We Ride Bikes

Mother Jones (pt. II)

In early 1898, agreements had been made in four states between the United Mineworkers of America and several mining companies. They were to implement an eight hour work day and have a standard pay scale for the miners, and the company stores were to be closed ending their monopoly on where the miners and their families shopped.

However, in the fall of that year the Chicago-Virden Coal Company and other firms  felt that those limitations were too stringent to adhere to and locked the miners out. They then proceeded to import strikebreakers from Alabama. This like Ludlow set the stage for violence.

On October 12, 1898, as the replacement workers and their families arrived in trains violence erupted. There were gunshots exchanged between the union and the men hired to protect the train and the strikebreakers. Before the day ended five company men were killed, and six union men had been killed - E.D. Welsh, Frank Bilyeu, Albert Smith, Joe Kitterly, Ernest Keutner, and A.H. Breneman.

In the aftermath, the strikebreakers were not allowed off the train by the train's conductor. They were later taken to and left in St. Louis without money or a way back to Alabama. The Governor ordered the National Guard to step in and prevent strikebreakers on a second train from offloading. This was the first time in U.S. History that a state's governor came to the aid of labor.

The dead union members were denied burial in established cemeteries, so the miners bought an acre of land in Mt. Olive, Illinois, where four of the men had come from. This became the Union Miners' Cemetery.

The lock out lasted six months, and labor won all of its demands. The union members were hired back under the terms of the agreement, and some supervisors were fired.

Now some of you may be asking, "Where are you going with this, Jake?"

Well, let me tell you.

A woman by the name of Mary Harris Jones or Mother Jones asked that she be buried with those workers, in the only cemetery owned solely by a labor union.

"When the last call comes for me to take my final rest, will the miners see that I get a resting place in the same clay that shelters the miners who gave up their lives of the hills of Virden, Illinois on the morning of October 12, 1898, for their heroic sacrifice of their fellow men. They are responsible for Illinois being the best organized labor state in America. I hope it will be my consolation when I pass away to feel I sleep under the clay with those brave boys."

Well faithful readers, today I stood at her grave and paid respects to one of the most famous, and revered labor organizers of all time. She was just over five feet tall, and never weighed more than a hundred pounds, and lived to be 100 years old. She lost her husband and four children to yellow fever, and came to embody one of her most famous quotes:

"Pray for the dead, but fight like hell for the living!"

Always do the right thing

The past week has left me questioning a lot of things. Not the least of which is my ability to hold together this band of activists.

I am a rather laid back and easy-going individual and, often, this leads to an open and informal leadership style. The problem is that this style is often loose and weak. I recognize this, and all too often fail to compensate for it.

Monday there were some issues among some of the interns and the meeting that we were in became a bitch session, and ended with one intern storming out. He later returned with the intention of leaving the site and either returning home, or taking another internship in a different field. This was, I believed, where it was going to end.

At 8:00 the next morning I received a phone call telling me that I needed to come get this intern because he was going to be beaten up. I went to their apartment, and found a tense situation that I feebly tried to diffuse. The argument consisted of two interns arguing, and another attempting to quietly rationalize with the other two. It was at this point that one intern threatened another with violence.

Let me say that I am a pacifist. Violence in my opinion is rarely justified. And the threat of violence should only be used as a precursor to actual violence and only in extreme cases.

I told everyone that they needed to calm down and be downstairs as we were leaving for work. I left and immediately called my supervisor to inform her that I wanted to send the intern home. He had been doing great work, and was getting along with the staff better than myself or the other interns were getting along with them.  Yet, his threat was a greater risk than I was willing to take, and as such I believed that under the circumstances he needed to be sent home. It was a snap judgment based on my feeling that his potential for violence was enough to cause an unnecessarily tense working environment for all of us. The director felt the same way, and yet we went round and round searching for any other solution.

Eventually it was determined that he would be sent home, and the other intern would be spoken to about his role in the argument. In all honesty, he had provoked him to a certain degree, and would need be held accountable.

By noon yesterday, I had decided to send an intern home, and was attempting to arrange for the second to stay.

Following the meeting on Monday, I posted the request for ideas to inspire. I felt that if I could just instill in the activists some passion and fire for the workers and social justice, then everything would be okay. I needed something, I needed to make them understand that in spite of our own issues, we are here for the workers, and for the movement. That we are simply this century's answer to the labor organizers of the past. That we share a common thread with some of the most justified, and righteous struggles in world history: the struggles of the working class to be compensated fairly and justly, and to be treated like human beings.

I have a picture that hangs above my desk (when I have one, and when I am not living out of a box or suit case) of the sanitation workers that struck in Memphis whose signs read "I AM A MAN" because they felt that they were not being treated fairly.

So thank you for your thoughts of inspiration, and thank you for your suggestions. I will definitely use them.

But yesterday when I didn't think that I had done the right thing, and when I felt that I may have just gotten in over my head, I talked to my dad. He put those thoughts to rest and assured me that in the end, these activists are my responsibility and that to act on the side of caution on their behalf, even if it means to send one home, I was doing the right thing. He also reminded me that the movement is bigger than all of us and our problems.

Then today, I got one of the nicest emails I have ever received. It was from my cousin, and we don't get to talk as often as we both would like, but it came at exactly the right moment.

So in the end, I think I need to make them understand that no matter how tedious, or how mundane the task or how frustrated we may get, we are here for the janitors. We are here for the countless workers and organizers that have fought for so much, and yet seems like so little: justice, respect, and dignity.

11:30 am, 93 degrees and Sunny - sorry I bitched about the cold...

Okay for a while now I have tried, for the most part, to not partake in the digitization of our everday tasks. I don't use the atm for anything other than getting cash. I don't use the check-in machines at airports, and I (for the most part) do not use the self check-out at grocery stores, or hardware stores etc. 1) I like dealing with people. I like learning people's names, and using it atleast once. and B) I just have a problem with participating in putting people out of work. Naive, you say? Optimistic, maybe? And to you, my friend, I refer you to the title of my small corner of the internets and say, you bet your sweet ass it is...

But just so you know that I am not the only person out there who harbors such wild delusions of changing it all. Check out my friend Jason's online journal entry for Tuesday, 17 May 05. There he discusses the ins and outs (no pun at all intended) of the robo-bathroom.

Robo-restrooms are the new thing I guess. But I hate that it’s taking away jobs. I’ve met a nice conversation on a few occasions with the bathroom attendant.

It's Saturday, it's three days before my birthday, two weeks before my last day at work, and 17 days until I leave for Chicago, and I am going to help a friend move. I hope everyone has a great weekend, and hopefully I will feel compelled to post more soon.

__________________________________________________________________________
Note: Okay okay okay...Jason Mraz is not really a "friend" of mine, but I am a fan.

The Balance of power is about to change.

"I am Jacob, I am noble in truth!"

Individuals of this name or its variations have come to mold their lives anew. The heart chakra energy gives them strong aspirations to create their lives in accordance with love. Discovering what that love is, is often the most difficult part of life for these individuals. They enjoy many things, but it is as if these things are simply a reflection of a greater love or activity that has not yet been given birth to.

“Yet” is the key word, as long as these individuals hold true their heart and aspirations, they will give birth to new aspects of their lives. This often requires that they step out of old patterns and into something that may not seem practical to others, but if the love for it is there, the abundance and success will follow. This then serves to teach others and fire heartfelt inspirations in them.

Yesterday was a good day. The above was taken from a graduation/birthday card that a friend gave me. All I can say about it, is that the card itself was probably one of the nicest things anyone has ever given me. I guess, it just came at the right time.

But I also received a phone call from Nancy telling me that she was recommending me for the site coordinator position this summer. (Here's a little bit of back story.) This is very exciting news, as I have been sending her emails pestering her for this job for the past 9 months. It feels good to know that my persistence paid off, and to know that so far my plan for this year has been fairly well executed.

Union Summer is an internship program created by the AFL-CIO for college juniors and seniors designed to recruit and invigorate younger generations into the labor movement. It has graduated more than 3,000 activists since its creation in 1996, including myself. When I participated in 2003, there were about 75 students from all over the country in that first 5-week program. We were sent to various cities in groups comprised of 2-8 interns where we would work directly with professional union organizers.

In Kansas City, there were 6 interns (me, Paul, Erica B., Erica W., Jenn, Iris) and a site coordinator (Teran). We worked with organizers helping nurses to unionize. We were placed in an extended stay motel not far from the organizing office. The union was incredible. We worked long hours and had a lot of fun doing it. I really learned a lot, and am looking forward to the experience of doing it again from a different perspective.

They will fly me to Chicago for site coordinator training on either June 6th or 7th. I will be there until the 9th, when I will fly to our site, St. Louis, where I will prepare for the arrival of the 10 interns. We will be working with the Justice for Janitors program organized by the Service Employees' International Union (SEIU). For the following few weeks I will act as a liaison between the interns and the professional union organizers with the Missouri division of Local 1.

We will assist the organizers in any number of tasks and functions, doing one-on-one discussions with workers, administrative stuff around the office, phone-banking, canvassing neighborhoods, and possibly helping to organize a high profile event, usually to encourage solidarity or maintain visibility. Then after about a month or two doing that, we will probably return to Chicago for a couple of days to wrap-up, then fly home. 

As of right now, Nancy said she could only authorize hiring me for the first session, and not the second, though that may change. If  it does not change and I only work the first session, I will be home on or about July 11th, and will move to Portland sometime before August 13th. If I do get hired for the second session, I will not be back until August 17th or 18th, and I will have to be in Portland as soon as I can, as New Student Orientation begins August 25th.

Like I said, Nancy could only "recommend" me for hiring, there is evidently a bureaucratic process of going through a board that has the final say. So barring any unfortunate discovery of my shady past, I will be working in Chicago and St. Louis this summer.

Okay, well it's taken me all day to get this post done, so I am going to bed.

Don't forget to call your mom tomorrow. It's Mother's Day.

May Day

Most people are taught that during the Industrial Revolution workers were mistreated and a typical work day consisted of 12-14 hours per day. What isn't taught, for the most part, is that the 8-hour work day was not an action by benevolent employers or a compassionate government, but a demand by the workers.

In 1884, a nationwide movement began to call for the 8-hour workday. As lobbying government officials had been unsuccessful, the Federation of Organized Trades and Labor Unions passed a resolution calling for a general strike to achieve the goal by their specified deadline--8 hours would constitute a legal day's work beginning on and following May 1, 1886.

From May Day - the Real Labor Day

The heart of the movement was in Chicago, organized primarily by the anarchist International Working People's Association. Businesses and the state were terrified by the increasingly revolutionary character of the movement and prepared accordingly. The police and militia were increased in size and received new and powerful weapons financed by local business leaders. Chicago's Commercial Club purchased a $2000 machine gun for the Illinois National Guard to be used against strikers. Nevertheless, by May 1st, the movement had already won gains for many Chicago clothing cutters, shoemakers, and packing-house workers. But on May 3, 1886, police fired into a crowd of strikers at the McCormick Reaper Works Factory, killing four and wounding many. Anarchists called for a mass meeting the next day in Haymarket Square to protest the brutality.

The meeting proceeded without incident, and by the time the last speaker was on the platform, the rainy gathering was already breaking up, with only a few hundred people remaining. It was then that 180 cops marched into the square and ordered the meeting to disperse. As the speakers climbed down from the platform, a bomb was thrown at the police, killing one and injuring seventy. Police responded by firing into the crowd, killing one worker and injuring many others.

Although it was never determined who threw the bomb, the incident was used as an excuse to attack the entire Left and labor movement. Police ransacked the homes and offices of suspected radicals, and hundreds were arrested without charge... [E]ight of Chicago's most active were charged with conspiracy to murder in connection with the Haymarket bombing. A kangaroo court found all eight guilty, despite a lack of evidence connecting any of them to the bomb-thrower (only one was even present at the meeting, and he was on the speaker's platform), and they were sentenced to die. Albert Parsons, August Spies, Adolf Fischer, and George Engel were hanged on November 11, 1887. Louis Lingg committed suicide in prison, The remaining three were finally pardoned in 1893.

It is not surprising that the state, business leaders, mainstream union officials, and the media would want to hide the true history of May Day, portraying it as a holiday celebrated only in Moscow's Red Square. In its attempt to erase the history and significance of May Day, the United States government declared May 1st to be "Law Day", and gave us instead Labor Day - a holiday devoid of any historical significance other than its importance as a day to swill beer and sit in traffic jams.

Nevertheless, rather than suppressing labor and radical movements, the events of 1886 and the execution of the Chicago anarchists actually mobilized many generations of radicals. Emma Goldman, a young immigrant at the time, later pointed to the Haymarket affair as her political birth. Lucy Parsons, widow of Albert Parsons, called upon the poor to direct their anger toward those responsible - the rich. Instead of disappearing, the anarchist movement only grew in the wake of Haymarket, spawning other radical movements and organizations, including the Industrial Workers of the World.

Since then, most industrialized countries recognize May 1st as May Day - the workers' day - and as an official holiday.

Yet, here, in the United States, where textbooks and curriculum are chosen by and for the lowest common denominator, this rich history of dissent, and activism is suppressed. Workers in this country do not see the relevance of the Labor Movement, because they have never heard of their success.

In Lies My Teacher Told Me, James Loewen discusses the reality of a near systematic dilution of the people's power to affect change. If these stories of labor struggles were taught accurately, students would at least have a better understanding of how unions are important, and at the most, believe that they could affect real change. The labor movement has a rich history that is interwoven into our history as a nation, but is ignored as it is empowering, and would ultimately teach students that governments, including our own, do not always act in the best interest of their citizens, but in the interests of business.

If the story of the Haymarket Affair, and the Ludlow Massacre were taught in our high school classrooms they would open the door to teaching students that our government is fallible, and is at odds with the goal of blind obedience.

Instead, we have students whose knowledge of unions is limited to the Baseball Strike, and Jimmy Hoffa. They know nothing of the sanitation workers strike in Memphis that Dr. Martin Luther King was supporting when he was assassinated. They are not taught about the textile workers that struck for a fair wage and basic human dignity - bread and roses.

Our lives shall not be sweated from birth until life closes –
Hearts starve as well as bodies: Give us Bread, but give us Roses.

So tomorrow, think of the workers that fought the battle to limit the number of hours they could work. Tomorrow is the Workers' Day.

 

 

April 20, 1914

Today marks the anniversary of the Ludlow Massacre, one of the saddest examples of the lengths to which businesses will go, rather than recognize a union.

In the autumn of 1913, several thousand mine workers had chosen to join the United Mine Workers' of America (UMWA). In order to gain recognition they opted to strike. Upon striking, the coal companies evicted the workers from their company owned homes who were then forced to set up tent colonies to continue their strike. The coal companies hired one of the most notorious strike-breaking detective agencies to harass striking miners and union organizers. Eventually the coal companies also compelled the governor to call  in the National Guard to suppress the strike.

Then following months of various acts of violence committed by both sides, the environment was ripe with tension and the stage was set for one of the bloodiest assaults on organized labor in this country's history:

The National Guard, with their ranks swelled by gun thugs and mine guards, decided to evict the tent cities that sprang up around the mines, even though the camps had been established on private property leased by the union.

Ludlow was the largest of the tent cities, located 18 miles north of Trinidad. On the morning of April 20, the Greek Easter celebrated by many Greek immigrants in the Ludlow camp, the National Guard opened fire with machine guns. They fired across the railroad tracks into the tents. Anyone who moved through the camp was targeted. The miners fired back, and the battle raged for hours.

In the afternoon a passing freight train stopped on the tracks, allowing many of the miners and their families to escape to the east to an outcrop of hills called the "Black Hills."

Louis Tikas, the camp's main union organizer went to the National Guard to arrange a truce. Lieutenant Linderfelt assaulted him with the butt of his rifle, and the soldiers fired three shots into Tikas's back as he lay on the ground.

The miners were outgunned. As night approached, the militia descended on the tent camp and set fire to it, apparently oblivious to the fact that two women and eleven children had been hiding in the pit beneath one tent and did not escape with the other strikers. When their charred bodies were found the next day, their deaths became a rallying cry for the UMWA, who called the incident the "Ludlow Massacre." In addition to the fire victims, thirteen people were shot dead during that day.

Today, this monument stands as a reminder to future generations of the legacy of organized labor, and as a memorial to those that have paid the ultimate price for the sake of the workers and their honorable struggle to improve their lives.

The inscription reads:

In memory of the men, women and children who lost their lives in freedom's cause at Ludlow, Colorado April 20, 1914

Erected by the United Mine Workers of America

And on a plaque, the names of those who lost their lives at the hands of the Colorado Fuel and Iron:

• Louis Tikas. AGE 30 YRS.
• James Fyler. AGE 43 YRS.
• John Bartolotti. AGE 45 YRS.
• Charlie Costa. AGE 31 YRS.
• Fedelina Costas. AGE 27 YRS.
• Onafrio Costa. AGE 4 YRS.
• Frank Rubino. AGE 23 YRS.
• Patria Valdez. AGE 37 YRS.
• Eulala Valdez. AGE 8 YRS.
• Mary Valdez. AGE 7 YRS.
• Elvira Valdez. AGE 3 MO.
• Joe Petrucci. AGE 4½ YRS.
• Lucy Petrucci. AGE 2½ YRS.
• Frank Petrucci. AGE 4 MO.
• William Snyder Jr.. AGE 11 YRS.
• Rodgerlo Pedregone. AGE 6 YRS.
• Cloriva Pedregone. AGE 4 YRS.

To find out more: Three Strikes: The Fighting Spirit of Labor's Last Century by Howard Zinn, Dana Frank, and D.G. Kelley

Maybe something is going around...

I just finished talking to a friend of mine online and she just seems so down. Sometimes its just hard seeing someone hurt so much, and there is so little that can be done. Whether it's because there is nothing to be done, or if its because you just aren't the person to do something....I don't know, I just don't like people to be unhappy. I just wish there was something I could do, but I guess there is a distinct possibility that I may not be the person that needs to be helping...

Things have been a little strained as it is for the past couple of weeks. I have tried updating periodically and only seem to get through a couple of sentences, before getting frustrated and falling back on old posts or song lyrics.

Maybe it’s the inevitable senioritis that they talked so much about when I was in high school. I mean, I graduate in less than a month, and am 99.9% sure that at this point, there is very little I could do to prevent that from happening. Normally, my desire to get good grades would inspire me to at least try and do well this semester, and yet given that at least one law school has accepted me, I really just don't care. Now, I know that this is the wrong attitude to have, and I know that this doesn't help my cause in the long run…but I just can't seem to want to show up to class, and try to learn.

 

So something else is going on. There is some externality, some outside force that I am having to overcome to get to school, or work every day.

Anyway, I realize it's late, but to me it is still Monday, so today in labor history:

Ford Motor Company signs first contract with United Auto Workers - 1941

Okay, going to bed, maybe this will get better tomorrow...

iSi, se puede!

March 1968:  Presidential Candidate, Sen. Robert Kennedy joins Cesar Chavez as he breaks his 25 day hunger strike in support of the United Farm Workers' union. It is this dedication to non-violence that is Mr. Chavez's legacy.

Today is Mr. Chavez's 78th birthday and I ask that you please remember those who dedicated their lives to helping others improve their own.

In his own words:

• We cannot seek achievement for ourselves and forget about progress and prosperity for our community…Our ambitions must be broad enough to include the aspirations and needs of others, for their sakes and for our own.

• There's no turning back. We will win. We are winning because ours is a revolution of mind and heart.

• It's ironic that those who till the soil, cultivate and harvest the fruits, vegetables, and other foods that fill your tables with abundance have nothing left for themselves.

• Because we have suffered, and we are not afraid to suffer in order to survive, we are ready to give up everything--even our lives--in the struggle for justice.

• Somewhere and somehow these people are never going to be the same. It's very important to us that people question; that they participate and that they are never afraid to have some principle and stand by that principle.

Never before had a farm workers' union been recognized (they are specifically excluded from the labor laws that regulate union recognition). Through the hard work of Cesar Chavez, Delores Huerta, and the rest of the United Farm Workers' union, they were able to gain recognition and negotiate contracts with management.

In his book Sal Si Puedes (Escape if you can), Peter Mathiessen writes that the true revolutionary is not the idealistic college student in the Che Geuvara t-shirt, but the person that brings about real change. That was Cesar Chavez.

iViva la Causa!
iViva la Huelga!

(Long live the Cause!)
(Long live the Strike!)

Summer Job

Well, I finished the phone interview a little while ago, and I think it went really well. She said that she has not confirmed or completed all of the sites, so she does not know how many site coordinators she will need, so she couldn't really hire me right away. The exciting and kind of stressful part of all of this, is that I would be gone more than 10 weeks this summer. If I am not mistaken the Union Summer program starts June 8, and I would need to be in Chicago a couple of days before that for the Site Coordinator training. I would more than likely participate in both "waves," because they have two five week classes of interns, and I would probably do both, returning to Dallas on or about August 17. Michigan State has their New Student Orientation on August 22. Which would give me less than a week to move there. A little intimidating, but very exciting.

My plan is to be completely ready to move by the time I would go Chicago in early June. So everything I own, save my clothes that I am taking on this internship, would be packed, boxed or otherwise crammed into the storage facility. So for all practical purposes, I would be moved out of my brother and sister-in-law's place by late May, early June. So when I get back in August, I would simply have to pick up a Uhaul, load it up, do some laundry, and drive to Michigan. Of course, somewhere in all of this I would have to say goodbye to everyone I know in Dallas...

So I am really looking forward to getting hired on with Union Summer because

• It's a great job, and a great opportunity
• I could be assigned anywhere in the country
• I should be making pretty good money
• I would be doing something that I WANT to do, helping people make their lives better

Then I get to come home, and start a whole new life almost...

Talk to you soon, gotta go study for a test that I have at 7:00....wish me luck.

About school...

I cannot wait to graduate, go to my summer job (hopefully. I have a phone interview tomorrow), and go to law school.

Saturday night, I was working, and a guest came in wearing a Michigan State jacket. Liz took his order and went to the back to get it started. I had a minute with him, so I told him, "I was actually just accepted to Michigan State's law school last week."
And don't get me wrong, I have had some interesting reactions to this statement, since it happened, but this guy was so excited for me. He immediately stuck his hand out and said, "Congratulations!" I shook his hand and we talked for atleast 20 minutes about the school, Michigan, East Lansing, and how much I will enjoy it there. He gave me some great advice, that, sadly, probably wouldn't have occurred to me. He said to not buy any cold weather clothing here or on my way or anything. He said to wait until I got settled in, then go to Goodwill. He said they have great stuff, and it will be cheap. It seems so simple and almost funny now, but its brilliance is its simplicity, I believe. He told me that the most beautiful place that I will ever visit is at the top of the lower half of Michigan and encouraged me to visit. He was almost giddy as he was talking about how much I was going to love it up there.

He said he would come back in to the resaurant to check on me, and make sure I was still going, and would try and think of more and tell me the next time he came in. I mean, I was excited before he came in, but now, I cannot wait to get there. I cannot wait to  live  in a state that is utterly unknown to me. I cannot wait to be surrounded by people that I don't know, and have to start from scratch. It's weird I know, and I realize that there will be homesickness and loneliness, but funnily enough, I am almost welcoming them. They almost seem like the cost of doing business, just something to deal with in return for everything else.

He was truly one of the nicest people I've met in a while, and he made my night. Even now I can't help but smile about how excited he was for me...and he doesn't even know me.

Well, after the way the night has gone, I doubt I will be sleeping much tonight, so I will probably be back sooner rather than later...