Today in Labor History May 13

Mexican American War

Today in Labor History May 13, 1846: The U.S. declared war on Mexico. Over 1,733 U.S. soldiers and more than 5,000 Mexican soldiers died in the Mexican-American War. However, the Mexican death toll was probably closer to 25,000. That’s because so many died from disease and accidents related to the war. As a result of the war, the U.S. conquered Texas, Alta California, New Mexico, Nevada, Arizona and Utah. The Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo promised U.S. citizenship to the Mexican and Indigenous Peoples living in these conquered territories. Yet, the U.S. denied citizenship to the Indigenous Peoples of the southwest until the 1930s.

Opposition to the War

Whigs and Abolitionists opposed the war as a land grab by the slave owners. In 1880, the Republican Campaign Textbook described the war as “Feculent, reeking Corruption…One of the darkest scenes in our history. A war forced upon our and the Mexican people by … President Polk in pursuit of territorial aggrandizement of the slave oligarchy.” In many ways, the Mexican-American War created the conditions for the Civil War and Indian wars that followed. It also paved the way for the brutal exploitation of Chinese and Irish labor in the construction of the transcontinental railroad.

The St. Patrick’s Battalion (Los San Patricios)

Another lesser-known legacy of this war was the defection of Irishmen from the U.S. Army. Many joined the Saint Patrick’s Battalion fighting for the Mexican side. These defectors were often recent refugees from the Potato Famine and had joined the U.S. army in order to earn enough to feed themselves. However, the wages were low and the Irish recruits were often subjected to racism and religious intolerance. The Mexican government offered them higher wages and land grants, as well as a common religion. The San Patricios were responsible for some of the fiercest resistance the U.S. faced in the war. In addition to the Irish, the San Patricios also included other disgruntled Americans, emigres from Europe and escaped slaves.

1900s

May 13, 1909: The Canadian government established the Department of Labour. It took the U.S. another four years.

Today in Labor History May 13, 1909: IWW river drivers and bush cutters ceased working in Fortine, Montana in order to gain better working conditions.

1920s-1940s

May 13, 1920: IWW Sabotage in Butte, Montana: Striking miners voted to start an “on-the-job” strike, vowing to purposefully and drastically reduce efficiency.

Today in Writing History May 13, 1944: Tales of the City author Armistead Maupin was born. Maupin wrote the novels over the course of nearly forty years, (1978-2014). He was one of the first writers to incorporate the AIDS epidemic into his novels.

1950s-1960s

May 13, 1954: Chinese middle school students in Singapore protested against British attempts to force them to sign up for the National Service. When they clashed with police, over two dozen were injured and nearly 50 were arrested.

Today in Labor History May 13, 1960: Police violently attacked UC Berkeley students who were nonviolently protesting HUAC hearings. 

May 13, 1968: Students occupied the Sorbonne, in Paris and joined workers in a General Strike. 

Resurrection City

Today in Labor History May 13, 1968: The Poor People’s Campaign raised Resurrection City, in Washington, D.C. The tent shanty town, part of the campaign to gain economic justice for poor people, existed for six weeks. The Poor People’s Campaign was originally organized by Martin Luther King and the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC). However, Ralph Abernathy took over leadership after King’s assassination. It developed from the realization that civil rights gains had not improved material conditions for African Americans. However, the Poor People’s Campaign was a multiracial movement that included white, Asian Hispanic and Indigenous Americans. Some of the Campaign’s leaders included Chicano leaders Corky Gonzales and Reies Tijerina. Other participants included Appalachian miners. The FBI and military intelligence spied on the camp and wiretapped the campaign. Some of the spies posed as journalists, or as black militants.

1970s

May 13, 1971: The Pakistani Army massacred 800-900 unarmed Hindu civilians in Bangladesh. During the 9-month Bangladeshi war for liberation, Pakistani Islamist militias killed 200,000-3,000,000 people. Furthermore, they raped between 200,000 and 400,000 Bengali women.

May 13, 1972: Ulster loyalists planted a car bomb outside Kelly’s Bar in a Catholic and Nationalist section of Belfast. Ulster Volunteer Force (UVF) snipers then fired on survivors as they tried to escape. For two days, the IRA fought gun battles with the UVF and the British Army. Seven people died and over 60 were injured.

The MOVE Bombing

Today in Labor History May 13, 1985: The city of Philadelphia bombed the house of the radical black activist group MOVE. The police dropped a bomb made with C-4 explosives from a helicopter over the African American residential neighborhood. When survivors tried to flee, the cops shot at them. As a result, eleven MOVE members died, including five children. Furthermore, the bomb and fires destroyed sixty-two others homes in the neighborhood. Consequently, 250 residents became homeless. Adding insult to injury, the bones of some of the victims were transferred to the University of Pennsylvania. Professors used them to teach courses on forensic evidence.

MOVE and Mumia

MOVE was a black liberation environmental movement. Many surviving MOVE members were still in prison as late as 2020. Mumia Abu Jamal, who was an associate of MOVE, is still in prison on trumped up charges of killing a cop. He is currently severely ill with diabetes and heart disease and Covid. The government has bombed civilians from the air several other times in history. The first was during the Tulsa anti-black pogrom of 1921. They also aerially bombed striking Appalachian miners that same year.

Tiananmen Square Hunger Strike

Today in Labor History May 13, 1989: 1,000 Chinese students occupied Tiananmen Square and began a hunger strike. Their protest was in support of democracy movement’s demands for a dialogue with the government. They naively believed that the government would respond favorably because it was hosting Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev in Tiananmen Square in two days. The government simply moved the welcome ceremony to the airport and ignored the students. However, citywide support for the students led to mass protests from May 16 to May 18. They ended their strike on May 19, just before the state declared martial law.

1990s-2000s

May 13, 1998: Thousands of yellow cab drivers in New York City went on a one-day strike in protest of proposed new regulations. “City officials were stunned by the (strike’s) success,” The New York Times reported.

May 13, 2019: Unita Zelma Blackwell died. She was a civil rights activist and project director for the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee. She was also the first African-American woman to be elected mayor in Mississippi.