That is not necessarily jack-booted fascism but could be, at least at this one location, closer to forced labor than propagandists would like to admit.
DC On Mon, Jan 26, 2009 at 12:13 PM, Doug Henwood <dhenwood at panix.com> wrote:
>
> On Jan 26, 2009, at 2:50 PM, James Heartfield wrote:
>
> But the International Council Correspondence for March 1935, page 8,
>> reports, for example that rebellious boys in the South Mountain Reservation,
>> in New Jersey were put under military discipline by one Captain Tobin, and
>> the mutineers expelled.
>>
>
> By god, proof that the New Deal was just fascism in drag!
>
> Here are a couple of reports from the capitalist hyena press. The NYT says
> they were kicked out of the CCC because they didn't want to go to bed at 11
> and give up their nightly carousing!!!!
>
> Doug
>
> ----
>
> <http://www.geocities.com/cccpapers/1281mut.html>
>
> Mutiny at West Orange
> Company 1281, Camp SP-7, South Mountain Reservation, West Orange, New
> Jersey
>
> On January 8th, 1935, 125 of the men of Company 1281, working in the South
> Mountain Reservation, went out on Strike, refusing to work due to a prior
> food complaint and dissatisfaction with the 11 o'clock bedtime. What
> happened next was best told by the New York Times which had two articles on
> the incident on January 9th and 10th. These articles are set forth below.
>
> 125 at CCC Camp Rebel at Curfew
>
> From the New York Times January 9 and 10, 1935
>
> Police Called to Escort them from West Orange Quarters When they Refuse to
> Work
>
> Court Martial Expells 14
>
> Others Fined, Agree to Obey 11 P.M. Bedtime Rule They Said Curbed Social
> Life
>
> Special to the New York Times
>
> West Orange, Jan 8. - Rebellion stirred the ranks of CCC camp 1281 up on
> South Mountain Reservation today and 125 of the 200 youths there were
> expelled by Captain James Tobin. They had told the captain, "No 11 o'clock
> bedtime hour or we won't work." So the captain turned them out.
>
> The youths made a sortie into West Orange and Orange, conducted by Essex
> County Park and local police. They met Mayor William P. Morse, emmissary
> dispatched from Army Headquarters at Governor's Island. The major told them
> to "go back to school" and back they marched.
>
> Summary court-martial proceedings were held on their return. Fourteen
> "ringleaders" were definitelt expelled. The other mutineers, fined from $1
> to $3, returned to work. The mutiny was over and 11 o'clock remained as the
> bed-time hour.
>
> Interfered With Social Life
>
> Virtually all the recruits in the camp are from Essex County and they
> have found the 11 o'clock retiring hour, which is a general rule in all CCC
> camps, an unreasonable interference with their evening social activities. So
> when they returned Sunday night, after being away since Friday, they
> protested to Captain Tobin at midnight. They were told they needed eight
> hours sleep to do eight hours' work.
>
> Bright and early this morning, however, Captain Tobin was met by a
> delegation who delivered the ultimatum. The captain delivered his, and when
> the 125 refused to work he called in the park and West Orange police.
> Without disturbance the mutineers were escorted two and a half miles down
> the mountain. At the Orange line they were met by police of that community.
> In front of the Central School on Main Street they decided to sent a
> committee to the local newspapers with their story.
>
> The committee of three declared protests against the food were made early
> last week and then the 11 o'clock rule was protested. Captain Tobin, they
> said, threatened to discipline them by sending them to bed at 10.
>
> The group went on to the Orange armory and there Major Morse showed up.
> They asked to use the armory for shelter, but the Major said it was a State
> building and he had no jurisdiction. Then he left.
>
> Advised to Return to Camp.
>
> Straggling back to West Orange, they again encountered Major Morse, who
> addressed them from the curb. He told them to regard the camp not as a place
> to earn money but as a school, and to keep the regulations. He advised them
> to go back, but warned them they would be court-martialed and the leaders
> expelled.
>
> Back to camp they trudged. The court-martial was snappy. Twelve were
> expelled as leaders. The others were fined $3, or three days pay. Later two
> more were expelled, and the fine was changed to $1 for youths in the camp a
> month or less and $3 for those who had been there longer.
>
> Those turned out as ringleaders were William J. Crosby, Patrick
> D'Allessio and Joseph Leone of West Orange, Sigmund D'Allessandro, John
> Porelli, Anthony Pice and Francis Clark of Belleville, George B. Pasopone,
> Joseph Squilacioti, Robert Tulloch and Albert Brennan of East Orange, Paul
> Dely and William Nemith of Roseland and Patrick Fritez of Orange.
>
> Not far from Camp 1281 is Camp 234. The 200 workers there continued at
> their tasks of reforestation and building new roads and bridle paths
> undisturbed.
>
> At Governor's Island Colonel Albert S. Williams, commanding officer at
> Fort Jay and district commander of the CCC, said: "They're all good boys -
> they're like school boys."
>
> 27 More CCC Men Dropped In Strike
>
> 11 to lose Back Pay, 16 Will Get Wages on Release and Rest of 125 Are
> Fined.
>
> Special to the New York Times.
>
> WEST ORANGE, N.J., Jan. 9 - The final chapter of the short-lived rebellion
> at Civilian Conservation Camp 1,281 was written here today when Captain
> James Tobin, in charge of the camp, signed an order that added eleven
> members of the camp to the list of thise dismissed and gave sixteen others
> administrative discharges.
>
> One hundred and twenty-five members of the 200 in the camp, on the South
> Mountain Reservation here, participated yesterday in the rebellion when
> Captain Tobin refused to accede to their demands to lift the 11 o'clock
> curfew rule. On the advice of Major William P. Morse, sent here from Second
> Corps Headquarters on Governor's Island, the strikers returned to the camp,
> from which they had been ordered by Captain Tobin, to stand trial at a
> court-martial.
>
> As a result of the proceedings, fourteen men were discharged yesterday.
> An investigation continued last night by Captain Tobin added the eleven
> others today and the sixteen who received administrative discharges.
>
> Captain Tobin explained that the men discharged outright were compelled
> to forfeit all back pay. Those who received administrative discharges will
> get their back pay when released from camp. The rest of the participants in
> the strike were fined from $1 to $3 and allowed to go back to work.
>
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