Montana labor news., 1933-03-02
HISTORY REPEATS
ITSELF
MASS PROTEST OF COS
is REPEATED
(By SCOTT NEARING.)

NEW YORK-(FP)-The wave of
mass protest which rose to record
heights in the railroad and mine
strikes of 1877 and 1878, and spread
into the S-hour movement of the early
eighties, broke in 1885 and 1886. Then
the wave receded. There was a lull
in the labor movement while union
leaders and workers alike struggled to
take advantage of the brief period of
good times" that proceeded the eco
nomic collapse of 1929.
The hungry nineties" disilIusioned
millions who had believed in capital
ism during the boom days. First
they followed Bryan in the free silver
campaign of 1896. Then they turned
to Debs and the Notwithstanding
support among Oklahoma farmers and
Illinois industrial workers that gave
the Socialist ticket its record vote in
1912. A section of the American
workers-the timber workers, the har-
vest hands and the dock workers
swelled the ranks of the Industrial
Workers of the World until that or
ganization could boast a vast mass
following.
This wave Of mass protest rose
through the late nineties and until the
war years of 1916 and 1917. Among
som. of the tenant farmers and casual
workers it grew to revolutionary pro-
portions. 1t was accompanied by an
immense increase in the writing and
printing of papers, magazines, pam
phlets and books expounding the doc
trines of the ~proletarian revolution.
It produced a crop of journalists, agi-
~tators and organizers who devoted
their lives to the working class move
ment.
The wav broke against the War Of
1917. 1t subsidized during the gilded
years of 1922-1929 prosperity.
The masses turned from Debs and
Bill Haywood to Henry Ford, Charlie
Chaplin, Jack Dempsey, VIII Rogers
and Herbert Hoover, to the whine of
jazz, the clatter of radio, to Install
ment-bought homes and automobiles
and the promise of permanent pros
perity. American Federation of Labor
officials joined the National Civic Fed
Grafton, the Chamber of Commerce
and the Council of National Defense.
The Amalgamated Clothing Workers
of America went into the banking
business. The Brotherhood of Loco
motive Engineers, under the leadership
of its $4,000 president, Warren
Stone, bought Florida land as an Sin
vestment." Membership in the unions
declined. The revolutionary move
ment all but disappeared.
Then 1929 became the 1892 of the
present period. Instead Of the Bryan
campaign of 1896 there was the Roose-
welt campaign of 1882 Bryan lost.
Roosevelt 0 For a while he viii
hold a certain body of mass support,
but already, in February, 1888, many
who supported him in November, 1882,
are expressing their doubts.
Again the wave of mass protest is
rising. The farmers of the grain belt
are militantly defying the law, organ
izing committees of action and for
chilly preventing foreclosures and
forced sales. The workers are on the
march, demanding support; clashing
with the public authorities. This
mass protest is only just beginning.
AS the depression continues it will
advance to higher and more class con-
scious levels. How will it be met
this time?
Can the capitalists offer the masses
a new age of prosperity and jazz?
Can they find a Ramsay MacDon-
aid to plead national emergency"
"gradualness," and "the Bolshevik
menace" as a reason for standing be-
hind the government"
Can they start a war to divert pub
lie attention from chaos at home to
new victories abroad?
Can they find a Hitler who will