Temperance Protests and Wall Street
They don't look like a bunch of hippies to me
Ken Burn's special on Prohibition is absolutely fascinating on its own merits with great production values and interviews with historians along with what you expect from a great documentary producer. One of the things I never knew prior to seeing this was the "Temperance" movement being connected in such a big way with women's rights along with abolitionists and voting rights for women. The movement was big on protests that initially started off very peaceful, with women sitting outside a saloon praying, and blocking men entering (at the time women NEVER drank in public and certainly didn't go to saloon). But things got violent, when saloon owners would spray the women with beer and fire depts would hose them down with water canons (sound familiar eh?). The documentary details how within nearly 60 years, what started out as what many considered an impossible task was ultimately responsible for ending Slavery, gave women voting rights, and made the United States a completely dry country, and created organized crime in the United States. All of it started with a group of women who protested outside saloons.
Women's Temperance Crusade demonstration, Ohio
There has been a lot of back and forth on how effective public demonstrations are in effecting any policy change, or even if historically Americans like them (I personally think they do). The Wall Street protests have galvanized many in this debate about effective and long term change. In our own recent past, many would argue the effective nature of the Civil Rights era with marches in large Southern cities, or Dr. Martin Luther King's speech in Washington, D.C. prior to the adoption of large scale civil rights laws in 1964-1966. The Tea Party movement certainly has effected a change within the Republican party (the debate over whether it's really an "astro-turf" movement is for another time).
Wall Street protests in lower Manhattan
Many on the left have complained about the lack of real progressive policies in the Democratic party and its consistent move to the right since the 1970s (the effect of the Republican party consistent move to the right has been no doubt a large part of that, but that too is another topic for another time). Like the Tea Party movement, the Wall Street protests spring from real concerns: the largest income disparity gap since 1928, the 30 year decline of real wage increases for the middle class compared to the wealthiest Americans, large increases in poverty, and a political system that seems perpetually broken.
Mr. Banker from "Monopoly" makes an appearance at the Wall Street Protests
The Wall Street protests are spreading in a big way, with demonstrations in large U.S. cities, and now even in Europe (see illustration below). Despite the media's largely ignoring the first days of the protest, the message is certainly resonating with a lot of frustration with people around the world, and in a way I personally believe in a much larger way than the Tea Party could have ever done. The difference of course, the Tea Party was able to elect people into office that were able to effect change. For the Wall Street protests, that has to happen to. But I give them small odds right now: unlike the Tea Party and mainstream politics, the "Occupy Wall Street" protesters are fighting "the man." Right now, they're bringing a knife to a gun fight: billionaires and millionaires will not just roll over and play dead. But maybe I could be wrong. Maybe the Wall Street protests will tap into Americans' fundamental sense of what's fair and unfair, and know they're being given a bad hand.
A recent Ramusssen poll has found a broad support of a basic tenant of the Wall Street protests:The [Rasmussen] poll also found that 79% of Americans agree with the primary point, that the “The big banks got bailed but the middle class got left behind.” Just 10% disagree with that statement and 11% are not sure.
Spreading: Zombie protesters at the TUC Demo in Manchester, U.K. where the Conservative Party Conference is being held.
***RESOURCES FOR FURTHER READING***
Boomerang: Travels in the New Third World
Combining his easy familiarity with finance and the talents of a travel writer, Mr. Lewis sets off in these pages to give the reader a guided tour through some of the disparate places hard hit by the fiscal tsunami of 2008, like Greece, Iceland and Ireland, tracing how very different people for very different reasons gorged on the cheap credit available in the prelude to that disaster. The book - based on articles Mr. Lewis wrote for Vanity Fair magazine - is a companion piece of sorts to The Big Short: Inside the Doomsday Machine, his bestselling 2010 book about the fiscal crisis. Like that earlier book its focus is narrow. It doesn’t aspire to provide a broad overview of the debt crisis but instead hands the reader a small but sparkling prism by which to view the problem, this time from a global perspective.
The Roots of Prohibition from Ken Burn's official website.
The Politics of Protest: Social Movements in America by David S. Meyer.
The Politics of Protest opens with a short history of social movements in the United States, beginning with the development of the American Republic and outlining how the American constitutional design invites protest movements to offer continual challenges. It then discusses the social impulse to protest, considers the strategies and tactics of social movements, looks at the institutional response to protest, and finally examines the policy ramifications. Each chapter includes a brief narrative of a key movement that illustrates the topic covered in that chapter. Drawing students in and clearly demonstrating how and why the subject is of importance to them, the book addresses such topics as Dorothy Day's Catholic Workers' protest against nuclear fallout drills in the 1950s, the Greensboro civil rights sit-in in 1960, and the so-called "Battle in Seattle" anti-globalization rally. Providing a concise, yet lively analysis of social movements in America, The Politics of Protest is ideal for political science or sociology courses that consider social movements and political protest.