Labor Day 2010

Labor Day, 2010, my secretary and I are at work, I cannot remember ever taking off for a public holiday...only religious holidays: Thanksgiving, Easter, Christmas, these were the only holidays my parents did not work, except for the Fourth of July, which I have written about previously because it was a custom in the rural community where they were raised to have a large July 4th picnic in honor of their country's birth date.

Labor Day was started in Chicago around 1884, after the first real union strike by the members of the Pullman Train union, a strike which paralyzed travel in America and which resulted in the deaths of many union members because President Grover Cleveland interfered by using troops. It was a time of racism, anti-union activity, and desperate working conditions.

It was during the Cleveland administration that the Statue of Liberty was dedicated in the New York harbor. Several hundred thousand white men were there for the dedication, not one black, not one American Indian, only two women: the wife of the president, and the wife of the governor of New York. Then as now, elitist politicians were in charge, most of whom have never known the honor of hard work, and most had never known the honor of serving their country in uniform, both of which, integral forces responsible for the greatness of this country. On the statue, Emma Lazarus' poem The New Colossus, "Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free.”

Over the years, with the seepage of socialism...liberal laziness promoted in the classroom, the courtroom, and the political smoke-filled backrooms, fewer and fewer are working more and more. Now in the year 2010, about one-half of the population do not pay any income tax at all...content to ride in the wagon, while hardworking Americans pull and push the wagon carrying them. Many Americans, loving the economic fortunes and opportunities afforded Americans are content to get a welfare check, food stamps, subsidized housing, as they become part of the problem, not the solution, content to just lay around, get fat and become the leeches of society. And, without a shot being fired to defend our borders we have been invaded by foreigners, who are perfectly happy to take the jobs and tax-supported subsidies provided by taxpaying, hardworking, god fearing Americans, and the greatest blight of all, politicians at the trough afraid of losing their position at the trough of government largess, know these foreigners who do not pay the price of democracy will vote for them.

I came from good genes, families who were early arrivals on the American shores, they were not slave owners, knew nothing about slaves. They were just enslaved in the challenge of the opportunity afforded them, never believing that their descendents would become slaves to the excessive taxation and subjugation of the American promise.

One of my closest relatives, a cousin and his wife, never could have children because they were so busy and burdened with trying to care for their own infirmed parents, living in their own homes. At the same time, both had responsible jobs; he, superintendent of maintenance at a hospital, she, teaching at a community college. They lived on a small farm, when not at their jobs, gardening, chickens, cows. One cow gave birth to a blind calf, having seen me stumbling around for many years, being led around, radios going in my house to give me direction, they put a bell around the neck of the mother cow. Her blind calf, who they named “Tom”, could always locate the mother, and they watched as the mother going towards the barn, would slow down, move her neck to ring the bell so her calf could follow, until the calf was finally weened. You see, responsible human beings and responsible animals, know the expectation of work, an inevitable part of living.

So many Americans, particularly those in elected offices, have never known what it is to sweat, their ideology supersedes their theology. The honest man works for a living, the honest man's character is defined by work, there is honor in work, and you honor those who do work. There is more to life than the conniving spirit of taking advantage of a situation, every man or woman cannot prosper by knowing the right person (it is not what you know, but who you know). Every man or woman cannot prosper by playing golf with the right people, every man or woman cannot prosper by excessive “markup” on a product. Every man or woman cannot inherit wealth, there must always be the foot soldiers in the trenches, who will determine the outcome of battle, hands on plows or hands on industrial power supply or even steering wheels that determine economy.

It is wonderful that our nation has progressed to the place that large air conditioned cabs on tractors can now create more agriculture than hundreds of mule pulling plows even 50 years ago, it is wonderful that large trucks, planes, trains, can now deliver needed commerce across the nation. But, we should never forget the calloused hands on the plows, the calloused hands on the reins which guided the horses and oxen, even 100 years ago. Lest those school children not going to school today, lest those teachers not teaching today, lest those bankers not working today, lest those government offices closed today, ever forget the time that hardworking students, teachers, postal workers, bankers, etc. appreciated what is now consider antiquated tools and procedures which enabled other to accomplish the progress that you enjoy, vacationing today.

The sweat, the stress, the strides of hard living, did not kill or limit our ancestors, but made them better for the experience, adversity always makes you stronger, just as heat purifies. It was not necessity but laziness that was the mother of invention.