Starting this Friday, the Labor Heritage Foundation's annual Great Labor Arts Exchange brings together labor musicians and artists from across the nation, organized by Elise Bryant. Saturday night don't miss the free concert honoring DC Diva Activist LUCI MURPHY with the Joe Hill Award. For more info, visit LaborHeritage.org and for the latest local labor calendar, go to dclabor.org and click on Calendar.
Here’s today's labor history:
On this date in 1877, ten miners accused of being militant "Molly Maguires" were hanged in Pennsylvania. A private corporation initiated the investigation of the 10 through a private detective agency. A private police force arrested them, and private attorneys for the coal companies prosecuted them. "The state provided only the courtroom and the gallows," a judge said many years later.
In 1948, the U.S. Supreme Court upheld the right of unions to publish statements urging members to vote for a specific congressional candidate, ruling that such advocacy is not a violation of the Federal Corrupt Practices Act.
And in 1997, an estimated 100,000 unionists and other supporters marched in solidarity with striking Detroit News and Detroit Free Press newspaper workers.
Today’s labor quote is by an anonymous Molly Maguire
"You either end up on the gallows or coughing your lungs out, what's the difference?"
The Mollies were a secret organization of Irish Catholic coal miners in Schuykill County, Pennsylvania. They were enraged about poor working conditions and low wages.