Workers of the World, Untie! Weekend Economists Labor Day Exravaganza Sept 4-7, 2009

[Demeter]

Well, I got off my sickbed, where I've been sulking since lunch, when I realized what time (and day) it was...

This is the Labor Day Weekend, when we get to celebrate the strong hands, the sturdy back, the tree-like legs that bring us all the good things in life--

The phonetic phrase is "shay-shay!" (Thank you, in Mandarin). Thank you, China!

But before China took over all the manufacturing in the world, the US was premier in everything with the exception of watches, chocolates, BMWs and other luxury goods....Hershey's notwithstanding.

And even in less exalted places, economy was a local event and people provided for themselves and their neighbors. We should be back to that within a generation (20 years) if not sooner, by my calculations. But in the meanwhile, let us celebrate the Working Man and Woman.

Working was never more elevated in this country than during the Great Depression, when Diego Rivera did his famous murals (see the Detroit Institute of Art), Isadora Duncan did her interpretive dance, and songs were gathered and written for generations to come.

Here is my favorite, incorporating the Women's Movement as well as the Labor Movement, sung by Judy Collins:

http://www.rhapsody.com/judy-collins/bread-and-roses--2...

The slogan "Bread and Roses" originated in a poem of that name by James Oppenheim, published in The American Magazine in December 1911, which attributed it to "the women in the West." It is commonly associated with a textile strike in Lawrence, Massachusetts during January-March 1912, now often known as the "Bread and Roses strike".

The slogan appeals for both fair wages and dignified conditions.

History

The Lawrence strike, which united dozens of immigrant communities under the leadership of the Industrial Workers of the World, was led to a large extent by women. Many claim that during the strike some of the women carried a sign that said, "We want bread, but we want roses, too!" No reliable evidence has yet been found to verify this, and the claim has been rejected by some veterans of the Lawrence strike.

A 1916 labor anthology, The Cry for Justice: An Anthology of the Literature of Social Protest by Upton Sinclair, is the first known source to attribute the phrase to the Lawrence strikers. A republication of Oppenheim's poem in 1912, following the strike, attributed it to "Chicago Women Trade Unionists".

The strike was settled on March 14, 1912, on terms generally favorable to the workers. The workers won pay increases, time-and-a-quarter pay for overtime, and a promise of no discrimination against strikers. The strikers are credited with inventing the moving picket line (so that they would not be arrested for loitering).

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bread_and_Roses

As we go marching, marching, in the beauty of the day,
A million darkened kitchens, a thousand mill lofts gray,
Are touched with all the radiance that a sudden sun discloses,
For the people hear us singing: Bread and Roses! Bread and Roses!

As we go marching, marching, we battle too for men,
For they are women's children, and we mother them again.
Our lives shall not be sweated from birth until life closes;
Hearts starve as well as bodies; give us bread, but give us roses.

As we go marching, marching, unnumbered women dead
Go crying through our singing their ancient call for bread.
Small art and love and beauty their drudging spirits knew.
Yes, it is bread we fight for, but we fight for roses too.

As we go marching, marching, we bring the greater days,
The rising of the women means the rising of the race.
No more the drudge and idler, ten that toil where one reposes,
But a sharing of life's glories: Bread and roses, bread and roses.
Our lives shall not be sweated from birth until life closes;
Hearts starve as well as bodies; bread and roses, bread and roses.


It was the great fear of working women and men, organizing, striking, and winning, that brought us permanent class warfare, the Federal Reserve, FDR and civil rights, and most of the events following the Civil War. And the workers united, because the corporations took over during the Civil War, as Lincoln so rightly feared even in 1860.