Coal Mines, Coal Mining Quotes
In 1902 there was a major coal and railroad labor crisis. The owners and operators refused to negotiate or bargain with labor: This quotation is very famous because it is an iconic picture of the views and attitudes of the large industiralists at the turn of the 20th Century. More than opposing labor unions, they actually believed that God had selected them to run the economic and business affairs of the country if not the world. It was their Christian values and paternalism that the workers should look to in order to determine the rights and priviliges of the working man or woman. This upper class attitude was one of the major reasons that class warfare broke into the open. Ironically, there was not much difference between the attidudes of the industiral leaders and the notions of fudalism.
Most mine safety initiatives have only been passed or implemented after a major mine disaster. This type of inertia, in most fields, is unfortunately typical of legislative calendars and agendas where only a few items are high priority at any one time.
President Jimmy Carter had invoked the Taft-Hartley Labor Law, which forced the striking workers to go back to work for a 100 day “cooling off” period.
The alarm that we were running out of energy sources was first raised because the steam engine would take so much coal. Lardner, felt that there was a much larger supply than needed for steam engines.
As a member of the Crow Tribe living on the Montana Crow Reservation, she recieved, alomg with all other tribal members, about $225 every quarter for the royalty payments that a commercal coal mining company paid on the coar that they mined on the Crow land. The demand for coal had been steadily decreasing for over a decade since coal was the worst of the fossil fules in terms of polluting the air and emitting greenhouse gases increasing the global warming. With the Fracking technology, oil had become much less expensive as was natural gas, making coal not only the dirtiest fuel for producing electricity but one of the most expensive whereas in the past it had been the least expensive. The Montana Crow Reservation was econmically destitute, with no industry, very little agriculture, and littel else to help the local economy other than the royalty payments for coal mining. In other parts of the country otehr Indian nations were giving up economic benefits that came from enviornmentally damaging commercial activity and there was some pressure on teh Crow nation to close the reservation to coal mining. Ms. Ten Bear Reed's quotation illustrated the great dilemma that she, the Crow, other Indian tribes and general citizens all over the country. For decades many areas of the country had been in economic recession, and poverty was endemic. The royalties from coal mining, oil drilling, pipeline right of way and other commecial activities that did or potentially threatened the enviornment was in many cases the only cash families and tribes recieved or it was a large proportion of their income. The moral dilemma was profound when there were chilren to feed and care for. it was much harder for the poor to be environmentally conscious than for people who were economivally better off.
This quotation on the surface appears to be a clear summary of the scientifically measured negative aspects to coal. However, it was an extremely bitter political quotation. The reason was that West Virginia and the other parts of Appalachia depend on coal for employment—jobs for the residents in a poverty-stricken area where there are few other potential sources for employment. Coal is also a key economic component of the economy in Wyoming. These states regard the reduction of coal as an energy source as one of the most serious political threats to their states and the treat it accordingly. West Virginia has Democratic Senators and congressmen from Appalachia. Wyoming has Republicans. Both exert enormous pressure on their Congressional Party leadership and the White House. With the country and Congress split at the time, Republicans had control of the House, and Democrats, the Senate and the Presidency—by very narrow margins so the leaderships cannot offend anyone in Congress. The result is that there was almost total silence about the huge coal pollution problem, and even in the second decade of the 21st century, where shale natural Gas was extractable in sufficient quantities to totally replace Coal as a fuel source, few in Congress or the administration ever even spoke of adopting a national policy to this effect, much less passed any legislation. During this period many Americans sickened and died as a result of coal every year with no end in sight.
