Nathan Newman wrote:
>But the Populists were more based on rural ideology than a worker
>mobilization-- and Populism foundered on the stronger racial identity of
>many Americans over their identity as workers. The exact period of
>Populist
>strength coincided with the tightening of Jim Crow and the completion of
>disenfranchisement of blacks in the South.
-This is all part of the "whatever their faults" - I'm no Populist. -But my point was that these rubes were deeply politicized and spent -time studying monetary theory.
I'm not condemning the Populists per se; the question was comparing the mobilization and unity of workers then and now. And the Populists were not a focus for unifying workers as much as rural agrarians. Workers remained divided between the parties and largely not mobilized politically as workers.
>The reality is the labor movement is more unified as a political entity
>within the Democratic Party TODAY than they ever were in the 19th century.
-Yeah, too bad it's shrinking and ever-more irrelevant!
To the broader progressive movement, labor is probably more relevant today than at the beginning of the Lane Kirland period in the late 70s, when labor was twice as large. Double the union strength back then couldn't stop the rise of Reagan, while that "shrinking" labor movement has helped contribute to a mass anti-globalization movement, supported the antiwar movement, built a movement against Wal-Mart and has built broader labor-community alliances today than existed a generation ag0.
The percentage of workers formally organized is a relevant number, but it's not unreasonable to argue that a far larger percentage of the existing members are actually mobilized through unions today than a generation ago when unions had larger nominal memberships but less activist energy.
Nathan Newman