If only wealthy white men could vote, George Washington would be
elected. But of course that was prior to our strange two party
system. And it was also prior to the careful building of a political
machine that literally has us by the throat. The word, democracy is
used to confuse us. So is National Pride. It took me some time, but
I finally gave up feeling proud to be an American. I live here, and I
speak my mind. But the political system that has held the people
captive for 240 years is not getting my Proud Support. This so called
American Government represents those who own it. Why should I pledge
allegiance to a system that does not represent me or the needs of my
people?
No, democracy, or the use of the word, is nothing more than a
distraction. And people who should know better work hard to undermine
any sign of democracy. If you don't like the voice of the majority,
just go ahead and cut them off. Make certain that it is really hard
for them to vote. Rig their districts and strike unwanted names from
the voters registers. And if all else fails, go to your "bought and
paid for" Supreme Court. And when the dust settles, as it did when
George Bush, "Won" the presidency, when that happens you can stick
your chest out and brag about our wonderful democracy.
Carl Jarvis
On 7/4/16, Miriam Vieni <miriamvieni@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
I've been puzzling over what people think democracy is for the past several
days as I have been reading articles by people who define themselves as
"liberal", which state that the Republican Party must disavow the choice of
their voters at their convention. It's really a puzzle. The majority of
Republican voters chose Donald Trump to be their nominee for President. But
the rest of us despise him so everyone is saying that the party should
reject the voters' choice. I don't know what the legal mechanisms are in
the Republican Party but I assume that they have a primary in order to
choose a candidate. And they did. The Democratic party also had a primary to
choose a candidate. There were some obvious irregularities. However, the
majority of Democrats appears to have chosen a candidate. The Democratic
Party, however, has super delegates to ensure that a people's candidate
can't accidentally win the primary vote. The Republicans, however, don't
have any obvious insurance against a people's candidate winning their
presidential nomination. Now if we were back in the good old days when only
white wealthy men could vote, Trump wouldn't be a candidate. So you see what
happens when the rabble are allowed to vote?
Miriam
-----Original Message-----
From: Carl Jarvis [mailto:carjar82@xxxxxxxxx]
Sent: Monday, July 04, 2016 10:44 AM
To: blind-democracy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Cc: Miriam Vieni
Subject: Re: [blind-democracy] 200 years ago: Journeymen shoemakers strike
in Philadelphia
So here we are, 240 years and counting, celebrating "our" Declaration of
Independence. But was it really "our" declaration of independence?
Is it possible that we have been lied to, and tricked into believing that
our Forefathers meant "Us"? A closer look at the evidence from those long
ago times, still available today, tell us that our Rulers kept quiet many
documents and publications that tell a different story. There is not space
enough for them here, but a simple google or two can bring up more than
enough material to make any serious American Historian cry out in Joy.
Despite having to lie and pressure the common man into taking up arms
against England, the Ruling Class found a way of seemingly including all
White men into thinking in terms of, "We", even though they had no say in
this new government.
A very small percentage of the population were privileged to cast votes.
Only those who were Landed or had a certain level of money could participate
in governmental affairs.
This article describing the plight of the shoemakers is one more example of
how entrenched the Capitalist System was, from the very beginning. Despite
the "give and take" of small gains by the working class over the centuries,
the Masters are still on top. Perhaps it is past time to stop saying, "We"
when speaking of the American Corporate Empire(formerly the USA). Our only
value to this sprawling monster is to produce and consume. And when we can
no longer produce and consume, we must lie down and die, because the Empire
has no place in its practical(greedy) heart for such thoughts as care for
the elderly.
Carl Jarvis
On 7/4/16, Roger Loran Bailey <dmarc-noreply@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
https://socialistaction.org/2016/06/30/200-years-ago-journeymen-shoema
kers-strike-in-philadelphia/
200 years ago: Journeymen shoemakers strike in Philadelphia
/ 3 days ago
April 2016 Cordwainer
By MICHAEL SCHREIBER
The autumn of 1805 was unusually mild. Farmers were able to plough
their land almost until Christmas. And in Philadelphia, the balmy
temperatures might have “gone to the head” of a group of journeymen
cordwainers [shoemakers], who had the temerity on Nov. 1, 1805, to
undertake what was one of the earliest labor strikes for wages in U.S.
history.
The journeymen had organized themselves back in 1794 into an elemental
trade union known as the Federal Society of Journeymen Cordwainers.
This came about as a reflection of the fact that a revolution in
production in the shoemaking industry had produced a new workforce.
In colonial times, shoes generally had been made to order for
customers by individual craftsmen, who might have employed merely a
few journeymen or apprentices as helpers. But by the end of the 18th
century, custom-made shoes were constructed only for wealthy
customers. More often, shoes were produced according to pattern for
the wholesale as well as retail trade. Far fewer craftsmen worked
alone; now they became employers of larger groups of journeymen, who
were given piecework wages to produce the commodities.
The wage rate varied according to the quality of the shoe. This
formula might be “justified” partly on the assumption that an average
worker would produce a cheaper shoe in less time than it took to
produce a better one, but it also reflected pricing conditions in the
markets.
Thus, men employed in making what were called “market-work”
shoes—those sold to poorer customers by retailers in the public
shambles—would receive wages that were only a third of what they could
earn in ordinary “shop work.” The journeymen grumbled that
“market-work” wages were not enough for them to feed and house their
families. Although they often labored from five in the morning until
past midnight, they still could not make ends meet.
And they also complained that the employers were giving them a lower
wage for producing shoes for retail sale than for custom-made
products—even though the quality of the two articles and the care put
into their manufacture was often the same. “I made some work for Mr.
Ryan,” a journeyman named John Hayes said in court, “and he made a
similar reduction upon me, because they were to go into the shop, when
he used before to give the same price for shop goods as he did for
bespoke work.” The journeymen highlighted the unjustness of the
situation by noting that the employers would still often sell the
shoes for two or three times what they would pay their workers to produce
them.
The journeymen had struck before, in 1799, when the masters had
threatened to reduce wages. The employers then advertised for “scab”
workers, but had little success in recruiting enough to break the
strike. In the settlement, the journeymen succeeded in stopping the
wage reduction. In 1804, another strike ensued, and again the
employers agreed to keep the current wage rate—but when business
slackened after Christmas, they began cutting wages again.
The November 1805 walk-out was provoked by an action that had taken
place two days earlier, when an informal organization of employers met
together to consider the demands of the journeymen for higher wages,
and resolved unanimously that “we will not give any more wages than
we have given for some time past.”
As in 1799, the employers advertised for scabs to take the jobs of the
strikers, and several employers attempted to fire men who had gone on
strike. Street battles took place between the scabs and striking
workers, which resulted in the arrest of the leaders of the
journeymen’s union and the collapse of the strike.
Public opinion in Philadelphia was polarized over the strike. William
Duane’s Aurora stood up for the strikers, while the Federalist press,
reflecting the opinion of the wealthier sector of Philadelphia
society, sided with the employers and the scabs. On Nov. 27, the
pro-Federalist United States Gazette polemicized against the Aurora by
promoting the bosses’ view of the events: “Electioneering trick.—The
Aurora this morning has trumped up a pleasant story of certain
journeymen shoemakers, who, he says, were last week committed to jail,
‘for meditating and proposing to demand an augmentation of the reward
for their manual labor.’—We then hear a good deal of rhodomontade
about English common law, aristocracy, nobility, oppression of the poor,
&c. &c.
“Now the story as we have heard it is thus: For a considerable time
past, ever since the inclement season commenced, a great proportion
of the journeymen shoemakers of this city have been conspiring to
raise the price of their labour; and for the purpose of accomplishing
this end have refused to work for the usual wages. Some few, however,
finding honest industry to be more profitable than idleness and
caballing, returned to their work. This exasperated those who chose
to stand out, and it is said they appointed a certain number of sturdy
individuals of their fraternity, to be dominated [nominated?] ‘The
Hammering Committee,’ whose duty it sho[u]ld be to find out and flog
all such as should return to their work at the customary wages.
“It is said that some of the members of this committee in the
execution of their duty, have been unkindly seized and thrown into
prison. This circumstance is caught by the Aurora as proof that the
object is to deprive these worthy hammering citizens of a vote at
the senatorial election tomorrow.”
The following day, the Aurora let the journeymen speak for
themselves by printing their “Address of the Working Shoemakers of
the City of Philadelphia to the Public.” At the beginning, the
document took a defensive tact by citing the guarantees of the
Pennsylvania state constitution “that the citizens have a right in a
peaceable manner to assemble together for the common good.” And in
accord with that proposition, it asserted that, “for the past fifteen
years and upwards,” the journeymen had been assembling “in a peaceful
manner”
for such constitutionally protected purposes. Now they wished “to
shew to the industrious of all trades, what danger threatens them, and
what wrong has been done to us.”
Then the Address went on the attack against the master cordwainers,
“who are only the retailers of our labor, and who in truth live upon
the work of our hands”: “As they are rich and we are poor—they seem to
think that we are not protected by the constitution in meeting
peaceably together and pursuing our own happiness—They suppose that
they have a right to limit us at all times, and whatever may be the
misfortunes of society, the changes in the value of necessaries, the
encrease or the decrease of trade, they think they have a right to
determine for us the value of our labor; but that we have no right to
determine for ourselves, what we will or what we will not take in
exchange for our labor.”
Unfortunately, the master craftsmen, with the support of the wealthier
echelons of the business community, decided to retaliate in the
courts against the strikers and their union. They brought charges
against the union and eight elected officers for “conspiracy.” A
major charge against the union was that they had used various methods
of compulsion—even violence—to force journeymen workers to not scab
against their fellows who were on strike. In effect, the bosses
professed that in prosecuting the union, they were merely standing up
for the democratic rights of their workers.
The trial was put on the docket of the Philadelphia Mayor’s Court for
January 1806. The twelve men on the jury could hardly be considered
peers of the defendants. The jury included three master craftsmen—a
hatter, a tailor, and a watchmaker. And the nine others were
employers, such as innkeepers, merchants, etc.
In final arguments, defense attorney Walter Franklin reiterated the
strikers’ insistence that they had been exercising their just right to
assembly. But more to the point, he asked, since the master
cordwainers had assumed the right to set the level of wages, did not
journeymen also have a right to bargain the price of their labor
power? And since the employers had taken action to join forces in
order to fix prices and wages, did not the journeymen also have the
right to seek collective action “to determine for themselves the value of
their own labor?”
In summary, Franklin appealed to the jury: “If you are contented with
the blessings enjoyed under our free constitution, which secures to
the citizens and equality of rights, and recognizes no distinction of
classes … I shall look for the result of these feelings and these
sentiments in a verdict of acquittal.”
But such arguments failed to deflect the bias of the jury. They
retired at 9 p.m. and came to a decision soon afterward. The court
then asked the jury to wait until morning before pronouncing the
verdict—“guilty.”
The eight defendants were each fined $8, and required to pay court
costs.
Just months after conclusion of the journeymen’s conspiracy trial, the
transcript of the proceedings, taken in shorthand by Thomas Lloyd, was
published in book form. An advertisement for the volume noted: “This
trial is deeply interesting, and shews to men of all professions, that
by the English common-law (now for the first time introduced into
Pennsylvania, since its first settlement as a province under William
Penn) they are not at liberty to associate together, for the purpose
of fixing the price of their labor, in the way attempted by the
society of Journeymen Cordwainers.”
It was a strong setback for labor’s cause. Three decades later,
however, the labor movement rose again in Philadelphia, with a general
strike and the formation of the first U.S. workingman’s party. By
that time, machine-driven factories had increasingly supplanted
handicrafts, and the system of masters and journeymen had developed
into a new system, with a clear division between capitalists and
proletarians.
This is an excerpt from a new book by Michael Schreiber, “Unsinkable
Patriot: The Life and Times of Thomas Cave in Revolutionary America.”
The book can be ordered from the author’s website:
http://www.philahistory.org.
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June 30, 2016 in Arts & Culture, Books, Labor, Marxist Theory &
History, Philadelphia.
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