[HN Gopher] The Battle of Blair Mountain
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The Battle of Blair Mountain
Author : pseudolus
Score : 58 points
Date : 2021-08-27 10:50 UTC (12 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.smithsonianmag.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.smithsonianmag.com)
| adolph wrote:
| Somehow Smithsonian portrays federal troops as relatively
| neutral.
|
| _Though many scholars attribute aerial terror's beginnings to
| the Spanish Civil War (1936-9), the US Army Air Service sent
| bombers to threaten the United Mine Workers and their supporters.
| After the UMW forces disregarded his threat, President Warren
| Harding sent in one of the Air Service's most capable weapons:
| The Martin MB-1 bomber. The Martin MB-1 was an American bomber
| /reconnaissance biplane designed towards the end of World War One
| and carried a crew of three. Unfortunately for the Air Service, a
| reconnaissance mission failed when one Martin MB-1 crashed,
| leaving the crew dead and the bomber destroyed. New developments
| in battlefield archaeology, however, allowed us to study the
| crash site. Studying the site provided an opportunity to better
| understand how the bombers were used within the Battle of Blair
| Mountain as both a military tool and a symbol of federal power._
|
| https://digitalcommons.murraystate.edu/postersatthecapitol/2...
|
| _By August 29 battle was fully joined. Chafin 's men, though
| outnumbered, had the advantage of higher positions and better
| weaponry. Private planes were hired to drop homemade bombs on the
| miners. A combination of poison gas and explosive bombs left over
| from World War I were dropped in several locations near the towns
| of Jeffery, Sharples and Blair. At least one did not explode and
| was recovered by the miners; it was used months later to great
| effect as evidence for the defense during treason and murder
| trials. On orders from General Billy Mitchell, Army bombers from
| Maryland were also used for aerial surveillance. One Martin
| bomber crashed on its return flight, killing the three crew
| members._
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Blair_Mountain
| handedness wrote:
| _The Smithsonian's federal funding for fiscal year 2021 (Oct.
| 1, 2020-Sept. 30, 2021) is $1 billion. The Institution is 62%
| federally funded (a combination of the congressional
| appropriation and federal grants and contracts)._
|
| https://www.si.edu/newsdesk/factsheets/smithsonian-instituti...
| AlbertCory wrote:
| I would expect the Smithsonian to have a better grasp of history.
| The Pullman Strike was far, far larger.
|
| By this article on Blair Mountain, 10,000 miners marched, and 16
| died.
|
| According to [1], in the Pullman Strike, about 70 were killed
| nationwide, 250,000 workers in 27 states were involved, and the
| President called out the Army.
|
| _Personal disclosure_ : I grew up about 2 miles from Pullman,
| not that that gives me any special insight.
|
| [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pullman_Strike
| js2 wrote:
| The wikipedia also claims Blair Mountain was the largest
| strike:
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Blair_Mountain
|
| It was the deadliest by this list:
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_worker_deaths_in_Unite...
| AlbertCory wrote:
| In 1941 in the River Rouge strike, [1] says "Sixty thousand
| workers and their families crowded into Cadillac Square in
| Detroit" So much for "largest march."
|
| However, you're right that Blair Mountain does appear to have
| had more armed conflict, although River Rouge had more people
| involved, as did the Pullman Strike. There were just more
| people in the industrialized North than in Appalachia.
|
| Why bother arguing about this? I'm really tired of things
| being called "the biggest [or worst] in history" when the
| real meaning is "biggest I can think of, off the top of my
| head."
|
| [1] https://speakoutsocialists.org/the-strike-at-river-rouge-
| det...
| adolph wrote:
| > I would expect the Smithsonian to have a better grasp of
| history.
|
| It might be good to adjust that expectation.
|
| _The Smithsonian 's interest in these flights was political.
| The reputation of the Smithsonian had suffered greatly in 1903
| when Langley's Aerodrome failed to fly. This made it more
| difficult to obtain funding, which limited its growth and
| effectiveness as a scientific organization. The current
| Secretary, Charles Walcott, felt that the best way to repair
| this reputation was the show the Aerodrome could have flown;
| the time and money spent on it had not been wasted._
|
| https://www.wright-brothers.org/History_Wing/History_of_the_...
| AlbertCory wrote:
| "these flights"?? what are you talking about?
|
| The original title, and the title still on the article, is
| "What Made the Battle of Blair Mountain the Largest Labor
| Uprising in American History?"
| bpodgursky wrote:
| They're posting an example of the Smithsonian acting as a
| political institution as opposed to a neutral observer of
| history.
| sharkmerry wrote:
| the example they are using is from over 100 years ago. Do
| we have any examples from a little more recently
| GavinMcG wrote:
| Were any of the individual Pullman marches larger than the
| Blair Mountain one?
|
| Since you _would_ expect the Smithsonian to have a good grasp
| of history, a charitable reading would imagine a reason that
| they would say "largest" even though they could certainly do
| the math to compare 10,000 to 250,000.
| AlbertCory wrote:
| > "even though they could certainly do the math"
|
| Could, but didn't.
|
| The headline isn't "Largest Labor March". It's "Largest Labor
| Uprising".
|
| Why are you trying to defend an obvious mistake? Is that
| where you work or something?
| GavinMcG wrote:
| Good lord. I'm arguing for charitable reading because the
| quality of public discourse has gotten so bad/ _un_
| charitable that you're here accusing me of a serious bias,
| and for what? Pointing out a legitimate alternative
| reading!
|
| Such deep cynicism is really an awful thing to see.
| AlbertCory wrote:
| It's not a "charitable reading." It's a rewriting. They
| screwed up. It happens in journalism. Let it go.
| PrinceRichard wrote:
| The plight of miners is one of the obvious go-tos when we try to
| explain why government must act to regulate industry. One day a
| friend pointed out something interesting - that those jobs were
| taken on by the free choice of the individuals working them.
|
| What should be done when an individual or group offers a job with
| poor conditions and wages? Presumably if the job is so bad that
| noone wants it, noone will take it. If someone does want it, and
| the two parties mutually agree to the conditions, it is not our
| business to intervene, other than to keep the peace.
|
| It is not the role of government to dictate working conditions or
| any other terms of employment that are mutually agreed upon by
| those involved. If there is a disagreement, the interested
| parties should seek an agreement, and if none can be reached,
| part ways. Physical violence may not be used to pressure either
| side to capitulate to the desires of the other. Employers, as
| with anyone, are to be held accountable for injuries or death
| resulting from their negligence or misconduct.
|
| Government must give neither labor nor employers special rules or
| treatment. Employers, as individuals, must be free to hire or
| release anyone they choose. Individual workers must be free act
| collectively - or not - and to offer their labor under any terms
| they choose. Neither side may use physical violence to achieve
| their ends.
|
| It is indeed true that mining jobs were and are often
| disrespectful to the human dignity and wellbeing of the workers.
| Yet, workers seek out these jobs and offer their labor
| voluntarily. Consentual agreements are not exploitation. If a
| person is dissatisfied with their job, it is their responsibility
| to remove themselves from it.
|
| It is also true that poor people are under more economic pressure
| to take on bad jobs. What should be done? Can we mandate that
| only safe and well-paying jobs will be offered? We could try, and
| that choice would inevitably exascerbate the poverty of those
| people by reducing the availability of employment to them.
| Further, they would be exposed to even more dangerous and low-
| paying illegal work.
|
| In the end, the principle of human freedom offers reliable
| guidance.
| dredmorbius wrote:
| _No society can surely be flourishing and happy, of which the
| far greater part of the members are poor and miserable. It is
| but equity, besides, that they who feed, clothe, and lodge the
| whole body of the people, should have such a share of the
| produce of their own labour as to be themselves tolerably well
| fed, clothed, and lodged._
|
| -- Adam Smith, _Wealth of Nations_
|
| _It may be said that of this hard lot no one has any reason to
| complain, because it befalls those only who are outstripped by
| others, from inferiority of energy or of prudence. This, even
| were it true, would be a very small alleviation of the evil. If
| some Nero or Domitian were to require a hundred persons to run
| a race for their lives, on condition that the fifty or twenty
| who came in hindmost should be put to death, it would not be
| any diminution of the injustice that the strongest or nimblest
| would, except through some untoward accident, be certain to
| escape. The misery and the crime would be that any were put to
| death at all. So in the economy of society; if there be any who
| suffer physical privation or moral degradation, whose bodily
| necessities are either not satisfied or satisfied in a manner
| which only brutish creatures can be content with, this, though
| not necessarily the crime of society, is pro tanto a failure of
| the social arrangements._
|
| -- John Stuart Mill, _Chapters on Socialism_
| teddyh wrote:
| To quote myself1:
|
| Some volontary transactions are nonetheless illegal, because to
| allow them would negatively affect society as a whole. The
| usual example is that it is not legal (as it once was) to sell
| yourself into slavery. Also, overly onerous contracts can (in
| many jurisdictions) not be enforced.
|
| Simply put, "It's a voluntary transaction" can never be a
| sufficient argument for why something ought to be legal.
|
| 1. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26131725
| masswerk wrote:
| Mind that this "principle of human freedom" incentivizes the
| system to bring and keep as many potential workers as possible
| in those poor economic conditions in order to optimize on labor
| cost at the cost of human health, happiness and freedom.
| w0mbat wrote:
| Who removed all the prepositions from the title? The title on the
| original article is more readable.
|
| I suggest restoring the prepositions and adding a question mark.
| i.e. "What Made the Battle of Blair Mountain the Largest Labor
| Uprising in American History?".
| ijlx wrote:
| *articles you mean, not prepositions. And almost certainly it
| was too long.
| bryanrasmussen wrote:
| "What Made the Battle of Blair Mountain the Largest Labor
| Uprising in American History?" is 86 characters long - 80 is
| the limit.
|
| Could do "Why was battle of Blair Mountain the largest labor
| uprising in American History?" 80 characters.
| dang wrote:
| The limit is 80 chars. We've replaced it with something
| simpler.
|
| (Submitted title was "What Made Battle of Blair Mountain
| Largest Labor Uprising in American History")
| neartheplain wrote:
| I'd guess the original title was too long for the submission
| field.
| pope_meat wrote:
| We're a bit overdue for a labor uprising.
|
| Fingers crossed the mass evictions heading our way leaves enough
| people hungry and desperate enough to fight for their future.
| zackmorris wrote:
| Not sure why you're being downvoted for this since what you
| wrote is honest. Although we can't condone violence, so maybe
| that should have read "to organize for their future".
|
| I live in a red state with right to work (for less) laws and a
| strong anti-union sentiment. The work ethic here is: if you
| have to cut down every last tree, desertify every last
| grassland, poison every last waterway, then you do it to feed
| your family. Now we're living under the consequences of that
| freedom, with rampant wildfires and the loss of most
| timber/grazing/mining jobs. $15 per hour is mocked like some
| kind of impossible dream because everyone works at the call
| center or does food service now.
|
| I'm concerned that many of the people reading this live in big
| cities with liberal politics so they haven't seen the
| consequences of unregulated wild west crony capitalism. I grew
| up with it, so I know how it leads to wealth inequality and
| inequality in general. It's basically the
| aristocratic/imperialist model like England had, where one rich
| guy hires everyone else and everybody is happy because the rich
| guy keeps them safe and the poor people have a meal ticket.
|
| But I would argue that's suboptimal. A much better system is
| one where everyone prospers. Reaganomics put us on the
| libertarian path since about 1980, but as the boomers retire,
| Gen X and younger doesn't have to stay trapped under that
| system they didn't vote for. My feeling is that change will
| come swiftly over the next 2 years and that only the very
| stodgiest boomers will still believe they have the power.
|
| There's talk of a general strike over the holidays this year
| where young people will not hire on to seasonal jobs, and
| abstaining from holiday buying will be encouraged. There's a
| chance that could break some of the smaller corporations that
| have borrowed against that holiday cashflow.
|
| But in order for that to stick and let young people transition
| to something more like solarpunk, automating drudgerous labor
| and UBI, they're going to need alternatives. There's some hope
| with some of the back to basics trends like tiny homes and
| working jobs like Uber that let employees set their own hours.
| That stuff will be attacked on every front though until young
| people internalize that they actually have the power because
| they do the actual work.
| eplanit wrote:
| Or maybe hungry and desperate enough to find one of the
| abundantly available job opportunities, or start a business,
| etc. to _pay for_ their future. Why wish for conflict?
| pope_meat wrote:
| ...if you suggest to someone who just got evicted to start a
| business, you'd get punched in your face, and you'd deserve
| it.
| [deleted]
| eplanit wrote:
| With a good attitude, anything is possible:
|
| https://www.entrepreneur.com/article/232341
| n8cpdx wrote:
| I don't think that makes sense. While there is considerable
| overlap, the group of exploited workers is fundamentally a
| different group than the group of exploited tenants.
|
| The issue of housing affordability is also, primarily, an issue
| of housing policy, rather than labor policy.
|
| The evicted people aren't going to be able to tell a clear
| story about who they are, why they are fighting non-labor
| (which I guess is business and employers), and why a labor
| uprising is the answer to a housing policy and pandemic
| response failures.
|
| I don't expect a clear answer, because recently, popular
| uprisings have been very unimpressive in terms of intellectual
| rigor. I moved to Portland expecting to join up with more
| radical groups, but I quickly learned that no one is really
| serious (hence why despite having overwhelming resources
| compared to the police force, they haven't succeeded in making
| change).
|
| In my experience, an unserious labor movement is one of the
| more convincing arguments for a neoliberal approach. Add to
| that public sector unions tarnishing the brand of organized
| labor in general (see police unions, teacher's unions) and I
| just don't see it.
| dredmorbius wrote:
| Rents and wages are inextricably bound. One cannot address
| one without addressing the other, least a gain in one side be
| appropriated from the other. The law of rent meets the iron
| law of wages.
|
| An excellent recent comment: "All goes back to the land, and
| the land owner is able to absorb to himself a share of almost
| every public and every private benefit"
|
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28267591
|
| http://www.andywightman.com/docs/churchill.pdf
| commandlinefan wrote:
| Out of curiosity, what would you imagine that fight to look
| like? I can see it going two completely opposite ways: one, a
| return to our pre-lockdown lives when people could earn enough
| money to pay their rent, or two, a push for wealth
| redistribution.
| [deleted]
| munk-a wrote:
| I think the next widespread labour action will be focused on
| benefits - it'll pull in both of the factors you mentioned
| (increased earnings and wealth redistribution) since I don't
| think any labour gains will ever happen without those factors
| (and the first factor necessitates the second factor). But I
| think the focus will be lowering employee stress by
| advocating for stronger requirements around healthcare and
| reducing the workweek.
| pjmorris wrote:
| I don't think those alternatives are as opposite as they
| first appear. One way to restore the pre-2000's relationship
| between income and housing expense would be to cancel the
| debts that were created by the stimulus created by the Fed
| and Congress since that time... which amounts to wealth
| redistribution.
| pope_meat wrote:
| Return to pre-lockdown conditions is basically saying the
| system is working.
|
| It's not. I've watched the homeless encampments grow over the
| last 20 years(maybe longer, but I can only speak for my lived
| experience). The lockdown was perhaps the straw that broke
| the camel's back to the point where it's hard to ignore, but
| the problem has been brewing for a while. I blame Ronald
| Reagan, the ghouls have had it real good since.
| ummonk wrote:
| The homeless encampments are not caused by housing costs.
| majormajor wrote:
| How prevalent are extensive "people can't pay their rent"
| lockdowns currently?
| EarthIsHome wrote:
| One difference between then and now is that more people then
| thought of themselves as workers, which gave a sense of
| connection and common struggle to build solidarity. They also
| worked closer together, lived closer together, etc. We're more
| atomized now.
|
| Maybe a similar sense of connection will happen with the
| housing crisis, but I don't think labor is the same as it was.
| People don't think of themselves as workers in a class; we have
| been divided more and think of ourselves as subgroups like
| entrepreneurs, doctors, engineers, scientists, etc., which I
| think changes how you feel about solidarity.
|
| To build solid and sustained mass movements, you have to
| struggle together. [0]
|
| [0]: Theory of class struggle
| majormajor wrote:
| The push for less ownership of one's primary residence, and
| less rent control (rent control is a policy that is much less
| popular now than it less was) also serves to heighten this
| separation.
|
| If one's residence is determined by market rents it's going
| to be very segregated by income level. Less stable
| neighborhoods and buildings where your neighbor who was there
| for two decades might be much lower income but
| "grandfathered" in by a lower sales price or lower rent back
| then.
|
| Being reminded that people in "lower class" jobs used to be
| able to afford what takes a high professional salary now
| would be a good reminder of the fragility of ANY labor,
| regardless of today's salary and comfort.
| macintux wrote:
| News is more atomized as well. YouTube, Twitter, FB, dozens
| of cable channels... hard to unite when we can't find common
| ground on what's actually true.
| neartheplain wrote:
| YouTube, FB, TikTok, Twitter etc. do make it easier to
| share and unite around feelings or emotional reactions.
| However, these platforms _don 't_ facilitate the sort of
| careful, thought-out organization and planning that
| historically has been necessary to make lasting social
| change. It's the difference between liking a tweet and
| maybe going to a protest vs. showing up to weekly meetings,
| having a long-term legal or political strategy, and
| executing on that strategy step-by-step.
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