera, “Politico” reported that Mark-Viverito “burst into tears” upon hearing that former President Barack Obama had pardoned the 74-year old on his way out the White House door.

Like Marcantonio, Mark-Viverito stands for Puerto Rican independence.

Her closing days in office suggest that madame president is not going quietly, or going anywhere, once her term is up.

Just weeks after Trump's victory, the “New York Post” reported Mark-Viverito leading a march to his Tower in protest of the president-elect's “racist, sexist, anti-gay” views.

Like Marcantonio before her, she has taken the side of immigrants in the face of Trump's deportation-minded policies.

The city council president will be on hand to accept the Vito Marcantonio Award, bestowed upon her for following “the often rocky, hard path of fighting the powers-that-be on behalf of the people.”

Prior recipients include Ralph Fasanella, Annette T. Rubinstein, and Pete Pascale. 

The place is Gaetana's Ristorante Italiano at 143 Christopher Street (at Greenwich Street). The time is 12-4 p.m. The program will be emceed by poet Maria Lisella, and include a talk by Dr. Gerald Meyer, dramatizations by LuLu LoLo Pascale and Roberto Ragone, and a reading by poet Gil Fagiani.

Tickets are $20 in advance and can be purchased at Brown Paper Tickets.

"The Goodfather (A Novel): The Rising Fall of the Marvelous Marcantonio," can be purchased here: MARC LIVES!

Sixty Years Later, Marc Remembered.

"Be it known the Council of the City of New York is proud to honor the inspiring life and indelible legacy of the Honorable Vito Marcantonio for his outstanding service and enduring contributions to our city and nation upon the 60^th Anniversary of his death on this the 9^th day of August in the year 2014."


And with this recitation did New York City Council Speaker Melissa Mark-Viverito rescue Rep. Vito Marcantonio (ALP) from an anonymity that has blanketed the six decades since he burned across the political firmament.

On the 60^th anniversary of his death, Marc did not lay alone beneath the grass and leafy trees at Woodlawn Cemetery in the Bronx, an ungrateful and indifferent metropolis clanking around him.

Instead, some 60 people organized, poked and prodded by the Vito Marcantonio Forum, gathered to pay homage and renew recent efforts to revive a reputation that was grand even in Gotham.

The crowd was peppered with public officials courageous enough to break the long-standing silence about Marcantonio's contribution to the well-being of New York's poorest, face the public and acclaim America's most successful radical congressman.

New York City Council Speaker Melissa Mark-Viverito

Said Vito Marcantonio Forum member David Giglio, “It's like we've opened up the dam of silence.”

Speaker Mark-Viverito promised to get a street in East Harlem named after Marcantonio.

Said Madame Speaker: “We all know that, too often, it is the brave and those who stand up for their ideals that are overlooked in the history books.”

The speaker recalled how her mentor, East Harlem housing attorney Gloria Quiñones, “sat me down and really wanted me to know about Marcantonio and the progressive legacy he embodied.”

Mark-Viverito discussed the crucial cover Marc gave those in the movement for Puerto Rican independence, “at a time when it was difficult to do that. He was our congressman. He was our ally. He was our voice.”

She said the life-long East Harlemite was the embodiment of a true New Yorker who, “grew up in a progressive community of Italians, Irish, Jewish, Black, Puerto Rican, and Caribbean immigrants who made East Harlem their home. It is no mistake he became a leader of his times and his community, which continues to be a microcosm of New York, as well as the rest of the nation.” 

New York State Assemblyman Robert Rodriguez (D)reflected, “I would not have had the opportunity to serve the community I love, in this way, were it not for Vito Marcantonio.”

Assemblyman Robert Rodriguez.

The congressman was beloved in his community, said Rodriguez, for the way he put its people first, regardless of race, class or ethnicity.

“At that time,” the assemblyman stated, “it was revolutionary, the concept that he could be a civil rights leader for African-Americans in the '30s and '40s - an Italian-American from Harlem - that is impressive.”

Rodriguez closed his remarks by presenting a proclamation “commemorating Marcantonio's accomplishments, life and legacy."

Actor and writer Roberto Ragone read from Marcantonio's speeches against militarism and the arms race, including this passage from June 1950, when he stood up to cast the sole vote against American intervention in the Korean War:  



Roberto Ragone.

“After all, Mr. Chairman, you live only once; and it is best to live one's life with one's conscience rather than to temporize or accept with silence those things which one believes to be against the interests of one's people and one nation."

Lulu Lolo read Gil Fagiani's “Litany of San Vito.”



LuLu LoLo

Actor Troy Hodges revived singer Paul Robeson's parting words to Marcantonio. Frank Marcantonio suggested that perhaps there's something in the family blood, for he had followed the path blazed by Marc without knowing much about him.

Professor Gerald Meyer of Hostos Community College also spoke of the man whose light he has carried through the dark years.


Professor Gerald Meyer

"The Bronx Chronicle" dedicated ink to the happening in its bailiwick. Reporter Kathleen Canzoniero wrote, “Marcantonio defended Italian-Americans against discrimination during World War II and advocated for African-Americans civil rights, especially in making lynching a federal crime. During his political career in the House of Representatives, he sponsored five bills calling for Puerto Rico's independence. A staunch and vocal activist, Marcantonio was against both the Cold War and Korean War. He tragically died from a heart attack in 1954 at the age of 51.”

Inspired by the event and others resuscitating Marcantonio's work “Bronx River Sancofa” blogger Morgan Powell took his readers on a walk of Marcantonio's East Harlem, pointing out the brick-and-mortar structures through which the congressman's presence asserts itself still.

Noting that Marc's childhood birthplace at 325 East 112^th Street was razed, so that room might be made for the Thomas Jefferson Houses, Powell wrote, “Perhaps it's fitting that low-cost modern housing for the masses – which he and La Guardia advocated – would succeed his own former address."

The event was also covered in New York's Italian-language daily, “Oggi,” which observed, and we quote:

"Marcantonio è stato senza ombra di dubbio uno de piú combattivi sostenitori dell classe operaia del XX secolo durante i suoi 14 anni di Congresso e uno dei politici piú radicali di sinistra, continuamente rieletto per sei mandati.”

Marc's graveside memorial was given a boost prior to Aug. 9, with an interview of Powell and Ragone on "BronxNet."

Bronx Borough President Ruben Diaz declared the anniversary “Vito Marcantonio Day,” and so on.

All of which is to say that the Vito Marcantonio Forum, with its multi-media campaign to put flesh and bones on a decimated reputation through events combining political discussion, theatrical play and poetry has piqued the interest of local thinkers and doers, while launching a process for restoring Marcantonio's work and thought to their rightful place in New York politics, past and present.