"Power concedes nothing without demand."

[white_wolf]

I'm currently reading Howard Zinn's "A People's History of the United States" and he is talking about the abolitionist movement leading up the Civil War and he quoted part of Fredrick Douglass's speech and I found its words very fitting in relation to the various labor struggles going on today. Of course, things aren't as bad as they were in the days of slavery, but honestly I wouldn't be surprised if the far-right wanted to take us back to those days. We will never see real progress without real struggle and for that we cannot rely on the ballot box alone. I'm going to quote part of the speech and link the rest, it's a very interesting read for anyone who hasn't read it before. Oh and I highly recommend Howard Zinn's book. It really changed my view on things. Full speech here: http://www.blackpast.org/?q=1857-frederick-douglass-if-there-no-struggle-there-no-progress

let me give you a word of the philosophy of reform. The whole history of the progress of human liberty shows that all concessions yet made to her august claims have been born of earnest struggle. The conflict has been exciting, agitating, all-absorbing, and for the time being, putting all other tumults to silence. It must do this or it does nothing. If there is no struggle there is no progress. Those who profess to favor freedom and yet deprecate agitation are men who want crops without plowing up the ground; they want rain without thunder and lightning. They want the ocean without the awful roar of its many waters.

This struggle may be a moral one, or it may be a physical one, and it may be both moral and physical, but it must be a struggle. Power concedes nothing without a demand. It never did and it never will. Find out just what any people will quietly submit to and you have found out the exact measure of injustice and wrong which will be imposed upon them, and these will continue till they are resisted with either words or blows, or with both. The limits of tyrants are prescribed by the endurance of those whom they oppress.

[Arctic Dave]

1. Absolutely. nt

[Remember Me]

2. and here's a fitting quote, I think, from a more recent source

Do not submit. It is extremely critical that repression be met head on and that it be resisted with every fiber in our being. There is absolutely no compromise that can be made with it. As a matter of fact, compromise is what oppression feeds on. Without compromise it would be defeated. -- Harry Belafonte, upon being asked in a TV interview how to survive political repression

[aquart]

3. Masters never like to be set free.