A Short History of the U From Colonial Times to the Twenty-First Century PDF
Preview A Short History of the U From Colonial Times to the Twenty-First Century
Short History US Working Class cover 6.pdf 1 2/22/16 5:48 PM “Exceptional book . . . not just for scholars or even for students, A but for the working class. Such books are rare.” S h —Labor Notes o r t H Noting that standard accounts of U.S. history often pay little attention to the working class, i s labor historian Paul Le Blanc presents a colorful, fact-filled history that concentrates on the t o struggles and achievements of that often-neglected laboring majority. Employing a blend of r y economic, social, and political history, Le Blanc shows how important labor issues have been o and continue to be in the forging of our nation’s history. Within a broad analytical frame- f work he highlights issues of class, gender, race, and ethnicity, and includes the views of key t h figures of U.S. labor, including Cesar Chavez, Eugene V. Debs, Elizabeth Gurley Flynn, e Samuel Gompers, Woody Guthrie, “Big Bill” Haywood, Langston Hughes, Mary “Mother” U Jones, Martin Luther King Jr., George Meany, A. Philip Randolph, and Carl Sandburg. . S . W In addition to the main narrative, a bibliographical essay directs readers to classic works and C cutting-edge scholarship in the field of U.S. labor history as well as to relevant fiction, o r M poetry, and films for further exploration or study. The book’s substantial glossary offers clear k Y definitions and thought-provoking mini-essays for almost two hundred terms, from the in most basic to the most complex and technical. g CM C MY l a CY “Although most books that consider the ‘working class’ are usually devoted to studying or s CMY s portraying the poor, Le Blanc’s book takes a much broader view. For Le Blanc, working class K and labor are synonymous. His aim is to make the history of labor in the U.S. more accessible to students and the general reader. He succeeds by outlining major events in the history of the U.S., then showing the role of labor in shaping them or describing their impact on labor. P a Le Blanc’s primer not only informs but should also prove to be a helpful resource.” —Booklist u l L e Paul Le Blanc is a professor of history at La Roche College, has written on and participated B l in the U.S. labor, radical, and civil rights movements, and is author of such books as Marx, a n Lenin, and the Revolutionary Experience and Lenin and the Revolutionary Party. c Labor History A Short History of the U.S. Working Class ISBN: 978-1-60846-625-2 $17 5 1 7 0 0 From Colonial Times to the Twenty-First Century haymarketbooks.org 9 781608 466252 Paul Le Blanc A Short History of the U.S. WORKING CLASS Short History_text_4.indd 1 2/22/16 5:39 PM Short History_text_4.indd 2 2/22/16 5:39 PM A Short History of the U.S. WORKING CLASS From Colonial Times to the Twenty-First Century PAUL LE BLANC Illustrations by MIKE ALEWITZ Haymarket Books Chicago, Illinois Short History_text_4.indd 3 2/22/16 5:39 PM Excerpt from The People, Yes by Carl Sandburg, copyright © 1936 by Harcourt, Inc., and renewed 1964 by Carl Sandburg, reprinted by permission of the publisher. © 1999 Paul Le Blanc First published 1999 by Humanity Books, an imprint of Prometheus Books This edition published in 2016 by Haymarket Books P.O. Box 180165 Chicago, IL 60618 773-583-7884 [email protected] www.haymarketbooks.org ISBN: 978-1-60846-625-2 Trade distribution: In the US, Consortium Book Sales and Distribution, www.cbsd.com In Canada, Publishers Group Canada, www.pgcbooks.ca In the UK, Turnaround Publisher Services, www.turnaround-uk.com All other countries, Publishers Group Worldwide, www.pgw.com This book was published with the generous support of the Wallace Action Fund and Lannan Foundation. Cover design by Rachel Cohen. Printed in Canada by union labor. Library of Congress CIP data is available. 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 Short History_text_4.indd 4 2/22/16 5:39 PM This book is dedicated to FRANK LOVELL (1913–1998) one of many who has taught and inspired me. Short History_text_4.indd 5 2/22/16 5:39 PM Short History_text_4.indd 6 2/22/16 5:39 PM Contents Preface to the 2016 Edition ix Preface 1 Carl Sandburg, The People, Yes (excerpt) 5 Introduction: Explaining the Title of This Book 7 Chapter 1 Origins 11 Chapter 2 The First American Revolution 17 Chapter 3 Industrial Revolution 25 Chapter 4 Slave Labor, Free Labor 31 Chapter 5 The Second American Revolution 35 Chapter 6 “Gilded Age” 41 Chapter 7 Rainbow Working Class 55 Chapter 8 Progressive Era 63 Chapter 9 Corruption 77 Chapter 10 Hardship and Resurgence 85 Short History_text_4.indd 7 2/22/16 5:39 PM Chapter 11 The Second World War and Its Aftermath 103 Chapter 12 Cold War and Social Compact 109 Chapter 13 American Dream 119 Chapter 14 Unfinished Business 125 Chapter 15 Rude Awakenings 135 Chapter 16 Where To, What Next? 143 Bibliographical Essay 153 Glossary 161 Timeline of the History of the United States 187 U.S. Labor History Chronology 189 Index 205 Short History_text_4.indd 8 2/22/16 5:39 PM Preface to the 2016 Edition It is a pleasure to see a new edition of this short history of the U.S. work- ing class made available by Haymarket Books—particularly with a new cover that highlights the diversity of those whose lives and labor have always kept our country running. In the book’s introduction, I define what I mean by working class (a term I much prefer to the fuzziness of mid- dle class)—it is consistent with the recent Occupy movement’s notion of “the 99%,” which means it refers to most of us, regardless of precise per- centages. The richness in composition of today’s working-class majority is matched by the richness of our history, which this book seeks to convey. At the present moment, a majority of the people in the United States seem to face—in some important ways—nastier realities than was the case when I was growing up. What has been made of our country and of our world, by those whose power and policies have been dominant, is shameful and outrageous and horrific. Growing numbers of people are becoming fearful, angry, and restive over this state of affairs, with a sense that things should be better than they are. This book helps to show how laboring people in the past faced similar hard times, and through soli- darity and struggle they brought about many positive changes in their lives. Some of these changes are still of benefit to us today. There is much that has happened since the first appearance of this book. Rather than attempting a fifteen-year update, we can put it quite simply: The situation of the broadly defined U.S. working class is worse in 2016 than it was in 1999. Yet there are also new strengths coming to the fore. Surveying the rich diversity of race and ethnicity that makes up our working-class majority, Martin Luther King Jr. commented back in the 1960s: “We may have all come on different ships, but we’re in the same boat now.” This elemental understanding is shared more widely ix Short History_text_4.indd 9 2/22/16 5:39 PM
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