Corruption Exposed: The Rise and the Fall of the Molly Maguires

Title: Corruption Exposed: The Rise and the Fall of the Molly Maguires

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Transcript URL: https://share.descript.com/view/j65pqEY904M

Description: Join us again, as we talk Friend of Ours, Joe Pascone of the Turning Tides History Podcast about the Molly Maguires. In this episode, we will wrap up the story of the Mollys and the transition of labor relations and unions in the Gilded Age into the Industrial Era.

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#OrganizedCrime #MollyMaguires #CivilWarHistory #CorruptionExposed"

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Begin Transcript:

[00:00:00] Welcome to Organized Crime and Punishment, the best spot in town to hang out and talk about history and crime. With your hosts, Steve and Mustache Chris.

Now that we've gone through that whole story with the, the Molly Maguires, and we've gone through so much of it with the Civil War, what was, Joe, what was the aftermath of the Civil War? How did that play out for this group of labor organizers and people and, you know, culture and everything? So, the Civil War, far from it being like this time of like, you know, there's this idea that after the Civil War, the country, everyone got [00:01:00] together, all the bad blood was kind of shed already, and only John Wilkes Booth really had a problem with what was going on and his conspirators.

It's not really the case. In reality. There were huge, violent ramifications throughout the entire nation, not just with the start of Reconstruction. You saw the rise of the Ku Klux Klan and the Knight Riders in places like the South. Uh, and in the Anthracite region, you see serious reaction and hostility.

These people, they argued for years that the Constitution should stay the same as it was, and the Union should stay the same as it was. That was no longer the case. Everything was turned on its head. And the entire economy basically contracted, uh, not just in America, across the entire planet. I cover Puerto Rico.

The economy there completely falls off a cliff because for a long time, Puerto Rico was supplementing the cotton that was not being grown and exported from the [00:02:00] United States, or the Southern United States. Uh, so you see this huge contraction and it affects these miners specifically because with the leaving of these federal troops, uh, with the nosedive of, of needs to market, uh, the entire economy sputters and a bunch of people are left out on the streets.

Uh, this, that means that a lot of people turn to highway robbery. They turn to things like, uh, bushwhackings of miners and stuff. And they turn to labor unrest, uh, some of the more moderate of them, I suppose, or the least violent. They turn to labor unrest, they try to start strikes. These strikes are usually not successful.

There's a very long one in 1865, where coal executives planned a 33 percent pay cut. Uh, and so to dispatch this, uh, or to end this labor unrest, the government [00:03:00] dispatches troops, like, right away, almost immediately following the Civil War, May 1865. Uh, so the troops are there. They do such a good job that co executives come up with a new excuse for another Pennsylvania militia unit to be stationed there.

The rest of the summer of 1865, um, in one of the more hilarious, uh, newspaper articles of all time, the Lebanon advertisers talking about the supposed uprising, and this is very tongue in cheek. They say several thousand have been killed. The Irish are murdering everybody. The country in general, and the streets of Pottsville in particular are crowded with blood thirsty miners who kill all but Irishmen.

So at this point. A lot of this, I think that goes to show that newspaper clipping right there. A lot of this, these arguments against labor uprisings have become kind of hashed out and people are experiencing a [00:04:00] general sort of weariness against labor agitation. And, but the, but the bosses. Don't seem to mind this.

This is how this guy, Franklin Gowan, comes into the picture. Gowan was, uh, I spoke about him in the first few parts here. He was born an Ulsterman, a Protestant Ulsterman. He was sent to a Catholic college because his father was incredibly, uh, he was for religious tolerance and liberation. And he's brought in as a lawyer for these coal executives because they need a legal excuse to bring in troops.

Uh, this starts his involvement in the coal region, and this starts his involvement with the railroads and, and with the whole. Um, the whole economy in the area in general, and he's ends up being 1 of the biggest players in the story to come. Uh, so almost right away. The, the fury [00:05:00] over these troops. pretty substantial.

A bunch of people get killed. There's a guy, Peter Monaghan. He's killed in a fight with, er, sorry, uh, Peter Monaghan gets into a fight with this guy, Tom Barrett. Barrett gets thrown in jail and he gets killed by guards, supposedly. Uh, thanks to the military occupation, the strike pretty much peters out. So, uh, the miners were saying, we'll accept 10 to 15 percent pay cut, not the 33.

Just just let us go back to work. We're all starving. You know, our families are going hungry. Co executives. They say, no, we're going to see this out to the end. Uh, the strike collapses people begrudgingly go back to work. Families are evicted. Uh. They're forced to move, they're forced to go all over the place.

In one of the most famous examples, a lot of these people who we consider Molly Maguires are part of the larger Irish community in Pennsylvania. They actually drift north to Canada and they take part in the Fenian raids. Uh, [00:06:00] Chris, I don't, I don't know if you want to talk about that. No, no, it's such a weird, crazy part of history.

These were Irish Americans who invaded Canada to protest, uh, the treatment of Ireland in, in, in the British empire is a hilarious scene. There's something like 400 different, um, you know, Irish militant nationalists who were full on invading Canada, and both countries had to get together to try and put down this, this strange movement.

It's one of the craziest parts of history. I read about it. I was like, what? Canada was still under the British Empire at that point. Now that you mention it, I, yeah, we didn't declare our independence until like, uh, much later. Um, yeah, now that you mention it, I do. Vaguely remember it. So this kind of reminds, I don't, you guys probably wouldn't know this, but this was like, 10 years ago.

It was a long time ago. I can't remember. And there were Tamils were [00:07:00] protesting what was going on in Sri Lanka, and they shut down a bunch of highways and then they People up here in Canada are like, what's going on here? Like, I don't understand. Like, do you know what, like, why would a Canadian need to know what's, you know, about the conflict that's going on in Sri Lanka, right?

And that's just one of those moments where you go like, I don't understand why they're shutting down the highways. Yeah, this, in this case, it's even. More egregious than that, these people are arming themselves and, and, you know, they kill something like 50 British soldiers in the whole war. It's a really, it's a really crazy thing that happened.

And by the end, there's only like 70. They were hardcore veterans, Civil War veterans, a lot of them. Like, it wasn't just a joke, a couple of mummers. Walk across the border and start, you know, shooting at people. That was a real thing. And wasn't it initially the U. S. government was kind of like, wink, wink.

And then, like, they realized they had to get on [00:08:00] it. I'm sure there must have been something like that. Because at the same time Because they allow it to happen. Yeah, you let 400 armed Irishmen walk across the border. I understand that border security probably wasn't on par is what it is today. But still, that's a pretty egregious thing.

I mean, they wouldn't let 400 people, they wouldn't let 400 armed Irishmen, you know, walk down the street in, in, in Philadelphia in the same time period. Well, what made it crazier is that they, uh, I think they staged off of an island in, um, the Niagara River, if I'm not mistaken. So they were allowed enough to, like you say, 400 Irishman stage and an island.

So they had to have had a lot of boats to get there and then a lot of boats to get to the other side. So there was a, there must've been somebody who was like, you know, let's take a little pot shot at the British, you know, now that the war's over. That's hilarious. Yeah, it's such a crazy part of history.

Uh, and Chris, you wanted to say something? [00:09:00] No, it's just like, I find like, just from reading a little bit of this story, it's a lot of like, oh, like how, like mistreated the Irish were, and there's a lot of that, right? But you see stuff like this and say you're like Anglo Protestant stock, your family's lived here a couple of generations and you see this and you're just like, we didn't have these problems.

And so, you know what I mean? Like, it's understandable, Regal. Like, is this, I don't know, is this something that we really want and, um, we're doing a series on, like, Italian immigration and stuff like that. And when people like Madison, like, Madison Grant was like a, was a super hardcore racist, right? Like, he had, like, racialist arguments for it, but I could understand a general perspective going, like.

Maybe we can just slow it down. Yeah. And I mean, you can make the same argument against like American revolutionaries in the 1770s. You're like, what? Cause you're paying, you're not, you're paying too many taxes. What are you talking about? You don't even pay that much compared to the rest of the British empire.

I mean, and the same [00:10:00] thing in Puerto Rico too. They were like, you can't tax us. How dare you? It was like, but. We're just taxing you the same amount that we're taxing everyone else in our country. So it's that strange dichotomy. I mean, it's, it's the upper versus the lower, and that's the, that's a constant struggle between the two.

And I think that really applies with the Molly Maguires because you think about it. After the civil war, there was a lot of, well, the, during the war, there was inflation and so they had to raise the end because of all the need for the more coal and more stuff like that. So the wages went up, but then when deflationary pressures come in.

Wages should naturally go down. So they had to fight to get the wages to go up during the inflationary times. And then, well, now our wages are like this, who wants to take a cut, even though the, you know, like the macroeconomic situation saying that price. This should go down. I mean, we're going through that same thing.

Now, wages aren't [00:11:00] keeping up with inflation and people want raises to keep up with inflation. But eventually inflation will settle down and who wants to have their, their wages go down once they're at a certain level to keep up with that. I mean, that's like classic Keynesian sticky wages, but it's more than just a theory when it's happening to you.

So you can really see how these. You know, these, uh, workers, you know, they're getting basically screwed on both ends of that. Yeah. Even today. Uh, I mean, I'll talk about this later, the coal mining situation in America. It's a pretty egregious the way the company or the country deals with with coal miners.

Uh, uh, I'm thinking of, I've just I'm researching right now about the, the Harlan county wars in the 1930s in this country. Basically, short story short, uh, miners in Kentucky were trying to unionize. It was [00:12:00] resisted violently by coal operators and local police forces. Uh, and by the end, we're talking like, 2011.

Um, the union succeeds, but Barack Obama passes a bunch of, uh, environmental legislation to counteract the effects of dirty coal, because coal is the dirtiest, uh, beyond anything that you can burn. It's the dirtiest. So there were. Logical steps taken to prevent, uh, coal mining to continue production. But this left the coal miners completely out in the snow.

I think, I mean, there's so much work being done toward marijuana legalization and the first people who get the first crack at a lot of these marijuana postings or jobs or whatever are people who were formerly incarcerated for marijuana charges. So I think it would be a good idea if. When any of this new green legislation comes forward, the first people who really benefit from it should be these coal miners who are completely [00:13:00] left in the dark.

It's not like, uh, their company just has to declare bankruptcy and they can go back, you know, they can go back to their moderately well off lives. The coal miners completely left in the dark. They're left with no money. And in some cases, they were actually forced, were forced to mine for no pay. And they, they stood on the tracks like these Sri Lankans did in Canada of the, of the railroad.

So the, the. Coal that they picked, which was basically using enslaved labor wouldn't be sent away. They wanted to be paid for the, the things that they did. And this is the same thing here. I mean, uh, as far as we've come, there's always farther we can go. And this just shows the level of egregiousness that it could be at first where it is now.

Not that there aren't problems. I just. I think I showed one right there. Coal miners who haven't done anything wrong. They're not trying to destroy the planet. They're not trying to raise sea levels. Not actively, they're just trying to bring home food for their kids and family. [00:14:00] But because of the situation they find themselves in, they're given the short end of the stick, like you were saying, Stephen.

But what do you guys think of that? Do you think that that's a pretty fair assessment with every environmental You know, in environment, green, new deal, whatever that gets passed. Uh, the 1st people who benefit, I think, should be these coal miners and the people who are getting the short end of the stick.

And in all these cases, it was like, when they did the industrialization and Canada and the United States, um, I mean, we can argue whether that was a good idea or not a good idea to switch over to more of a service economy. And, uh. I have my own opinions on that problem is like a lot of the so when they closed a lot of these factories down, I mean, you can pull up the articles.

It's a meme now, but literally a lot of these people thought, like, the people that were working in these factories, we're going to learn how to use computers, or they're going to be coders, or they were going to do this or that. And like, Yeah, if you're in a think tank and you're talking about [00:15:00] people like they're interchangeable, it sounds like a good idea, but the reality is, like, I am assuming a lot of these guys that are working in coal mines, yeah, maybe the managers and stuff like that, slightly different, but the guys that are actually, you know, mining the coal.

They're not going to be working on computers and stuff like that. And I mean, in a humane way, you have to find them something else to do. You just, you have to, right? Otherwise you have what happened in Pittsburgh. You have what happened in all these towns that, uh, became deindustrialized. They, they become hell on earth.

I mean, look at Detroit. It's going to be interesting to see what this trend, because I mean, yeah, it's been since like the, since the seventies and the deindustrialization has hurt really, uh, I mean, I guess you would say more unskilled labor, but now like we're getting into chat GPT and all these things that you can write code in chat GPT that would take 20 coders.

A week to [00:16:00] do, and these AI programs are doing it better and an hour or less. I mean, it's so now that it's creeping into the, like the next rung of skilled labor that has not, that has not been affected by these, these trends. I wonder what's going to happen with that. I mean, so many fields are going to be disrupted through.

AI and things like that in HR and in accounting where they're just not going to need people, you know, armies of people. And it's going to be interesting to see when it creeps into the, to zoomers getting affected by, by all of these trends, you know, what's going to happen to the, to that, to people who, I mean, arguably probably for one reason or another, I have a lot more voice in society.

You know, what's going to happen when they're, I mean, we're, we're starting to see the trends, like job numbers. Most of the, the [00:17:00] increase in jobs has been in the service economy on the lower end of the pay scale. But the, the number of people who are in the 100, 000 job range that are getting laid off, it's like 30%.

It's huge. Wow. Yeah. It's definitely a problem because I mean, I don't need to tell anyone. The historical, uh, parallels to the situation that we're in where people are making or being employed at at bad jobs, and they're forced to get more jobs to make ends meet and, uh, either they run to the far left or the far right.

There's there's really no in between, and they sort of the government sort of forcing the situation on on people. And that's really that's really not okay. I think that before anything, more democracy is what's needed. Uh, in the government and in the workplace and in everyday life. I don't think that there's really a point where democracy can really fail.

If anyone, if [00:18:00] everyone has an opinion, everyone should be allowed to express it. That's just me. Yeah, that definitely opens up a huge, a huge, uh, discussion. Steve here. We are a member of the Parthenon Podcast Network, featuring great shows like Richard Lim's This American President and other great shows.

Go to ParthenonPodcast. com to learn more, and here is a quick word from our sponsors. Yeah, you guys are, you guys are talking about AI and like, you know, like robotics and stuff like that slowly taking away a lot of these jobs. I mean, another repercussion, I think people, um aren't taking into account is physical labor.

I'm not talking about the stuff that the time period that we're talking about in terms of the minors, you know, like the black cloth and the horrible working conditions. And I mean, that was not right, obviously, right? It was extremely bad, but physical labor in terms of just, you know, physically working a [00:19:00] job.

Now, I'm not saying that, uh, people have to do this, uh, for their entire lives. This is. I don't know. It's kind of basically what I do for work, but I think once that's kind of not there, it's not going to be good, especially for men, to be quite honest with you. I think they should, every man should have to work a physical job at one point in their life, just to kind of understand, um, if you think you have it bad at your job, you know, it beats throwing coal in the crate and lugging it up a hill.

You know, like, it really does. I think it has like kind of a leveling effect. It's either you can do the job or you can't do the job. Right? Um, I just think that's something that's, I don't know, people aren't talking about and I don't know, people say it, I don't know, they see it as a liberation and go, I'm liberated from the, uh, you know, the toils of hard labor, but a hard, hard labor in and of itself, I think is a good quality.

And I was thinking too, like that, that connects back to the Molly Maguire's and like this, uh, [00:20:00] conflict between labor and management, like, think about it to the, you know, over the past, the, the de industrialization of the seventies, the eighties, the nineties, and even to the two thousands, like all the people who lost their jobs, are they going to really.

That now the, the managerial class and the coders and the, the accountants and the HR that they're losing their jobs now, like that class distinction has been set up now and they're not going to really care and there's not going to be a lot of room for, uh, forming alliances because they're going to be like, yeah, you made, uh, you know, six figures for all these times while I was, uh, you know, For a gen, two generations now, people have had no jobs, you know, so I think a lot of conflict is going to be coming up and a lot of that conflict really played out in the 1870s where there was such a massive change in the [00:21:00] way the economy worked.

Yeah, definitely. And speaking of the 1870s, uh. Uh, the thing like the Paris Commune just happened, 1870. The Communards rose in Paris, and something like 20, 000 to 100, 000 Parisians were butchered in the street by a reactionary French government. Uh, and this became The the synonymous calling card for all forms of agitation.

They blame the great fire in Chicago on on communards. They, they, they compared the, the Sioux nation, which was fighting their last rebellion in the, in the plains of Dakota and, and, and stuff to, to the reds. They were like, these were the first and that's, it works out that they were literally red men.

That's what the, the, at least journalists and everything called them. Uh, and they were like, this is red society in America, and we need to stop this out. So Americanism can start to flourish again. And that was how this whole, [00:22:00] uh, uh, scenario was sort of, uh, Uh, placed in and and throughout the late 1860s, uh, early 1870s, the Molly Maguires were very active.

So there's a guy, David Muir. He's killed. He shot through the heart and he stabbed repeatedly. There's this guy, William Pollack. He's on the road with his kid. Uh, he gets bushwhacked, uh, uh, he gets shot in the back, but somehow he's managed to, he manages to turn on his attacker and during their hand to hand struggle, his son is just like pummeling this dude over the face with a horse whip, uh, who's only 14 years old.

So, so good on that kid. He was, uh, seemingly raised pretty well that he was able to defend him and his father in that situation. Um, so following that, yeah. There was a period of calm. This is because there were no major peasant holidays in between. So the 2nd, December starts up. Boom. There's another killing.

Uh, a company store was ransacked. Uh, Philip Warren's [00:23:00] his house was ransacked to his wife was held at gunpoint terrorized. 1866, same exact thing. It's more of the same. The, uh, on April 2nd, two strangers, complete strangers arrive in Mahoy Township, and they shoot a mine owner's son in the face. This kid, uh, or I assume young adult.

I'm not sure how old he was. He manages to stay alive. And he, he fights off these two and one of them gets killed in the, in the melee. Uh, this shows pretty clearly that Mali's were working across county lines. They would travel north and south across county, uh, territory and commit hits based on, you know, what this guy said about this mine operator or what this member said about this company store.

Uh, and this is how things happen for a lot. So, to counteract this, the Pennsylvania state legislature goes to an unprecedented, uh, uh, uh, new level. They give [00:24:00] private military powers to the coal executives and they create the coal and iron police. This, um, as you might expect, uh, was not a very, uh, good institution.

They mostly targeted people for labor agitation of any kind. I mean, maybe some of the people they arrested were genuinely. Awful people, and that's definitely possible. Uh, but for the most part, a good portion of the people they went for were, you know, community men about town who had a voice who weren't going to be cowed by, you know, the coal executives and what they wanted.

Um, uh, this was compared at the time to feudal retainers. So who, who, I mean, today, who knows what it would have been compared to? I mean, it probably would have been compared to is the Wagner group, which is what we talked about a little bit before, and it goes a step further. The guy, uh, what Mark Bullock, he says, basically.[00:25:00]

That there was a colonized island in the midst of the Pennsylvania Commonwealth. So, uh, they've given up all forms of control. Um, so for months, as these strikes go on, the, the companies just keep the mines open. They're like, we're going to keep the mines open. We're going to get rid of the worst. And we're going to bring in new people.

We're going to bring in people from England and Wales. When they bring in these miners, they're also complaining about, you know, rigorous work schedule, lack of pay, you know, no pay for putting up beams of protection, et cetera, et cetera. Um, and they're like, what's the problem? So, eventually the coal operators just go broke.

They run out of money. And this sort of opens the door for this guy Gowan to come in, uh, before he's able to come in and take over everything, a union rises. This is one of the first, uh, major mining unions, especially in the state of Pennsylvania. This was the WBA or the Workmen's Benevolence [00:26:00] Association.

Um, it was headed by an Irish miner named John Siney. He only recently moved to America. He immigrated from England, uh, born in, in, in County Leash. He was, he immigrated to England and then he immigrated once more to America in 1863. And this was a clear sign that things were changing for the Irish community in Pennsylvania and the country at large.

It wasn't just some Irish thing anymore. The WBA was, uh, incredible in the fact that it allowed all nationalities to participate. Uh, any kind of person can join this, uh, Workmen's Society and, and receive, um, benefits through it or support. Um, with the rise of the WBA, you see immediately Molly Maguire killings fall off a cliff.

In four years, there were two. Uh, that's almost unheard of. Every other year we've talked about so far, there's been at least 10, uh, if not more, [00:27:00] uh, uh, uh, uh, MALDI related killings. So what does this say? I think this says, and uh, when we talked earlier in, in our first part, uh, Chris was asking, what's the point of all this?

I don't, I don't get it. I don't know. I don't know where to, what to make of this. I think what to make of it is that when, when this union came, violence fell off a cliff. And when unions spring up in anywhere across the planet, violence, especially labor related violence, falls off a cliff. That's not to say there aren't, uh, places where corruption can sneak in and organized crime can take over.

I mean, my grandfather was a teamster under Hoffa. So he, I know full well about the many abuses that could take place when unions are given too much power. But if you treat them as equal. Uh, equal institutions, equal associations. You see, uh, violence fall off a cliff. Uh, any country, you can name it. Uh, [00:28:00] violence has fallen off dramatically once union rights are preeminent in the, the state's thinking.

Talk about a place like Italy. In the 1890s, the, the Fasci movement was huge and they were these violent agitators, much like the Molly Maguire movement. Um. And what happens after they're crushed violently by this guy? Crispy, uh, new prime minister comes in. He allows the right to strike. He allows unions the right to organize.

He allows collective bargaining and instantaneously wages go up. The livelihoods of people go up and the economy flourishes, not just flourishes. I'm talking about Italy has the second highest growth rate prior to World War I than Japan. Every other country, it outpaces. It outpaces Great Britain, it outpaces France, even the United States.

Uh, there's not a more powerful, uh, economy besides Japan who's going through the Meiji Restoration at this time. So this to me is the [00:29:00] point. I think union rights, when they're introduced, They mitigate violence on a huge scale, but what do you guys think? Oh, I was going to say, like, you brought up, I mean, the problems with the unions.

I mean, one big part of our show, really, uh, Organized Crime and Punishment, is talking about organized crime and unions and the corruption that it can breed, right? Um But you, but at the same time, like, if you know you're dealing with, say, characters, say, from the mafia, I'm just going to use this as an example, you're less likely to screw around.

Are you not? I don't, that's, uh, because you don't know who's going to be knocking on your door, right? Um, but in terms of like, say, like the owners and say, union reps being able to communicate with one another, um, better if, uh, the unions have a bit, uh, more power. Yeah. I would generally agree with that. I mean, I'm not, I'm not the, I don't know, like, I didn't grow up with, like, the Teamsters Union and stuff like that.

[00:30:00] Right? So, like, I have, like, an interesting, I don't know. I don't know how exactly how to feel about unions because, like, I hear sometimes, like, You know, somebody joins the union and then I hear what they're getting paid in terms of what, uh, he's like somebody at work mentioned their, their husband's like a carpenter or something, or he's doing, I don't know, something.

He's in the union and they're paying, um, I think it's like 70 an hour. And I go, I don't think that's sustainable. You know what I mean? Like, I just, I don't think that's, you know what I mean? Like, long term, I don't think that wage is sustainable. I know up here in Oshawa, where I currently am right now, there's a big GM plant, and they basically shut the entire plant down for, I believe it was 2 years to basically get all the old workers out.

And then they brought it back up. Then they opened it up again, and I think they're making a truck and 1 other vehicle out of there and they brought all new workers. And I mean, 1 of the reasons that they got rid of all the old workers, you had guys that have been working there for, you know, 30 [00:31:00] years, right?

And literally their job is to, like, say, put the tires on the car when it's going through the assembly line. And some of these guys were making close to 50 an hour. And I go, I don't know. You can't. Run a profitable pro plant at those wages, only a few dollars, not more than three or four dollars a day. And they weren't even paid based on like rate age or wages or anything.

They were paid on tonnage. So it depended on how much coal you literally. Mind and of course, every single dynamite charge you use to displace call that was taken out of your paycheck. You broke a piece of equipment that was taken out of your paycheck. You, you, you know, your thing went off on your headlamp.

You had to replace that. That's coming out of your paycheck at the end of the week. And this is in the movie, this is one of the best scenes in the entire movie. Uh, he's getting his paycheck. And the guy in the nice suit is saying, You used three things of, uh, dynamite. You had to replace, [00:32:00] uh, a wick on your thing.

And you have, um, you had to replace a bunch of boards. Here's 23 cents for the whole week. And that was literally all the money he made and and Richard Harris is just there staring at him like stunned. Like, what are you talking about? And this was a whole lineup of people that have to just sit there and bear all these expenses that they shouldn't have even been charged.

I mean, realistically, this should have come out of the company's paycheck at least. I think that's at least a little bit fair. They're forced to come home with 23 cents or in some cases. Oh, I don't know. The place that they work at. Well, yeah, I mean, it's it's circumstances like that, where you look at it and go, like, organized labor in terms of fighting against some of these injustices.

It makes sense, right? Um, it more so my commentary is kind of like how modern unions are kind of running. And I just use the wages as an example. And people, I don't know, people will say, like, push [00:33:00] back and say, well, you're like a bootlicker or something like that. But I think they just think objectively, you know, like, you can't.

Yeah. It's not sustainable to be paying a guy, you know, 55 an hour just because he happened to work there for 30 years to put a tire on a car. It's just not, the company can't be profitable. And at the end of the day, like it, it has to be like a symbiotic relationship, right? They can't be just all about the workers and it can't be all just about the owners.

It really has to work together because if the owners are not making a profit. Right? How can they justify keeping the workers and vice versa, right? This is what happened in England with the, uh, the miners there and Margaret Thatcher, right? People can say whatever they want about Margaret Thatcher, but the, um, coal miners in England at the time, these were not profitable endeavors.

They just weren't. And regardless of whether you think what she did was right or not right, you know. Because I have a lot of respect for her because she decided on a course of action and she stuck to it, you know, and that's [00:34:00] an example of where it becomes way too much in one direction. Really at the end of the day, and people talked a lot about this throughout history, right?

You want to have like a symbiotic relationship kind of where like the owners are respecting the workers and the workers are respecting the company. Yeah, I really, it really boils down to it when there's an imbalance in the labor market, those people, the, the workers in those Pennsylvania coal towns, there's nowhere for them to go.

It's not like they could pick up and go to the next company. So the company really did have them over the barrel. But then when it, like Chris was saying, when things get out of balance in the other way. And labor has so much power over the companies, then the companies wind up folding because they can't pay those, those wages, do those imbalances just have to work them out and they suck at the time that it's either going to, it's going to be bad for.

Everybody at some [00:35:00] point when those labor, when labor versus management breaks down, but eventually it's going to work itself out. Like, I think almost we want, like, we want everything to run smoothly, but sometimes it just doesn't. And I mean, I keep bringing it back to how things now with the industrialization.

Yeah, it's 40 years and it's, it's really crushed, like in a lot of places, two generations, but in the grand scope of things is 40 years, a long time. As far as historical trends go, it's really, really bad for individuals on the micro scale, but in the macro scale, that's just how these things work out. Yeah, but, and that's obviously no consolation for someone who's just working and it's like, wow, I, I have to work three jobs just to get my kids into like a decent school or something, you know, uh, uh.

Like you were saying today, huge change in the market, huge change in the way America makes money. Now we're mostly a service, [00:36:00] uh, uh, service style economy where previously we were industrialized. Uh, I'm in the process of actually researching vociferously for, um, uh, uh, the ninth, my 1930s episode. It's going to cover the thirties, forties.

Um, and there is exactly like what you were talking about, Steve, where labor is given too much power, not out of, you know, like a shifty sort of double dealing kind of way, but genuinely, they were trying to give workers power. But what ended up happening, and FDR readily admitted to this, uh, America became a cartel economy.

These unions became cartels. And the companies that served them became sort of like, uh, the drug fiends. So the, the drug fiends would do anything possible to keep the cartels happy. Which left the government happy, but this led to the massive recession of 1937, which was, which was a huge deal. I mean, [00:37:00] there were questions if FDR was even going to get reelected for his third term.

Uh, we don't think about it now, but it's a, it's a huge part of American history. And there was actually a very, uh, uh, well known, uh, uh, Sort of report a statistical analysis done. Uh, I'm just trying to remember who did it. I think it's UCLA, but he basically, this guy basically puts forward the argument that FDR prolonged the Great Depression through his interventionists economic policies.

That might be the case. I'm not arguing that that's either here or there. I'd suggest reading. The, the, the study, because it goes into way more detail than just that. Obviously, there's more than that. He makes a point to point out that toward the end of his presidency, FDR changed his mind on a lot of these things.

And a lot of these same, uh, ideas were shifted and, and, and changed to a more even middle keel sort of place. Um, but basically what ended up happening is, is like what I was saying, it [00:38:00] became a, a, a cartel and that's obviously not good. But it's obviously not good when, you know, private industry is given complete control over their employer.

Uh, and I think it helps to explain how organized labor and organized crime weren't actually the strange bedfellows. They actually, it actually made perfect sense. Just like how organized crime and law enforcement aren't strange bedfellows. It makes perfect sense. They work with each other. Constantly. I mean, it's a, it's a basic relationship.

It can be symbiotic. It can be incredibly detrimental. Steve here. We are a member of the Parthenon Podcast Network, featuring great shows like James Early's Key Battles of American History Podcast and many other great shows. Go over to ParthenonPodcast. com to learn more. And here is a quick word from our sponsors.[00:39:00]

You really do lay out, Joe, those two dichotomies of where, in the 1870s and in the earlier, earlier than that, where these corporations had so much control, and then it swings in the other direction. And I think that you really have to think about, like, hopefully people are looking at these things and trying to figure out, you know, what can we do?

To stop it from swinging so much because then when things do swing to such a degree, that's where, how you were saying earlier is that people either go to the extreme left or the extreme right or some sort of extreme that doesn't end well for everybody. Yeah, exactly. It's all about balance. It's all about middle ground.

I mean. Even the argument like, oh, I want a complete socialist economy. I want a complete capitalist economy. Those are completely unfeasible, uh, uh, uh, structures. You can't, I mean, even when Adam Smith was writing Wealth of Nations, he was writing it at, right at the start of, of the [00:40:00] Industrial Revolution in England.

So he needed, he was writing about something that was already passing him by. Same thing with Marx. He was writing about socialism from an early industrialized perspective. He wasn't writing about it in the future where, oh, the AI is going to take over people's jobs. He wasn't thinking about this. He was thinking about, like, sewing machines taking over people's jobs.

I mean, it, it's literally, that's literally the, this. Yeah, no, it's the truth. All right, people. I mean, it's good to read the original thinkers, obviously, right? Like, especially there's like a lot of people will claim like, oh, I'm a socialist or, you know, like, I'm a fascist or something. You're using, like, the, the 2 extreme rights and then you talk to these people and like, have you, did you.

Have you actually read Benito Mussolini's book? Like, did you actually read Karl Marx? I know for sure a lot of the times they're lying, because if you actually tried to sit and read Das Kapital, God bless you, I've tried. I got through some of [00:41:00] it. But it's, it's not a fun read at all. Look, Joe, now that we're moving into the 1870s, tell us a little bit more what was going on at that, uh, at that time.

So, through the whole early 1870s, you have this guy, Franklin Gowen. He's buying up everything. He's buying up the canal, which was the main, uh, exporter of coal previous to this. He's already been placed in charge of the, the Reading Pennsylvania Railroad. Um, and he's starting the process of buying out the legislature.

Super easy to do, you know, no problem. That this isn't the issue he's having. The issues he's having is with the union, the WBA, uh, which is now basically a statewide institution, has a lot of power, has a lot of, uh, I guess, progressive congressmen who are on their side, pro labor congressmen, whatever you want to call them.

Um, and he's buying up all this stuff. He's also trying to buy up all these [00:42:00] individually owned small, um, uh, businesses, but right before the 1870s, I should just mention this. There's this massive disaster, uh, massive mining disaster for the time. It was the deadliest in United States history. It's in 1869 at a place called Avondale in, uh, Luzerne County, Pennsylvania, uh, 110.

Uh, miners were trapped when a single shaft mine collapsed on them. Uh, they basically suffocated in the, in the collapse, like whole townships came to try and save the people still inside, but there was no hope. Um, uh, in, in response. Or, well, right before that, there was actually a safety bill in Pennsylvania state legislature that would have, uh, demanded a 2nd exit to your mind.

It would have demanded a safety instructor for your mind. It would have, uh, another 1 would have demanded, [00:43:00] uh. Fencing around an empty hole, for example, all of these were rejected by the state legislature. The guy who rejected it is this guy, Samuel G. Turner, who said, I can't only remember, but 1 instance where fire damp explosion has hurt a single minor.

So, because he can only remember the 1 time when it happened, he decided to, uh, Vote against this bill. Uh, basically his words are recounted. His life is in danger. Um, and he ends up passing a safety bill through the house. He loses right away. So at least democracy works a little bit, I guess. Um, at this time, the Mali's are basically underground.

I mean, they're letting the union do their thing. Their main face is the ancient order of hibernians. So that's what they're mainly doing. They're helping out Irish people in town. They're helping out, you know, Irish people in local politics because the Irish, they latch on to local politics, uh, very easily.

I mean, [00:44:00] they become sheriffs, they become mayors, they become. You know, state senators, et cetera, et cetera. And they have a huge avid base because Irishmen will always vote for fellow Irishmen, um, almost exclusively. Even this guy, Gowen, he's voted for exclusively by Irishmen during the Civil War. So, uh, 1870, Gowen, he's forced to sign a contract with the Union because rail unions are, uh, striking or, or threatening to strike in solidarity with the WBA.

He signs another one. And, but in the north anthracite fields, they're, um, they're still, uh, they're still under control of separate mining institutions. And these mining institutions are saying we're going to need to cut wages. So they strike against John Siney's wishes. Um, it was very effective, but this is when Gowan puts the hammer down.

He, he raises freight rates [00:45:00] 100%. He closes down the canal he just bought, and he starts buying up even more territory with these dummy companies. Um, by the end of 1874, he has 100, 000 acres of, of prime coal mining real estate. Uh, and, and this was basically in a single movement, he became like the kingpin.

Uh, and this basically crushes the strike. They agree to arbitration and they all begrudgingly, everyone begrudgingly returns to work. So, by 1873. Gowen is meeting with, he meets with Alan Pinkerton. Uh, I assume everyone knows the Pinkertons famous private detective agency. Uh, he he's famously also this guy, Alan Pinkerton, he delivered, um, information to the union on like military movements.

He claimed that like the Confederate army was like 200, 000 strong outside of Richmond and, and. This is what made George McClellan pee his pants [00:46:00] and, and run as fast as he could away from there. Uh, but he be, he's like this incredibly conservative, like, tough on crime. Like, he would get visibly, like, he would visibly shake when he heard about certain crimes.

Like, if he heard about, like, a, a really bad break in or something, he would become visibly angry and, like, red in the face. He was a real, like, crusader. Here's about this from Gowan almost right away. He's like, yes, let's stop this movement. We need to we need to end it where it's that where it where it is right now before it gets even worse.

He fingers, uh, uh, 1 of his detectives guy named, uh, James McParland. He, um, this guy is an Irish Catholic from Ulster, so he fits the part perfectly. Uh, and his job is to go undercover into school, kill county infiltrate the Molly McGuire movement. Uh, report on any crimes or anything committed and and through this investigation, uh, he will end up bringing [00:47:00] down the Molly Maguires.

So he arrives in October 27th, 1873. He showed up. He said he was an itinerant Irish worker. He was just on the lamb and he was accused of murder. Supposedly got into a fight with this guy and that was his cover story. He's almost discovered like right away. The second he shows up in, in, in school, kill.

He's almost discovered by, uh, uh, uh, a barman who I assume knew him, uh, from, uh, you know, time previous, he gets off Scott free there. He meets up with the body master of, uh, I forget what County it is. But he, he meets up with this guy Lawler, who makes him a part of the HOA, and then the Molly Maguire movement.

Uh, he is then made the note taker, because he can read and write. No one seemed to question this. They just were like, okay, you can read and write. Sure. Uh, take all the notes. This made it incredibly easy for him to, you know, dig up dirt and, and keep [00:48:00] track of everything that was going on. And it made him an integral part of every meeting.

I mean, he was there when they decided when to give out blood money for, for, for a hit and when to, to do this and to do that. And he kept notes on all this stuff. Now, he wrote a book following this, actually, about the whole situation. Now, a lot of people claim he was actually, like, an agent provocateur.

Like, he was working to sully the good name of the HOA and the Molly Maguire movement. Which, previous to this, genuinely wasn't very violent anymore. I mean, this was, they put on their public face. And the Molly Maguires was, you know, something they brought out if they really needed to threaten someone. Um.

But through this whole time, they weren't really necessary, the Molly Maguires. I don't know, what's your opinion? Was he there to be an agent provocateur, or was he just legitimately investigating what was going on? I think it's a little bit of both. I think that it was this and that. I don't think [00:49:00] that there was one clear answer there.

Because, I mean, if you look at a picture of this guy, he's like, he's steely, determined stare. He seems like the kind of guy. I mean, I don't know him personally, uh, but he seems like the kind of guy to, to go to any length to advance his station. And, and this is sort of how he's portrayed by Richard Harris in the movie.

He's this guy will go to any length to just get a little bit ahead because he's been, he's been stepped on his whole life. And that's sort of what he, he, um, he looks like genuinely and, and, and just following him. The, the Molly Maguire's, uh, he would use the same archetype to bring down other movements.

Like, he's made, uh, in the early 1900s, he's made the head investigator for this bombing in Nebraska, I think. And he uses this bombing of t