Remembering Ludlow, 97 Years Ago Today, featuring Woody Guthrie and Howard Zinn

The Ground We Walk On: A History of The Jackson Miners Union (Post 9)

By David Roddy

Note: Here is a list of all previous posts in descending order.
Fifty Good Miners



"The Tournament of Today--A Set-To Between Labor and Monopoly." Date unknown.

Five miners are waiting in an old Western room; their expressions grave despite the blossoming hillsides and fluttering birds outside the dusty windows. On the table before them lay three sheets of paper, one for each superintendent of three local mines. Each reads:

Tea Party Vs. Sustainable Bridges

By David Roddy

  “Humanity stands at a defining moment in history. We are confronted with a perpetuation of disparities between and within nations, a worsening of poverty, hunger, ill health and illiteracy, and the continuing deterioration of the ecosystems on which we depend for our well-being. However, integration of environment and development concerns and greater attention to them will lead to the fulfillment of basic needs, improved living standards for all, better protected and managed ecosystems and a safer, more prosperous future. No nation can achieve this on its own; but together we can - in a global partnership for sustainable development.”
                                 ~Preamble of U.N. Agenda 21

Gadsden’s serpentine yellow flag, threatening all that tread upon it, awkwardly conflicts with the anesthetizing minutia of county government. Nonetheless, those who stand so proudly beneath its folds have crept into city and county board meetings across America, waiting to protest any perceived attack on their Liberty by oppressive public officials. Their primary target, as reported by Stephanie Mencimer in Mother Jones, is a U.N. action plan ominously named Agenda 21.

A Few Little Questions: Guest Post by Nora Coryell

A Few Little Questions


Did the Amador County Board of Supervisors openly violate the Brown Act by attending a local tea party meeting en masse and discussing county business there?

The Ground We Walk On: A History of The Jackson Miners Union (Post 8)

By David Roddy

Western Federation Expands


The hard rock mines of the Southern Sierra dot the foothills like acne on the face of an unhygienic teenager. The collection of mines scattered around the town of Jackson accounted for only a fraction of the mineworkers in Amador County. North of Jackson, along the undulating grassland and oak forests above the mother lode, is Amador City. At the turn of the last century, Amador City provided lodging and services to the men who drilled and blasted into the quartz bed beneath it. Like their Jackson counterparts, the mine owners expected their employees to work ten-hour shifts for $2.50.

Mother Lode Progressives at April 4th "We Are One" Rally

Mother Lode Progressives stand with Wisconsin (and Ohio, Florida, Maine, Indiana, etc) take four!




The Ground We Walk On: A History of The Jackson Miners Union (Post 7)

By David Roddy

Synopsis of past posts:

Post 1: “49ers” remove most of the placer gold in the southern mines of California during the last decades of the 1800s, deeper mines to remove gold from quartz beds attract capitalist investment which in turn exploits cheap immigrant labor.


Post 2: Parallel developments across the Western United States lead to miners unionizing to demand wage increases and safer workplaces. In 1893, the Western Federation of Miners unites these unions and grows after a successful strike in Cripple Creek Colorado in 1894.

Post 3: In 1901, Jackson mine owners preemptively threaten to fire any unionized workers as well as anybody that showed sympathies to a rumored union. The WFM becomes militant after a series of violent strikes, advocates socialism and the possibility of armed insurrection against the capitalist class. Local newspapers side with mine owners.

Post 4: On September 6 of 1901, self-proclaimed anarchist Leon Czolgosz assassinates President William McKinley. This triggers a national panic against immigrants, anarchists and leftists. The cacophony around the national red-scare silences any rumors of a Jackson miners union.

Post 5: The Jackson Miners’ Union, No. 115 of the Western Federation of Miners, announces its presence in the fall of 1902, much to the horror of local newspapers. Newly inaugurated President Theodore Roosevelt deals peaceably with striking coal miners in Pennsylvania, giving labor unions a credibility in national media.

Post 6: Jackson Miners Union president Frank O’Connell writes a letter to Amador Dispatch calling for a socialist economy. Both Republican and Democratic newspapers attack the Jackson Miners Union.

Tensions Build On the 28th of November in 1902, the Amador Dispatch quoted an editorial from the San Luis Obispo Breeze titled “Organized Labor the Safeguard of Society.”

A broad view of the labor movement, which recognizes the fact that there is an abundance for all, is the only tenable ground. Keep up the organization, and benefits will come as fast as outside conditions will warrant. The safety of all depends upon the intelligent organization of labor.

"TR teaches the childish coal barons a lesson"
From Wikipedia.

Toleration for labor unions became increasingly fashionable as the United States entered the “Progressive Era.” The treatment of striking anthracite coal miners as equals to their employers by the administration of President Theodore Roosevelt strengthened public sympathy towards the cause of organized labor. The admittedly conservative president of the American Federation of Labor Samuel Gompers went so far as to state in his 1925 autobiography:

Several times I have been asked what in my opinion was the most important single incident in the labor movement in the United States and I have invariably replied: the strike of the anthracite miners in Pennsylvania ... from then on the miners became not merely human machines to produce coal but men and citizens.