Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 2003/02/16
[Author Prev] [Author Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next] [Author Index] [Topic Index] [Home] [Search]At 08:25 PM 2/15/03 -0600, Matthew Powell wrote: >Labor rights "would have been handled by Congress" without strikes, >without protests and without the work of labor unions, who often had to >fight government thugs as well as strike-breaking thugs? Please. Almost all basic labor legislation was passed prior to 1920; only the creation of the NLRB and OSHA came after that. And there were no effective labor PROTESTS prior to that date or, really, until the end of that decade, though the Wobblies tried hard enough to organize such. There were lots of STRIKES but the purpose of those was to obtain specific concessions from a specific employer, not to obtain legislation from Congress. >Civil Rights - when did Congress "handle" things of its own accord? Oh, 1953, 1957, 1959, 1961, and 1962, for starters. The major piece of Civil Rights legislation, the '64 Act, would have been passed in early 1963 - -- BEFORE the initial Civil Rights protest march -- had Kennedy not been snowballed by the Democrat leadership in Congress. For that matter, Truman obtained Congressional approval in 1948 of the additional budget for the FBI to add a Civil Rights office and, again, obtained this same approval for the additional costs brought about by desegrating the military the following year. >Women's suffrage - you had fifty years of action by women before >Congress and the states allowed women to vote. Where was Congress >working on its own there? Hmm. You have a marginally better case for this one. There were some minor suffragettes attempting to hold protests prior to 1920 but these were quite small and obtained no significant press coverage in this country, though similar protests did obtain good press in the UK. But, again, it wasn't "protests" which led the Constitution to be amended; it was a growing awareness among the power elite (the yeomanry and gentry) that it was time that such be done, the same manner in which all of these changes are brought about -- and protests are the most certain manner of alienating these groups. > >Why did "liberal Democrats and mainstream Republicans" finally get >around to it after almost a century? Because of protests. Because of the >civil rights movement, because of court actions by civil rights lawyers, >because people outside of the government made it an issue, and because >Congress had to respond. > Wow! You are confusing and conflating a zillion things, sir! There were no general Civil Rights protest marches until that of 1963, though there had been specific protests over specific issues before this. However, the impetus for equality goes back a lot farther (see today's WASHINGTON POST MAGAZINE for a minor example of just how this worked in 1939) and really dates back to the era before the First World War. "Protests" are one thing, "strikes" are another, and "court actions" are a third, and the impetus behind them differs dramatically. I said nothing about strikes; I said nothing about court actions -- hell, man, I'm an attorney! I merely said, and say again, that mass public protests have been uniformly ineffective in the history of the US in changing the manner in which our government operates. And, of course, the additional level of such ineffectiveness often arises from the confusion of purpose affecting the participants. Study, for instance, Coxey's Army or the Bonus Marchers to see how mixed the motives of the participants can be and how mass movements like these -- or the earlier Whiskey Rebellion in Pennsylvania or Sheay's Rebellion in Massachussetts or, for that matter, Bacon's Rebellion in colonial Virginia - -- failed as they rapidly lost focus. Or, for that matter, look at how ANSWER, the coördinating group behind the current spate of anti-War marches in the US, is keeping out groups which are not openly anti-Israeli. Finally, bear in mind that the US is a federation. As such, there is an equal burden on the states to protect the citizens, and the states are accorded fair broader powers to do so than is the Federal government. You speak of everything n terms of "Congress" while forgetting the role of the Presidency and the Courts at our Federal level and the State governments at another. Finally, everyone who showed up at these various US protests yesterday would have accomplished far more by speaking directly to their Congressman and Senators. (And, yes, as I posted before, I also have deep reservations about US foreign policy -- and my Congressman, a friend, is well aware of my attitudes as are both of my US Senators. ANY citizen can do the same: these guys are hungry to dsicuss issues with the voters.) Marc msmall@infi.net FAX: +276/343-7315 Cha robh bąs fir gun ghrąs fir! - -- To unsubscribe, see http://mejac.palo-alto.ca.us/leica-users/unsub.html