ATDDTA (6) 178-179

[robinlandseadel at comcast.net]

              bekah:
              178:9
	 
              "Here's what you do," suggested Tansy Wagwheel...,   "It's 
              in this wonderful book I keep close to me all the time, 'A Modern 
              Christian's Guide to Moral Perplexities.'  Right here on page 
              eighty-six, is your answer. Do you have your pencil? Good, write 
              this down--'Dynamite Them All, and Let Jesus Sort Them Out.'"

              I looooove that.   LOLOL!

You did, of course, pick up on that "page eighty-six"?

My stepmom worked for the UAW AFL/CIO, we had LPs from the AFL/CIO with lots of 
worker's and activist's songs from all eras. "Which Side Are You On?" seems 
particularly pertinant, as it shows how far polarized the workers and the bosses 
were from each other.

              In 1931, coal miners in Harlan County were on 
              strike. Armed company deputies roamed the 
              countryside, terrorizing the mining communities, 
              looking for union leaders to beat, jail, or kill. But 
              coal miners, brought up lean and hard in the 
              Kentucky mountain country, knew how to fight 
              back, and heads were bashed and bullets fired 
              on both sides in Bloody Harlan.
              It was this kind of class war -- the mine owners 
              and their hired deputies on one side, and the 
              independent, free-wheeling Kentucky coal-miners 
              on the other -- that provided the climate for 
              Florence Reece's "Which Side Are You On?" 
              In it she captured the spirit of her times with 
              blunt eloquence.

              Mrs. Reece wrote from personal experience. 
              Her husband, Sam, was one of the union leaders, 
              and Sheriff J. H. Blair and his men came to her 
              house in search of him when she was alone with 
              her seven children. They ransacked the whole 
              house and then kept watch outside, ready to shoot 
              Sam down if he returned.

              One day during this tense period Mrs. Reece tore a 
              sheet from a wall calendar and wrote the words to 
              "Which Side Are You On?" The simple form of the 
              song made it easy to adapt for use in other strikes, 
              and many different versions have circulated.


              Come all you good workers,
              Good news to you I'll tell
              Of how the good old union
              Has come in here to dwell.
              CHORUS:
              Which side are you on?
              Which side are you on?
              Which side are you on?
              Which side are you on?
              My dady was a miner,
              And I'm a miner's son,
              And I'll stick with the union
              'Til every battle's won.
              They say in Harlan County
              There are no neutrals there.
              You'll either be a union man
              Or a thug for J. H. Blair.

              Oh workers can you stand it?
              Oh tell me how you can?
              Will you be a lousy scab
              Or will you be a man?

              Don't scab for the bosses,
              Don't listen to their lies.
              Us poor folks haven't got a chance
              Unless we organize.

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