LaborHistory, Vol. 41, No. 3, 2000

Book Reviews

ImaginedHistories: American Historians Interpretthe Past ANTHONY MOLHO & GORDON WOOD (eds.), 1998 Princeton:Princeton University Press pp. ix 1 490,$65.00 (cloth); $24.95(paper)

Thename ofthe AmericanHistorical Association oftenconfuses outsiders because the ªAmericanº refersto the nationality ofthe historians ratherthan to the nation beingstudied. And, at atime when the ideaof ª nationºis underattack (includingfrom historians), it seemsincreasingly anachronistic to organizeour professional work based on placeof residence. Is there, in fact,anything distinctively American about Americanhistorical writing?Should therebe? ªYesºto the ®rstquestion and ªnoºto the secondare the answersoffered in ImaginedHistories . Although 19different essays (covering everything from the ancientworld to 20th-centuryAmerica) cannot not speak in asinglevoice, the largestnumber concludesthat Americanhistoriography has had apeculiarlyAmerican accent but that it is probably betteroff without it. ªAmericanhistorians,º write editorsAnthony Molho and GordonS. Wood, ªhave traditionally brought to bearon the past a perspectiveoften strikingly different from that ofhistorians ofother nationsº (3). But this ªlong exceptionalisttradition in Americanhistorical thinking seemsto be drawingto acloseº(17). Daniel Rodgers ’sleadessay on ªExceptionalismºsets the theme forthe volume by arguingthat, particularly afterEurope collapsed in the cauldronof World War II, Americanhistorians beganto take ªexceptionalismas an Americangivenº and that only in the past decadehas anewª postexceptionalist Americanhistory comeinto viewº(30). Rodgersapplauds theseefforts to ªto re-embedthe history of the UnitedStates within aworldof transnational historical forcesº(36). Although Rodgerswrites as ahistorian of the UnitedStates, his theme ismost stronglyechoed by the contributorswho arehistorians from the UnitedStates but writeabout othernations. They arenot so much concernedwith claims about the ªexceptionalismºof the UnitedStates (its departurefrom generalpatterns of historical development) but about how particularand oftenparochial assumptions about Americahave shaped the way othernations ’ historieshave beenwritten. Carol Gluckastutely describeshow aªveryAmericanº historiography ofJapan has givenway to onethat while ªnot exactly postparochialºis ªat leastmore open to the insights ofhistory fromafarº (450). And sheoptimistically welcomesª the opportunity to writea postnational historyº(451). Richard Kaganequally embraces recentsigns of the declineof William Prescott ’slong-dominant paradigm in Spanish history, which emphasized abackward and decadentSpain as the antithesis ofthe UnitedStates. KeithMichael Baker and Joseph Zizeksimilarly celebratetransnationalism. ªNo longer,ºthey write,is thereª adistinctive Americanhistoriography ofthe FrenchRevolutionº ; the ªRevolution ’shistoriographical economy has truly becomeglobalº Ð ªacollectiveand cosmopolitan enterpriseº(378± 379). Obviously, transnational- ism has not beenthe only forcefor historiographic change.Molho astutely shows how the waningof the Cold War, the entranceof new types ofscholars into the profession, and an intensifying professionalism has challengedthe traditional Americanparadigm forRenaissance studiesÐ the notion that the rootsof modernity areto be found in 15th-centuryFlorence. Not surprisinglyAmerican historians ofEurope ® nd transnationalism particularly appealing sinceit isless likely to placethem as junior partnersin the historiographic enterprise,but those writinghistories ofthe UnitedStates generallyalso welcomethe change.Gordon Wood, forexample, observesthat the waningof the nationalist and exceptionalistparadigms has meant that the colonial periodhas ªlost much ofits relevancefor those looking forthe originsor roots of the nation. But it has gainednew relevancefor those who have otherquestions orinterests in mindº(157). Still, some expressunease about the newpostexceptionalist, postnationalist historical paradigm. Wood worriesthat ifª the colonial era¼ is to be cutloose from the storyof American nationhood or identity, will it continueto be meaningfulto most Americans?º(160). Unfortunately,Wood ’s interestingcomments about popular interestin history arenot matched by any sustainedresearch into popular historical consciousness.These essays are, in general,strongest as intellectualhistoryÐ as well-craftedsurveys of what historians have writtenover the past centuryÐand weakestas social,

ISSN0023-656X print/ISSN1469-9702 online/00/030351±55 Ó 2000Taylor &Francis Ltd on behalf of The Tamiment Institute 352 BookReviews political, oreconomic history (as an analysis ofthe contextsthat have shaped historical writing).Some essays(e.g. Linda Kerberon gender,Gabrielle Spiegel on medieval history, and Richard Salleron the ancientworld) offerinteresting re¯ ections on the relationship betweena changingprofessoriate and a changinghistoriography, but the volume provides no sustainedlook at the socialhistory ofthe profession. Similarly, EugenWeber contributes a usefulgloss on WesternCivilization textbooksbut no researchinto the actual teachingof that courseat diverseinstitutions acrossthe country. To be fair, the volume neverintended to be morethan an intellectualhistory, but oncethe authors move into speculations about the reasonswhy certainhistorical interpretationshave dominated and how historians should connectwith theiraudiences, these contextual issues acquire greater importance. Naturally, many ofthe essayists(especially those who writeon the UnitedStates) offerdifferent narrativesthan the exceptionalistto postexceptionaliststory. GeorgeFrederickson, for example, focuses lesson the overalltrajectory of historiography of19th-century America and insteadincisively describes ªhow recenthistorians have dealtwith the originsand impact ofthe Civil Warº(166). Naomi Lamoreauxsuccinctly traces the post-war triumph ofthe ªneweconomic historyº and its simultaneous failureto have much long-termimpact on eitherhistorians oreconomists. ªTheorganizations that cliometriciansbuilt so assiduously to promote theirwork,º she concludes, ª now increasinglydemarcate an intellectualghettoº (77). Giventhe editors ’ postmodern emphasis on history as aconstruction,as an imagined enterprise,it is appropriate to observethat this volume offersa particularset of narratives about historiography as practicedin the UnitedStates. Welearn little about the historiography ofthe ªthird world,ºsince only Gluckwrites about the ªnon-West.ºAnd, as noted, the collectionprovides only cursorytreatment of the sociologyand politics ofthe profession(e.g. the riseof the NewLeft in the 1960sor the job crisis ofthe 1970s)or the relationship ofprofessional historians to diverseaudiences (e.g. studentsin high schools and community colleges,history enthusiasts, ormuseumgoers). This may simply be the result ofthe enormousburdens of compressing a centuryof scholarship into alimited number ofpagesÐ a task the authors carryout with extraordinaryskill and intelligence.Or it may also re¯ect the backgroundsof the authorsÐ virtually all ofthem workat the most eliteresearch universities and most enteredthe professionmore than 30years ago. Evenif our historical practiceis becomingless parochial, it remainsshaped by ourmultiple identitiesas scholarsand citizens.Thus, eventhe approximately 500closely printed pages in this excellentvolume cannot possibly offera fullsurvey of all historiography and historians. Still, ImaginedHistories is an invaluable guideto not just oneof the major historiographic storiesof the past century(the declineof parochialism) but also to many ofthe smallerstories that help explainwhy Americanhistorians have imagined ourmany pasts in so many differentways.

ROY ROSENZWEIG, CASDistinguished Professorof History, George Mason University

Laboring For Rights:Unions and Sexual DiversityAcross Nations GERALD HUNT (ed.), 1999 Philadelphia: Temple UniversityPress pp. vii 1 302,$65.50 (cloth); $27.95(paper)

This isa global surveyof the way tradeunions have addressedissues of sexual diversity. GeraldHunt, an AssociateProfessor of Industrial Relations and Organizational Behavior at Nipissing Universityin Canada, has assembled 15high-quality chaptersand tightly editedthem. They offeran overviewof union practicesrelating to sexualdiversity and the roleof unions in advancingthe rightsof lesbians and gays. Takingdiverse approaches, they shed light on largeissues such as the relationship ofª newsocial movementsºto the union movement, the powerexerted through de®nitions ofspouse and family, and the linkageof tolerance of sexual diversity to largerpolitical contexts.They also explorenovel structures ofunion democracyand successfulstrategies for activists. Framed by an introductionthat discussesthe signi®cance of the topic and aconclusionthat coherentlysynthesizes major ®ndings, thesewell-written chaptersmake fora greatbook. Following the introductionare two chaptersfocusing on Canada. Hunt reportsthe resultsof two surveys,® ndingconsiderable (albeit uneven)progress in the degreeto which Canadian unions have addressedissues of sexual diversity. Public sectorunions and those with ahigh femalemembership seemto be particularly responsive.Cynthia Petersendetails 25 years of court battles overspousal bene®ts resulting in an increasingacceptance of same-sex partners as ªspouses.º Thenext four chapters are concerned with eventsin the UnitedStates. Based on extensiveinterviews BookReviews 353 with keyparticipants, Christian Arthur Bain offersa chronicleof ª the largelyunwritten history of lesbians and gaymen in the U.S. union movementº(59). Thechapter describes national and regional efforts(in Chicago, NewYork, and Boston, in addition to California). Focusingon gayand lesbian caucuseswithin unions, Miriam Frank offersa sampling ofevents illustrating the diversecauses that have galvanizedlesbians and gaysin the U.S. Desma Holcomb, along-timeactivist and Research Directorat UNITE,provides fascinatinginsight into the strategiesand tacticsactivists have employed in their® ght fordomestic partner bene® ts. She bringsto lifeconcrete successes (e.g. the ªspouse equivalentºhealth plan negotiatedat the VillageVoice in the early1980s), describes new discriminatory practicesof the insuranceindustry emergingwith the AIDS crisis,and shows the strategicimportance ofunion insistenceto extendpartner bene® ts not only to gayand lesbian couplesbut to unmarried heterosexualcouples as well.Sounding acautious note, Jonathan Goldberg-Hillerexplores why unions failedto support the gayand lesbian ®ght forthe rightto marriagein Hawai ’i. Hesuggests that the civil rightsframe which informedthis debatehindered union support in various ways. Thesituation forgays and lesbians livingin South Paci®c islands otherthan Hawai ’iis fundamentally different,as JacquelineLeckie shows in the followingchapter. While thereare traditions accepting certainforms of liminal genderidenti® cation, acceptancefades as theseidentities merge with homosex- uality. Theresult is aleadensilence on mattersof sexual diversity together with the continued criminalization ofconsensual homosexual behavior betweenadults in some countries,exacerbated by appeals to Christian morality and nationalism. Cataloguing developments ofunion policiesconcerning sexual diversity at the centraland statelevels in Australia, Shane Ostenfeld® nds patternsresembling those in Canada, with white-collarworkers and public servantsleading the ®ght foranti-discrimination measures.Mazibuko K.Jara, Naomi Webster, and GeraldHunt offera fascinatingaccount of the perniciouseffects of apartheid on lesbian and gay organizingand the considerableambiguity towardshomosexuality in the newSouth Africa.Apartheid hinderedorganizing among blacks, leavingresistance to the restrictive1968 anti-gay law to white activists. While the newSouth Africanconstitution guaranteesnondiscrimination on the basis ofsexual orientation, therehave beenfew changes in the workplace, and unions have beenunreceptive towards gayand lesbian causes. Thenext four chapters focus on Europe.David Rayside provides an excellentcomparative account linking differinglevels of salience and acceptanceof sexual diversity issues in France,Germany, The Netherlands, and Britain to particularpolitical contexts.He furthermore discusses the promise of Europeaninstitutions forlabor and sexualdiversity advocates. Ronald Holzhackerargues that German unions oftenhave acknowledgedsexual diversity groups and theirª human rightsº, but have failedto push equity issuesin collectivebargaining. Phil Greaslyuses survey data to describea sea-changein British unions ’ willingnessto addresslesbian and gayissues in alegalcontext that still allows discrimination in employment, housing and otherareas. Finally, Fiona Colgan describesthe radical stepsthat UNISON, createdin a1993merger of three public sectorunions, has taken to ensure democraticparticipation forminorities. Theunion encourageslesbians and gays, women, black members, and disabled members to ªself-organizeº, providing spaceand resources,and includingthe self-organizedgroups in the decision-makingstructures of the union. Theexperiment in radical democracyshe describes provides astirringconclusion to abook that should be requiredreading for everyoneinterested in furtheringthe rightsof lesbians and gaysand in advancingdemocracy in a multicultural world.

ELISABETHPRU È GL, Associate Professorof International Relations, FloridaInternational University

JewishWorkers in theModern Diaspora NANCY L. GREEN (ed.), 1998 Berkeley:University of California Press pp. vii 1 256, $14.95

This volume is asplendid exampleof comparative history at its best. Editedby Nancy L.Greenand containingmaterial preparedby eightother scholars, the book focuseson various aspectsof the lives ofEastern European Jewish immigrant workersin sixdifferent urban localitiesÐNew York, London, Paris, Amsterdam, Buenos Airesand GermanyÐfrom the late-19thcentury to the 1930s. Theintroduction to the volume surveysthe history ofJewish workersin eachsetting. The general editordiscusses the speci®c localcontext, the timing and patternof the Jewish immigration, and the industriesin eachsetting that attractedJewish workersand had an impact on theirlives and livelihood. 354 BookReviews

InNew York, most immigrants workedin the garmentindustry, food preparation, the building and renovation trades,printing, metal and jewelrywork, and tobacco production. InLondon, the immi- grantswere overwhelmingly engaged in tailoring, but many immigrant men also workedin the boot and shoe industry and immigrant women in cigarand cigarettefactories. In Paris, the immigrants became capmakers and tailors, cabinet-makersand jewelers,peddlers and shopkeepers. InBuenos Aires,the immigrants concentratedprimarily in the clothingindustry and furnituremaking. InGermany, because ofgovernmental policies, the immigrants weredispersed throughout the country. An overviewof differentGerman localities shows that Jewish workersconcentrated in cigarettemaking and the garment industry. InAmsterdam, the Jewish workerswere largely Dutch ratherthan immigrant Jewsand they approximated Dutch workersin general.Here Jews worked as peddlers,cigar makers, clothingworkers and diamond polishers. Theintroduction is followedby fourlong chapters, eachof which opens with abriefintroduction, followedby documentsillustrating the chapter ’smajor themes. Theseinclude: the worker ’sdaily life, labor and leisure(Chapter 1); the societiesand organizationscreated by the workersand immigrants (Chapter 2); the workers ’ politics and ideology(Chapter 3); and the debatesover acculturation and Jewish identity (Chapter 4). Thegeneral editor and the contributorshave rendereda greatservice by translatingheretofore inaccessibleYiddish, Dutch, Germanand Spanish documentsand making them available to English- languagereaders. Taken from published and unpublished memoirs, letters,archival reports,newspaper articles,literary accounts, and oralhistory interviews,the documentspresent an insideview of the early Jewish neighborhoods through the multiple voicesof the workersthemselves and ofsome oftheir observersand critics.The documents help to reconstructthe livesand identitiesof the Jewish workers and the Jewish poor. Juxtaposed the way they are,the documentsallow the generaleditor to ask anumber ofpertinent questions about the comparative natureof Jewish settlement:To what extenthave Jewish workersbeen alike the worldover? How have localconditions shaped the experienceof Jews in the modernDiaspora? And how did Jewish workershelp internationalizenational labor movements? Despitecultural, political and economicdifferences in eachcity, certainpatterns were evident in all ofthem. With the exceptionof Berlin, Jewsmoved to fairlylarge, dense and close-knitcommunities. InBerlin, likethe restof Germany, Jewswere less concentrated and individual communities weresmall. But in everyplace, the workersformed social, religiousand political organizationsthat resembledeach other. Many ofthe industriesthat wereexpanding and providing job opportunities werethe same in most ofthe localities,notably the garmentindustry. Thestereotype of the Jewish tailor orsewing machine operatorthus has astrongbasis in reality. Ideologically,a Jewish leftof varying strength and with varyingtendencies appeared in eachcountry. However,one characteristic was trueeverywhere: the Jewish leftwas divided within. Therewere anarchists, and Socialists, Bundists and Communists, Zionistsand assimilationists, in addition to diversefactions within eachgroup. TheJewish leftalso arguedover language, with Hebrew,Russian, Yiddish, and the languageof the newland, all having theirpassionate supporters. Overtime, in all the cities,the development ofa working-classconsciousness was underminedby workersbecoming owners ofsmall businesses.But sincemany ofthe ¯edglingenterprises failed, and theirowners became workers onceagain, the linebetween workers and ªcapitalistºbecame less apparent. This tendedto alterpublic discourseand affectedworkers ’ organizations Signi® cantdifferences also existedbetween the workersin the differentlocalities. In New York, Paris, London and Buenos Aires,Jews settled in ethnicenclaves and engagedin light industry and commerce. Owingto legaland economicreasons, in Germanythe Jewish immigrant community remainedmore disseminatedand morerural, with asmallerworking-class population. InAmsterdam, becausemost of the Jewish population was descendedfrom the Sephardic (Spanish and PortugueseJews) immigration ofthe 15th and 16th centuries,the Dutch Jewswere basically anative groupof workers who werewell integratedinto the Dutch polity and the Dutch socialistmovement. Theculture and attitudestoward immigrants also differedin eachplace and affectedthe climateto which the Jewish workeror immigrant minority adapted. Forms ofpolitical organizationlikewise differedfrom city to city. For example, in Amsterdam, Jewshelped found the GeneralDutch Diamond Workers’ Union(ANDB), as aDutch union not aJewish one. InNew York, however,Jews built the InternationalLadies Garment Workers ’ Union(ILGWU) in theirimage, and the ®rstmeeting reports and constitution werewritten in Yiddish. Thegeneral editor concludes this ®nestudy by emphasizing that, despitethe differencesfrom place to place, Jewish workersformed an identi®able group, albeit with agreatdeal of diversity. Thegeneral BookReviews 355 editorand hercolleagues have succeededadmirably in presentinga unique comparative portrait of Jewish workersin the Westernworld. Inthe process,they have shown that the conceptof ª diasporaº ismore complex than is oftendiscussed.

ROBERT ROCKAWAY, Senior Lecturer, Department ofJewish History, Tel-AvivUniversity

Keystoneof Democracy:A History of Pennsylvania Workers HOWARD HARRIS (ed.), 1999 Harrisburg:Commonwealth ofPennsylvania, Pennsylvania Historicaland MuseumCommission pp. xiv 1 361,$24.95 (cloth); $16.95(paper)

Keystone ofDemocracy is acollectionof essays tracing the history ofPennsylvania workersfrom the colonial erato the late1990s. The editor ’sgoalis to presentlabor history to ageneralaudience, includinghigh school and collegestudents, and to illuminate the roleworkers played in developingboth Pennsylvania and the UnitedStates. Thebook clearlyand logicallyreveals the history oflabor in Pennsylvania in amannerthat newcomersshould ®nd informative and straightforward.However, those alreadywell-versed in U.S. labor history will ®nd littlethat is newor revealing. Thechapters are arranged chronologically, and sharethree broad themesÐthe natureof work and the in¯uence of technology; the evolution ofthe workforcewith respectto race,gender, ethnicity, and skill; and the roleof politics and the statein the labor movement. Theauthors includewell-known labor historians such as KenFones-Wolf, Ronald Filipelli, PeterGottlieb, and Paul LeBlanc. Following each chapteris aseriesof ª KeystoneVignettesº Ð ®rst-hand accountsand reminiscencesof events that will help make this a®nechoice as alabor history textbook. Pennsylvania has beenthe settingfor many important individuals and eventsin the history of Americanworkers. From Philadelphia printersand artisans to the Homesteadlockout, the Lattimer Massacreof 1897, and 20th-centurycoal and steelstrikes, Pennsylvania workersplayed an important rolein U.S. history. Still, Pennsylvania is not aperfectmirror for labor throughout the UnitedStates, and Keystone ofDemocracy doesexaggerate its claim that ªthe storyof Pennsylvania ’swageearners is representativeof the history ofall workingpeople in the UnitedStatesº (xi). For instance,Pennsylvania lackedsigni® cant numbers ofAsian workersthat characterizedthe AmericanWest, and the experiences ofagricultural workers and sharecroppersso prominent in the South arenot found in the Keystone State. Industrialand mining occupations crucialto Pennsylvania ’sworking-classhistory, but absent in otherareas of the U.S. arethe focusof this volume. InChapter 1, Ronald Filippelli investigatesPennsylvania workersfrom early settlement to the Revolution. While he doesa ®nejob ofillustrating the breadth ofworkers ’ experiences,including freemenand slaves, indenturedworkers and women, his approach is abit too romantic. Abrief discussionof Native Americansand theirlabor would have made his essayseem less celebratory of Anglo-Americanexpansion. KenFones-Wolf in Chapter 2coversthe periodfrom 1800± 1872, and revealsthe transition fromartisanal to factoryproduction, as wellas the resultingdivisions oflabor. He also describesworkers ’ reactionsto changesin technologyand the labor process,both individually and in formingsuch organizationsas the National Labor Unionand the Knightsof Labor. Thedevelopment oflabor unions, industrial evolution, and violent confrontationfrom 1873 to 1916 is the focusof Chapter 3. PerryK. Blatz describesthe continuingstruggle by workersto organize,as wellas the strugglefor improved wages,hours, and conditions ofemployment. Blatz also chroniclesthe increasedrole of state and federalgovernments in legislation, judicial decisions,and the useof military force.Blatz convincinglydemonstrates the importance oftwo ofthe most violent and widelyknown labor confrontationsÐthe railroadstrikes of 1877 and the Homesteadlockout in 1892Ðfor both Pennsylvanians and the U.S. PeterGottlieb chronicles the roller-coasterrise of organized labor from1917 to 1941in Chapter 4. Labor’sgainsduring World War I wereall but lost in aseriesof economic depressions, while employers and the stateattacked workers ’ interests.Expanding his scopebeyond the boundaries ofthe workplace, Gottliebincludes such diverseelements as immigration restrictionsand consumerism. Pennsylvania workersbene® ted greatly from New Deal legislation, formingpowerful unions in industriesthey had beeneffectively barred from since the 19th century.The continued signi® cance of these victories is describedby MarkMcColloch in Chapter 5, appropriately titledª GloryDays: 1941±1969.º The prosperity and employment generatedby WorldWar II empoweredlabor, but also energizedrenewed employerand stateintervention in effortsto curtaillabor ’spower. McCollochdescribes the shift in 356 BookReviews labor’sgrowthin the 1960sfrom industrial to public employees, and the originsof low-wage nonunion employment. Inthe sixth and ®nal chapter, HowardHarris depicts the continuedtransformation oflabor from 1970to 1997.Although that periodbegan optimistically, the evolvingglobal economy, continued initiatives by employers, and the sustainedshift ofstate support fromlabor to business, all contributed to growingeconomic uncertainty. While the KeystoneState ’straditional industrieswere in aperiodof greatdecline, the picturewas not all bleak. Public employeesand theirunions, togetherwith such service-sectororganizations as health careworkers, continued to champion workers ’ interests. Becausethis is intendedas an introductorysurvey, there are no footnotesor detailed bibliography. Thereis alist ofrecommended readings after each chapter, and thereare many excellentillustrations throughout. Although the subject matterfocuses strictly on Pennsylvania, those looking fora general surveyof labor history should ®nd this an interestingand usefulbook.

JOHN CASHMAN, PhDCandidate in History, Boston College

Vindicating theFounders: Race,Sex, Class, and Justicein theOrigins of America THOMAS G. WEST, 1997 Lanham, MD: Rowman and Little®eld pp. xv 1 219, $22.95

Festoonedwith blurbs fromRush Limbaugh, NewtGingrich, Michael Novak, Dinesh D ’Souza, Harry V.Jaffa, and ForrestMcDonald, this is not abook aimed at labor and socialhistorians, norwill it probably attractmuch interestfrom the historical professionin general.The author is aStraussian political theoristtrained at that school ’sClaremont fortress,and at the book ’sverycenter is a denunciationof the ªhistoricismºthat leadsus to viewthe foundinggeneration as captivesof their period’sdominant ideologies.And yetthis is abook which historians with an interestin equality, orin history fromthe bottom up, might pro® tfromreading, for it reveals,sometimes despiteitself, some of the limitations ofrecent approaches to the Revolutionary era. Westbreaks with contemporaryorthodoxy, he tellsus, by insistingthat the Declarationand the ªFoundersºreally meant that ªall men arecreated equal.º His opening test case is slavery. Rather than beingthe hopeless racistsand hypocriteswho people some textbooks, the Foundersmust be credited with endingslavery in the North and putting it on its road to extinction.Arguing that ªthe whole Revolution was an antislavery movementºthat `inexorablyºled to abolition, Westappropriates oneside ofan ongoingdebate about the relationship ofthe Revolution to slaveryand antislavery. But he is not contentto stop there.His classical understanding of citizenship, and agenerallysunny perspectiveon Americanhistory (until about 1932),leads him toward asupport ofcolonization as an answerto the problem ofslavery consistent with the rightsof American citizens, and to adenunciationof later abolitionists as ªshrillºperfectionists who deniedthe reasonablenessof denying citizenship to free blacks (who, ªas agroup, did not behave as wellas othersº). Thedispassionate culmination in what many would seeas apatently racistconclusion, and the yoking ofpast ®guresto ayardstickof self-evidenttruths and theoreticalvirtues, turns the author himself into akind of18th-century ® gure, and seemsconsistent with his aim to synthesizeand vindicatea foundational viewpoint. Theremainder of the book followsfrom this logic:the founderswere egalitarians who rightlyput limits on citizenshipin orderto protectnot only themselvesbut everyonefrom the resultsof, for example, family breakdown, post-slavery racialresentment, and the empowermentof the indigent beforethey acquirethe rightbootstrapping values. Thestrength of West ’sapproach isthat it connects questions ofclass, race,and genderwhich historians have all too oftenseparated into discreteboxes, leavingthem to fumble with faulty generalizationsor inferences about the Founders ’ simplistic racism, sexism,and/ orclassism (examples ofwhich Westprovides at the beginningof each chapter). The weaknessis that both West ’sgeneralizationsand the oneshe criticizesrely on aratherimmature view ofª the Founders.º(West would takethis as acompliment: schoolchildrenand the lesseducated of Americansare right to reverethe Foundersand to seethem as ahappy, heroicband.) Whereolder debateslimited TheFounders to the patriots of1776 or the framersof 1787, West lumps ahalf-century ofpolitical leadersinto this onecategory. They rarelyever disagree about anything reallysigni® cant. And they arethe main, eventhe only, actorsof history. Orrather of theory, forWest ’smain point isthat TheFounders understood that equality derives mainly fromrespect for property rights(which is also creditedwith antislavery, America ’sgreatwealth, and the supposed absenceof class con¯ ict in U.S. history). Westis quite up frontin the book that he BookReviews 357 reallywants to resuscitateThe Founders as guidesto presentpolitical questions, rescuingthem from the dustbin ofhistory into which they arethrown by most liberalsand some conservatives. What should intriguethe labor historian hereis how easilyand con®dently West mobilizes the kinds ofquotes that progressiveand neo-progressivehistorians onceused to claim the AmericanRevolution forthe left.Why has the strategyof the Popular Front becomethe accomplishment ofa neoconservative scholar? Becausehistorians on the lefthave branched out in differentdirections: they have shown how African-Americans,women, and workingpeople wereactors in history and (contraryto West ’s assumptions) oftenfound themselvesopposing the Founders, some ofwhom, it was plain to see,did not have theirinterests in mind. ªThelot ofwomen, blacks and the poor improved substantially in the foundingera and afterwards,ºbut not in West ’sviewbecause of anything they themselvesmight have done, such as freeingthemselves from certain kinds ofdependency in the vaunted household. That is to say, Westhas to ignorea greatdeal of scholarship by socialhistorians in orderto make such claims. Westis also not able to seehow his briefagainst ª historicism,ºand in favorof treating the Founders as political theoristswho lefta corpusof Great Books (or the equivalents), makes it impossible to comprehendhow the attitudesand ideasof Revolutionary and post-Revolutionary Americansmay have changedover time oreven varied from place to placeor from group to group(though he doeswrite white deepsoutherners out ofthe antislavery consensus).This anti-historicism is in factnecessary for West’seffortsat proof, forit allows him to assemble quotations fromgreat men indiscriminately oftheir datesor political contextsÐto breezilymaintain, forexample, that the Revolution usheredin an ageof nearlyuniversal male suffrage,and thus to neglectthe half-centuryof struggle and debateover the franchise,not to mention the newlyexplicit whiteness and malenessof the early19th century ’s new suffragelaws. Westeliminates any signof real political strugglewhere it might detractfrom the image ofthe FoundersÐor from the notion ofa groupof people wecan call The Founders. This much is not surprising.Nonetheless, West ’sbroad-brush approach canserve as awarningfor historians. Americanistshave not merelytaken the Foundersdown severalpegs but also raisedup other founders,who have becomethe newheroes because their struggles for freedom and equality oftenlook moreimpressive. But the Founderswill not goaway, especiallyinsofar as heroism and celebration remaindominant attitudestoward history. Whetherhe intendedit this way ornot, West ’s book is a timely reminderthat when professionalhistorians ignorethe complex, contradictorymeanings of the Revolution, simplistically trash TheFounders, setup cardboardcounter-founders, or fail to write historiesthat show the relationships betweenelites and non-elites,or between categories like class, race, and gender,they leavethe dooropen fora neo-consensusrevival, and abattle ofstraw men and women.

DAVIDWALDSTREICHER, Associate Professorof History, University ofNotre Dame

Antislavery Violence:Sectional, Racial, and Cultural Con¯ict in AntebellumAmerica JOHN R. MCKIVIGAN & STANLEY HARROLD (eds.), 1999 Knoxville:University of Tennessee Press pp. ix 1 336, $30.00

This book is about the praxis ofliberation, the relationof theory and practice,of ideas and action, in the struggleto freeblacks fromslavery and whitesfrom the incubus ofracism in ante-bellum America. Thelinkage of antislavery violencein wordand deedunites the 10essays that comprisethis thought-provoking volume. Theessays cover the periodfrom the Gabrielplot in 1800to the aftermath ofJohn Brown ’sraid at HarpersFerry on the eveof the Civil War. Intheir introduction, the editorsattribute antislavery violenceto aclusterof ideas and practices:the tradition ofvigilantism and lynch law; the evangelicalnotion ofa higherlaw; memoriesof the American Revolution; the romantic conceptof manhood; and the violent atmosphere in the South that reverberatedamong the slavesand, with the passageof time, among northerners.One or more of these conceptsis featuredin all the essays. Thebook isdivided into two parts. PartI dealswith the keyrole blacks themselvesplayed in the liberation struggle,as insurrectionists,mutineers, vigilance committees, and publicists. Black initiative was crucial,for as FrederickDouglass, whose presencelooms largein the book, oftenremarked on the platform, ªHewho would be freemust himself strikethe ®rstblow.º Part II is moreabout what white abolitionists did and said. Blacks precededwhites in the praxis ofviolence. Douglas R.Egerton ’sexcellentdepiction of revolutionaryactivity among slavesin the North Carolina and VirginiaTidewater leading to Gabriel ’s 358 BookReviews plot, and Junius Rodriguez ’sequally ®nedescription of the lesser-knownbut better-organizedinsurrec- tion in the Louisiana sugarcountry in 1811make the point. They also revealhow the American Revolution and evenmore the recentHaitian Revolution impacted on mainland slaveaction. ªIdeasof revolution,ºwrites Rodriguez, ª imported fromSanto Domingo, inspiredslaves who rosein rebellionº (82). Romantic ideologypervaded the thought ofa growingnumber ofabolitionists. EvenGarrisonians committed to nonviolencetacitly sympathized with violent effortsby slavesand whiteslike John Brown to rollback slaveryby force.Such actionscould at the veryleast be viewedas heroicexpressions of manhood. Themost theoreticalof the essaysexamine the relationship ofromanticism and antislavery violence.The theme is ably presentedby Harroldin his essayon the 1841slave revolt aboard the ship Creole.Abolitionists likeFrederick Douglass, Harroldcontends, viewed slave leader Madison Washing- ton as both Byronichero and avengingangel. Inhis imaginative essayon identi®cation with Indians, John Staufferprobes romantic strainsin the antislavery rhetoricof four prominent abolitionists, two black and two whiteÐ GerritSmith, James McCuneSmith, FrederickDouglass, and John Brown. Inthe minds ofthe fourreformers the Indian as savageserved as symbol ofheroism and manhood through exerciseof the warriorvirtues and of national regenerationthrough aviolent strikeat acorruptedcivilization that permittedthe continuation ofslavery. Ina romantic twist, the savagethus becomesthe means fora regeneratedcivilization. However,ª Inthe eyesof many northerners,ºStauffer notes, ªJohn Brown became more (his italics) savagethan Indiansº(252). Ironicindeed. Perhaps the most provocative essayin the collectionis James H.Cook ’s on the praxis ofFrederick Douglass and antislavery violence,ª Fighting with Breath, Not Blows.ºWith what appears aslight touch ofsarcasm, Cook contendsthat by the 1850sthere was awideninggap betweenDouglass ’s increasingcalls for violence against slavery and his increasingunwillingness to engagepersonally in violent action, in contrastto his initial yearson the antislavery circuitwhen he he cameto blows with his tormentors. Cook makes considerablefuss over Douglass ’srelationswith John Brown, his failureto join his old friendin the HarpersFerry ® asco, and his apparent feelingsof guilt long afterwards. And again, in spite ofcalling African-Americans to the colorsafter 1863, Douglass himself did not volunteer.This seems to be stretchingthe argument.Douglass was, afterall, in his mid-40s and would have goneas an enlistedman! Inthat violent age,to which abolitionists made theircontribution, moral choiceshad to be made. Douglass subscribedto the romantic codeof manhood and physical bravery, but wordswere onething, foolish action another. Threewell-formulated essays focusing essentially on the thought and actionof white abolitionists are James BrewerStewart ’son vocal antislavery congressman,Joshua Giddings;Chris Padgett ’s on evangelicalProtestantism ’sin¯uence on callsfor violent resistanceto slaveryin Ohio ’s Western Reserve;and KristenA. Tegtmeier ’son northernwomen in ªBleedingKansas.º The book might have beenbetter served had therebeen more essays on women, black and white. Thebook is enhancedby copious notesat the endof each essay and a®neª SelectedBibliography ofSecondary Sourcesº at the conclusion. Theeditors are to be commendedfor assembling without exceptionan outstanding collectionof fresh scholarship. Antislavery Violence isa worthy addition to the literatureof abolitionist thought and practice.

OTEY M.SCRUGGS, Professorof History, Syracuse University

Yankeys Now:Immigrants in theAntebellum U.S., 1840± 1860 JOSEPH P. FERRIE, 1999 NewYork: OxfordUniversity Press pp. xii 1 223,$15.00 (paper)

In Yankeys Now,Joseph P.Ferrie,an economistat NorthwesternUniversity, employs highly sophisti- catedquantitative methods to analyzeboth the experiencesof Irish, German,and British immigrants and theirimpact on Americansociety during the ®rstgreat wave of transatlantic migration in the 1840s and 1850s.Unlike earlier mobility studies, which capturedonly the minority who persistedover time in particularcities or counties, Ferrie traces the geographicmovement and economicperformance of nearly2600 adult immigrant males whom he linked fromthe passengerlists ofships arrivingin New York in 1840±50 to the 1850and 1860federal census indexes and schedules.In addition, he compares theirexperience with those of4271 male, native-born whiteslocated in the 1850and 1860census BookReviews 359 schedules.The result is aunique longitudinal study which suggeststhat both upward and downward economicmobility in the pre-Civil WarU.S.A. weregreater and morespeci® c to certainregions and occupational and ethnicgroups than previously realized. Ferrie’sanalysis con®rms that antebellum immigrants weredisproportionately urbanizedand concen- tratedin particularregions and occupational sectors.In 1850, 46% of the immigrants in his sample livedin towns ofmore than 2500inhabitants (over36% in citieswith morethan 10,000people), compared with only 17%(and 9%) ofthe total white population. Likewise,43% of his immigrants lived in the MiddleAtlantic states, versusmerely 27% of the native-born. Nearlyhalf the immigrant males werecommon laborersor servants, compared with slightly overa ®fth ofthe native-born, whereas51% ofnatives werefarmers (against 28%of immigrants) and 11%of natives workedin commerceor the professions(against only 3%of immigrants). Only among skilledworkers were the proportions of immigrants (23%) and natives (17%) fairlyeven. Relatively fewof Ferrie ’simmigrants remainedin NewYork City aftertheir arrival from Europe: roughly 65%left the citymore-or-less immediately, and by 1850over 86%, by 1860nearly 90%, had departed,primarily forurban destinations in the MiddleAtlantic and Midwesternregions. Germans and Britons, olderimmigrants with largefamilies, and farmersand unskilled workerswere most likely to move to the Midwest,Far West,or Southwest. Thosewho leftNew York, especiallythose who departedsoon afterarriving, experienced much greaterrates of upward occupational mobility than those who remainedor tarried long in the city. Ferriemeasures the immigrants ’ occupational mobility by comparing theiroccupations as statedon the ships’ passengerlists with those recordedin the 1850and 1860census schedules. By 1850, 44%of those listedas unskilled in theirships ’ manifestshad attained higher-statusoccupations, whereasa fourth ofthose listedon arrivalas white-collaror skilled workers had falleninto the ranks ofthe unskilled, with most upward and downward mobility occurringin the immigrants ’ ® rst years in America. In1850, 23% of Ferrie ’simmigrants ownedreal estate (mean $262),compared with over46% of the native-born (mean $1124),but by 1860some 60%of the immigrants possessed realproperty (mean $921),compared with 77%of the native-born (mean $2231).In 1860 his immigrants also possessedan averageof $60 in personal property (versus$77 among natives). As expected,immigrant farmers,western settlers, and those who had arrivedwith high-status occupations faredbest. However,on averagean immigrant ’swealth increasedannually by some 15%during his ®rst 20years in the U.S., and overall, Ferrieconcludes, immigrant wealth accumulation was ªimpressiveº (128). Ferriecon® rms the earlier® ndingsof Stephen Thernstromand othersthat immigrants in all occupations weremuch moregeographically mobile than theirnative-born peers,and that unskilled immigrants experiencedthe highest ratesof non-persistence. However, whereas Thernstrom hypothe- sizedthat non-persistingworkers comprised an impoverished, ¯oatingproletariat, Ferrie® nds that most immigrants who changedcounties between 1850 and 1860(nearly two-thirds ofhis sample did so) improved theireconomic condition by moving. This was especiallytrue of unskilled arrivals, whose ratesof upward occupational mobility and ofwealth accumulation weremarkedly betterif they changed countiesthan ifthey persisted;moreover, those who moved farthestfrom New York City enjoyed greatestsuccess. By contrast,farming, white-collar,and skilledimmigrants who changedcounties in 1850±60 were more likely to experiencedownward occupational mobility and lowerrates of wealth accumulation than those who persisted. Perhaps ofgreatest relevance to labor historians isFerrie ’sdiscoverythat, as contemporarycritics complained, antebellum immigration had severelynegative effects on skillednative workers,especially in the urban Northeast, as theirincomes fell steadily in directproportion to immigration. Ferrieargues that the plight ofnative artisans was not causedprimarily by directcompetition fromskilled Germans and Britons but ratherby indirectcompetition fromunskilled Irishimmigrants, whose poverty and increasedavailability enabledAmerican manufacturers to mechanizeand ªde-skillºmajor industries. Oneresponse, Ferrie notes, was awaveof labor militancy and strikesamong skillednative workersin the 1850s.Another was the spectacularrise of organized nativism, which helped destroythe existing political party system and ledto the Civil War. However,Know-Nothing politicians (unlike theirearly and late20th-century counterparts) did not demand outrightrestriction of immigration, and Ferrie contendsthis was becausethe antebellum U.S. economy ’sabsorptive capacity was so greatthat immigration ’simpact was generallybenign, its negativeeffects primarily con®ned to oneregion and one occupational group. This in turn, FerrieconcludesÐ reviving and modifying F.J. Turner ’s ª safety valveºthesisÐ largely re¯ ected the presenceof an urban frontier,as his data indicatesheavy internal migration by skillednative workersfrom the Northeast to Chicago, Milwaukee,and otherrapidly 360 BookReviews growingwestern cities in responseto Irishimmigration and its consequencesfor northern manufactur- ing. To this reviewer,it is comfortingthat Ferrie ’s®ndingscon® rm and re®ne existing knowledge about Irishimmigration. TheIrish in Ferrie ’ssample, compared with Germanand British immigrants, were lesslikely to leaveNew York City, lesslikely to move farfrom the EastCoast, moreheavily concentratedin urban± industrial centersand in unskilled occupations, leastlikely to achieveupward (and most likely to experiencedownward) occupational mobility, and leastsuccessful in accumulating wealth. Ferrieattributes Irish immigrants ’ comparatively poor performanceto acombination oftheir relativedisadvantages at arrivaland nativist discrimination in the U.S. Nevertheless,he concludesthat by 1860ª any differencesbetween the Irishand the British and Germansthat couldnot be accounted forby occupation had beenerasedº (189). However,Ferrie ’ssampling techniquesmay bias his data towardunduly benignconclusions with respectto economicperformance among the Irishand, by extension,to antebellum immigrants, generally.Heroically, Ferrie tried to link nearly23,800 European male immigrants fromthe passenger lists to the 1850±1860 census indexes, but he was successfulin linking only 3103to eithercensus and merely508 to both. DespiteFerrie ’sable argumentsfor his sample ’srepresentivity,this reviewerstill wonderswhether those immigrants most likely to be single,unmarried, poor, transient,Irish, ordead werealso the most commonly unlinked and omitted. Moreover,Ferrie tried to link oneout ofevery 20adult male immigrants fromthe ships ’ manifeststo the 1850±60 census indexes for those who arrived in 1840± 45,but only oneout of40 for those debarkingin 1846± 50,when Irishpauper immigration was heaviest. Perhaps as aresult,the Irishcomprise only 28.5%of his sample, whereas they were45.6% of total immigration in 1841±50 (by contrast,38% of Ferrie ’simmigrants areBritish, compared with 15.5%of all arrivals). Also, Ferrie ’sinability to link immigrants with common names may have producedan Irishsample with adisproportionately largeminority ofProtestants, who were morelikely than Catholic peasants to have capital and high occupational levelsat arrival; thus, Ferrie linked (and sketchedthe careerof) Irishman John Claxton, becausehis probably ªProtestantºname was unusual among Irishimmigrants, but he was unable to link the overwhelminglyCatholic Patrick O’Briens.Likewise, Ferrie ’sinability to link femaleimmigrants may have distortedhis conclusionsÐ especiallyfor the Irish, with theirdisproportionately largenumbers offamine widows and singlewomen travelingalone. Inaddition, it must be notedthat Ferrie ’sªnativesºcomprise an extraordinarilyheterogeneous group, as the 1850±60 census data did not permit him to distinguish betweenimmigrants ’ American- born sons and the descendantsof 17th-century colonists. Ofgreater concern is Ferrie ’sdependenceon the ships’ passengerlists to identifyimmigrants ’ occupations at arrivaland to plot theiroccupational mobility fromthat point to theirsubsequent appearancein the censusschedules. As Ferrienotes, in the greatmajority ofinstances British port of®cials merely scrawled ª farmers,ºª laborers,ºor ª servantsº verticallyacross the passengerlists, oremployed endlessditto marks, which obliteratedvital distinctions among weavers,joiners, shoemakers, etc.,that wererecorded in ahandful ofmanifests. Moreover,Ferrie is too sanguinein assuming that Liverpoolclerks applied the same occupational measurementsto British and Irishimmigrants; this was unlikely becauseof anti-Irish prejudice, becausefamine Irishimmigrants ’ generallyragged appearance often belied real distinctions among them, but also becauseª farmersºin Britain and in Irelandwere very different, generally. Few Irish farmers(virtually all ofwhom weretenants) couldmatch an Englishclerk ’simageof a sturdy, ªindependentºyeoman fromKent or Yorkshire. Also, the most sensitiveclerk could not record(if he couldsee) the crucialsocioeconomic differences among Irishtenants of 20, 10, or 5 acresÐor between the latterand alandlessfarm laborer; yetthose distinctionsoften had major consequencesin the U.S. labor market. Also questionable areFerrie ’sdecisionsto identifyas Americanª farmersºonly those whom the U.S. censusschedules designated as farm- owners,and to lump Americantenant farmers into the ªunskilledº category.Farm tenancyin the U.S.A. was formany immigrants asteptoward farm ownership; by contrast,tenants in earlyand mid-centuryIreland almost nevercould achieve farm-ownership, and for an immigrant who in Irelandhad tilledten boggy, rack-rentedacres, or who had beena cottageweaver ora landlessagricultural laborer, even permanent tenancyof 50 or more American acres probably representedan enormousimprovement in both wealth and status. Afullappreciation ofFerrie ’sbook requiresfar more quantitative sophistication than most historians, includingthis reviewer,can boast; consequently, this volume is perhaps unsuitable forassignment in most undergraduatehistory classes.Yet despite these caveats, Yankeys Now isa veryimpressive and important work. Scholars ofantebellum social, immigration, and labor history will have to cometo BookReviews 361 termswith Ferrie ’s®ndings, just as they must appreciatethe enormousmagnitude ofhis effortand accomplishment.

KERBY MILLER, Professorof History, University ofMissouri± Columbia

TheColored Aristocracy of St.Louis CYPRIAN CLAMORGAN (Editedwith an Introductionby J ULIE WINCH), 1999 Columbia: Universityof Missouri Press pp. xiii 1 122, $22.00

At the heartof this slim book is apristinereproduction of a 20-pagepamphlet published in 1858 about St. Louis ’scoloredaristocracy and authored by ameanderingson ofone such elitefamily. Thepamphlet itselfconsists of thumbnail sketchesof the quality that year.The commentary is breezy,mostly fond, but occasionally derisive.Of immediate noteto readersof this journal aretheir occupations as barbers, rivergamblers, saloon and boardinghouse keepers.They had money, weremostly but not all light-skinned, and favoredold families. Though slaverystill existedin St. Louis, nonewas an owneror a traderof human chattel, afactunlike NewOrleans or Charleston. Catholicism was the faith ofchoice or inheritance among St. Louis ’sblack gentry.A moral black elitesuch as in Boston and NewYork was not the aim ofthe onein St. Louis, nordid they form benevolentor literary associations. Rather, socialbetters simply knewhow they stood. Theirworld strivedfor tradition, but was actually transient,especially among Mississippi gamblersor when California’sgoldmines beckoned.Cyprian Clamorgan was onesuch wanderer.Though he camefrom an old family, most ofhis lifehe followedthe riveras abarberand steward.Though his pamphlet was oftenvery critical of Clamorgan ’sfriends,he was not ostracizedor attacked. This was his soleliterary effort. By itself,the pamphlet would remainimpenetrable, alist offorgotten denizens who livedin a shadowy socialstratum just beforethe GreatWar which would rendertheir identity redundant. Julie Winch, bestknown forher ® nebook Philadelphia ’sBlack Elite: Activism,Accommodation, andthe Struggle forAutonomy (1988), has usedher superb researchskills to reinvigoratethis ¯imsy narrativeinto a thorough model ofinvestigation. Around the pamphlet, Winch arrangesan introductionwhich tellsus ofslavery in St. Louis(a subject rarelytouched) and the socialmores and ®nancesof its black elite. She followsthat with the storyof the Clamorgan family, which commencedlocally with Jacques, who arrivedin St. Louisfrom a backgroundand lineagemixed of Spanish, Portuguese,Scottish, Welsh, Frenchand possibly African,to tradeslaves. Hehad also workedas arope-maker, furtrader, and lead miner, and at various illicitscams. Heknew a number ofIndian tonguesand was owedpatronage by many small tradersin the region,a factthat helped when creditorsclosed in. Hehad ®veª Negrowivesº whom he exploitedand brutalized, evensold. Hesired an unknown number ofchildren and became the patriarch ofa contentiousand ambitious family. Itsmatriarch was his ®rstwife, who, though illiterate,had realestate documents forged to claim his land when he threatenedto sellher children in NewOrleans during a business downturn in 1808.She becameguardian of his acknowledgedchildren sixyears later. Jacques’sestate,which was tangledwith lawsuits, counterclaims,and multiple claims, preoccupied the livesof his children,of Cyprian ’sgeneration,and the followingsiblings. Hedid not liveto seethe courtcases settled. We also learnof Cyprian ’scontemporarieswho includeLouis, acousin, whose family triedto pass in the 1880sand becamepart ofa scandal, which shook St. Louissociety. This mix ofhistorical and biographical detailemerges again laterin the book, when Winch adds a45-page appendix to the pamphlet. Herannotations tellus ofthe backgrounds, wealth and property and careers ofevery person mentioned in Clamorgan ’s pamphlet. Weknow all this and much morebecause of Winch ’sextraordinaryresearch. She combines skilled historical insights with agiantpile ofgenealogical data found in courthouses,local historical societies, and among legaland personal papers. As aresult,the pamphlet ’scitizenscome alive. Oneof my favoritesis P.G. Wells, describedby Clamorgan as aªtall, pompous black manÐ agreatbraggart ¼ He is not only treacherousand deceitfulto his own color,but had deceivedand cheatedevery white man who has trustedin his promises.ºWinch then tracesWells ’scareeras abarberand boardinghouse keeper.She ®nds Wellsat the National Convention ofColored Men in Syracuse,New York in 1864. Heand his wifeleft St. Louisby the late1860s. Her citations forsuch information includeseveral decennialcensuses, directories, marriage directories, and conventionproceedings. This is arelatively 362 BookReviews briefnotation; othersgo on forpages of fascinating detail about aclassof people who would have remainedobscured save for the diligenceof Winch. Thebook then is signi®cant for illuminating atumultuous black elitein amajor bordercity just beforethe Civil War. Beyond that Winch ’sachievementagain shows how badly such workneeds to be donewell. There are many characterswithin the freeblack worldthat needsuch asympathetic and thorough biographer as Winch. Thesame is truefor the worldof antebellum white laborers.This may not be alargebook, but it is amodel ofhistorical investigationand description.

GRAHAMRUSSELL HODGES, Professorof History, Colgate University

Closingthe Gate: Race, Politics, and theChinese Exclusion Act ANDREW GYORY, 1998 Chapel Hill: TheUniversity of North Carolina Press pp. xii 1 354, $49.95

AndrewGyory ’s Closing the Gate revisitsthe causation forthe race-and gender-basedChinese ExclusionAct of 1882. The scholarly investigationin the past has divided alongthis line: either California and its working-classpeople ormore general, nationwide racialimages of the Chineseled to the clamorfor that legislation.Gyory questions the validity ofboth ofthese theses, the formercalled the California thesisand the latterthe national racistconsensus one. Though Gyoryacknowledges that both did play asigni®cant role in fomentingnationwide dissatisfactionwith the presenceof Chinese immigrant labor, he claims that the pressuresof electoral politics, morethan anything else,turned cross-classin¯ ammatory rhetoricinto calculatedlegislative action. To provehis contention, Gyorystudied wide-ranging sources from the public speechesand private lettersof politicians and organizedlabor leadersto widelycirculated newspapers and working-class periodicals. Government-generateddocuments and contemporarypolitical and socialcommentaries also cameunder review. These materials seemedto suggestthat animosity in the Easttoward the Chinesewas muted until the rati®cation ofthe unequal AngellTreaty of 1880, which setthe course forpassage of the anti-immigration law of1882. The minuscule number ofChinese in the East, adesire to avoid settinga precedentthat would determinethe fateof future immigration fromEurope, and a lingeringbelief in freelabor shaped this indifferenceor/ and in some cases,opposition to exclusion. ªWhiteness,ºthe author argues,but doesnot necessarilyprove, did littleto counteractthose sentiments. Gyory’sclaim that organizedlabor eastof the Rockiesdrew a sharp distinction betweenimported contractlabor and Chineseimmigration is also unconvincing.His contention that easternworkers ’ opposition to the entryof these Asian newcomerswas morerooted in arejectionof ª coolielaborº ratherthan that ofthe Chineseas araceitself is problematic. Thevocal protestagainst Chinese contractlabor stemmed fromfears of ª yellowperil,º a panic shaped by virulentracial images that clearlyinfected the political culturein the UnitedStates. Thesupposed staticdivide between importation oflabor and Chineseimmigration clearlywas ¯uid and respondedto long-heldskewed understandingsof race and Americannational identity. Thearrival of a political consensusfollowing the gradualfading of sectional animosity in the late1870s meant that politicians ofboth mainstream partieshad to ®nd an issueto setthemselves apart fromone another. Risingclass tensions and an economicrecession during that decade encourageddemagogues and politicians to blame the Chinesefor the ills ofthe republic. The unanimous votein 1882signaled the triumph ofthe manipulation ofrace to advancepolitical agendas. Scholars familiar with this literaturewould, however,® nd this lineof argument familiar and hardly path-breaking. Still, Closing the Gate doesreveal for the ®rsttime that the Chinesequestion held centerstage duringthe electioncampaigns ofthe late1870s, which in turnhelped to bringthe curtaindown on Chineseimmigration in 1882.What isunclear is whether the ChineseExclusion Act was the outcomeof politicians ’ pursuit ofself-interests, or the resultof elected leaders responding to public opinion. Gyory’sworkis awelcomeaddition to UnitedStates labor history and Asian-American Studies and will prod most to reconsiderold assumptions about the anti-Chinese movement.

BENSON TONG, Assistant Professorof History, Wichita State University BookReviews 363

Sorting Out theNew South City:Race, Class, and Urban Developmentin Charlotte, 1875± 1975 THOMAS W. HANCHETT, 1998 Chapel Hill: Universityof North Carolina Press pp. 380,$47.95

Howhave southernurban dwellersde® ned ª agoodplace to live?ºThomas Hanchettexplores their de®nitions and how they wereshaped by industrialization and commercialdevelopment overa century in Charlotte, North Carolina. He® nds that forthose with the powerto decidewhere they livedand wherethey worked,the notion ofa goodplace to livepropelled a ªsortingºprocess that transformed this southernmetropolis through the lensof race and class. InCharlotte, as in othersouthern cities, residential segregation and commercialsegmentation did not emergefull-blown fromthe Civil Warand Reconstruction.Wealthy white Charlotteans ’ move to isolate themselvesin outlying suburban communities emergedslowly, Hanchetttells us, especiallyin compari- son with northerners ’ urban-to-suburban ¯ight. When developerslaunched Charlotte ’s®rstNorthern- styleª streetcarsuburbº in 1891,for example, white-collarprofessionals were reluctant to embracethe conceptof living on the outskirtsof town. Instead,Hanchett ’sanalysis revealsthat ªsalt and pepperº residentialpatterns characterized Charlotte until 1900.Until the 1920s,patchwork con®gurations of African-American,working-class white and white-collarneighborhoods existed.Commercial and residentialareas were intermingled, and mill executivesbuilt housing fortheir workers adjacent to middle-classtracts. Thesorting of the cityÐresidential from commercial, middle classfrom working classÐ proceeded much the way it had in northerncities in the 1820sand 1830s.But industrialization and commercial development camemuch laterto the urban South. Hanchettuses Charlotte as abasis with which to revisethe chronologyof urbanization. Beginningin the 1890s,the migration ofrural whites seeking jobs in the newtextile mills and the accompanying Populist politics alteredthe classstructure in the city, stateand region.Charlotte ’seconomicinterests, once uni® edin favorof railroad construction and commercialprogress, became shaken and frayed.The city ’snewspapereditors and boostersnoted a tenorof ª insolenceºand ªlibertyrun mad.º Charlotte ’selitenow fearedthe randomness ofcity life, and accordingto Hanchett, theseforces prompted them to plan anew,fragmented city. Consequently, Charlotte ’sbuilt environmentevolved into an intensivelyplanned and segregated environment, writesHanchett. After1900, developers planned residentialtracts especially for black citizens.The process was not oneof ª ghettoization,ºHanchett claims (143), but oneof ª directed opportunity.ºSuch housing was aestheticallyappealing and reasonably pricedwhen newlyconstructed, and presumably pleasingto residentsand planners alike. Meanwhile, newmiddle-class developments wereaccompanied by deedrestrictions which prohibited the building ofstructures costing less than $1500or their sale to African-Americans.And the exclusivitythat was not accomplished by law was institutedthrough othermeans. Windingstreets in the newwhite-collar suburbs, forexample, broke with the previously established gridpattern of Charlotte ’score.While such alayout nicely® tthe topography, it also made the suburbs look and feela placeapart fromthe centralcity. Hanchett’sworkcontributes to the workof other historians ofurban development who have detailed migration, suburbanization, segmentation,and the functionof restrictive covenants outside the South. Theauthor suggeststhat the urban South ’sdevelopment isunique, and ®nds that segregation,political disfranchisement,and, in Charlotte ’scasethe lackof an immigrant votingpopulation aredistinguishing features.Hanchett joins agrowingnumber ofurban historians with his treatmentof the NewDeal and subsequent federalmortgage and lendinginitiatives. These,he writes,accelerated the sortingprocess. Such federalprograms, alongwith the unequal apportionment ofcity services and the placementof parks and highways, re¯ectedthe preferencesof the localoligarchy. Planning aªgoodplace to liveºthus was aself-servingendeavor and allowed Charlotte ’selitesto develop the community as they alone wished. Hanchett’sworkraises questions about how wewrite the history ofurban development and the extentto which non-elitescould or did contributeto the planning process.City leadersdetermined wherepeople should dwell, wherethey should work, what is the suitable mix ofstores, factories, and houses, and the properarrangement of black people and white people. InHanchett ’sCharlotte, few othersweighed in on thesequestions. With fewexceptions, we hear only the viewsof a small groupof cityleaders, planners, and newspapereditors. Did otherschallenge the plans forCharlotte ’s develop- ment? Did community leadersor textile workers offer criticism of it? Hanchettonly brie¯y reminds readersthat the sortingprocess did generatelocal criticism which becamenational. Indeed,the U.S. 364 BookReviews

Supreme Court case Swann v.Charlotte-Mecklenberg Boardof Education ,decidedin 1971,signi® es a degreeof discontent with the prevailingspatial orderingby classand color. Hanchett’scontribution to the history ofrace, class and urban development stemsfrom his analysis ofchange over a fullcentury. He extends both the geographicand chronologicscope of the history of urban development, and in so doing, demonstratesthat the processesof sorting and segmentationare neverquite completeand areconstantly renewed.Though he offerslittle new to the history of suburbanization and the cultureof new South boosterism, he expertlysets the scenefor the emerging Sunbelt in amuch-neededpolitical and racialcontext.

STACY KINLOCKSEWELL, Assistant Editor,Margaret Sanger Papers,New YorkUniversity

Rootsof Reform:Farmers, Workers,and theAmerican State,1877± 1917 ELIZABETH SANDERS, 1999 Chicago: Universityof Chicago Press pp. x 1 532, $39.95

Elizabeth Sandershas undertakena laudable task. She seeksto ªreclaimthe agrarianradical heritage and evento suggestthat its goalsand methods have some relevancetodayº (410). Inthis endeavor,she largelysucceeds. Along the way, however,she also offersan analysis ofProgressive era reform that is open to considerablequestions. At the core, Roots ofReform arguesthat national Progressivismneither camefrom eastern business elitesnor the urban middle class. Rather, reformat the federallevel originatedwith an allianceof farmers and workerswho followedrepublican producerideology and sought anon-administrative stateto tame the evilsof corporate capitalism. Regionalpolitical economy provides the startingpoint forthis provocative argument.Based on economicand population statistics, Sandersdivides the countryinto threetypes ofregions: industrial core,agrarian periphery, and diverseindustrial± agricultural.The industrial core,which shesees as exclusivelysynonymous with ªcapitalism,ºspans only the Northeast and easternGreat Lakes, while all ofthe remainder,even Chicago, is eitherdiverse or peripheral. With thesecategories in mind, Sandersundertakes roll-call analysis and carefulinvestigation of statutory formation in Congress,mostly in the periodbetween 1910 and 1917.She rangeswidely, consideringtransportation regulation,banking issues,trust busting, tariff® ghts, agriculturaland vocational education, and labor legislation.By looking at who actually wroteand votedfor these laws, sheshows convincinglythat Southern Democratsand ªinsurgentºMidwestern Republicans draftedand carriedthrough most ofthe progressivelegislation of the period. At leastat the public level,Sanders demonstrates,eastern capital actedª defensivelyºand acquiescedto bureaucraticregulation only as a way to staveoff more harmful statutory controls.Similarly, farmersand workersaccepted administrat- iveregulation as acompromise. Hence,state building emergesas ªinteractive.ºBeyond this negative point, Sandersalso persuasivelyoutlines the CongressionalProgressives ’ vision ofwhat shecalls a ªstatutory stateº(389). Such astatewould be responsiveto people through directdemocracy and local participation and would restraincapitalism through directlegal penalties rather than bureaucratic regulation. Much of Roots ofReform isdevoted to arguingagainst historians, especiallyGabriel Kolko, who have seenanti-trust, banking, and otherlegislation as emanating frombusiness interests.Within the limits ofher methodology, Sanderssucceeds, but herapproach leavesdoubts. She statesat the outsetthat she isinterested in public actions, not private intentions. While analyzingpublic behavior and discoursecan be valuable, Sandersdoes so without astrongtheoretical foundation and oftenends up taking public pronouncementsat facevalue. Inthe end, the in¯uence of capitalists, especiallyoutside the Capitol building, remainsuncertain. Heranalysis ofthe farmer±laborer alliance is also problematic. Labor endsup beingprimarily the AFL, and morepointedly, Samuel Gompers. Sanderslooks brie¯yat the Knightsof Labor, seeingthem as the besthope forlabor in politics. She criticizesthe leadershipof the Socialist Party fordogmatically rejectingfarmers as beingpart ofthe owningclass. TheAFL also comesin forcensure for sticking to ªpureunionismº instead of engaging in electoralpolitics. Themajority ofindustrial-core workers, she assertswithout much evidence,voted Republican based on ªfull-dinnerpailº appeals. Inthe end, it remainsunclear what the mass ofworkers wanted from the state. Theagrarians, however, are at the heartof the book, and here,too, dif®culties arise. She tracesfarm protestfrom the Grangersthrough the Greenback-LaborParty and the Alliancesto the Populists. With the demiseof Populism, shemaintains, Southern Democratstook up the agrariancause. Throughout BookReviews 365 the legislativeanalysis, Southern DemocraticProgressives are consistently labeled ª agrariansºand even ªfarmersºbased on the simple factthat they comefrom the ªagrarianperiphery.º In reality as numerousscholars of southern Progressivism have shown, Southern Democratsdid not simply carry out the wishesof farmers. Many sought an agendaamenable to southernbusiness, evenif that con¯icted with the northeasternindustrial elite. Moreimportantly, the Socialists wereprobably rightabout aworkers ’ alliancewith Southern ªagrarians.ºBy 1910,when Sanders ’sdetailedanalysis begins, the yeoman classwas disappearing rapidly as many white Southernersslipped into tenancyand sharecroppingor drifted into emerging industries.While some small farmersremained, Southern agriculturistswith any political cloutwere members ofa capitalist eliteof planters and merchantswho canhardly be consideredª producersºand whose interestsclearly did not liewith labor. While this regionalelite may have sought controlson easterncapital, they nonethelesspursued a regionalcapitalist agenda, not an agrarianone. Finally, callingSouthern Democrats,or even Midwestern Republicans, ªagrarianradicalsº who wantedª universalsuffrageº and ªdirectdemocracyº does some violenceto those terms.Sanders argues that the agrarianvision implied closeconnection to constituencies,but the Southern Congressmenwho advocatedthis vision had also disenfranchisedAfrican-Americans, curtailed white votingrights, and foughtwomen ’ssuffrage.While Sandersacknowledges such limitations, shedoes not considerin depth how restrictedthe agrarianprogram becameafter the death ofPopulism. While theseproblems muddy the book ’sanalysis, Sandersdoes provide afreshinterpretation of national Progressivismthat integratesmore fully the in¯uence of Southern and Midwesternelements ofthe movement. She is also correctthat historical analysis ofthe Americanstate has becometoo focusedon the development ofbureaucratic regulation. Moreover, she admirably resurrectsthe agrarianhope fordemocratic regulation of capitalism. As rapacious globalization engulfsthe planet, Sandersis rightto recallª the old Greenbackrepublican beliefthat neitherunrestrained business nor autonomous bureaucracycould maintain abroad and democraticprosperityº (419). Perhaps this vision offersan avenueout ofthe duality ofmarket dei®cation and anti-democraticstate control, and as Sandersconcludes, ª perhaps its time will comeagainº (419).

JAMES D.SCHMIDT, Associate Professorof History, Northern Illinois University

Their Fathers ’ Daughters: SilkMill Workers in Northeastern Pennsylvania, 1880±1960 BONNIE STEPENOFF, 1999 Selinsgrove:Susquehanna UniversityPress pp. 199,$29.95

Bonnie Stepenoff ’slabor oflove, TheirFathers ’ Daughters,describesthe birth, growthand declineof a distinctivelabor forceand worldconnected to the silk mills in NortheasternPennsylvania primarily between1900 and 1940.Two of Stepenoff ’sgreat-auntsworked in thesemills and it isthe importance and preeminenceof family that is the dominant theme ofthis book. Thegrowth of coal mining in this regionin the late19th centurynot only createda vital union tradition, but also attractedcapitalists looking to takeadvantage of the labor ofthe children,primarily daughters,of the miners. Thesilk mills ofPennsylvania (as opposed to those in NewJersey or New England) developeda distinctivelabor force,immigrant girlsand daughtersin theirteens and earlytwenties who camefrom a tradition of labor militancy practicedin theirunion halls, communities, and homes. Stepenoffassesses how these mill workerschanged, how they engagedin avarietyof strikes (or refusedto participate in some) and how they negotiatedthe expectationsof their families ’,theirunions ’ (and some very¯ amboyant labor leaderslike Mother Jones), progressiveera reformers battling child labor, and theirown needsand desires. Stepenoffcontends that thesefemale mill workerswere ª theirfathers ’ daughters.ºThis isa more complicated thesisthan it appears at ®rstglance. On the onehand, mill workerswere dutiful daughters, workingunder exploitative conditions fora pittanceto help support large,vulnerable, demanding families. Inthe wakeof the AnthraciteStrike of 1902, the AnthraciteCommission queriedall involved, includingthe femalesilk mill workers,whose youth had beensacri® ced for the coalmill owners.When theseyoung women testi®ed, however,ª theirown needsremained submergedº ; they would rather ªsupport theirfathers ’ demands forhigher wagesº (p. 69). Unlikesilk workersin Paterson, NewJersey, forexample, theseyoung, femalesilk mill workersdid not respondto the appeals ofradical militant unions toimprove theirconditions: ªThecrucial factor in¯ uencing the decisionof Pennsylvania ’s silk workersnot to join the IWWstrike[in 1913] was not that so many ofthem wereyoung and female, 366 BookReviews but that so many ofthem livedin households headedby localminers or mine laborers¼. Family loyalty and the ideologyof self-help militated against radicalunionism but gaveyoung silk workersthe strength to work, help theirfamilies and ®nd otherroads to abetterlifeº (83 and 85). Young, femalemill workers,however, went on strikea number oftimes duringthe ®rstthree decades ofthe 20th centuryand in this way, they werealso theirfathers ’ daughters.As they objectedto poor pay, poor workingconditions, excessivehours, and arbitrary supervision, the silk mill workersattracted attention to themselvesand duringthe ProgressiveEra they cameto symbolize the evilsof child labor in the UnitedStates. Becauseof attention by MotherJones, John Mitchell,Clarence Darrow, and others, the thin, pale, undernourishedwaif, laboring herchildhood away to make the sumptuous silks ofthe Ladiescame to representall ofthe evilsof child labor. By the 1920s,the excessivepractices of many ofthese employers had moderatedand the averageage in the mills increased. Stepenoff’smost interestingchapter, ªMothers,Daughters, and Choices,ºdescribes the fallout of thesechanges. During the 1920s,child labor laws, improved educationalopportunities, immigration, and increasedrationalization in the mills all contributedto changingwork and family arrangements. Now, mothers morefrequently left the home to work, ªsometimes exchangingroles with adolescent daughterswho assumed greaterresponsibility forhousehold tasks and child care¼ Daughtersof thirteenand fourteenwho might previously have goneout to workin the silk mill insteadattended school all day and then rushedhome to carefor younger school agechildren, clean house and start cookingsupperº (p. 125). Children did not have to labor in the mills, but timeswere still hard and opportunities remainedlimited. By the endof World War II, both the anthracitemills and the silk mills beganto closedown. This is ausefulcase study becauseit demonstratesthe importance ofexploring the intersectionsof family and workwhen doinglabor history. Itis at its bestwhen it provides the day-to-day textureand strugglesof the workers ’ lives. Theinfrequent sections that offercomparative insights hint at areas wherethe study might have proved evenmore useful.

LISA M.FINE, Associate Professorof History, Michigan State University

Alabama North:African-American Migrants,Community, and Working-ClassActivism in Cleveland,1915± 1945 KIMBERLY L. PHILLIPS, 1999 Urbana and Chicago: Universityof Illinois Press pp. xv 1 334,$59.95 (cloth); $21.95(paper)

Kimberly L.Phillips has succeededin producinga signi®cant community and working-classstudy of black migrantsin Clevelandduring the ®rsthalf ofthe 20th century.Relying on traditional sources, such as manuscript collections,newspapers, censusdata, organizationalminutes, and government reportsÐas wellas newertypes ofevidence such as oral histories, artwork, and music lyricsÐPhillips provides adetailedand interestinglook at lifein black working-classCleveland from 1915 to 1945. Phillips’ main ®ndingis that working-classblack lifein Clevelandwas so dominated by southern folkways and values that the citygenuinely earned its sobriquet ofª AlabamaNorth.ºImmigrants from the DeepSouth generallyÐand the mines, mills, and factoriesof Alabama speci®callyÐ shaped black working-classCleveland so that aculturearose that challengedthe city ’sblack middle classas wellas its white employers. Migrantsfrom the South cameto Clevelandwith the ferventhope that lifenorth ofthe Mason± DixonLine would be easier,fairer, and morelucrative. Instead they found white AFL and CIO unions that failedto liveup to theirlofty rhetoricabout racialinclusion and equalityÐ much lessracial fairness on the shop¯oor. They also found themselvesconfronted by hostile black eliteswho weredisdainful oftheir militance, and white employerswho weresometimes as weddedto racial discrimination as theirformer employers back in Alabama. To dealwith thesechallenges, these black migrantsfell back on the mechanisms that had servedthem wellin hostile territorydown south. They formedexceptionally strong community and kinship ties,bolstered by associational and fraternal groups, Baptist, Holinessand Pentecostalchurches, and the FutureOutlook League(FOL). Phillips ’ study isespecially strong when it analyzesthe importance ofemotional activistsouthern religion for the migrantsas wellas the musical Gospelquartet singing that had its rootsin North Alabama ’siron, coal, steel,and railroadtowns and ruralsacred harp and jubilee singing.Using the latesttechniques afforded by ethnomusicology and culturalanthropology, the author squeezesmeaning from music and lyricsin atruly interdisciplinaryway. BookReviews 367

Phillips spends agreatdeal of time and efforton the FutureOutlook League,describing it as a southern-dominated organizationthat sought genuineimprovement in the livesof working-class blacks in Cleveland, regardlessof the hostility it facedfrom the city ’sestablished black middle class, white workers,and white employers. TheFOL, foundedin the depths ofthe GreatDepression in 1935and dominated by the iron-willedand sharp-tongued Alabama migrantJohn O.Holly, embarked on a careerthat fosteredindividual and collectiveactivism, valued the equal involvement ofblack women, and evenformed an independentblack union afterdispleasure with the racialpolicies of white-domi- natedAFL and CIO unions reacheda nadir. Comprising 10,000members, the FOL thrived until the late1950s, waged boycotts, protests, streetbattles, and othertypes ofmilitant behavior, published a newspaper, revitalizedthe localNAACP, criticizedthe timidity ofthe city ’sblack middle-class leadership, openedbranches in neighboringcities, and generallymade black workersÐmale and femaleÐsuch aforceto be reckonedwith in Clevelandthat today politicians still make sureto exhibit fondnessand respectfor its memory. For too long, studiesof race have falleninto oneof two separatecategories: either a civilrights study ora study ofwhite supremacistreaction against blacks and minorities. Actually, though, civilrights is bestunderstood as atwo-sidedcoin, and it isimpossible to understandeither side fully without consideringthe other. Likewise,societal enthusiasm forincreased civil rights and societalopposition to vigilantism evolveas differentfaces of the same coinover time. Both ofthese facesÐ the drivefor civil rightsand white supremacistreaction, the dark sideof the civilrights coinÐ receive some attention in this book. While Phillips doesnot consciouslyor explicitly articulate this relationship, it isto the book ’s creditthat it doesinclude both attempts by blacks to win greatercivil and political rightsas wellas white backlash and reactionagainst those attempts. While Clevelanddid not sufferthe racialviolence that othercities in the North did, notably Chicago and Detroit,working-class whites were successfully race-baitedby theiremployers. Angerand violencegreeted black attempts at residentialdesegregation in Clevelandas in othercities both North and South. In sum, AlabamaNorth isa solid study that adds much to ourknowledge of the copingskills, resourcefulness,and militanceof working-class blacks in an urban settingin the North. Especially interestingis how working-classblacksÐ confrontedby middle-classblack antipathy, white working- classracism, and hostile white employersÐrelied on southernculture and folkways to adapt, survive, and at times evenprosper.

GLENNFELDMAN, Assistant Professorof History, University ofAlabama at Birmingham

Of Mosesand Marx:Folk Ideologyand Folk History in theJewish Labor Movement DAVID SHULDINER (Forewordby P AUL BUHLE), 1999 Westport, CT: Berginand Garvey pp. xii 1 248, $65.00

Thelabor movement built by EasternEuropean Jewish immigrants in the UnitedStates in the late19th and early20th centuriesincluded a widevariety of institutions and ideologies.In addition to unions in the garmentand otherindustries, there were fraternal organizations, political parties, periodicals, and theatergroups. Socialists made up the dominant faction. But therewere Communists, Anarchists, and Labor Zionistsas well.In Eastern Europe, the UnitedStates, and elsewhere,the Jewish labor movement formedits own distinctsubculture,often in opposition to the mainstream Jewish culturaland religioustradition, against which the movement ’smembers rebelled.The nature of the relationship betweenJewish radicalism and the Jewish culturaltradition is an issuethat has interestedobservers sincethe beginningsof the movement. David Shuldiner, who is himself partly aproductof the milieu he describes,aims to apply the tools offolklore to the study ofthe Jewish labor movement ªby focussingon the ways in which beliefand ritual have beenused by Yiddish-speaking radicalsºto expressa synthesis ofethnic Jewishness and class-basedradicalism (1± 2). Heargues that members ofthe movement constructeda coherentª folk ideologyºout ofelements drawn from their experiences with both lifein traditional Jewish societyand with workand politics in urban industrial society.This folk ideology, togetherwith its rituals, served as an ªintegrativesystem,º allowing forboth culturalcontinuity and change.Shuldiner shows that while Jewish radicalsrebelled against Jewish tradition, they also transformedparts ofit into something new. Hebases his argumenton interviewshe conductedwith 20agingJewish radicalsin the early1980s, as wellas on extensivereading in the scholarly and popular literatureon the Jewish labor movement in all its aspects. 368 BookReviews

Shuldiner doesan excellentjob ofsorting out theoreticallythe problematic relationship between modernJewish radicalism and traditional Judaism per se.Hesurveys the literature,arguing that scholarly and popular observershave by and largebought into the movement ’sown folk ideologythat posits adirectconnection between the two. Shuldiner counters,rightly, that it isa mistake to seeJewish radicalism as arisingdirectly out ofJewish religioustradition, especiallyas it was practicedin Eastern Europe.Rather, it arosefrom the dual ethnicand classconsciousness of its adherents.As such, however,it usedJewish symbols, language,holidays, and othercultural artifacts to drawan ªideationalº link betweenbeing Jewish and beingradical. TheYiddish-speaking radicalsfelt their Jewishness deeply and it thoroughly infusedtheir politics. Inone interesting chapter, Shuldiner examinesthe useof alternative rituals for the holiday of Passover, commemorating the emancipation ofthe Jewsfrom slavery in Egypt, to articulatethis secular Jewish-radicalsynthesis. Hesees a transformation ofthe seder,the centralhome ritual ofthe holiday, froma celebrationof divine ªhegemonyºand diverseintervention to oneof human strugglefor liberation. At ®rst, many radicals, especiallyAnarchists and, later,Communists, mockedthe holiday and its ritualsby creatingparodies ofthe Haggadah,the textfor the seder,as part oftheir anti-religious efforts.Later, however, they fashioned theirown alternative Haggadahs and held theirown secularand socialist seders.Shuldiner arguesthat the radicalsused their versions of Passover to ªmediatebetween community and polity,ºthat is to demonstrateto themselvesand othersthat radicalism was essentially Jewish and that Jewishnesswas essentiallyradical (139). Through their seders,the radicalsalso asserted theirethnic identi® cation evenas they eschewedits explicitlyreligious manifestations. Thebook includesthe fascinatingtexts of several radical Haggadahs as appendices. Historiansmight have some dif®culty with some aspectsof the book. Oneproblem is its lackof speci®city. Although he acknowledgesthat Communists, Socialists, Anarchists and Labor Zionistsoften differedin theirapproaches to Jewish identity and symbolism, he tendsto lump them all underthe headingª radicalºwithout exploringtheir differences. Similarly, the analysis sometimes lackshistoricity. Thecontext provided by Shuldiner ’sthorough readingin the secondaryliterature mostly concernsthe heyday ofthe Jewish labor movement in the late19th and early20th centuries.His database of interviews,on the otherhand, re¯ects the stateof mind ofhis subjectsin the early1980s. The book doeslittle to tracethe evolution ofthis cohortof Jewish radicalsbetween the two time periods, orto relatethe speci®c eventsthat might have in¯uenced that evolution. Ahandful offactual errors will also bother afewspecialists, as will the author ’sapparent lackof facility in his subjects ’ primary language (attestedto by anumber ofgarbled transliterations and translations fromYiddish). Despiteits shortcomings, however, OfMarx and Moses makes asolid theoreticalcontribution to the study ofthe Jewish labor movement, sortingout the complexinteractions between class and ethnicity, and betweenradical politics and ethno-religiousbackground. Indoing so, the book offersa more convincingframework for understanding how traditional Jewish cultureinformed the politics ofthose who rebelledagainst it than that provided by those who seea directline running from the prophets or the Talmud tomodernJewish Marxists.Moreover, the work ’sinvestigationof the radicalappropriation oftraditional ceremoniespoints in interestingdirections for historians interestedin the importance of ritual forthe formation and expressionof new forms of ethnic, class, and political identity. DANIELSOYER, Assistant Professorof History, FordhamUniversity

Wordsof theUprooted: Jewish Immigrants in Early Twentieth-CenturyAmerica ROBERT A. ROCKAWAY, 1998 Ithaca and London: CornellUniversity Press pp. ix 1 230,$16.95 (paper)

Inthe introductionto his newbook, acontribution to the Documentsin AmericanSocial History series,Robert Rockaway provides abriefdiscussion of the turn-of-the-centurydynamic ofuptown and downtown Jews, amodel familiar to studentsof American Jewish, labor, and immigration history. Many assimilated GermanJews, arrivingin the UnitedStates in the mid-19th century,channeled their business acumeninto ®nancial success.Residing in wealthy uptown homes, they soon comprisedan elitethat was socially self-containedyet integrated into mainstream Americanpolitics and culture.At the endof the 19th century,Jews from Eastern Europe arrived in the countrywith vastly fewer resources,a higherlevel of religious observance, and atradition ofradicalism. They occupiedthe tenementsdowntown (in NewYork, on which the model was based, this meant the LowerEast Side). Intheir poverty and politics, the downtown Jewswere viewed as athreatby those uptown, as their ªbackwardºways might have aªdeleteriouseffect on Americanopinions ofJewsº (5). BookReviews 369

Rockaway describesthe urgencyof the situation forAmerican Jewish philanthropy in the early1900s, as conditions in Russia deterioratedand the number ofJews entering the U.S. rosesteadily. Thestrain on the resourcesof the moreestablished GermanJews increased while the livingconditions ªdowntownºin Manhattan and otherlarge cities worsened. Rockaway focuseson oneorganization ’s strategyfor ameliorating the livingconditions ofthe newcomers.In 1901,several groups joined to form the IndustrialRemoval Of®ce (IRO), an institution with the goalof re-directing Jewish men (and, if they weremarried, their families) to smallercities in the South, Midwest,and Westwhere their skills wereneeded. Rockaway introducesus to the leadership ofthe IROÐ both the leadersin NewYork and its agentsthroughout the U.S.A.Ð as wellas the organization ’spublicity and carefulpreparation for immigrants in eachª host community.ºIRO staffendorsed the ideathat achangein environment, residencein alesscongested town wherethe skills ofthe immigrant couldbe utilizedand he would not be treatedas aªcharity case,ºwould bestserve both the established Jewish community and the individual laborer. For 20years, the IRO became, Rockaway tellsus, ªahumanized labor exchange,º relocatinga small percentageof Jewish immigrants (26). Theremainder of the book is comprisedof a collectionof documents with briefintroductory summaries by Rockaway. Thedocuments are letters (including some formal reports)about and from those who facedª the trauma ofa seconduprooting,º leaving ® rsttheir home town and then the familiar Yiddish cultureof the LowerEast Side (18). The® rstthree chapters include letters from the IRO staff, the last fourchapters, fromthe immigrants themselves. Theletters between IRO staffmembers show the immense amount ofeffort expended in trying to match Jewish immigrant men to aJewish community and ajob. Thevalue-laden rhetoric of class and ethnicprejudice sheds light on the assumptions the staffbrought to theirwork and encountered in the natives ofhost communities. Wherehe did not ®nd anti-Semitism, forexample, onestaff member found acommunity hungry forthe ªhigherintelligenceº of Russian workersbecause their own ªclassof laborº Ð ªunreliableºand ªshiftlessºÐ leftthem ªdisgustedº(48). Similarly, staff members expresseddisdain forany signsof political radicalism among theirclients. While the idiosyncraticnature of personality con¯icts and ®nancial disputes within the lettersoffer little for Rockaway (or the reader)to workwith, the staff ’sviewsof women, Americanization, and the ªmoralº characterof the EastEuropean laborers deserve deeper analysis than Rockaway ’sbriefsummaries provide. Theimmigrants ’ letters,translated from Yiddish by the author and divided into those ofgratitude, request,complaint, and economicand social/culturaladjustment, offerpoignant portraits ofdisplaced immigrants, some ofwhom meetsuccess but many ofwhom encounterserious obstacles. Again, though the lettersjump betweenlocations, individuals, and eras,several themes run throughout and begmore analysis: the workers ’ own senseof ethnic and classidentity, theirdomestic arrangements and responsibilities, theirperceptions of the con¯icts within small-town populations. What comesacross most clearlyin theseletters, however, is the powerof the IROoverthe livesof their ª removalsº(their termfor their clients, and onewhich suggestsa limit to theirª humanizedºexchange). The IRO leaders in NewYork sat in judgment overeach requestÐ for a man to be reunitedwith his family, forexample, at the costof the IROÐ and the pleas wereoften wrenching. One man complained that ªyou have send [sic]us up out here¼ to starve,ºwhile another indictedª Americanphilanthropyº as ªamatterof show, ofadvertising, to pose beforeothers as benefactorsº(147, 153). TheLos Angeles Arbeiter Ring, a Yiddish mutual aid society,accused the IRO ofwanting ª to play with the livesof hundreds of workingmenº(80). Accordingto Rockaway, many men threatenedsuicide (and severalfollowed through on their threats) as away to earncompassion fromthe IRO staff;his indication that this factª re¯ected the ongoinglack of communication and trustºbetween the two communities seems,at the least, understated(154). Severalstaff members, especiallyIRO DirectorDavid Bressler,expressed sincere sympathy overthe immigrants plight and factoredthat sympathy into theirdecision making. Overall, though, the strongsense of paternalism runningthrough theseexchanges deserves further examination, as Rockaway suggestsin his epilogue. Ofcourse, as acontribution to aseriesof Documents in AmericanSocial History, Words of the Uprooted leavesthis examination to its readers.Rockaway offersexcellent source material that iscrucial to studentsof this period. Thetask remainsfor these students to drawmeaning from the wordsof these downtown Jewish laborers,scattered throughout the U.S.A. by uptown philanthropic leaders,in order to placetheir experiences in the largercontext of immigrant and labor history.

MARJORIE N.FELD, PhDCandidate in American History, Brandeis University 370 BookReviews

E.W.Scrippsand theBusiness of Newspapers GERALD J. BALDASTY, 1999 Urbana: Universityof Illinois Press pp. xii 1 217,$42.50 (cloth); $16.95(paper)

Studies ofU.S. mass media have shown that the nation ’slargestcirculation newspapers and television networksmarginalize and misrepresentthe activitiesand concernsof working-class Americans and their labor unions. Distortions oflabor and classissues are outgrowths of the media ’splacewithin the capitalist political economy and have prevailedfor much ofthe 20th century.Edward Willis Scripps, however,saw afardifferent role for the press vis-aÁ -vis workersand tradeunions, as communications scholarGerald J. Baldasty explainsin this informative book. Scripps createda chain ofpolitically independent, inexpensivenewspapers that cateredspeci® cally to the interestsand needsof the workingclass. Eschewingexcessive advertising, the Scripps chain hoped to avoid controlby commercialelites. Pursuing such ªhighly principledºgoals did not precludeScripps fromrealizing another objective, maximizing pro® ts: ªHad the working-classnewspaper not been pro® table, Scripps would not have beenits prophetº(149). As corporatecapitalists in otherindustries sought to rationalizetheir enterprises at the endof the 19th century,so Scripps aimed to createª a centrallymanaged and economicallyef® cient chain ofnewspapersº (2). Baldasty concentrateson how Scripps ’sthreebusiness strategiesÐminimizing costs,market segmen- tation, and verticalintegrationÐ shaped both the newspaperchain ’sformation and its content.Vertical integrationincreased ef® ciency and minimized costsby making Scripps ’snewspapersboth clientsand contributorsto the chain ’snews-gatheringoperations. Scripps createdspecialized departments for news-gathering,printing, circulation,and accountingand formeda highly centralizedand powerful management structure.The chain expandedinto small and medium-sizedcities with signi®cant working-classpopulations and with conservative,anti-labor newspapers. Scripps ’scompact newspapers (4± 8pagesin length) employed small, poorly-paid staffsand reliedheavily on his own newsservice. Fearingthat rampant advertisingthreatened the press ’sindependenceand thus endangeredits rolein ademocraticsociety, Scripps focusedon revenuesderived from circulation. As aresult,Scripps newspapersremained ® ercelyindependent, often® ndingthemselves the targetof business-led boycotts. Scripps’sadvocacy ofworking-class interests derived from several sources. His philosophy of journalism de®ned working-class-oriented newspapers as the remedyfor a pressthat had becomethe tool ofa business elite.Childhood memoriesof poverty made Scripps criticalof a wealthy business class and sympathetic toward the workingmasses. And while competingpublishers eitherattacked or ignoredthe workingclass, Scripps embracedit as avast and pro® table audience. Newspapercontent re ¯ectedScripps ’sgoalof securing working-class readers. Scripps newspapers agitatedfor working-class causes, including affordable mass transportation, regulationof monopolies, municipal ownership ofutilities, and electoralreforms. Although Scripps saw unions as elitist, he recognizedtheir value in checkingcorporate power. Heemployed union printersand accommodated union wagedemands, in part, to increaseworking-class readership. Scripps newspaperssympathetically coveredthe Knightsof Labor duringthe 1880sand the AmericanFederation of Labor in subsequent decades.They maintained goodrelations with locallabor organizationssuch as citytrades councils. Scripps’sidenti®cation with working-classorganizations had limits. Hisnewspapers provided virtually no coverageof radical labor groupsand, in theireffort to monopolize the working-classnewspaper market, triedto preventthe creationof new working-class journals. When such competition emerged, includingcompetition fromthe tradeunion and radicalpress, Scripps moved to destroyit. Baldasty estimatesthat Scripps ’snewspapersoffered almost ninetimes more space to labor issues than competingpapers. Scripps publications werethree times more likely than theircompetitors to covertopics such as workingconditions, union political activities, and union meetings.They offered sympathetic coverageof strikes, detailing workers ’ demands forshorter working days, collective bargaining, and safetyon the job. Scripps ’scompetitors, on the otherhand, werethree times more likely toreporton strikesthan on otherlabor issuesand to usesuch occasionsto criticizetrade unions and support the business community. Scripps emergesfrom these pages as acomplexbusinessman who resistedthe lureof advertisers and addressedthe interestsof working-class Americans, yetremained the quintessential capitalist manager, seekingto controlthe production processand maximizepro® ts. An advocateof democracy, Scripps neverthelessresisted any challengesto his rule.Baldasty praisesthe newspapermagnate for supporting organizedlabor duringan erawhen unions ªhad fewfriends and many enemiesin the Americanpressº (147). But Baldasty considersquixotic Scripps ’sexperimentin working-classjournalism and his campaign against business in¯uence. He contends that Scripps failedto realizethat most Americans BookReviews 371 preferredª business-subsidizedmedia despitethe inherentproblems in such ®nancingºand that the workingclass never appreciated or understood Scripps ’smodel ofjournalism (152). Indeed,Scripps apparently assumed that his readerspreferred short featurearticles, advice columns, sports, humor, and illustrations to aregularoffering of business and political news.These intriguing observations lack suf®cient documentation and elaboration. Baldasty too readilydismisses, as amatterof speculation, the dif®cult question ofhow to assessthe interactionbetween working-class audiences and the Scripps newspapers. Baldasty’sanalysis ofScripps ’sideologyas wellas the operation ofhis media empirerests on numerousquotations fromthe massive E.W.Scripps correspondence.Social historians may ®nd the analysis and sourceshere limited. Baldasty makes littleuse of labor orsocial histories that explore turn-of-the-centuryworking-class communities and that offerinsights into how such communities interactedwith mass culture,including the mass media. Nevertheless,Baldasty has produceda solid business history ofE. W.Scripps ’srolein rationalizingthe newspaperindustry and his unique efforts to both resistcommercialization and serveworking-class Americans. NATHAN GODFRIED, Associate Professorof History, University ofMaine, Orono

Ideasin Action:Political Tradition in theTwentieth Century STEPHEN ERIC BRONNER, 1999 Lanham, MD: Rowman and Little®eld pp. xi 1 349,$69.00 (cloth); $24.95(paper)

Stephen EricBronner, a political scienceprofessor at RutgersUniversity, argues that the Americanleft needsa newphilosophy. Hemaintains that philosophy in generalis valid only to the degreethat it is historically based and relatedto action, and that aphilosophy forthe leftmust be rootedin the support ofthe masses. The® rsttwo-thirds of Ideasin Action is acritiqueof 20th centurypolitical philosophy bearingthese preceptsin mind, and this isfollowed by an assessmentof the newsocial movements ofthe 1960sand 1970sin light ofthe critiquealready offered. In running through some ofthe main schools ofthought, the author usesa chronologicalformat. Fleetingly,he dealswith modernism. While this gaverise to fertilemovements likeexpressionism and surrealism,it was rathertoo closelylinked with ªsalon anarchismº(68), amovement with littlemass appeal. Not surprisinglyfor someone who has worked as amedia commentator in Germany, the author emphasizes the importance ofthe Communist-led Institutefor Social Researchin Frankfurt. Itsleading theorists included Erich Fromm and Herbert Marcuse,and they wereknown collectivelyas the FrankfurtSchool. When they ¯edHitlerand settled in the U.S.A. in 1937,they coined,as adescriptorof their approach, the term critical theory . Bronner goeson to dissectpostmodernism and poststructuralism and theirimpact in the Americaof the 1970s and 1980s.He ® nds that the postmodernist philosophers werepromisingly left-wing,but that they lackedboth aprogram foraction and mass appeal. Ideasin Action is in the main writtenin an accessiblestyle, and it contains lively observations. For example, Bronnerillustrates his point that an understandingof the past must inform any progressive program forthe futurewith the observation that ªtradition has too longbeen in the hands of traditionalistsº(13). Hiswriting is in severalways both courageousand challenging.He thinks the ªend ofhistoryº theory is nonsense, and that the wide, post-Cold Waracceptance of the liberal capitalist statehas not terminatedthe discourseabout those who areleft outside (12, 301). Postmodernism was areactionto totalitarianismÐ and he thinks that includesthe culturaltotalitarianism that emanated fromCold WarHollywood. With action and mass movements in mind, he triesto ®this heroesinto the contextof his viewson philosophy. Thus, MartinLuther King, Jr. was aman ofmoral and concrete vision and not ªthe precursorof a tepid postmodern particularismº(243). Indeed,Bronner appears to view King’sassassination in 1968as amoreimportant philosophical turningpoint than the fall of EuropeanCommunism in and around 1989. Up to apoint, Ideasin Action is agoodprimer on left-wingphilosophy. But, amongst its weaknesses isthat ofmis-timed de®nition. Bronnerde® nes concepts like poststructuralism in afair-mindedand pithy manner, but not until he has usedthem repeatedlyin the text.This will clearlybe frustratingto any newcomerto the ®eldwho triesto readthe book fromstart to ®nish. The author’smost salientshortcomings are, however, his de®ciencies as an historian. On page27 alone, he makes two observations that might be defendedbut, in the absenceof any defense,rank as errorsin judgment: whateverhis giftsas apropagandist, onewould not normally rank Tom Paineas an Enlightenmentª thinkerº; acuteobserver though he may have beenof contemporary events, one 372 BookReviews would not in the light ofsubsequent scholarship citeKarl Marx as one ’ssoleauthority on the revolutionsof 1848. Like so many who have studiedthe Americanleft, Bronner gives too littleattention to U.S. socialistthinkers of the Progressiveperiod, notably the originaland in¯uential Robert Hunter. Hefalls into the staletrap ofimagining that the Frenchphilosopher GeorgesSorel in¯ uenced the outlook ofthe IndustrialWorkers of the WorldÐconsidering Bronner ’semphasis on action, it isa pity he did not study moreclosely the Americanproponents ofdirect action and theircontemporary critics. Infact, Franco-American themes in Ideasin Action generallydo not stand up to scrutiny.Bronner should have made clearthat the VietnamWar did not relateto Frenchpostmodernism, but, rather,to the acceptability ofthe newFrench modes ofthought in the U.S.A. Ifhe means Parisin claimingthat HerbertMarcuse ’s One-Dimensional Man (1964)anticipated ªthe spirit of1968,º he is beingimprob- able (209). Ifhe means America, he needsto substantiate that 1968occurred in that countryin the senseindicated. Inblithely assuming that the opponents ofª silentmajorityº politics werepopulist without examiningthe reverseproposition, he leaveshimself, oncemore, open to the criticismthat he has not studiedhis history (227). An evenmore serious criticism of Bronner might be that he failsthe testhe has setothers: ªOnly by providing positive convictionscan a philosophy exhibit its political validityº(203). Theauthor doesnot attempt to do this, at leastnot consistently.True, he takesfeminists to task on the groundthat, fearing reprisals,they have ignoredthe socialistelement in theirtradition. But he excuseshis beloved Frankfurt school fordropping the label ªsocialistºon the groundthat they neededto gainacceptance in 1930s America. IfBronner wants to reinventthe socialisttradition, perhaps he should beginby labelingand de®ning his own socialism.

RHODRI JEFFREYS-JONES, Professorof History, University ofEdinburgh

¼And thePursuit of National Health:The Incremental Strategy towardNational Health Insurance in theUnited States of America JAAP KOOIJMAN, 1999 Amsterdam: Editions Rodopi pp. iii 1 262, $44.00

This study proclaims boldly an intention to changethe termsof the historical debateover 20th-century Americanhealth policy. Drawinginspiration principally fromthe workof Daniel Fox, Jaap Kooijman proposes to concentrateon ªthe policy that was enactedº(7) in the UnitedStates, not the policy of universalhealth insurancethat was not enacted.This is an admirable ambition. Unfortunately,for the most part, this revisionistanalysis ofpolicy-making fromthe 1910sthrough the late1960s proves quite disappointing. Kooijman contendsthat historians ’ preoccupationwith failedcampaigns forsocial insurance legis- lation has obscuredthe development ofan alternativepolicy that re¯ecteda durable national consensus. Inhis interpretation,Americans cared relatively little about providing health securityfor all citizens. Instead,Kooijman maintains, they consistentlysupported legislationto increasethe supply ofhealth services,through federalfunding of hospital construction,training of health professionals, and sponsorship ofmedical research. Certainly, the ªsupply-sideºapproach to health policy deservesmore attention. However,readers of ¼ Andthe Pursuit ofNational Health will ®nd that the neglectedstory ofexpanded supply is largelyneglected still. Kooijman provides insuf®cient description, much less explanation, ofgovernment initiatives to expandthe stockof health resources.Speci® cally, the author givesinadequate considerationto the enactmentof the Sheppard± TownerAct, the GIBill, the Hill± Burton Act, and the streamof post-World WarII legislationpromoting such venturesas the enormousbiomedical researchprogram centeredin the National Institutesof Health and the establish- ment ofnumerous new medical schools. Moreover,the processof societal consensus-building around this courseof action remainsobscure in this account. Likethe scholarshe criticizes,Kooijman is preoccupiedwith the defeatof state and federalhealth insurance.He devotes almost achapterto the unsuccessfulreform drive led by the American Association forLabor Legislationduring the 1910s.Unlike the otherchapters, which proceedfrom considerableoriginal research in primary sources,Kooijman ’ssketchof Progressive failure depends all too heavily upon secondarysources. His detailed exploration of the shaping ofthe Social SecurityAct ®xeson the exclusionof medical insurance from the Rooseveltadministration plan, not on the inclusion ofprovisions enhancingthe supply ofhealth services.Kooijman dwellson the dif®culties that confrontedthe Wagnerbill of1939 and the seriesof Wagner± Murray± Dingell bills that beganin 1943. BookReviews 373

Inthe same vein, he considersthe inability ofMedicare and Medicaidto pave the way fora universal entitlementto protectionafter 1965. Kooijman attempts to compensatein two ways forthis retreatfrom his declaredintention to shift the discussion. First, he returnsto the much-studied politics ofnational health insurancein orderto reinterpretthe roleof the AmericanMedical Association, whose antagonism to reformhas, in his view, beenoveremphasized. Despitehis worthy aim togobeyond the common ªbogeymanºcharacterization, the author accomplishes little. Muchof his own evidenceonly recon®rms the powerand adamant stanceof the AMA. Kooijman doesnot reducethe importance ofthe medicalassociation by demonstratingthe importance ofother opponents ofnational health insurance.Second, the author delvesagain into the veryfamiliar storyof mid-20th-century health policy in orderto illuminate the strategyof incrementalism devised by the architectsof reform. Here, too, the analysis is unsatisfying. Kooijman erroneouslydismisses I. S. Falk and EdgarSydenstricker as ªideologuesº(53), without indicatingwhat ideologydrove them. Thereis nothing newof any signi®cance regarding the master incrementalist,Wilbur Cohen. (Those interestedin understandingthe incrementalstrategy would do betterto readEdward Berkowitz ’srecentbiography ofCohen, Mr.Social Security .) Kooijman’streatmentof the roleof organized labor in health reformis somewhat moreuseful. To be sure,he mistakenly assertsthat in the 1910sdrive for compulsory sicknessinsurance, ª Therewere no grassrootsorganizations, norrepresentatives of workers who advocatedsuch legislationº(28). This claim ignoresthe endorsementof reform by 18state labor federationsand by morethan ascoreof national unions. On the otherhand, this study doestake note of labor ’sstrongsupport forthe Wagner±Murray± Dingell bills in the 1940s.It also illuminates the criticalrole of the labor movementÐ especiallythe UAW, USW, and ILGWUÐin organizinga mass movement ofthe elderlyfor Medicare. Inthe wakeof the defeatof the Clinton health plan, it is only natural that historians ofhealth policy aretaking renewedinterest in the changesthat did happen ratherthan those that did not. Inall probability, some futurework in this ®eldwill takeup the agendathat this book proposes but doesnot consistentlypursue. Such historical investigationwill be most helpful ifit yieldsnot just asimple verdict as to whetherthose who sought to expandsupply weremore in¯ uential than those who sought to expanddemand through socialinsurance but insteada senseof the complexinterrelations between the two tendencies.Future studies might also takeup Kooijman ’sprovocative contentionthat Americans have placedlittle value on assuringhealth carefor all citizens.

ALAN DERICKSON, Professorof Labor Studies andHistory, Pennsylvania State University, University Park

Senator Thomas J.Walsh of Montana: Law and PublicAffairs, from TRtoFDR J. LEONARD BATES (Forewordby R ICHARD LOWITT), 1999 Urbana: Universityof Illinois Press pp. xiv 1 410, $39.95

This is apolitical biography in the traditional style, comprehensive,® rmly anchoredin archival sources, and clearlyadmiring ofits principal. Thomas Walsh ofMontana was amajor ®gurein the progressive eraDemocratic Party, asenatorfrom 1913 to 1933,and chairof the DemocraticNational Committee in 1924and 1932.He declined his party ’svice-presidentialnomination in 1924but resignedhis Senate seatto acceptan appointment as Franklin Roosevelt ’sattorneygeneral in 1933.He died before he couldbe swornin. Despitethe limits ofthe genre,solid biographies likethis oneprovide awealth ofdetailed information forhistorians and political scientistsinterested in largerquestions. Particularlyuseful, in the reviewer ’s opinion, is the exampleof the powerof ethnic origins in political careers(Sen. Walsh might have ®t comfortably into the progressivewing of Montana ’sdominant Republican Party, but his IrishCatholic heritageplanted him ®rmly in the Democracy), and the pressuresconfronted and appeased by a westernpolitician ofprogressive inclinations in astatedominated by powerfulmining corporations. Despitethe strongconservative streak in his temperament(signaled, perhaps, by the perpetual scowl on his facein photographs), thereis no doubt that Walsh meritsthe label ªprogressive.ºBates says little about his votingbehavior, but the bills he sponsored, his Senatespeeches, and his private correspon- dencereveal Walsh ’ssupport forprogressive era legislative landmarks: antitrust, railroad, and labor legislation, alowertariff, women ’ssuffrage,farm creditlegislation, prohibition, directelection of Senators, and public resourcedevelopment. Hewas adedicatedWilsonian, faithfully followingthe president’sleadon most issues.But morepragmatic than the presidenthimself, Walsh backed 374 BookReviews reservationsin orderto expandsupport forthe Leagueof Nations Treaty,and continuedto workfor U.S. participation in the WorldCourt and disarmament afterthe Treaty ’sfailure.In the 1880sWalsh was afreesilver man and aBryan Democrat; in the 1930she becamea strongsupporter of FDR ’s presidentialcandidacy and election(in opposition, by then, to his fellowIrish Catholic Al Smith). Even beforethe NewDeal, he was an advocateof public workslegislation and the investigationof utility monopolies. On the otherhand, the constraintsof Montana politics and his own innateconservatism are also evident.Walsh maneuveredcarefully to avoid antagonizingthe Anaconda Copper company. Itis unfortunatethat Batesdoes not provide moredetail on the natureof the Senator ’suneasy relationship with the copperkings, but what he doesprovide makes clearthat Walsh was signi®cantly morewilling to compromise and do important favorsfor his state ’smajor industry, and was lessa friendto poor farmersand workersthan his friendand colleagueBurton Wheeler.He was also willingto throw Wheelerto the wolveswhen his association with the liberal, pro-labor districtattorney threatened to derailWalsh ’sreelectionbid in 1918.(Wheeler took the lessonto heart; to preparethe way forhis own Senateelection, he latermade his own compromises with corporateelites, though neverso many as Walsh.) Batesacknowledges that, in viewof Walsh ’ssupport forland and waterpower development and a generousleasing policy, ªhe hardly quali® esas aconservationistof the Roosevelt±Pinchot± LaFollette breedº(207). Hewas also clearlyunenthusiastic about antitrust legislationin the Wilson yearsand ªacceptedthe factof bignessº (94). Hissupport fortariff reduction was predictably compromised by the demands ofhis state ’smineral, wool, timber and sugarbeet producersÐ and perhaps by his own ®nancial interestsin those industries. But the biggeststain on Walsh ’srecordis the policy that, morethan any other, borethe imprint of his stubborn efforts:the Espionageand Sedition Actsof 1917 and 1918,and his support forthe use offederal power to crushthe IWWand otherantiwar radicalsand wartimestrikers. Walsh ’s ª unlawful associationsºbill (which fortunatelydid not pass) would have outlawed associations ªthat in time of warproposed to bringabout any governmental,social, industrial, oreconomic change in the United States by physical force,violence, or injuryº (149). Violatorswould have beensubject to 10-yearprison termsand ®nesof up to $5000.Walsh also activelycampaigned forthe investigationand possible expulsionof the Senate ’sleadingprogressive, Robert LaFollette, forhis expresseddoubts about the wisdom ofU.S. entryinto WorldWar I. Thomas Walsh was asmart lawyerand avain and ambitious politician who played important roles in both the idealisticand the darkersides of the progressiveera. This biography couldhave been enlivenedby probing deeperinto the psychological and ideologicalfoundations ofthis con¯icted progressive.It would also have beenmore helpful to political scientistshad it provided more information on Senator Walsh ’selectoralstrategy (his appeals forthe support oflabor, farmer,ethnic and othergroups), and votingpatterns in thesecontests. This couldhave beenbalanced by abene®cial pruningof the overlongchapters on the Teapot Dome scandal (in which Walsh servedas chiefSenate investigator)and land policy. The work’smajor contributions, asidefrom the mound ofdetail on the longcareer of an important politician, may be to encouragere¯ ection on the compromises with economicpower and irrational fear ofª subversivesºthat evenestablished liberalshave feltcompelled to make in Americanpolitics.

ELIZABETHSANDERS, Professor,Department ofGovernment, Cornell University

MaritimeSolidarity: Paci® cCoastUnionism, 1929± 1938 OTTILIE MARKHOLT, 1998 Tacoma, WA: Paci®c Coast MaritimeHistory Committee pp. xvi 1 461, $19.95

MaritimeSolidarity is an important study ofthe dramatic upsurgeof unionism on the WestCoast waterfrontin the 1930s.Its publication is atestamentto the generosityof scholars such as Archie Greenand Robert Cherny, ofunions such as the InternationalLongshore and WarehouseUnion (ILWU)and the Sailor ’sUnionof the Paci®c (SUP), and ofmany veteranlabor activists, especiallyin the Seattle±Tacoma area.Above all, however,it is atestamentto OttilieMarkholt ’sremarkable tenacity; it is hertriumph, and vindication. She beganwriting the book that eventuallybecame Maritime Solidarity in the late1930s, while hersmall childrenplayed nearby and herhusband Bob Markholt servedas aleadingactivist in the SUP. She completeda draftin 1942.But the SUP, on whose behalf BookReviews 375 it was written,declined to seethe manuscript through to publication, and eventuallydeposited it at the Universityof California ’sBancroftLibrary. That ’swhereI encounteredit in the 1980s,when Iwas writing Workerson the Waterfront (1988), which coversmuch ofthe same terrainfrom a different perspective.At the time, Ithought the author was PeterB. Gill, aNorwegiansailor and founding member ofthe SUP who had servedas the union ’sport agentin Seattlefor many years.His name appeared on the titlepage. Ifthere was any mention ofOttilie Markholt in the introductionto the typescriptI read,I do not recallit. But (unbeknownst to me) shewas still out there,still ®ghtingthe good® ght. Inthe 1940s,she had becomea tradeunion activistand labor journalist, workingclosely with the old Wobbly Ralph Chaplin on the TacomaLabor Advocate ,the newspaperof the Tacoma CentralLabor Council. Inthe late1950s, with herchildren grown and two marriagesbehind her, shehad resumedwork on the manuscript. Apart froma fewfriends in and around Tacoma, shelabored in virtual obscurity, eventuallyproducing ªthousands ofpagesº on the history ofthe Paci®c Coast maritime unions, fromtheir founding in the 1880sto theirmeteoric rebirth during the GreatDepression (xv). Finally, in 1991,the labor folklorist ArchieGreen happened to ask her, ªWhat have you donewith your maritime history?ºª Writtena tome that no onewill possibly publish,ºshe replied (xvi). With Green ’sencouragement,she winnowed her storydown to an accountthat focusedon the extraordinaryevents of the 1930s.It appeared in 1998, published not by auniversityor commercial press but by the Paci®c Coast MaritimeHistory Committee, headquarteredin Tacoma. MaritimeSolidarity isitself an actof solidarity. But givenher own backgroundand orientation, Markholt has hardly beena nonpartisan chronicler. On the contrary,this ishistory with an edge;it is meant to vindicatesome ofthe leadingplayers in her storyat the expenseof others. Markholt was amember ofthe Communist party fora briefmoment in the 1930s;so was herhusband Bob. Lookingback on the experience,she believes that when shejoined the Communist party sheª abandonedºher ª criticalfacultiesº and becameª adrudgeof the revolutionº who ª `[took]orders with the soul ofa dray horse ’ º(xii). Disillusioned, sheand herhusband not only quit the party; they alignedthemselves with its opponents in the bitterfactional rivalry that would split the maritime union movement and make amockeryof the epicsolidarity that had won the BigStrike of1934 and sparked the formation ofthe MaritimeFederation of the Paci®c Coast ayearlater. In this context,that meant joining up with HarryLundeberg and acadreof militant activistsin the Sailors ’ Unionof the Paci®c againstthe Communist party and HarryBridges, a rank-and-® ledockworker and secretparty member who becamethe leaderof the WestCoast longshoremen ’s union. Markholt oftenspeaks the languageof Cold Waranticommunism. Inher rendering of events, Communists did not join unions; they ªin® ltratedºthem (17). Evenas electedof® cials, they did not leadunions; they ªdominatedºthem (103). And when atradeunion cadrebroke ranks with the party, he did not simply leaveit; he ªdefectedºto the otherside (271). From hervantage point, the party was amonolith and its cadreswere the virtual slavesof its dictates.She makes fewif any allowancesfor the give-and-takethat characterizedHarry Bridges ’ relationship with the members ofhis union, orfor the irreverentrank-and-® leinitiative and independencethat werepart ofthe ethos ofthe Communist-led National MaritimeUnion (NMU). But in hermost basic criticismof the party, thereis a largeelement oftruth. Anti-Communists in the maritime unions ªobjectednot so much to Communist `radicalism, ’ º sheargues, ª but to people carryingout the Party linerather than actingon theirown convictions¼. in ashowdown the Party would come® rstand the [union]second.º For her, then, anti-communism is an honorableÐ and necessaryÐstance. It has ledher to embracea widerange of allies, not only the Communists’ opponents on the leftbut virtually anyone in the tradeunion movement who sought to keepthe Redsfrom ª capturingºtheir organizations. One can remain deeply skeptical about herchoice ofallies, as Ido, and still recognizethe basic integritythat underliesher position. Mostlabor historians have paid farmore attention to the Congressof Industrial Unions (CIO) than to the AmericanFederation of Labor (AFL), and have demonstratedfar more sympathy forthe former than the latter.But Markholt remainsan unabashed AFL partisan. Inher rendering of events on the Paci®c Coast, it was AFL waterfrontactivists in Tacoma who kept the faith and maintained their organizationduring the open shop 1920s,and who played aleadingrole in the renaissanceof longshore unionism in the mid-1930s. Morethan Bridgesand the Communists, sheargues, they took the lead in formulatingthe demands that wereat the heartof the 1934strike, and it was theirvision that came to fruitionwith the formation ofthe MaritimeFederation of the Paci®c in 1935.According to Markholt, moreover,their commitment to maritime solidarity was moreconsistent and principled than Bridges’.On morethan oneoccasion, ª RedHarryº caved in to the shipowners ’ demands, in orderto protectthe interestsof his longshoremen,or because he fearedthat another showdown with the employerswould alienatepublic opinion. 376 BookReviews

Thus, when Bridgesopted forthe CIOin June 1937,it was not amatterof ª radicalsºversus ªconservatives.ºOn the contrary,Markholt argues,the CIO ’srolewas to deepenthe fault linesthat had beendeveloping within the MaritimeFederation, to make reconciliationÐand hencereal soli- darityÐ impossible. Inthe auto plants and steelmills ofthe Midwest,she concedes, the CIO was a progressiveinstrument of class struggle. But on the WestCoast waterfront,its comingwas not only counterproductive;it was an ªinvasionº(318). But did ªCIO af®liation ¼inauguratethe fratricidalwars that destroyedmaritime unity,ºas Markholt charges(334)? Hereit seemsto methat sheis stretchingher evidence for partisan purposes. For, as sheherself documents, the ®rstmajor breakdown ofmaritime unity beganwithin months ofthe MaritimeFederation ’sfounding, and relationsbetween the Bridgesand Lundebergfactions continued to deterioraterapidly thereafter.The CIO did institutionalize thesedifferences, to be sure,but the eventsthat transpiredfrom the summer of1937 to the springof 1938 only servedto hasten acollision and breakup that appears to have beeninevitable. Onecan disagree with Markholt on many points ofinterpretation, however, and still respecther achievement, especiallyin recoveringthe historical roleof longshore union activistssuch as Bill Lewis and the irrepressiblePaddy Morris,of Tacoma. Thesemen werevili® edby the Communists, in part becausethey wereformidable obstaclesto the party ’sagendaon the waterfront.In the eventsof the 1930s,andÐ evenmore soÐ in the historiography ofmaritime unionism, they have beeneclipsed by the largerthan life® gureof Harry Bridges. Markholt ’saccountrestores these historical actorsto their rightfulplace in acomplexsequence of events. While admiring Markholt ’srichsource base, onecan still takeexception to the way shehas documentedÐor failed to documentÐsome ofher claims. Ifound this to be especiallytrue with regard to issuesof race. Unlike many AFL partisans, Markholt doesnot dodgethe factof racial discrimi- nationÐ in employment and within the maritime unions. But shemakes claims that are,in afew instances,impossible. For example, sherefers on page90 to the ªblack LosAngeles Longshoremen ’s Association,ºwhose members refusedto scab duringthe 1934strike. She then statesthat the association had ª750membersº (110). But accordingto censusdata, therewere two black longshore- men on the LosAngeles waterfront in 1930and onein 1940.Interviews with veteranlongshoremen, conductedby the union and by otherhistorians (myself included), suggestthat the LAlongshoremen ’s localhad no black members until WorldWar II, and that blacks wereinvisible and unwelcomeon the LosAngeles waterfront during the 1930s. This remains, nonetheless,an important study; it is beautifully illustratedand writtenwith passion, insight, andÐ sometimesÐ realeloquence. Markholt laments the disintegrationof the MaritimeFeder- ation in the late1930s, but her® nal wordsare right on the mark. ªAlthough the federationperished,º sheconcludes, ª the individual organizationsremained strong. Members held fastto theirunions and hiringhalls. Neitheremployers nor government could break themº(386).

BRUCE NELSON, Professorof History, Dartmouth College

Organizing theShipyards: Union Strategy in ThreeNortheast Ports, 1933± 1945 DAVID PALMER, 1998 Ithaca, NY: ILRPress/CornellUniversity Press pp. xvii 1 264, $39.95

David Palmer ’s Organizing the Shipyards is asolid, oftenilluminating monograph that focuseson the CIO-af® liatedIndustrial Union of Marine and Shipbuilding Workers(IUMSWA) and its organizing campaigns at threemajor shipyards in the Northeast: NewYork Ship, in Camden, NewJersey; Federal Ship, in Kearny,New Jersey; and ForeRiver, in Quincy, Massachusetts.Palmer discusses a host of factorsÐincluding the roleof the state, union leadershipat the national and locallevels, and the composition and characterof the rank and ®leÐthat help explainthe riseof the IUMSWAand the limits ofits achievements.But he ismost concernedwith the roleof union organizers,and much ofthe book’sargumentderives from interviews he conductedwith morethan 50IUMSWAveterans over an eight-yearperiod. Theauthor readilyacknowledges the importance ofthe largercontext in which organizingtook place, and he concedesthat, at NewYork Ship in particular, the labor policiesof the Rooseveltadministration werevital to the union ’ssuccess.But he believesnonetheless that organizersin the ®eldwere the critical factor,and that organizingcampaigns succeededonly when they werebased upon the mobilization of rank-and-® leworkers in the yards. Hischapters on NewYork Ship and ForeRiver are especially BookReviews 377 instructivein this regard.New York Ship was an independentcompany whose management was often clumsy and inept in respondingto the challengeposed by the union insurgencyof the mid-1930s. Camden, meanwhile, provided an unusually supportive environmentfor the union. Itslabor forcewas mainly NorthernEuropean in background, and thus self-con®dently ª Americanº; the localpolitical system, includingCamden ’sRepublican party, was ªresponsiveto workers ’ concernsº(20); and across the DelawareRiver, Philadelphia was astronghold ofthe Socialist party, which provided some ofthe keyleaders of the organizingdrive and the nascentunion. In1934, in astrikethat won the support of the overwhelmingmajority ofthe yard ’s3300workers, the IUMSWAwon asubstantial wageincrease and asignedagreement that concededthe rightto preferentialhiring for union members. Ayearlater, the union was compelledto defendthese gains with another walkout that featuredmassive picketlines, the aggressiveharassment ofscabs by strikersand theirwives, and abroad base ofsupport that included Camden’sdaily newspaperand eventhe localpolice department. Although the federalgovernment played an important rolein overcomingthe company ’sbitterresistance to asettlement,the keyto victory, Palmerargues, was the consistentinvolvement ofthe rank and ®lenot only on the picketlines but in the union ’sdecision-makingprocess. Incontrast to NewYork Ship, which becamethe IUMSWA ’sstronghold, the union failedin one organizingdrive after another at the giantFore River yard, nearBoston. ForeRiver was part of Bethlehem Steel ’sshipyard division, and hereopposition to the union re¯ecteda sophisticated corporatestrategy that employed abroad arrayof tactics to keepthe IUMSWAat bay. Quincy, moreover,was farmore conservative than Camden. Accordingto Palmer, it ªresembleda largevillage on the edgeof a metropolitan areaº(154), and Boston, the hub ofthat metropolis, was abastion of Yankeeand IrishCatholic conservatism. Inthis environment, eventhough the Communist party was anegligiblepresence in and around the yard, red-baitinginitially proved devastatingly effectiveas a deterrentto unionism. But the keyto the union ’slong-standingfailure at ForeRiver, Palmerargues, was the IUMSWA leadership’sincreasingdependence on the courtsand the administrative agenciesof the NewDeal state. Overtime, the union ’sSocialist leadersÐnotably, PresidentJohn Greenand Secretary-TreasurerPhilip VanGelderÐ evolved into NewDeal Democrats who wereinclined to relyon alliesin government ratherthan rank-and-® leshipyard workersto accomplish theirobjectives. This proved to be adisaster at ForeRiver, especiallyin the volatile political climateof the late1930s and early1940s. It demobilized the yard ’sworkforce,demoralized the union ’sactivist cadres,and ledto ahumiliating defeatin aNational Labor Relations Board electionin 1941. Aftersuspending the autonomy ofthe ForeRiver local and red-baitingand expellingsome ofits most committed activists, national union leaders® nally relentedand assignedveteran organizer Lou Kaplan to pick up the pieces.Kaplan, who had ªaleft-wingorientationº (208) and an outspoken aversionto red-baiting, was ªperhaps the union ’sbestorganizerº (218). Underhis leadership, many ofthe expelled activistswere restored to the union and acampaign based upon rank-and-® lemobilization was initiated. Itrelied on ªhundredsof volunteer organizers who workedin the yardº(222), paid close attention to grievancesthat aroseout ofday-to-day conditions in the workplace, and, forÐthe moment at leastÐbene® ted from the fearof unemployment that grippedFore River workers as they witnessed the surgeof layoffs that hit theirindustry in 1945.This time, the union triumphed in the representation election,winning 57% of the vote. But forthe IUMSWAas awhole the victoryproved to be short-lived. Theend of the warmeant the rapid erosionof government contracts for naval shipbuilding, and the union ’smembership declined precipitouslyÐ from178,300 in 1945to 76,800a yearlater to 18,700by 1962. Palmeris interestedless in this ªnaturalºdecline than in the lessonsthe union ’s12years of uneven growthoffer to historians ofthe CIOeraand, perhaps, to union activiststoday. Hismost essentialpoint is straightforwardenough: the union succeededwhen it mobilized the rank and ®le;it failedwhen it didn’t. But forthe most part ªthe rank and ®leºremains elusive, and oftenfaceless, in this book. The author doespay some attention to ethnicity. At ForeRiver, he tellsus, ªworkersof Irish descent could be the most militant but also the most anti-union, while Italians werequieter but tendedto be more pro-unionº(225). This bald assertionbegs for elaboration, but Palmerfocuses most ofhis attention on the activistswho emergedfrom the ranks, especiallythoseÐ likeKaplanÐ who becamemembers ofthe union’sorganizingstaff. Usually left-wingers(Socialists at NewYork Ship, Communists and CP sympathizers at FederalShip and ForeRiver), they were,at once,animated by aªbroad socialvisionº (241)and committed to rank-and-® ledemocracy. Theproblem was that rank-and-® ledemocracy and abroad socialvision didn ’talways complement eachother. Inspite ofthe IUMSWA ’segregiouserrors at ForeRiver, the conservatismof its 378 BookReviews rank-and-® leworkforce was apparently amajorÐ perhaps insuperableÐ obstacleto union organizing, until anewset of circumstances prevailed during World War II. And at NewYork Ship, afarless conservativeworkforce was comfortablewith the continuedmarginalization ofAfrican-Americans. Here the broadervision ofthe cadres,when they daredto articulateit, clashedwith the sensibilitiesof the rank and ®le.Even apart fromthis contradiction,democracy and grassrootsinsurgency often proved to be complex, destabilizingphenomena that pulled the union apart as much as, orperhaps morethan, they knit it together. Palmerbelieves that the tragedyof the IUMSWAlay lessin its inevitable declinethan in the factthat men likeGreen and VanGelder, who begantheir union careersas left-wingSocialists, became increasinglyreluctant to trustthe rank-and-® ledemocracy that had built the union at NewYork Ship. As a20-year-old,Green had leda major strikeat aGlasgowshipyard and beenprosecuted under Britain’sDefenceof the Realm Act. As arank-and-® lemilitant in the UnitedStates, he embodied the traditions ofAmerican socialism and ªClydesidesyndicalismº (24). But then, likeso many ofthe new men ofpower who emergedduring the overlapping NewDeal and CIO eras,he becamea centralizer and, ultimately, an autocrat. To his credit,Palmer acknowledges the political and institutional forces that pushed him in this direction.But, ®nally, he leaveshis readerssuspended between the determinist weightof the largerhistorical contextand the voluntarist dimension ofhistory as aseriesof ªopportunities found and lost.ºPerhaps that ’srightwhere we belong.

BRUCE NELSON, Professorof History, Dartmouth College

Truman and Korea: ThePolitical Culture of theEarly ColdWar PAUL G. PIERPAOLI, JR., 1999 Columbia: Universityof Missouri Press pp. xiv 1 261, $39.95

This talentedyoung authorÐ he was born nearlya decadeafter the warhe iswriting aboutÐ has undertakenwhat he describesas the ®rstscholarly, in-depth (he usesthat academicdescription) study ofthe KoreanWar ’smobilization and the politics that surroundedit. Hemoves chronologicallythrough the war’sphases, drawingtheir politics, and concludesthat the Truman administration sought to avoid the economicconfusions of World War II and especiallyto avoid creationof a garrisonstate: the administration put mobilization in the hands ofbusinessmen, which was whereTruman and his advisors desiredit, and attempted to placate (actually to be utterlyfair to) labor. All this as the government’splanners triedto getthrough the warto an approximation ofpeace in Koreaand at the same time to createarmed forces strong enough to confrontthe Soviet Unionduring the increasingly awkward Cold War. For adoctoraldissertationÐ the book had its originsin adissertationunder the directionof the well-knownscholar at Ohio State University,Michael J. Hogan, and acommitteeof the Department of History’sdistinguishedhistoriansÐ Pierpaoli ’stask was, to useanother academicword, daunting, perhaps too largean order.The author generallywrites well and his forcefulprose gives movement to what in lesserhands couldhave beena tediousaccount. Nonethelessthere are problems. One, in the department ofwriting, whether the fault ofthe author orthe committee, is the proliferationof metaphors. Thebook beginswith discussionof a watershed, and turnsto aTrojan horse, and alongthe way exploresother ® gures.It stressesa fearof the time, that ofa garrisonstate, and the point isat the leastsuspect. As asurvivorof the eraI must say that Inever heardthe phrase; it strikesme as anotion oflater times. Theauthor ®nds the U.S. Chamber of Commerceusing the phrase but citesno otherauthority, and areadersimply seesthe phrase every severalpages, which is not suitably impressivefor ª the centralthemeº of the study, as de®ned (4). Then thereare awkwardnesses in making points, in which aclear-cutstatement may only precedea taking away, aremoval, as in the following: ªAs it turnedout, the Truman administration was more sympathetic toward labor than it was toward management. To acertainextent, however, ¼ º(106). And again: ªTheextent to which priceand wagecontrols and economicstabilization in generalaffected the in¯ation rateis dif®cult to quantify. To acertaindegree ¼ º(100). An alliedproblem is the swirlof events on the home frontas committeesand individuals comeand go.The use of acronyms frequentlydisturbs areaderwho canhardly keepthe alphabet soup in mind. Theauthor ®nds it dif®cult, as onewould have expected,to keepthe confusionin orderso as to give meaningto areader,and on onenotable occasioncontradicts himself within apageor so. Considerthe following: ªSo criticalwas the shortageof copper ¼ that the presidentwas forcedto authorizethe BookReviews 379 releaseof some ®ftymillion tons ofthe metal fromthe nation ’sstrategicstockpileº (140). This then isfollowed by: ªThecopper shortage of 1951 was greatlycomplicated by the labor management dispute that had closedone of the nation ’slargestcopper smelters in Gar®eld, Utah. Administration of®cials estimatedthat the strikecould diminish coppersupplies by nearly23 million pounds permonthº (141). This lackof organization is the essentialproblem ofa book forwhich the author has searcheddeeply in the recordsof the Truman Libraryand National Archives.As he slips fromparagraph to paragraph he usesthe joining wordsª meanwhileºand ªat the same time asºbut thesedo not reallysuf® ce to bridgethe gap betweenmaterial and meaning. Considerthe book ’sthird chapterentitled ª Labor ’s Cold Shoulder,ºa chapterthat struckthis revieweras an idealvehicle for a reviewin LaborHistory . Instead the chapterdeals with akaleidocopeof subjects and towardits endanalyzes the problems ofsmall businessesand closeson apaean to the administration ’spoliciesin general.The next chapter, entitled ªThePolitics of Rearmament,º seems clear enough, and is sizable(119± 159), and yetthe chapteris acuttingof pie, orto mix the ®gurea straddle,in which the readermoves alongwith the mixtureof paragraphs betweeninitial af®rmations followedby ªhoweverºportions subtractingfrom what has just been, seemingly,doled out. TheKorean War era, as the author relates,was atime ofenormous confusion, both within the administration and among greatmasses of the Americanpeople, and it is not easyto generalizeabout it. As Pierpaoli writes,it marked the beginningof the erain which wepresently live, atime when life in Americamakes the so-calledgolden twenties (the 1920s),pale in comparison. Theeconomy doubled, without in¯ation, in 1950±65, and doubled again, with in¯ation, in the next15 years. He is correctin pointing out that the garrisonstate never appeared. But, then, perhaps he should explain wherethe notion camefrom in the ®rstplace, savefor that oratoricalpronouncement by the fatheaded U.S. Chamber ofCommerce.

ROBERT H.FERRELL, ProfessorEmeritus, IndianaUniversity

TheCold War at Home:The Red Scare in Pennsylvania, 1945±1960 PHILIP JENKINS, 1999 Chapel Hill: Universityof North Carolina Press pp. xiv 1 271,$49.95 (cloth); $18.95(paper)

This comprehensiveand insightful casestudy enlargesour understanding of the Cold Warera by exploringthe RedScare in Pennsylvania, an important industrial statewith astrongradical tradition and an extremeanti-Communist reaction.Jenkins, who also wrote Shirtsand Hoods : The Extreme Right in Pennsylvania , 1925± 1950 (1997), expertlydescribes the anti-Communism orderof battle: Republican ®guresfrom moderate Governor James Duffto immoderate CongressmenJohn McDowell,Francis Walter,and James E.VanZandt, and statesenator Albert R. Pechan; Pewand Mellonmoney; the Pennsylvania Manufacturers ’ Association; and diversegroups from Protestant fundamentalists to the AmericanLegion to the John Birch Society. Hedoes not slight the repressiveaspects of the RedScare, but he isat pains to distinguish the epiphenomenon McCarthyism fromthe morecomprehensive anti-Communist movement. Heemphasizes the degreeto which Pennsylvania ’sRedScare was the workof non-WASP, non-elite, and economicallyliberal groupsand individuals. Among the state ’smost unrelentinganti-Communists werepro-labor Democratand defenderof Sacco and VanzettiJudge Michael A. Musmanno, labor priestand civilrights advocate Father Charles OwenRice, and Polish-American leaderand co-founder ofAmericans Battling Communism Blair F.Gunther. In1945 Pennsylvania Democratswere in trouble. Afterlanguishing forgenerations, they had become the majority in 1936by unitingculturally diverse elementsÐ labor, Catholics, Jews, African-Americans, and ethnicgroupsÐ around economicissues. Pennsylvania Communists, 6000strong, were a small but visible part ofthe coalition. Now the Cold Warthreatened to returnthe Democraticparty to minority status as drovesof Catholic and ethnicvoters defected to the militantly anti-Communist Republicans. Thebeating they took in the 1946election convinced Democrats to expelthe Communists. Thereafter, matching, and sometimes exceeding,the anti-Communism ofthe Right helped them to remainthe majority in Pennsylvania fordecades. Jenkins emphasizes transnational religiousand culturalfactors to explainthe militant anti-Commu- nism ofthe Democraticbase. Catholic clericspresented the struggleagainst Communism to the laity as an ideological,theological, and mystical battle and incorporatedit into devotional practice. Catholics, inspiredby prophecy attributed to the Virginof Fa Âtima and the persecutionof the Church 380 BookReviews in EasternEurope, were urged to destroyCommunism, the Antichrist. Pennsylvania ’s many newer immigrant communities followedseparate paths to anti-Communist consensus,in¯ uenced in varying degreesby Catholic anti-Communism, eventsin the homeland, and pressurefrom the federal governmentand the mainstream pressto demonstratetheir Americanism. Thedecades-old split overCommunism within the state ’slabor movement becameirreconcilable duringthe RedScare. The older craft unions and, exceptinga fewlocals, the UnitedMine Workers and UnitedSteel Workers were solidly anti-Communist. Subjected to the fullforce of anti-Commu- nism wereCommunist-led orin¯ uenced unions oftransport, food and tobacco, hotel and restaurant, shipyard and dockworkers, and Philadelphia teachers.Legendary was the anti-Communist waron the UnitedElectrical, Radio, and MachineWorkers (UE) in Pittsburgh wagedby the FBI, the House Un-AmericanActivities Committee, the SenateInternal Security Subcommittee, and McCarthy ’s PermanentSubcommittee on GovernmentOperations. InPennsylvania the federalgovernment, citing the Communist dangerto defenseindustries, promoted anti-Communism, intervenedin stateand localmatters, and took powerunto itself. Washington conductedSmith Actprosecutions, implemented loyalty/securitymeasures, and employed and showcasedMatt Cvetic and otherprofessional informers. Anti-Communist Congressionalcommit- teesheld hearingsin Philadelphia and Pittsburgh. And it was the federal,not the state, courtsthat belatedly censuredthe civilliberties violations ofthe anti-Communists. Not until 1968had the RedScare run its course.That was, Jenkins notes, when the Cold War ideologicaldivide that had appeared in the campaigns ofJoe McCarthy and HenryWallace was replacedby the riseof their ª namesakes: EugeneMcCarthy, the peaceactivist, and GeorgeWallace standard-bearerfor an enragedwhite workingclass.º Jenkins concludesthat Pennsylvania ’sRedScare left an ambiguous legacy.Certainly it leftno visible scarson the landscape and littleimprint on public memory compared to the subsequent collapseof basic industry. Still, he argues,anti-Communism helped to rede®ne American loyalty and citizenship moreinclusively in termsof class and ethnicitythrough apopulist ªinvertednativismº whereby immigrant groupsreversed roles with traditional elitesthat had longstereotyped them as un-American. Oneindisputable resultof the RedScare, the demiseof the Communist party, did not mean rejection ofCommunist positions on all issues.As has oftenhappened in Americanhistory, ªextremeºideas, such as the party ’son labor, peace,race, and gender,although contested,joined the mainstream. Takinginto accountrecent historiographic trends,Jenkins doesnot demonizethe Right orglorify the Left.Neither does he goall the way with scholarswho, based on partial accessto Soviet and American archivesand infusedwith conservative,post-Cold War, post-Reagan triumphalism, claim that domestic anti-Communism savedthe Nation fromdestruction. In the 1960sin most industrial nations, he notes, Communists becamedinosaurs without an American-styleinquisition. So while it may be truethat it was ªnot without honor,ºthe anti-Communist movement was also not without irony.

CHARLES H.McCORMICK, ProfessorEmeritus ofHistory, Fairmont State College

TheSuppression of Salt of theEarth: HowHollywood, Big Labor, and PoliticiansBlacklisted aMoviein ColdWar America JAMES J. LORENCE, 1999 Albuquerque: Universityof New Mexico Press pp. xv 1 279,$45.00 (cloth); $19.95(paper)

Indirector John Sayles ’ Return ofthe Seacaucus Seven (1980), acadreof aging baby boomers recalls theirhalcyon days ofpolitical activism duringthe turbulent 1960s.Once, when put behind bars in the titular NewJersey city, they had playfully chantedª Wewant the formula! Wewant the formula!ºto the bewilderedjailers. Awryhomage by the NewLeft to the Old Left,the referencewas to acathartic moment in Salt ofthe Earth (1954), when astalwartband ofimprisoned Chicana housewivesdemand milk foran infant. Inan informative volume that yokeslabor history and ®lm studies, historian James J.Lorencetells the fascinatingstory of what is perhaps the singlemost anomalous cinematiclegacy of Cold War America. As an indexof class, race,and gender,the holy trinity ofcurrent academic fashion, Salt of the Earth makes an irresistiblesubject foran extensivecase history. Itsastronomical political correctness quotient aside, however,it is also that rare® lm that takeson asigni®cance beyond itself,not just as a cause ceÂleÁbre frozenin time but as arichvein from which to mine the nuggetsof Cold Warculture. That such a®lm gotmade in the Americaof 1954 seems astonishing; that it is aworthy ®lm, so BookReviews 381 prescientin its documentaryaesthetic, multicultural sympathies, and feministconsciousness, is nothing short ofmiraculous. To Lorence,it enduresas ªacelluloiddocument of the resistanceto Cold War repressionand arecordof a people strivingto make theirown historyº(61). Alabor oflove and alovesong to labor, Salt ofthe Earth was writtenby MichaelWilson, produced by Paul Jarrico,and directedby HerbertBiberman, oneof the originalHollywood Ten.Rendered personanon gratain Hollywood by the 1947HUAC hearings and the WaldorfStatement (in which the major studios pledgednot to knowingly employ Communists), they teamedwith otherblacklisted ®lmmakers underthe banner ofthe IndependentProductions Corporation to make movies which, in Jarrico’swords, ªpacked arealsocial and political wallopº(55). For their® rstproject, they settledon the truestory of the 1951Empire Zinc strike by Mine±Mill Local 890 in GrantCounty, NewMexico. At the height ofthe confrontation, in adramatic display oflabor and gendersolidarity, the wivesof the strikingminers took overduties on the picketline in orderto circumventa court-orderedinjunction againstthe men. Theresult was amini-revolution in the workplaceand the home space, the mines and the kitchen. Lorenceis ameticulousresearcher, ably negotiatingthe internecinewrangling of labor union politics and the intricaciesof motion pictureproduction and distribution. Drawingon interviews,oral histories, and arigorousinspection of the relevantmanuscript collections(notably the archivesof the Western Federationof Miners and InternationalUnion of Mine, Mill, and SmelterWorkers and the Clinton JencksPapers at the Universityof Colorado at Boulder), he has reconstructedthe alternativelyuplifting and sorryfate of a ®lm createdª to challengethe blacklist and the widerpolitical persecutionthat sti¯ed freeexpression in Cold WarAmericaº (196± 197). Surprisingly, big labor emergesas abiggerobstacle than eitherHollywood orHUAC. InLorence ’s telling,ª business unionismº(7) is the realfoe of the workingman, the agentof a devil ’s bargain whereinª organizedlabor accommodated itselfto the demands ofthe Cold Warand made its peace with the corporatestateº (7) to becomeª ajunior partnerin the Americannational securitystateº (21). Roy Brewer,the staunchly anti-Communist head ofthe InternationalAssociation ofTheatrical and StageEmployees, isthe reactionaryvillain at centerstage. The refusal of IATSE projectionists to handle Salt ofthe Earth is what strangledthe projectcommercially: big labor killing apro-labor ®lm. Not that otherforces weren ’talignedagainst the perceivedthreat to national security:FBI agents monitored the production, INSagentsharassed Mexicannationals, and producerHoward Hughes consultedwith Congresson how bestto sabotageproduction and distribution. Lorenceis out-frontabout his own prejudices:his is not adisinterestedeye on a®lm he callsª an enduringreminder of both the MexicanAmerican struggle for equality in the Southwest and the corrosivein¯ uence of the Hollywood blacklist that sti¯ed the creativeimpulses ofmany motion picture artistsin the 1950sº(44± 45). Theauthor celebrates Salt ofthe Earth not just forits on-screenideology but its means ofproduction, seeingit as an exemplarymodel forthe cooperativeradicalism ofª cultural workersºand workerworkers, the ful®llment ofthe dreamof the vanguard elitelocked arm and arm with the sturdyproletariat. Theoutlook is always partisan and sometimes credulous,very much in the romance-of-American-Communism grainof left-wing scholarship. As Lorencechronicles the backstory to Salt ofthe Earth ,onecan almost hearthe Weaverscrooning ª Which Side AreYour One?ºin the background. Curiously, then, Salt ofthe Earth the movie getsshort shrift. Though Lorenceis scrupulousin his attention tolabor in® ghtingand the exigenciesof the motion picturebusiness, he neglectsthe kind of aestheticanalysis that might make the ®lm comealive as cinematicart. DirectorBiberman was no Eisenstein,but despiteits many ¯aws (bad sound recording,histrionic acting from the castof amateurs, and heavy-handed confrontationsbetween noble workersand malevolent bosses), Salt ofthe Earth remainsa compellingmotion picture,the bare-bonesauthenticity enhancingthe polemical forceof the narrative.To be sure,Lorence diligently records the enthusiasticreceptions from pro-labor audiencesÐ accordingto Biberman, ªbig tough cynicalºtrade unionists wereleaving screenings ª with tears streamingdown theirfacesº (116)Ð but how much ofthis ismere ballyhoo fromparty linersis dif® cult to gauge.Was agrainy, black and white ®lm about MexicanAmerican mine workers,with no action adventureor romantic angle,ever going to be embracedby Americanmoviegoers in the ageof This is Cinerama or The Creature fromthe Black Lagoon ? As Lorencenotes, evenmore than the pro-labor, cross-racialsolidarity, it is the feminism of Salt of the Earth that remainsso strikingin retrospect:ª Thewomen and men ofLocal 890 and the IPC questionedthe sex-rolede® nitions ingrainedin the receivedculture and revised,at leasttemporarily, the sexualdivision oflabor assumed, ifnot lived, by many Americansº(202). Doubtless onereason the ®lm ªgotbetter over the yearsinstead of worseº (194), as producerJarrico observed with satisfaction, 382 BookReviews is that the pro-labor agit-prop is foregroundedby the machinations ofan affectingwomen ’smelodrama, whereinthe macho husband and the Chicana housewife(played by the luminous Mexicanactress Rosaura Revueltas, oneof the fewprofessionals in the cast)blossoms into an activeagent of her own destiny. Itis perhaps inevitable that abook about so contentiousa passagein Americanhistory should itself partake ofthe passions and intemperanceof the times. ªScab Workersattempt to provoke picketing womenº(32) readsa cutlinefor a photograph and the jargonof ª corporateoverlordsº (19) and ªindustrial peonageº(15) pervadesthe prose. Alesspartisan tonewould not have detractedfrom Lorence’smission; it may also have facilitateda moreopen-minded appreciation ofthe complexitiesat workeven in the McCarthyera. Lorence pretty much af®rms what many historians ofthe eranow question, the popular imageof the ªhomogenization ofCold Warculture in the UnitedStatesº (167). Thus, in honoring his heroes,the author ’srhetoricsometimes soarsover the top: ª¼the Salt group stood almost aloneagainst the thought controland censorshipin aperiodof grave constitutional danger;and they emergedas people ofcourage who insistedthat the Bill ofRights be honored, despite the pressuresexerted by the forcesof political conformity,ºhe declares. Afterall, fromthe depths ofCold WarAmerica, apro-Communist movie by Communist ®lmmakers was producedand releasedto generallyfavorable reviewsfrom all quarters.It was also systematically suppressed, as Lorencechronicles so ably, by abroad coalition ofgovernment, business, and labor union censors.In an irony that cametoo lateto pro® tthe IndependentProductions Corporation, but that is too richnot to savor, Salt ofthe Earth has livedlong and prosperedЮ rst,in 16mm screenings on the universitycircuit in the 1960s,where the young activistsof Return ofthe Seacaucus Seven surely viewedit, and now on videotape, wherethe standard FBI warningvouches for its copyrightprotection, and on cabletelevision, where it isin fairlyfrequent rotation on TurnerClassic Movies, courtesy of the ªcorporateoverlordsº at Time-Warner.

THOMAS DOHERTY, Chair,Film Studies Program,Brandeis University

Tupperware:The Promise of Plasticin 1950sAmerica ALISON J. CLARK, 1999 Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution Press pp. x 1 241, $24.95

Alison J. Clarke ’shistory ofTupperware reveals complicated and genderedaspects of labor history, and offersas wellan exceptionallysuggestive exploration of the layeredmeanings of consumer culture. Duringthe Depressionof the 1930s,Earl Silas Tupper was barely making alivingin his family ’s New Englandcommercial nurseries. By the early1940s, his skills and compulsive curiosityas aYankee tinkererled him to workout the techniquesof producing plastic containers.His efforts relied on support fromthe DuPont Corporation which was eagerto successfullyinject plastic into molds and then into Americanhouseholds. Theresult was Tupperware,the seriesof plastic containers(and later myriad objects) with theirmemorable colors,design, and unique closurecalled the ªTupperware burp.º However,what turnedhis productsinto iconsof 1950s America and into the basis fora successful enterprisewas the workof Brownie Wise. In the early1950s, she was astrugglingsingle mother from Detroitwhose inventivenessas apromoterled her to develop the approach that reliedon the workof housewiveswho organizeddirect sales through Tupperwareparties. She thus provided Tupper with an alternativeto unsuccessfuldepartment storesales. In1954, she was the ®rstwoman to appear on the cover of Business Week .By 1958,when Tupper ®redWise (six months beforehe sold the company to anational corporation), they had partedways. Theshy Tupper, who workedat corporateheadquarters in NewEngland, took offenseat the ¯amboyant Wise,who traveledextensively, promoted herselfin ways that made the productsand herpersonality inseparable, and presidedover yearly sales meetings calledHomecoming Jubilees that wereheld nearher Florida home and the company ’sdistribution centerin Orlando. Yettheir combined effortshad alreadymade theirmark on Americanlife. By 1956the Tupperware was on display in NewYork ’sMuseumof Modern Art as an exampleof authentic, modern, and unclutteredAmerican design. At the same time, theseproducts had found theirway into the homes of millions ofAmericans, in part becausetheir inexpensiveness relied on largecapital expendituresand low labor costs. Clarke’shistory ofTupperware continues the reinterpretationof the 1950sAmerica that BookReviews 383 othershave begun. Theeasy way out is to seeTupperware as yetanother symbol of1950s passive suburban domesticitythat resultedfrom the advertisingof household products. Clarke ’sanalysis is morecomplicated. She shows how the promotion ofthese products hid the conditions oftheir production and sheemphasizes how they bridgedª the gulfbetween traditional customs and the newly formulatingmanners of the postwar homeº(57). Keyaspects of the storycontradict the long-familiar pictureof 1950s domesticity. Hostessparties, hardly inventedby Wise,feminized direct sales by providing an alternativeto the aggressivemale salesman who forcedhis way into the home with one foot in the door. Clarkealso revealshow the actual usesto which women put Tupperwarechallenged Tupper ’s own hopes, born in the 1930s,that he was providing items that would shoreup the gentilityand tastefulness ofthe Anglo-Saxon woman. Wise ’s¯amboyant entrepreneurship,as wellas the workof thousands of women who held Tupperwareparties, both reinforcedtraditional notion ofwomen ’sdomesticlabor in the home and underscoredthe outlinesof a moremultifaceted story of how productsare promoted and usedÐand how in the processsaleswomen gained a signi®cant foothold in the economy. Inthis story, Wiseplayed acriticalrole, preaching and practicingwhat Clarkecalls ª apotent doctrineof positive thinking, sisterlyconcern, and self-empowermentº(129). As Clarkeshows, Tupperwareparties ª raisedthe status ofhomemaking skills frominvisible labor to marketable skillº(117). Fully acknowledginghow salesand useof Tupperware reinforced traditional femininity, Clarkealso emphasizes how they ªprovided apragmatic, ifcompromised, alternativeto domesticsubordinationº (127). Eventually, as Clarkeskillfully reveals,the storyof Tupperware becomes part ofthe dramatic expansion abroad ofAmerican consumer culture and corporatepower. Inthe early1950s, Tupper was expandinginto foreignmarkets. By century ’send, aTupperwareparty occurredevery 2.5 seconds and about 85%of sales occurred outside the U.S. Clarke, atutorin designhistory and material cultureat the Royal Collegeof Art in London, tellsthis storywith clarityand thoroughness, turningthe history ofthese polyethylene containers,their development and promotion, into onethe most successfulstudies we have of20th-century material culture.What helps make possible herrich story is her skillful useof varied sources, from Tupper ’s quirky musings in his diariesfrom the 1930sand 1940sto oral historiesof Tupperware hostesses of the 1950sand after.She skillfully embeds Tupperware ’shistory into acomplexnexus of socially and culturallyconstructed meanings of goods shaped by gift-givingand otherrituals, sociability, woman- hood, and the centralityof commodities to moderncapitalism. DANIELHOROWITZ, Professorof American Studies, SmithCollege

BettyFriedan and theMaking of theFeminine Mystique:The American Left,the Cold War, and ModernFeminism DANIEL HOROWITZ, 1998 Amherst: Universityof Massachusetts Press pp. 255,$39.95

Daniel Horowitzjust shouted, ªGotcha!ºas ifhe had won aschoolyard game, claimingpossession of the most recent,if not the last, wordon Betty Friedanand the originsof second-wave feminism. This thorough, ifsomewhat testy, biography ofthe author of The Feminine Mystique locatesthe originsof Friedan’sfeminism in herexperiences as asmart Jewish girlgrowing up in Peoria, as an activist and scholarat Smith College,and as alabor journalist duringand afterWorld War II. Accordingto Horowitz,the Friedanmystique holds that it was the detailsof life as aªhappy housewifeºliving in an af¯uentsuburban ªconcentrationcampº with no room ofher own that ledFriedan to discoverª the problem that has no nameºwhose only curewas engagementwith the largerworld, preferablyin a paying job. Horowitzargues, in responseto Friedan ’sclaims ofhaving experiencedan epiphany in the suburbs, that herfeminism had its originsin the leftradicalism ofher college years at Smith, herbrief graduate study in psychology at Berkeley,and the earlyyears of her marriage living in the raciallydiverse and culturallylively Parkway Villagein Queens.No typical housewife,Friedan had aradicalpast whose theoreticalunderpinnings served her well in the articulation ofa newwomen ’sagenda.He notes that ªDuringmuch ofthe two decadesbeginning in 1943,Friedan was participating in left-wingunion activity, writingarticles that rancounter to Cold Warideology, and livingin acosmopolitan, racially integratedcommunity. Not many 1950ssuburban housewivesread Engels ’sargumentfor the liberation ofwomen ¼º(239). 384 BookReviews

Horowitzunderestimates the powerof the phenomena that Friedanbrought to ourcollective consciousness.Many women ofFriedan ’sgeneration,growing up in asocietythat stressedthe importance ofbeauty as awoman ’smost important attribute in the quest fora husband, were ambivalent about theirbrains. They couldthink, they couldspeak, they couldwrite, but couldthey catchthe rightman? Inan af¯uent culture that established ªhousewifeºas the norm forwhite middle-classwomen, it took courageto callone ’sselfa writer,and it was nothing lessthan heretical to say that fourth grademath homework provided limited intellectualstimulation fora college-educated mom. IfHorowitz de-emphasizes the seductivebut ultimately deadeningidiocy of1950s suburban life,he doesconcede its impact on Friedan: ªShe couldnot have written The Feminine Mystique ¼ had she not spent so many yearsin the suburbs as ahousewifeº(238). Hisprodigious researchhelps to clarifythe extentto which shecould not have writtenthe same book without the experiencesof her early career as astudentand journalist in which shetook principled stands against antisemitism and racismand, occasionally, sexism.Horowitz details Friedan ’sparticipation in an emergingdebate over ª the woman problemºin progressivecircles. Her interests included ª rentstrikes, protests against escalatingprices, discrimination againstwomen, cooperativeliving arrangements, natural childbirth, the father ’s re- sponsibility forchild careand housekeeping,and the heroicparticipation ofwomen in historic movements forsocial changeº (144). Although he considersFriedan to have beenª too small aplayer in the realmof labor journalism and radicalism forinvestigators to have noticedº(145), he doesmake it clearthat the anticommunism of the Cold Waryears had achillingeffect on activism on the left.Anti-Communists ªtargetedeven liberal women’sorganizations,ºmaking it dif®cult for women to stepout ofthe domesticsphere for fear of beinglabeled ª Communistºor worse, ª unfeminine.ºIf Friedan found an audiencefor articles on women’sissuesduring her years at the UEand the FederatedPress, Horowitz notes that her progressivestands on women ’sissueswere less in vogueby the 1950s.Ironically, Friedan ’sarticlesin LadiesHome Journal , McCall’s, Mademoiselle , and Redbook helped to createthe normative imageof the Americanwoman as ahappy housewife. When Friedan® nally brought The Feminine Mystique to press,it was, as Horowitzargues, hardly the ®rstexpression of the discontent,or at leastthe emotional dissonance,of many Americanwomen. Recognizingthis, he ishard-pressed to explainthe dramatic successthe book enjoyed. Hesuggests that Friedan’spath-breaking book is merelya reworkingof familiar themes, are-articulationof familiar ideas about the value ofmeaningful work and the deadeningquality ofalienated women ’slabor, and a panderingto middle-classsensibility in its defenseof heterosexuality and marriage. The Feminine Mystique is all ofthis and much more. While the book is aproductof the lessonsFriedan learned in the classroom, in the labor movement, and in leftpolitics, it is also an articulation ofwomen ’s dilemmas in the post-War and Cold Warworld. Itwas aproblem that had no name until Betty Friedannamed it. Herbook, forall its enduringimpact, is aproductof its author ’stime and the concernsof her middle-classmoment. Ifher analysis ledher momentarily away fromthe concernsof race and class, we canperhaps forgiveher, as it was Betty Friedanamong otherswho articulatedthe importance ofgender as acompellingcategory for historical analysis.

BARBARA L.TISCHLER, Horace Mann School

For Freedom’sSake: TheLife of Fannie Lou Hamer CHANA KAI LEE, 1999 Urbana and Chicago: Universityof Illinois Press pp. xvi 1 255, $29.95

Fannie LouHamer was born in poverty in 1917in MontgomeryCounty, Mississippi. She was the youngestchild ofsharecroppers who had 19other children. In addition to sharecropping, which paid verylow wages,her parents, James and LouElla Townsend, held avarietyof other jobs to provide for such alargefamily. Hamer ’smaternal grandmotherhad beena slavein Mississippi and hermother provided averycentral role in herupbringing, providing herwith inspiration and couragethat she carriedwith herthroughout herlife. Hamer began picking cotton at sixyears of age. As ayoungster growingup, sheoften had to wearrags and was usually hungry. Untilthe ageof 12, through the sixth grade,Hamer attended school just threemonths ofthe year.Thereafter, her formal educationended, but shecontinued reading and studyingthe Bible. Herdif® cult childhood ledto hercommitment to socialprotest and herengagement in politics. BookReviews 385

As Hamermatured into agiftedleader, her early development provided herwith a®rmfoundation. Deeplyreligious, she was atalentedspeaker and singer,and oftenled marches with songsshe had learnedfrom her mother. Herearly life was besetwith hardship and tragedy.Her father died when she was 12years old and hermother had an accidentthat eventuallycaused her to loseher sight. Hamer lefthome in the early1940s and marriedPerry Hamer, afarmerand sharecropperon aneighboring plantation. She workedthe land with herhusband and servedas atimekeeper,reporting the hours of otherlaborers. Because of her skills with numbers and herleadership ability, shealso sold life insurance. Inthe early1960s Hamer was introducedto Ella Bakerof the Student Non-ViolenceCoordinating Committee and herlife as agrassrootsleader began. Hamervolunteered to travelto the country courthouseto registerto vote. She and the 18others who accompanied herwere asked to pass aliteracy testby readingand interpretinga sectionof the stateconstitution. Hamertook the testthree times and ®nally passed. Onceshe registered and voted, whitesretaliated with violenceand harassment, not only ofher, but also to herfamily, friends,and community. Hamersuffered extensive violence at the hands ofwhites. Beforeshe even joined the civilrights movement, doctors,who werepurportedly doingminor surgery,sterilized her. She was jailed and beatenso severelythat shehad health problems throughout the restof her life. Because of her activities, whiteswouldn ’thireher or her husband, and they weredependent on charity to survive. But Hamerwas persistentand fearless.She gainednational attention forher cause with the founding ofthe Mississippi DemocraticFreedom Party in April 1964.As alocalactivist, Hamerhelped run clothingdrives, get food to needyfamilies, and monitored civilrights issues. She ranfor elective of® ce many timesbut neverwon. Herrole at the 1964Democratic National Convention propelledher into the national limelight. She was acharismatic, grassrootspolitician, and goodmovement symbol. Objecti® cation ofher as asymbol by SNCC and othersin the movement was somewhat problematic, but it is unclearhow shefelt about this. Readersof this journal will be particularly interestedin Lee ’sinterpretationof Hamer ’smotivations forher activism. Accordingto Lee,much ofHamer ’sresolvewas herobjection to the whites ’ devaluation ofblack labor. Hamerargued that through theirlabor and workon the land, African- Americansmade Mississippi the placeit was. Inthe late1960s Hamer ’sactivitiesincluded the organizationof Freedom Farm, acooperativepig bank and agriculturalproject that helped blacks becomeindependent farmers and homeowners. She becamea supporterof the Mississippi Freedom Labor Unionand continuedher grassroots organizing of poor people. Black farm laborerswere being put out ofwage-labor by increasingmechanization and useof farm machinery. Hamerhelped to promote the Unionand raisedfunds for it. She also proposed boycotts ofwhite businesses. Thelast ®veyears of her life were especially hard forHamer. Apassionate speakerand organizer,she continuedto travelthroughout the country, despitethe factthat shewas exhaustedand depressed.She was hospitalized severaltimes and forcedto restand takeoff from her busy schedule.She diedin March1977 from breast cancer. Leehas donea fairjob in portrayingHamer, who is adif®cult subject. Thereare many inconsisten- ciesin basic biographical information, and thereseems to be alackof documentation on many aspects ofher life. Often Hamer ’smotivations arenot clear,and Leedoesn ’talways satisfactorilyuntangle the possibilities forspeci® c choices.Frequently Lee raises signi® cant questions about Hamer ’s actions, giventhe lackof evidence on certainmatters. However,Lee doesn ’tprovide answers,but rather,further speculations. Another areathat is leftmurky is the tensionsbetween the various constituenciesin the Civil Rights movement. Yet, givenall the challenges,Lee has givenus the ®rstscholarly biography of Hamer.

JACQUELINEGOGGIN, GraduateSchool ofDesign, HarvardUniversity

What WorkersWant RICHARD B. FREEMAN & JOEL RODGERS, 1999 Ithaca: CornellUniversity Press pp. xi 1 226, $35.00

This veryvaluable book reportsthe resultsof a large-scaleand complexsurvey aimed at understanding the preferencesof employees regarding workplace governance and theirattitudes toward the threekey institutions in the labor market: unions, government,and ®rms. The® ndingsare broadly consistent with othersurveys but no effortto datehas beenas sophisticated and convincing. 386 BookReviews

TheWorker Representation and Participation Survey (WRPS) was conductedin 1994.The design ofthe surveywas shaped by focusgroups and extensiveinteraction with union and management representatives(the surveywas conceivedas part ofthe Commission on the Futureof Worker± Manage- ment Relations, the so-calledDunlop Commission). This was followedby a26minute telephone interviewwith 2308employees as wellas a15minute follow-up with 801people fromthe original sample who had beengiven written material to which they wereasked to react.The sampling framewas employees18 years and olderin private sector,pro® tand nonpro® t, establishments with 25or more employees. Top managerswere excluded but managersbelow the top weresurveyed. The response rate was 88%. Theauthors reportthat theirsample represents75% of private sectorworkers. Oneof the greatstrengths of the book, and ofthe survey,is the carewhich wentinto the designof the instrumentand the thoroughnesswith which the authors discussdesign issues. The care was driven, as the authors make clear,by the politically highly chargednature of the material and the needto make the ®ndingscredible to all sides.As aresult,this book couldwell serve as atextbookin asurvey researchcourse. The authors describethe impact ofalternative wording of questions, ofthe useof differentresponse scales, and ofquestion order.They engagedin extensiveexperimentation with alternativedesigns and reportthe results.The reader comes away convincedthat this workwas done about as wellas possible. Thebook is writtenin abreezystyle which, while initially surprising,should make it accessibleto awideaudience. Theanalysis asks about workers ’ preferenceswith respectto in¯uence at the workplaceand their attitudestowards unions, management, and government.The main ®ndingsgo as follows. Between21 and 28%of employees are very satis® edwith theirin¯ uence on workplaceissues while 53%are somewhat satis® ed. Theremainder express various degreesof dissatisfaction. When askedwhether they would likemore in¯ uence on workplaceissues 63% said yes. Workersare split 50/50about whether they would preferto addressworkplace issues as individuals orthrough some formof collective representation.On the otherhand, when askedabout the natureof the kind ofrepresentation which they would want thereappears to be moreconsensus. Three quarters of the respondentsbelieve that an employeeorganization cannot be effectivewithout the cooperationof management and, when asked about the natureof the employeegroup they would want, about 63%opted fora groupwith no power but with management cooperationwhereas about 22%chose a groupwith powerbut which manage- ment opposed. Quitesurprisingly, thesepreferences are essentially identical for both union and non-union employees. About onethird ofnon-union workerswould votefor a union and 90%of currentunion members would voteto retaintheir union. Togetherthese latter ® gurespoint to a substantial gap betweenthe degreeof desired representation and the realitytoday. Thebook isrich with carefulanalysis ofthe headlinessummarized above and shows how the ®ndings changewhen parsedin various ways. Thebook also provides veryinteresting material on arangeof topics. Welearn, for example, about workers ’ and managers ’ assessmentsof the productivity gainsfrom various workplaceinnovations, theirviews regarding the desirability and effectivenessof government regulation,and how they think about what formthe employees ’ organizationsmight take. However,the main storyline is the desirefor a greatervoice combined with adesireto getalong with management evenat the expenseof power. Itis around this ®ndingthat the debateengendered by this book centers. Freemanand Rodgersargue that it would be foolish to ignoresuch clearinformation about employee preferencesand Ithink that they areright. Unionsneed to think about how, in light ofthese patterns, they canmake themselvesmore attractive to workersand Congressshould (although it likely won ’t) worryabout why employeeswho want unions areunable underthe currentlegal setup to obtain them. Managers,currently in the catbird seat, probably will not worryabout anything but the book doesat leastopen the question about how to satisfy afairlywidely held desirefor a greatervoice in the workplace. Itis, however,worth pushing alittlemore on these® ndings. Oneimportant nuanceis that the data arenot quite as consistenton the desirefor cooperation as it might appear froma quick reading.The ®ndingregarding cooperation is found in exhibit 3.8which shows that 65%of union workerschose the organizationwith no powerbut with management cooperation. Yetin alaterchapter, and in response to aslightly differentlyworded question, but onewhich is verysimilar in spirit, nearly70% of union workers(and essentiallythe same fractionof non-represented but pro-union employees) chosea ªstronglyindependentº organization (exhibit 4.10). Evena quarterof anti-union workersthought that strongindependence was adesirablecharacteristic of worker organizations. Afairreading, then, isthat workerswant astrongorganization with powerbut also want to getalong with management. Thesegoals aren ’tnecessarilyconsistent given modern realities (i.e. management opposition to unions) and so the question iswhat choicesemployees would make ifforced to. This BookReviews 387 question is not explicitlyaddressed but it doesseem that afairreading (and the onethe authors seem to support) isthat they would chooseto getalong. However,it may be that this choiceis not as stable orbedrock as arethe morestraightforward preferences. Imagine that asurveylike this was taken in 1929.What would it have shown? Thestory told by Lizabeth Cohen in Making ANew Deal (Cambridge: Cambridge UniversityPress, 1990) strongly suggests that the resultswould have been similar. Yetpreferences regarding unions, i.e. stronglyindependent organizations, were radically changedby eventseven while, at the same time, the same workerswho becamestrongly pro-union did not losetheir underlying desire to getalong with management. Itis not clearhow likely it is that wewill witnesssuch asea-changeof attitudes and certainlyshifts in the economy and the composition ofthe labor forceraise doubts. What practicaladvice ¯ ows from the book foremployee organizations in lesshospitable circumstances?One important point is that throughout the book thereis evidencethat the worstoff members ofthe labor forceÐminorities, lower income, lesseducatedÐ are more eager for aggressive representation. Given the currentstate of affairs, thereis ample scopefor organization in, forexample, lowerend service work. Thereis also considerable support forthe ideaof workplace councils which might representemployees on arangeof issues but not collectivelybargain overwages (this, ofcourse, ¯ ows fromthe Europeanworks council model). The hard question is how to squarethese with the desirefor strong independence. Beyond this, it would have beenhelpful had the surveyasked more about what unions might do to make themselvesmore attractive(though, keepin mind that about 40%of the respondentswould votefor unions as weknow them today). Inshort, this isa terri®cally usefulbook which contains awealth ofinformation. Differentactors will differabout what exactlyto make ofthe ®ndingsand what they imply forthe futurebut the material should not be ignoredas wethink about what shape labor market institutions should take.

PAULOSTERMAN, Professor,Sloan School, Massachusetts Institute ofTechnology

Why Unions Matter MICHAEL D. YATES, 1998 NewYork: Monthly ReviewPress pp. xii 1 183, $17.00

Thecontinued decline of organized labor is oneof the moreperplexing developments ofrecent decades.Until the mid-20th century,unions generallyexpanded in goodtimes, when labor was in short supply, and declinedin recessionyears, when unemployment rose.The prosperous 1990s witnessed a robust increasein the number ofjobs and an equally dramatic fall in the ranks ofthe unemployed. In addition, the regulatoryclimate became more favorable as the ReaganNLRB appointees departed. Organizedlabor presumably should have expandedrapidly. Not so. Unionmembership continuedto fall until 1999,when it increasedmodestly. Ifit had not beenfor the statepublic employeebargaining laws passed in the 1970sand 1980s,the labor movement would have beenvirtually moribund by 2000. Itis a measureof the unions ’ plight that MichaelD. Yates, alabor educatorat the Universityof Pittsburgh, callshis book WhyUnions Matter ,atitlethat would have seemedto belabor the obvious only afewyears earlier. Yates aims his accountat potential union members, especiallyactivists and leaders.He summarizes current academic research in arefreshinglydirect and readablestyle. Inthe ®rst fourchapters, devotedto ªhow unions form,ºª union structuresand democracy,ºand ªcollective bargaining,ºhe provides solid, practicaladvice on how to organize,conduct negotiations, process grievances,and performother vital functions. Yateshas awealth ofexperience to drawupon, and his advicewould be usefulto all but the most experiencedorganizers and negotiators. Inthe nextthree chapters, devotedto broaderissues, Yates revealshimself as aradicalwith an ambitious political agenda.Chapter ®veargues for an independentlabor party; sixexamines the unions ’ recordof race and sexdiscrimination; and the ®nal chapteraddresses the author ’stwo seemingly contradictorythemes, the criticalrole of unions in societyand the sorryrecord of the actual labor movement. Yatesargues that amorepositive type ofunionism, the type he favors, is feasible,but the historical exampleshe citesare all ofleft-wing organizations, mostly fromthe mid-centuryCIO. He neglectsto point out that they weremostly short-lived and at theirpeak accountedfor only atiny fractionof union membership, hardly encouragingmodels forthe revivalhe envisions. Theunintended consequenceis striking. If unions areso hard to organizeand manage(the point ofChapters 2±4), and eventhen rarelyescape various socialills (Chapter 5±6), why should anyone bother with them? Iam tempted to digresson the sins ofwriters who treatlabor history as abag offacts to be dumped 388 BookReviews out to provide illustrations foran argument,any argument.I shall resistthat temptation. Thereis a positive lessonin Yates ’sanalysis, though he would ®nd it unappealing. Therecord of the last century and athird suggeststhat Americanunions have beenquite successfulat improving theirmembers ’ livingstandards and workingconditions. Theirexperiences in obtaining pro-union governmentpolicies areless impressive, but still positive. However,they have had littleor no successin promoting broader political causes;independent labor partiesin particularhave beenconsistent losers. Why people like Yateskeep insisting that unions, which facemany problems tryingto do what they do well,should devotetheir resources to tasks that they do poorly ishard to imagine. Presumably it has to do with the ahistorical approach notedabove. But evenpresentists like Yates ought to realizethat oneof the ªinternalºfactors deterring union growthis the suspicion ofprospective members that they and their dueswill becomecaptive to political activistswho seeunions as stepping stonesto political power. As Yatesindirectly points out in his early, morehelpful chapters, the hurdlesfacing potential unionists arehigh enoughwithout extraneouschallenges. No onecontemplating such aroleshould underestimatethem. Therewere exceptional periods, notably the yearsfrom about 1937to the early 1950s,when the NLRB and otherfederal agencies embraced pro-union policies. Otherwisedetermined employersalmost always have had the upper hand. To succeedin such an environment, unions have to operatein abusiness-likeway, in the bestsense of the phrase. As Yatesargues, they have to relyon systematicorganization and teamwork, not just assertiveor intimidating leaders.This is atough assignment, perhaps anear-impossible onewithout adedicatedand inspiringcore of activist members. Howwill prospectivemembers reactto this account?Even if they only readthe ®rstfew chapters, Isuspectthat many will conclude,however reluctantly, that individual bargaining(supplemented perhaps by the informal company unions that have proliferatedin recentyears) is the rational choice. Insummary, Yateshas provided valuable insights into the nuts-and-bolts challengesthat face modern-day unions and workers,but not acompellingrationale for a membership upsurge.Unless the refurbishedAFL-CIO canbring about substantial changesin governmentpolicy, most workersare likely to concludethat in factunions don ’t matter.

DANIELNELSON, Professorof History, University ofAkron

Ravenswood:The Steelworkers ’ Victoryand theRevival of American Labor TOM JURAVICH & KATE BRONFENBRENNER , 1999 Ithaca, NY: CornellUniversity Press pp. xi 1 245, $29.95

This isa rivetingaccount of a remarkablestruggle of rank-and-® lesteelworkers and theirunion against powerfulinternational corporationsand ®nancial operators. Theauthors, both notedlabor scholars, activists, and educators,had accessto all ofthe major union actorsin this battle as wellas union documents. This allowed them to givea verypersonal ¯avor to the narrative,which sometimes reads likea goodmystery novel. Theresult is a®rst-ratelabor history, combining vivid descriptionsof the action with sophisticated analysis. Ravenswood, WestVirginia is a small mill town situatedalong the Ohio Riverabout athree-hour drivesouthwest ofPittsburgh. Itis home to alargealuminum re®ning and fabrication plant, opened in 1954and employing about 1700workers at the time ofthe lockout in Octoberof 1990. The Ravenswood plant had beenbuilt and ownedby KaiserAluminum. Theemployees quickly unionized and enjoyeddecent relationships with the company, largelyas aresultof their strong solidarity and militancy. However,the onsetof economic stagnation and the resultingcorporate offensive against organizedlabor in the mid-1970scaused union± management relationsto deterioratedramatically. Following atypical pattern, the plant was sold in the late1980s as Kaiserradically downsized. Thenew owners were part ofa Byzantine chain ofholding companies, ultimately controlledby international metals traderand fugitivefrom U.S. law, MarcRich. On October31, 1990, the new ownerslocked out the workersafter stonewalling for months in the negotiationsfor a newcollective bargainingagreement, months duringwhich supervisorssped up the workso incrediblythat several men werekilled on the job. Oncethe workerswere locked out, the company quickly hiredscabs to do the workand armedthugs to guardthe plant and harass not only the workersbut theirfamilies and supporters. At ®rstthe rank-and-® leorganized their own ®ght back, and while this helped to solidify the union as neverbefore, it soon becameapparent that the national union would have to geton board. Underthe leadership ofGeorge Becker, national union of®cials working closely with local unionists and theirfamilies developeda strategyof domestic and international attack on the BookReviews 389 corporationand Mr.Rich. Theircampaign includedpicketing around the world, acomplexunfair labor practicescharge under the National Labor Relations Act, health and safetyviolations chargesunder the Occupational Health and Safety Act, and multiple self-helpactivities by the members. Members, staffers,and supportersformed a band, built giantpuppets, took road caravansto employerheadquar- ters,held weeklysuppers, organized® nancial and emotional support mechanisms, ¯ewto the far cornersof the earth, and literallyrisked their lives to confrontthe enemy. Greatsolidarity was forged among workersin the UnitedStates and many othercountries, notably TheNetherlands, Switzerland, Czechoslovakia (beforepartition), Rumania, England, and Venezuela.In the end, the workersand their union prevailed, gettingback theirjobs, savingtheir union, and bringingRich to his knees. Theauthors arecontent to letthe readersdraw their own conclusionsfrom this story. Thevictory at Ravenswood makes it clearthat the followingare among the ingredientsnecessary for workers to defeattoday ’sglobal employers(and, ofcourse, one of the most important lessonsof Ravenswood is that victoryagainst such apowerfulfoe is possible): Theremust be astrongrank-and-® leinitiative; theremust be acommitted and imaginative union staff, willingto leadbut also willingto trustand to interactdemocratically with the rank-and-® le;both workersand staffmust aggressivelypromote national and international solidarity; and theremust be acampaign wagedon multiple fronts,and it must consistentlyescalate the pressureon the employer. Thebook endswith an ªEpilogue,ºwhich, end-of-movie-style,tells us what has happened to the main actorssince the strike.As the authors point out, ªVictory,no matterhow great,is neversimple.º What is most strikingis the ways in which the strugglehelped to changeand radicalizethe consciousnessof the workers,not in the sensethat they all becamesocialists but in the sensethat they all cameto abetterunderstanding of the worldaround them and theirplace as wagelaborers in it. It is doubtful that they will everagain be taken in by the anti-workerpropaganda ofthe corporationsor the politicians. Itmight have beenuseful for us ifthe authors had examinedthis strugglemore theoretically. Have its lessonsbeen learned, by the steelworkers ’ union and by the largerlabor movement? CurrentUSWA presidentGeorge Becker was propelledinto of®ce in part by his tremendouslybold and courageous leadership ofthe Ravenswood struggle.How has what he did therechanged the way the USWA, a notoriously bureaucraticunion, operates?How can a rank-and-® leunionism be createdand institution- alized?What areRavenswood ’slessonsfor labor internationalism? Perhaps they canwrite a sequel!

MICHAELYATES, Professorof Economics, University ofPittsburgh at Johnstown

Lives on theLine: American Families and theStruggle to Make Ends Meet MARTHA SHIRK, NEIL G. BENNETT & J. LAWRENCE ABER, 1999 Boulder, CO: WestviewPress pp. x 1 294, $19.95

Americahas not extendedits conspicuoussuccess in reducingpoverty among the elderlyto otherage groups. Indeed,social statistics compiled by NeilBennett, a public health demographerat Columbia and oneof the authors ofthis book, indicatethat nearlya quarterof America ’schildrenunder the age ofsix live in poverty. What accountsfor the apparent failureof this societyto takecare of its young? Theauthors highlight such factorsas singleparenthood, low educationalattainment, and part-time employment. As they note, eachfactor alone makes it morelikely that afamily will be poor; the presenceof all threeof these factors ª candeal a crushingblow to the economicvitality ofa young familyº(247). Togetherthese factors constitute what the authors describeas the ªBermuda triangleº offamily poverty: ªThey de®ne the spacewhere we lose many youngpersons in theirtrip froma childhood at the marginsof American public educationsystem to an adulthood at the marginsof the Americanlabor forceº(260). Thebulk ofthe book consistsof 10 case studies, writtenby journalist Martha Shirk, that describe, with aminimum ofboth editorialcomment and socialscience analysis, the situations in which 10poor ornear-poor families ®nd themselvesat the endof the 20th century.Her vignettes imply that the poor aredifferent from the rich. Although they sharethe same basic values, such as acommitment to workingand otherforms of self-help, the poor lackenough money to dealwith the contingenciesthat separatethem fromcatastrophe. An illnessleads to medicalexpenses, reduces the number ofhours of labor afamily cansupply, and means the differencebetween relative contentment and abject misery. (Mr. Micawbermade the same point in DavidCopper® eld ;the dilemma is not anewone.) Inone of Shirk’scasestudies, aMississippi woman worksin acat®sh factory,cutting the heads ofthe ®sh with 390 BookReviews asaw that is dangerousto operate.Her employment is seasonal, and herminimum wagejob comes unadornedwith much in the way offringe bene® ts. For such awoman, alonein the labor marketbut with afamily to support at home, the linebetween poverty and adecentliving is avery® neone. Another family describedby Shirk contains two workingparentsÐ one a cookin atiny Aspen restaurant and the othera managerat aconveniencestoreÐ who still cannot put money asideagainst such contingenciesas an unexpectedillness, pregnancy,or lay-off. Ina short concludingsection, the authors, mainly J.LawrenceAber who directsthe National Center forChildren forPoverty at Columbia ’sSchool ofPublic Health, make some suggestionsfor improving the situation. They endorsethe EarnedIncome Tax Credit, and they advocateraising the minimum wage.Both ofthese ideas represent attempts, as the popular expressionhas it, to make workpay. They also believethat private employersneed to offermore comprehensive bene® t packages(an ideawhich was at the heartof President Clinton ’sfailednational health proposal). Noneof their suggestions seems unreasonable. Inkeeping with the controlledtone of the book, the authors claim no specialvirtues on the part of the poor, and they do not challengeAmerica ’scommitment to workas the primary engineof social policy. They simply point out that many workingAmericans are having troublemaking endsmeet and that the consequencesare disastrous forchildren. Inno senseis this book ahistory, but it canbe viewedin historical perspective.It closelyresembles amonograph on socialconditions ofthe sortthat the TwentiethCentury Fund orthe RussellSage Foundation usedto publish. Thebook readsnot unlikea reportfrom a progressiveera investigating commission concernedwith safetyin the workplaceor wage rates for women. Theauthors writeas if they wereliving at Hull Houseand worryingabout the livingconditions ofthe immigrants in the neighborhoods around them. Only as modernobservers the authors lackthe moral certitudeof those earlierreformers, even if they arecertain that, nearlya centuryafter the advent ofprogressive reform, the most basic ofsocial problems remainto be solved. To be sure,we have raisedthe poverty lineto what would have passed forrelative luxury in the ®rstdecades of the last century.Nonetheless, we continueto placeour children at risk. This book contains asimple and compellingdescription of that condition and some tentativesuggestions for its amelioration.

EDWARD D.BERKOWITZ, Professorof History, George Washington University

Cuttinginto theMeatpacking Line: Workersand Change in theRural Midwest DEBORAH FINK, 1998 Chapel Hill: Universityof North Carolina Press pp. xv 1 201, $39.95

Muchof the laborforcein the ruralMidwest has beenas invisible to Americansas has beenthe land itself.Most people, includinga largehandful ofscholars, don ’tseerural Americans as part ofan industrializedworkforce but rathercomfort themselves with pastoral imagesof land-owning men and women holding tight to theirÐand ourÐagrarian roots. Tilled, irrigated,and productiveÐthis is all we seeof the countrysideas we¯ yoverit in ajet. Agricultural,white, and middle-classÐthis isall weknow ofrural people as wewatch ®lms on the farm crisisin ourfamily rooms orread history books in our of® ces. Deborah Fink ’sunforgettableinvestigation of working-class culture in ruralIowa, which centers around herparticipant± observerstudy ofthe packinghouse industry, turnsthese bucolic notions and many otherson theirheads. Afterworking for four monthsÐ longerthan the majority ofemployeesÐ at the IowaBeef Packers (IBP) hog-processingplant in Perry,Iowa, and interviewingdozens of current and formerworkers there, Fink tellsof both the importance and the isolation ofthe ruralworking class. In1990,one in fourAmericans lived in anon-metropolitan area,but dueto corporations ’ unrelenting searchfor cheap labor, sound infrastructure,and aªbusiness-friendlyºenvironment, morethan 7in 10 unskilled jobs werebased in theseregions. Rather than the relativelywell-paid jobs ofthe past, the new ruraleconomy is based on deskilled,low-paid, dif®cult, and dangerousjobs likethose at IBP. Ironically, the failureof family farmshas provided aportion ofthe industry ’sworkforce.The rest comes from placesas faraway fromrural Iowa as Laos, Mexico,and Sudan. Fink’sbook contributesto the small but growingliterature of the ruralworking class in threedistinct ways. First, shereminds us that the presenceand contributions ofthe ruralworking class only appear to be recentphenomena. Theculture of the ruralMidwest has longbeen predicated on the idealof classlessness,but this idealhas longbeen contradicted by the realityof signi® cant class diversity. BookReviews 391

Laborersliterally built the backbone ofthe region ’seconomy by workingon railroads, on farms, and in localmanufacturing and food-processing.Industrialized meat-packing in Perry,for example, dates back to 1920.Nevertheless much ofthe historical literatureof the ruralMidwest concentrates on middle-classlife. The best of these works problematizes the hegemonyof the ruralmiddle class, the worstmerely accepts it. Both goodand bad, however,reinforce its signi®cance. Fink remindsus that working-classlife is evenmore isolated in this culturaland intellectualcontext than it is in urban contexts.The ª hidden injuriesof classº Ð which Fink amply and sometimes heartbreakinglydetailsÐ aremuch morehidden in the ruralMidwest than they areelsewhere. Second, Fink adds to ourgrowing understanding of the ways in which the federalgovernment in¯uences the livesof rural people ofall classbackgrounds who areoften understood to livebeyond the reachof the longarm ofthe state. Inthe caseof the IBPplant, the Civil Rights Actof 1964 challenged time-honored patternsof employment discrimination. As onemale union of®cer commented in 1978, ª `That’swhen westarted having troublewith women! ’ º(89). Federallaw forcedplants likethe one in Perryto make certainjobs open to women that hadn ’tbeenbefore and to equalizewage scales. It also ªlaid bareinformal mechanisms with which men maintained powerin the plantº(194). What it couldnot change,however, was amoregeneralized contempt forworking women and the ways in which the ªnewbreedº of meatpackers, likeIBP, usedboth sexismand racismto decreaseall workers ’ pay and prestige.One white workertold Fink that when he leftthe plant he would seekª `a white man’s job’ º(151). By the early1990s few of the jobs at IBP seemedto ®tthat description,no matterthe colorof the workerswho held them. Lastly, Fink castigatesthe present-dayunion leadership ofthe UnitedFood and Commercial Workersfor its failureto effectany meaningfulchange in the plants. Individual workers,she says, have forcedconcessions from IBP, sometimes through sheerpersistence and sometimes because,once trained,rural workers are not easilyreplaced. IBP workershave also expressedtheir grievances through informal sick-outsand by sabotaging the equipment and the meat products. But Fink arguesthat individual actionswill gainquite littlefor workers as awhole. At the same time, shedoes not condemn industrialization entirelyor yearn for the yearsgone by when ruralAmerica was (supposedly) fully agrarianand freeof these dreaded machines. Inan astonishing conclusion, shesays, ªInspite ofthe stupidity, obscenity, and horrorof the work, leavingthe plant has beenwrenchingº (201). A countrysidereplete with factoriesthat servesociety rather than corporategreed and with active, ªprincipledºunions at the helm is the ruralAmerica of her fondest imaginings. While readersmay not sharethis ®nal vision, they will undoubtedly applaud herexamination ofrural working-class culture fromthe insideout.

CATHERINEMcNICOL STOCK, Associate Professorof History, Connecticut College

Ethnic Peacein theAmerican City:Building Communityin Los Angelesand Beyond EDWARD CHANG & JEANNETTE DIAZ-VEIZADES, 1999 NewYork: NewYork UniversityPress pp. x 1 177, $29.95

InLos Angeles, Mexican and CentralAmerican immigrants shop in a mercadokoreano . Neither customersnor merchants speak much English, but somehow this shopping relationship mostly functionssmoothly. African-Americansshop in them too, but actually, accordingto Chang and Diaz-Veizades,not as much as newsaccounts would leadus to believe.(Most Koreanbusinesses cater to otherKoreans.) Nonetheless, the troubled relationship betweenthe newlyimmigrated Koreans and the moreestablished African-Americancommunities ofLos Angeles is the onewe hear about. This is becauseof the notorious shooting ofLatasha Harlinsand the unnervingand catastrophic riots associatedwith the Rodney Kingcase. Ethnic Peace in the American City seeksto describeand analyze theseproblematic relationships, the effortsof community leadersand citygovernment to defusethe harshness ofthe con¯icts, and to make some proposals about how multi-racial coalitions might in the futurebe formedand made effective. The authors’ impressivesurvey-interview research among Latinos, Koreans,and African-Americans about theirattitudes toward oneanother arenot optimistic. For example, while Latinos ªgenerally admired the Koreans ’ workethic and wantedto emulatethem,º Koreans characterized Latinos as poorly educatedand lazy, though they appreciatedthem as ªan important sourceof cheap labor and/or an important customerbase fortheir businessesº (102). TheAfrican-American± Korean stereotyping, however,is evenmeaner: ª AfricanAmerican residents often regard Korean merchants as 392 BookReviews

`aliens,’ `foreigners, ’ or `outsiders’ who are `ripping them off ’ orexploiting the AfricanAmerican community.ºKoreans, among the people most hopeful about America, ªoftenhave no respectfor AfricanAmerican customers who areunemployed and dependenton governmentprograms ¼ ºand af®rm that they ªshould not blame anyone exceptthemselves for their situationº (52). Thesediffering Latino and African-Americanattitudes explain, in part, the verydissimilar responsesto the shooting of aLatina customerby aKoreanshopowner (who also livedin Highland Park, the community in which the 1996shooting happened) and the outragewhich the moreinfamous 1991killing of Latasha Harlins brought forth. Certainly, though, the most menacingaspects of these inter-ethnic tensions exploded in civilunrest when the policemenwho had beenvideoed beating Rodney Kingwere acquitted. While the newsmedia portrayedthe Korean,Latino, and African-Americanparticipants in predictably formulaicways, the authors in predictably liberal fashion attribute black rageto ªThesocial (racism), economic(de-indus- trialization), and political (neo-conservatismand policebrutality) conditions ofsouth centralLos Angeles¼ º(30). Again, the authors ’ examinations ofsuch organizationsas the Black/KoreanAlliance and the Latino/Black Roundtable do not givecause for optimism either.Both organizationswere formed by the LosAngeles Human Relations Commission (1983and 1986,respectively) and ®zzledout dueto lack ofinterest, jealousy, and rivalriesfor political power. Usingthe lessonsdrawn from their analyses, Chang and Diaz-Veizadesprescribe requirements for future coalitions to work: paraphrasing their words, they must be all inclusive,have astrongresource base (dues), and organizeby communities and agitatefor each other ’seconomicand socialneeds. In other words new coalitions must be and do much morethan theirdata suggestis actually possible. Thereare several strengths to this book. Usefuldata on the socio-economicsituation ofsouth central LosAngeles are presented, and theirown surveyresearch work is quite substantive and revealingof inter-ethnicattitudes. Theiroutlines of the differentmodels ofcon¯ ict resolution and coalition building (ªthe human relations,ºª interestgroup,º ª issue-based,ºand ªmulti-identityºapproaches) the neophyte will ®nd enlightening.Another sourceof ª building community in LosAngelesº would, of course,be such union effortsas Justicefor Janitors (SEIU)and drivesto organizethe multi-ethnic garmentworkers. These movements arenot mentioned. That the book leavesat leastthis reviewer feelingpessimistic about the futureof race relations in the cityof his birth is not the fault ofthe authors but ratherof the sad stateof affairs of race relations in America.

DOUGLASMONROY, Professorof History, The ColoradoCollege

TheFlight of Icarus: Artisan Autobiography in Early ModernEurope JAMES S. AMELANG, 1998 Stanford: Stanford UniversityPress pp. xi 1 497, $60.00

James Amelang has writtena veryimportant book about the journals, diaries,chronicles, memoirs, and recordbooks kept by artisans in EarlyModern Europe. Much has beensaid about the creationof the ªselfºin Europein the periodthat stretchedfrom the MiddleAges to the IndustrialRevolution. There has beena number ofattempts to look at this phenomenon in adirectway through the study ofthe various formsof personal writingthat mergedduring this periodinto the genrewe call ªautobiography.ºBut most such studieshave focusedon the fewexceptional texts that have entered the mainstream ofliterary history (Cellini, Pepys), and nonehas attempted to look systematically at the autobiographical compositions ofwriters from Europe ’sartisan classes,many ofwhose workshave been published only in the past threeor four decades. This was aformof writing which, as Amelang shows, was morewidespread in Europethan is usually supposed by the localhistorians who, until now, have beenthe principal readersand editorsof these texts. Thestarting point forAmelang ’swork, and asourceto which he frequentlyreturns, is the ªurban chronicleand personal journalº(1) kept by MiquelParets of Barcelona from 1626 to 1660.(A section was previously translatedand published by Amelang as AJournal ofthe Plague Year:The Diaryof the Barcelona Tanner Miquel Parets,1651 [NewYork, 1991]).But Amelang also workscomfortably with artisans’ writingsfrom Italy, Germany, France,England and North America, all ofwhich arelisted and describedin averyuseful ª Checklistºof popular autobiographical writingpublished as a100-page appendix. Intreating questions ofstyle, organization, and audiencethe underlyingquestion forAmelang BookReviews 393 remainsthe motives ofthe writersin writing.Although religion® guredlarge in the minds ofthese artisan authors, Amelang shows that therewas nothing speci®cally ªProtestantºor ª Catholicºabout this genreof writing, which was common in both Protestantand Catholic lands. Amelang treatsthe authors as concernedprincipally with theirsocial role and status in this world, ratherthan theirsouls ’ fatein the nextone. Weberhaving beendisposed of, artisan autobiography isinstead treated as the productof what might be calledª classconsciousnessº Ð albeit in aperiodin which modernconcepts ofclass were only in earlyformation. Inpolitics, religion,and the arts, Amelang shows that earlymodern artisans weremore integrally involved in the societiesin which they livedthan (he argues)would be the casefor proletarians after the IndustrialRevolution. Commentary on political and religiousaffairs abounded in many ofthese texts.So too did socialstriving in the formof allusions to classicalpoetry and mythology, generallyfrom aratherlimited and predictablestock of sources. Given Amelang ’sheavy emphasis on socialposition, possibly morestudy couldhave beendevoted to economicquestions, and especiallyto the systemsfor ®nancial record-keepingto which thesewritings often belonged. Inlooking forreasons why thesewriters wrote, Amelang drawsattention to the workof a groupof Italian scholars(Angelo Cicchetti, Raul Mordentiand Fulvio Pezzarossa)who in the 1980swere among the ®rstto treatthese writings as belongingto aliterarygenre, and who have insistedin particularthat attention be paid the intendedaudiences of this sortof private writing.These scholars generally emphasized the family as the intendedaudience and evenas the communal author ofthese texts, but Amelang’sexplanations reachbeyond the limited family circle.He sees artisans as activelyengaged in the largerworld of a somewhat idealizedª cityºÐ which he describesas the political universein which the artisan couldreasonably expectto participate. Asubchapter isaptly titledª Autobiography as Citizenshipº(201). Although the artisan scribblerserved sometimes as voiceof the community and sometimes as voice ofthe family, oneof this book ’smany virtuesis that it helps us to listento what was undeniably individual in its subjects. Theartisan diary, Amelang argues,was an artform, notwithstanding the pretendedspontaneity ofthe genre.

WILLIAMJ. CONNELL, The Joseph M.andGeraldine C.LaMotta Chairin Italian Studies, Seton Hall University

TheBrave NewWorld of European Labor: European TradeUnions at theMillennium Edited by ANDREW MARTIN & GEORGE ROSS, 1999 NewYork and Oxford:Berghahn Books pp. xv 1 416, $65.00

Ifthis book is alook at Europeanlabor froma distance,the distanceis geographical rather than ideological.American academics have hereanalyzed the challengesto and responsesof European unions froma perspectivesympathetic to the values and goalsof their subject. Sometimes they seem to have beenmore leftist than some ofthe Europeanleft they arestudying. This attitudemight put off some potential readerswho areless close to the labor movementÐ which is ashame becausethey, too, couldlearn a lot fromreading this volume. Thebook comprisesas its corestudies of six national tradeunion movements in the 1980sand 1990s:those ofthe UK,Germany, Sweden, France,Italy, and Spain. Theseare complemented by an introductionsetting out the generalproblematique, asectionon the Europeanization oftrade unions within the EuropeanUnion (EU) and aconcludingand summarizing chapter. Eachnational chapter startswith abrieflook back at the history ofthe tradeunions in the respectivecountry. Itcontinues with adescriptionof the newchallenges and changesincluding the strategiesof the two othercentral actors,the stateand the employers. Thefollowing and largestpart is then dedicatedto the union strategiesresponding to this newenvironment, in particularin the areasof politics, bargaining, organization, mobilization and recruitment.A conclusiongives a short summary ofeach chapter. For abook with so many differentcontributors it isremarkably homogeneous. Theeditors, Ross and Martin, have obviously donea goodjob. They must have re-workedall contributions although they overlooked(or produced?) aduplication ofa sentencedescribing Italian macroeconomicpolicy on pages228 and 229.Anyway, they succeededin harmonizing the countryreports and wroteexcellent surveys.A readerwith littletime to spend couldcollect most ofthe information by readingthe introductionand conclusionwhich both have lots oftables that allow arapid overviewon the subject matter. Thedescription of the relationsbetween unions and partiesin Germanyin table 9.4(378) is, 394 BookReviews however,lop-sided (the Social-DemocraticParty [SPD]has beena political ally ofthe unions during its time in opposition, too). Throw in the conclusionsof each national chapterand you geta verygood ideaof what is goingon in the Europeantrade union movement at the endof the century. That doesnot mean that the countryreports are super ¯uous. They provide awealth ofdetailed information that isthe verybasis ofall the moregeneral theses and theoriesthe two editorsare offering in theirsections. But ifyou arenot reviewingthe book and not particularly interestedin, say, the special caseof the Italian tradeunion movement thesenational chaptersare somewhat tough readingwith their detaileddescriptions, manifold acronyms and localparticularities. The acronyms areoften not ortoo lateexplained (the list on pagesx± xv is also not complete). So appear the COBAS on page218 only to be explainedon page222 and without appearancein the list ofabbreviations. Thereader has to guesswhat DELFA is (136)or ABI (279), FP2 (281), AFETT (324). Oftenyou getthe impression that you aresupposed to know alreadythe respectivenational historiesrather well. More tables with the book is hardly worth mentioning). Isit just aproblem ofinsiders versus outsiders as discussedin the chapteron Germany? Obviously, onecannot expectfrom this book to explainall theseproblems that have appeared since the endof the ªGoldenAgeº and, in particular, the collapseof Communism. Thebook focusesrightly on the unions and theirresponses to theseproblems. This actor-centeredapproach deliversmany a valuable insight. Itcertainly is indispensable readingfor everybody interested in the recenthistory of Europeanlabor.

MICHAELDAUDERSTA È DT, FriedrichEbert Stiftung, Bonn, Germany

TheIllustrated History of theHousewife, 1650± 1950 UNA A. ROBERTSON, 1999 NewYork: St. Martin ’s Press pp. xv 1 224,$14.95 (paper)

Who couldrank as the most invisible ®gurein writtenhistory ifnot the housewife?The contempt of the culturefor housewives and housework is oftenremarked upon, and usually, although not entirely fairly, blamed on the women ’smovement. Mrs.Conehead wearingher ª Ihate houseworkºapron in SaturdayNight Live skits is some sortof statement of modern attitudes. UnaA. Robertson intendsto counterthe attitudeof ª only ahousewifeºin her Illustrated History ofthe Housewife . This workis intendedfor a generalaudience, and its meritsand limitations must be consideredin that light. Itis awell-researched,detailed, congenially written overview of the conditions and workof housewivesin the British Islesfrom the earlymodern period to the 20th century.This history is well groundedin contemporarysources ranging from the observations oftravelers such as Celia Fiennes, whose Through England on Sidesaddle isquoted extensively,to manuals such as GervaseMarkham ’s The English House-wife which ranto many editionsthroughout the 17th century.The book is organizedin chaptersaccording to household tasks (ªFuels and Fireplacesº, ªLightingthe Home,ºª Laundrywork,º etc).There are 75 black and white illustrations includedthroughout the text. Thestrength of Robertson ’sworkis in its detaileddescriptions of the incrediblearray of skills necessary,technological hurdles overcome, and managerialchallenges met by the housewivesof the past. Thesubtitle ofMarkham ’smanual servesas an illustration ofthis virtuosity. ªContaining the inward and outward vertueswhich ought to be in acompleteWoman. As herskill in Physick, Surgery, Cookery, Extractionof Oyles, Banquetting stuffe,Ordering of great Feasts, Preservingof all sortsof Wines, ConceitedSecrets, Distilations, Perfumes,ordering of Wooll, Hempe, Flax, making Cloth, and Dying the knowledgeof Dayries, Of®ce of Malting, ofOates ¼ Brewing,Baking and all otherthings belongingto an Householdº(ii). Itwas feministhistorians who ®rstaddressed the historical importance ofwomen ’sworkin the home in the extensiveliterature on the cultof domesticity ofthe 19th century.Glenna Matthews, Faye Dudden, Ruth SchwartzCowan and LauraUlrich Thatcher paid particularattention to housework. Theseworks provide detaileddescriptions of women ’sworkin the home, as wellas analysis ofthe changingworld of the household and the ideologicaltransformation ofthe roleof the housewife. The Illustrated History ofthe Housewife doesnot provide such historical and sociologicalanalysis. The major transformingfactor in the narrativeis technologicalchange, particularly electri®cation and mechanization, which simpli® edoreradicated much ofthe housework ofan earlierera. The social and economicchanges which brought about atransformation ofwomen ’sroleinside and outsidethe home arementioned brie¯ y in Robertson ’saccount.Students will be fascinatedby the complexhousehold BookReviews 395 routinesdescribed here, but theirteachers will have to provide the contextof the emergenceof industrial capitalism and the broad transformations ofwomen and men ’sworkthat that economic revolutionentailed. While Robertson describesthe changingattitude toward housework, herexpla- nation is primarily that technologyleft little for women to do in the home, and thereforethe value of housework declined.This rathersimplistic explanation ignoresevidence that indicatesthat ªlabor savingºappliances did not necessarilydecrease housewives ’ workbecause of higher expectations, more elaboratehomes, and fewerservants. Robertson also doesnot discussthe bifurcation ofpaid versus unpaid workthat emergedwith the advent ofcapitalism, beginningthe devaluingof women ’s work in the home longbefore technology was amajor factor.While The Illustrated History is aimed at ageneral audience,more attention to the socialand economiccontext of the housewiferole would have given this workless of an antiquarian tone. Nonetheless,the information provided hereis invaluable foranyone interestedin women ’s history and socialhistory. For Americanreaders the contrastswith the Americansituation areinstructive. The two most obvious arethe greaterpresence of servants in Britain, and the lagin the introductionof technology, gas, and electri®cation compared to the UnitedStates. Oneof the greatmysteries of Englishlife is still not adequately explainedfor this reader.Why, until quite recently,did the British fail to heat theirhomes adequately? Robertson ’sexplanation that the British just lovegazing into a®re doesnot satisfy. Did not this coal-producingnation understandthat onecould have a®replaceand centralheating at the same time? Those looking fora scholarly workon housework, ora comprehensivediscussion of economic and socialchange will be disappointed. However,as adetailedevocation of the housework ofthe past, this book isinformative and entertaining.It would workwell in undergraduatecourses on women ’s history, labor and socialhistory. Themajor messagethat Robertson conveysis the incredibleamount ofskill and sheerphysical effortexhibited by women in theirrole as housewives. To that endthe centralrole ofwomen in providing sustenanceand material comfortto theirfamilies is welldemonstrated.

ELIZABETHA. MILLIKEN, Assistant Professorof History, Seton HallUniversity

TheIndustrial Revolution,1760± 1830 T.S. ASHTON (With anewPreface and Bibliography by P AT HUDSON), 1997 Oxfordand NewYork: OxfordUniversity Press pp. xiv 1 139,£ 7.99(paper)

This editionof Ashton ’scelebratedbook is to mark 50years since its ®rstpublication in 1948in Oxford’sHomeUniversity series, which aimed to introducethe widerpublic to the fruitsof historical scholarship. Itwas writtenat the beginningof a periodwhen debateon the socialimpact ofindustrial changewas seenas part ofthe way to understandthe post-war worldand Ashton, likea handful of historians at the time, was determinedto make his writingaccessible. Hence the survivability ofthe piece,which has beenthe ®rstintroduction to the industrial revolutionfor more than onegeneration ofstudents. Itwas brief;it was lucid; and it was writtenwith enthusiasm and commitment. Itwas also writtenwith the con®dence of not asinglefootnote in sight. Ithas longbeen a startingpoint fordebate and discussionand atreasure-troveof ideas. Thefascination ofre-reading something which one® rstencountered four decades ago is to testhow far one’sunderstandingof the topic has changedsince Ashton ’sday. Ashton ’swork, afterall, predated Landes,Rostow, Deaneand Cole, Flinn and many otherswho in the 1960sgave us the means to look afreshat the patternsof economic growth and theirconsequence, just as it predatedthe great ¯ourishingof social history and labor history triggeredby the workof E.P. Thompson. Certainly few now would be so con®dent in writingof a ªrevolutionºin the classicperiod of 1760± 1830, as aresult ofwhich ªthe faceof England changedº . All recentwork emphasizes the much moregradual process ofeconomic change and the unevennature of industrialization. Cotton and ironwere undergoing a periodof dynamic growthhelped by technologicaladvances, but they werebut asmall part ofan economy still largelycomposed oftraditional handicraft industries,where new techniques hardly penetrated.Ashton, in contrast,sees the technicalinnovations as central(76): ªWithout the inventions industry might have continuedits slow-footedprogressÐ ® rms becominglarger, trade more widespread, division oflabour moreminute, and transport and ®nancemore specialized and ef®cientÐ but there would have beenno industrial revolution.º For readersof this journal the main interestwill be in what he has to say about the relationsbetween capital and labor. Inthe debateon livingstandards he was ®rmly on the sideof the optimists. Hesought 396 BookReviews to challengethe gloomy picture,which the Hammonds had painted 40years before of early factory life as ªahell ofhuman crueltyºparticularly forthe children.Rather he focusedon the evidencefor ª an increasedconcern for human unhappinessº(92) and on risingfamily incomes, greaterindependence forwomen and girls,more regular payment ofwages and the strengthenedposition ofworkers, ª no longerisolated cottagersºand able to formtrade unions. Inmining, women and childrenin the pits werethe remnantsof a previous moreprimitive stageof production that was disappearing. Far fromdestroying skills, the requirementsof industrial change meant that traditional skills werein demand and wereenhanced. The losers, the hand-loom weavers, stockingersand nail-makers, werethose who ªwereslow to respondto economicchangeº (99) and who werefailing to takeadvantage of what, he claimed, was becomingª asingle,increasingly sensitive, marketfor labourº (101). Hedoes, however,acknowledge the newdisciplines which factoryregulation imposed and his throwaway remarkthat ªanewsense of time was oneof the outstanding psychological featuresof the industrial revolutionºmay have inspiredE. P.Thompson ’sclassicarticle on time and work-discipline. However,the adverseeffects on leisure,family life,the position ofwomen, the environmentand on classrelationships arenot consideredand industrial disputes arelargely seen as the resultof ª amorestrident noteº (107) on the part oforganized labor. Itwould probably be justi® cation enoughfor reprinting Ashton ’sbook as amodel ofelegant and succinctwriting and thereare still to be found in it ideasand insights which deservefurther exploration. Whetherit is helpful to encouragestudents to readit as an introductionto the study ofindustrial changeis morequestionable. Onecan only assume, however,that the republication ofan account which placedits faith in economicliberalism and believed® rmly that marketforces would producethe bestof all possible worlds, ifonly workerswould shake offtheir inertia and conservatism, re¯ectsthe dominance ofsuch viewsat the presenttime acrossthe Westernworld.

W.HAMISHFRASER, University ofStrathclyde

Hard at Work in Factories and Mines:The Economics of ChildLabor during theBritish Industrial Revolution CAROLYN TUTTLE, 1999 Boulder, CO: WestviewPress pp. 308,$63.00

John Wyatt, who in 1741(along with LewisPaul) inventeda rollerspinning machine foruse in Britain ’s textileindustry, wrotein support ofhis invention: ªAdopting the machine, aClothier formerly employing ahundred spinnersmight turnoff thirty ofthe bestof them but employ an additional ten in® rmpeople orchildren previously supported by the parish.ºAnd the attorneygeneral was persuaded; he justi® edgranting a patent to this invention by notinghow ªevenChildren of® veor six Years of age [couldoperate the newmachine] by which means eventhe poorestof the Clothiers will be enabledto supply theircustomers.º Encounteringfacts like these in Carolyn Tuttle ’sbook (114)one realizes that our attitude to child labor has changeda lot sincethe earlyyears of Britain ’sindustrial revolution. Yet, as the initial chapters ofthis book make amply clear,in many parts ofthe worldthe problem remainsmuch the same as in Britain in the late18th and the ®rsthalf ofthe 19th centuries.Tuttle ’sbook is an excursioninto the economichistory ofchild labor in Britain duringthe industrial revolution, undertakenwith an eyeon the present.It drawson moderntheory and contemporaryempirical studies and remindsthe readerin severalplaces that the purpose ofher history isto shed light on this tragicand largeproblem oftoday ’s world, made all the moreglaring by the factof the globe ’sgeneralprosperity. However,the strongestparts ofthe book arethe oneswhere the author stays away fromthese larger questions ofrelevance and abstracteconomic theory, and focuseson carefulhistorical ®ndings. Chapters 4and 5,dealingwith, respectively,the textileindustry and the mining industry areexcellent scholarly contributions. She goesinto greatdetail about the machines and technologyin useand inventedduring the industrial revolutionand theirrole in the employment ofchildren. This is backed up with fascinatingaccounts of how, forseveral machines, the verypossibility ofemploying children was seenas theirstrong point, as the quotations in my startingparagraph show. Itis this which distinguishesthe book underreview from the severalthat have beenwritten on the history ofchild labor. Another chapter, which stands out as original, is Chapter 6which dealswith women ’s labor in the contextof children ’s work. Indrafting policy to contain child labor, it isimportant to know how it relatesto women ’s work. BookReviews 397

Mostof the writingson this, delvinginto questions such as whetherchildren and women aresubstitutes orcomplements, areimpressionistic. Tuttle ’schapteron this provides some veryuseful details, albeit in ahistorical context,on thesematters. Unfortunately,Tuttle begins the book by emphasizing ratherdifferent aspects of it. Thereis, ®rstof all, too self-consciousan attempt to statea centralthesis and show how this is novelЪ This book offers an entirelydifferent view of child labor fromthe most recentliterature on the subjectº(8). Again, on the same page: ªOthersblame the industrialists forhiring children because they werea sourceof cheap labor and easyto discipline. Iwill offerevidence to support an alternativeexplanation.º And the novel thesis, when it isstated, doescome as adisappointment: ªIarguethat industrialists preferredchild labor overadult labor becausechildren make idealfactory workersÐ they wereparticularly suitedto operatethe machines and theirnature was morecompatible with the newindustrial regime.ºNot only doesthis not sound novel enoughbut it makes the mistake ofsupposing that if x is acauseof child labor, y cannot be acause.I doubt ifindustrialists would employ child labor ifit werenot suf®ciently cheap. Onedoes not have to discreditthis to arguethat childrenwere well suited to the newindustrial regime.The truth about the worldis that thereis not as much room fornovelty as researchersseek. Chapters 2and 3provide support formy claim that the most interestingmaterial in this book comes in the laterchapters. Thesetwo chaptersare devoted to asurveyof theories, and on the whole they constituterather dreary statements. Ablooper in the bibliography revealsthat this is not the author ’s forte.I was initially puzzledto seeArunava Sen ’selegantbut extremelyabstract paper on virtual implementation and the Nash equilibrium citedin the bibliography. Alittleresearch, however, showed that what the author reallywanted to cite(on page53) was another SenÐ Amartya, and Nash ’s other ideaÐconcerning bargaining, which Amartya Sen has usedto explaincon¯ ict and cooperationin the family. But Iam willingto overlookthese ¯ aws. This isa book that offersmany interestinginsights and contains ahost ofuseful information foranybody interestedin the problem ofchild labor, international labor standards, labor rightsand the British industrial revolution. Thefact that the book doesnot have asinglenovel binding thesismay disappoint this reviewer,but isnot something that the readerswill hold against it.

KAUSHIKBASU, Professorof Economics andC. MarksProfessor of International Studies, Cornell University

Thomas Burt, Miners ’ MP,1837± 1922: The Great Conciliator LOWELL J. SATRE, 1999 London and NewYork: LeicesterUniversity Press pp. viii 1 200, £25.00

No careeris betteradapted than that ofThomas Burt to illustratethe tensionbetween what onemight callthe ªpoliticalºand the ªeconomicºstrands in the British labor movement in the late19th and early 20th centuries.General secretary of the Northumberland Miners ’ Association from1865 to 1913,Burt spent much ofhis lifeconducting myriad detailednegotiations with the mine ownersover pay and conditions ofwork. But his primary concernwas always with the dignity ofthe individual ratherthan with the material rewardof a classÐnot that he would have deniedany link betweenthe two. As one ofthe ®rstworking men electedto Parliament (forMorpeth in 1874),he was aclassicrepresentative ofthe ªLib± Labºelement which contributedso much to the Gladstonian cause,even if its radicalism continually outran what Gladstonehimself couldcountenance. Self-educated after going down the pit at the ageof 10, Burt stood on aplatform ofuniversal (not just manhood) suffrage,equal electoral districts,shorter parliaments, payment ofMPs, disestablishment, reformof the land laws, temperance, and free,compulsory, non-sectarianeducationÐ all the means ofraising the civicstatus and moral stature,as much as the material well-being,of the workingclasses. The battle was againstprivilege and discrimination, and againstmoral as much as economicdeprivation. Burt was not looking to overturn the structureof society, or to seizeeconomic, as opposed to political, power. Capitalism was neverthe enemy, and classcon¯ ict never the way forward,for this free-marketindividualist, astudentof Adam Smith and John Stuart Mill. Burt’srecipefor progress in industrial relationswas patient, reasonablecollective bargaining, and resortto arbitration ratherthan strikeaction wheneverpossible, an approach with which he had substantial successas the principal miners ’ leaderin the Northeast. Between1873 and 1886,Lowell J.Satretells us, the joint committeeof mine ownersand union representativeswhich Burt had been 398 BookReviews instrumental in establishing dealtwith some 3000questions and disputes within individual collieries. Theinstinct for conciliation and arbitration as opposed to combat easilyextended to wider® elds.Burt not only carriedthe messageto continentallabor, but sought to propagate it in international relations: he was prominent in the Europeanpeace movement and activein the foundation ofthe Inter- Parliamentary Union. Not surprisingly, his concentrationon achievingsocial and political freedomsand small cumulative improvements in the workplace, ratherthan on seekingmilitantly to revisethe distribution ofwealth, ledBurt to be regardedincreasingly as aªfossilºby the newunionists and socialistsof the post-1880 period. Parliamentary Secretaryto the Board ofTrade in the Liberalgovernments of 1892± 95, and heavily dependentfor his electionexpenses on wealthy employersand landowners, he seemedtoo thoroughly assimilated to aLiberalism still tiedto the interestsof the possessingclasses. But he held to his convictions, callingon socialiststo ªnow and again say something about duty as wellas about right¼ and do not letus imaginethat it is only the richand well-to-dowho have dutiesº(130). Hewould not join the infant Labour party becausehe saw its disciplineas too restrictiveof the individual’sduty to follow his conscienceand its classcharacter as inimical to Parliament ’spropertask ofreconciling the diverseinterests within the nation. Yet, howevermuch criticismhe attracted,he retainedan extraordinarydegree of respect and affectionin working-classcircles. Transparently sincere, modest and disinterested,and taking self-effacementto the point ofleaving no papers behind him, he offerslittle purchase to abiographer on the personal level.The signi® cance of his public career nonethelessfully justi® esthe carewhich LowellJ. Satrehas devotedto tracingit, notably through the voluminous recordsof the Northumberland Miners ’ Association and the columns oflocal newspapers. Thereare one or two slips in backgrounddetails. Theª Conspiracy and ProtectionActº of 1875 should be the Conspiracy and Protectionof Property Act; the 1870Education Act did not setup school boards in orderthat they should provide ªsecularºschools (61), though they coulddo so ifthey chose;and it is puzzlingto readthat the 1904Licensing Bill ªshiftedlicensing authority fromlocal magistrates to Justicesof the Peaceº(122). Noneof this detractsfrom the value ofthe book as the most complete recordthat weare likely to have ofa ®gurewhose tradeunion and parliamentary lifeadmirably reveals both the immense capacity ofLiberalism to attractthe independent, self-improvingworking man and the inability ofthe Liberalparty so to exploitthat advantage as to sti¯e independentlabor politics at birth.

PAUL SMITH, Emeritus Professorof Modern History, University ofSouthampton

Siemens:1918± 1945 WILFRIED FELDENKIRCHEN , 1999 Columbus: Ohio State UniversityPress pp. vii 1 714, $75.00

Intermsof economic power, Germanyranks as oneof the most formidable players on the worldstage. Everyoneknows this, but it behooves us to recallthat this has not always beenso. Infact, it was not until afterthe middle ofthe 19th centurythat Germanybegan the greatconversion process that was to make it into amodernindustrial dynamo. Itis also worth rememberingthat it was not until the decadeof the 1890sthat the industrial sectorof the Germaneconomy gaineda clearpreponderance overagriculture and the othertraditional wealth-creatingactivities. All ofthis, ofcourse, had momentous socialand political consequenceswhich arehighly visible to this veryday. Which industriesplayed the keyroles in the initial phase ofGermany ’sindustrialization, the so-called ª®rstindustrial revolutionº? Theshort and convenientanswer is the smokestack industries:coal. iron, steeland, ofcourse, the railroads. Itis surprising,however, how briefwas theirreign on the supreme heights ofthe newGerman economy. Itis equally remarkablehow soon they becamedecrepit and dependenton tariffs,cartels, and otherdefensive strategies in orderto survive.Likewise, it is amazing how desperatelythey forgedsymbiotic political connectionswith the barons ofagriculture, the guardiansof the old socialand political order.In following these courses of action they not only forti®ed theireconomic interests, but they gavean obsoleteand dyingelite, the Junkers,anewlease on life,with direconsequences for the country. But Germanyentered a ªsecondindustrial revolutionºbefore the 19th centurywas over.Powering this mighty transformation werethe chemicaland electricalindustries. Neither one suffered from the sclerosesand pessimism ofthe ªrustbeltindustriesº . Rather, they wererobust and growthyfrom the start. Theirpositions in the global marketswere quickly and solidly consolidated. They neededno BookReviews 399 protectionfrom tariffs and theirpolitical preferenceswere with the free-trade,free-market progressive partieson the leftside of the spectrum. Theiremployees tended to be well-educatedtechnologists who appreciatedtheir generous compensations and company bene®ts and repaidtheir employers with loyal and conscientiousservice. This was most emphatically trueof the electricalindustry which becamea model ofenlightened, progressive, vigorous, and innovative enterprise. Itis the electricalindustry, morespeci® cally Germany ’spreeminentelectrical engineering company, the giganticSiemens Company ofBerlin, which is the subject ofWilfried Feldenkirchen in this book. This verysubstantial and detailedstudy ofthe legendary® rmis what makes this averyimportant book. Itschronological boundaries are1918± 1945. Feldenkirchen ’searlierbiography ofthe founderof the enterprise, Werner von Siemens: Inventor andInternational Entrepreneur ,is the predecessorof this work. Itwill requireat leastone sequel, athird volume, to bringthe storyof the Siemens company down to the present. Duringthe periodunder investigation, barely morethan 25years, Germany suffered the trauma of military defeat,economic discrimination, in¯ation, depression,Nazi totalitarianism, war, and, just two yearsbefore the Siemens Company was to celebrateits ®rstcentury of existence, once more, defeat. At this point, likemost ofthe country, the ®rm ’sfacilitieswere bombed-out hulks, its workforce decimated,its capital lost and its reputation tarnished. Itseems nothing short ofa miraclethat the ®rm survivedat all. Feldenkirchen,with fastidious scholarship, takesus through all this and yetunfortunately, he neglects to workit up into the engrossingstory it seemsit couldhave beenand thereforeshould have been. The reading,most regrettably,is oftena tediousslog. It seemslikely that accountants, corporatemanagers, lawyersand engineerswill often® nd moresatisfaction here than will historians. Readerswho want to know what the author thinks about all the information he has gatheredmay ®nd themselvesa bit disappointed. Askimpy four-pageconclusion, stimulating enoughas faras it goes,is all they aregoing to get. What isamply demonstratedon pageafter page is that Feldenkirchenis aconscientiousand diligent investigatorand that is emphatically laudable. But areperseverance and industriousnessenough? The workof gathering and presentingthe information and the factsof the matteris doneto the point of exhaustion. But the factscannot speak forthemselves. Information is not insight. Perseveranceis no substitute forperspicacity. Therichness and abundance ofthe data seemto have overwhelmedthe author. Hegives too littleindication ofhaving digestedthem. Where,we might ask politely, is the sweepingvision which all his hard workhas entitledhim to unveil and which his readerswill be anxious to consider?May welook forwardto the sequelto this compendious workand ®nd there,not only a storehouseof data, but the expansivethinking which the author must be readyto sharewith us.

RALPH WALZ, Associate Professorof History, Seton HallUniversity

Japanese Working ClassLives: An Ethnographic Study of Factory Workers JAMES ROBERSON, 1998 NewYork: Routledge pp. xi 1 227, $85.00

This isa book ofcounter-narrative against the hegemonichold ofthe Japanese salarymen image stereotypedin the conventional studieson the Japanese workingclass. Roberson points out that the company-centered,middle-class-biased conventional narrativesoverfocused on the people employed in largerenterprises, especially white-collar salarymen, which composed lessthan onethird ofthe entire Japanese workingclass only. What Roberson wantedand succeededin this study isto counter-balance this repressiveand totalizingportrait ofthe Japanese workersby presentingan ethnographic portrait of the small factoryworkers in Japan. TheShintani MetalsCompany, the subject ofthe study, is awatchcaseand jewelrymanufacturing factoryof 55 men and women workers,located in the westernTokyo region.The company was established afterWorld War II and has progressedalong the ups and downs ofJapan ’s post-war economicgrowth. Theauthor did participation± observation ®eldwork, at both workand play, fora 14-month periodduring 1989± 1990, when the company wentthrough the criticalyears of recessionÐ the burstingbubble ofthe Japanese economy. Thecompany wentthrough diversi®cation ofproducts fromwatchcase to jewelry,downsizing of the workforceby ®ringregular workers and also hiringwomen part-timers, and the workersformed a union to copewith the economicdif® culties. The 400 BookReviews number ofworkers was reducedfrom 55 to 43in this period. Roberson did 53interviews with both men and women workersand the presidentand the managersof the company. Through his ®negrasp of the currentliterature on the issuesand discussionsrelated to the Japanese male and femaleworkers, the author skillfully weavesthe bibliographical information with his discussionsin the texts,and educatesus with the currentacademic understanding of the Japanese workingclass. InChapters 2±4, by looking at company history and labor-relation organizationin Shintani Metals,Roberson reexaminesevery stereotyped old myth ofthe Japanese worker,such as lifetimeemployment, senioritysystem ofpay increasesand promotion, workercommitment and company community (paternalism), and enterpriseunionism. Hereevaluates the validity ofall the above characteristicsfor the entireJapanese workingclass because it simply did not ®tJapanese workers workingin the medium± small enterprisescomprising more than two-thirds ofthe Japanese workforce. Hestresses much morecomplex and dynamic ¯uidity and diversityof the workersin this medium± small enterprisesector. The old conceptof the Japanese educationalsystem and the linearstereotype ofJapanese men ofexamination hell and kyoiku mama also proved to be amiddle-class-biased view. Itsimply did not ®tthe Shintani Metalsworkers (Chapters 5±7). Theethnographic heartof the book liesin Chapters 5±10, in which Roberson skillfully answersthe currentlyinquisitive post-modern question. Ina changingJapan, what arethe important factorsin shaping aªsenseof selfº of blue-collar workers, and forRoberson ’scase,especially the workersof the smaller® rms? Thetheoretical guideline for his analysis is the practicetheory (or structurational perspective)centering around Anthony Gidden ’sconceptof trajectory of self. This approach leadsthe readerto the most valuable and funpart ofthe book: his analysis ofworkers ’ play and leisureand theirrole in the creationof self-identities, dealt with in Chapters 8±10. This is wherethe powerof his longethnographic ®eldworkshines through and makes this study avaluable work. Heis hitting the essential,yet much ignoredand neglectedissue, the working-classculture, which was usually missing in the conventional narrativeson the Japanese workingclass. Workers’ leisuretime was examinedin threedifferent categories: company-sponsored after-hours time; nakama (co-workerfriend) events, and private time spent in family events,friendship events,and private selfevents. The leisure behavior isagain divided into passive pursuits such as TVwatching, cartoonreading, pachinko gambling, killing time in the watertrade, horse racing, and music listening, and active,individualistic, and multifacetedpursuits, which include® shing, sports, traveling,motorcy- clingand otherhobbies (shumi) forthe innerprivate self. Thestrength of the book is arede®nition ofthe Japanese worker ’sexperiencein moreinclusive, complex, and pluralistic terms.Although workis averysigni® cant aspect of their overall sense of self and purpose in life,it isnot the totality oftheir self-identity. Their sense of self is also affectedby what they consume, how they play, and takeleisure, and createinterpersonal relationships. Nakama groupingsare based on complicated lifecourseand socialrelational characteristics of the participating individuals, includingage, sex, marital status, residence,commonality ofinterests, and compatibility of characters.Roberson stressedthe Shintani Metalspeople have theirown styles, tastes, and constraints in leisureand areless constrained by corporatedemands on theirpersonal time. Private-timeactivities and relationships areimportant fortheir sense of self and personal meaning. With valuable ®eldworkbased upon personal affectionfor the subjects, and a®negrasp of anthropological theoryand extensiveknowledge of the topic, James Roberson presentsa much enriched portrait ofthe factoryworker in the Japanese small ®rm. Itis a wonderfuladdition tothe much-needed counter-narrativeson the Japanese workingclass.

SOON-WON PARK, Lecturer, Keio University

J.B.McLachlan: ABiographyÐ Thestory of alegendary labour leaderand theCape Breton coal miners DAVID FRANK, 1999 Toronto: James Lorimer& Company pp. 592,$39.95

J.B. McLachlanis the stuffof myth in industrial Cape Breton. To this day, among steelworkersand the minerswhose unions he oftenled, McLachlanis arevered® gure,a heroof the classwars that pitted rapacious, absentee,monopolistic bossesand theirservile (and armed) stateagainst the beleaguered miners. This strugglepeaked in the 1920swhen McLachlanand the coalfamilies ralliedto the standard ofa livingwage, challenging patrician employers, bourgeoiscourts and soldierstouting machine guns, BookReviews 401 as wellas the bureaucratizedconservatism of the UnitedMine Workers of America and theirautocratic head, John L.Lewis.McLachlan and the workingclass did not win the ultimate material ®ght in Cape Breton, and industrial labor was pushed into aslidethat has yetto be reversed,but the battle forthe heartsand minds ofthe toilingmasses in Cape Bretonwas neverin doubt. Aminer, aunion leader, aªmoralºpillar ofrighteous indignation, an agitator, an editor,a CommunistÐ McLachlanwas assailed by classenemies, imprisoned by constitutedauthority, stripped ofhis union rank by a cautiously conservativelabor of®cialdom, and eventuallychastized by his chosenCommunist Party of Canada. But in the eyesof many minershe could, and would, do no wrong. Myths, likemuch else,are regional in Canada. David Frank has produceda textualizedversion of the McLachlanmyth; he wants to gonational with what alreadyexists as apowerfulpopular memory. Itis an evocativebook, writtenin apurposefully accessiblestyle that aims to takethe heroism of McLachlaninto the Canadian workingclass as awhole, bringingthis larger-than-life® gureinto focus, not just forJim ’sCape Bretoners,but forpeople who livein localesother than those ofthe Maritime steelmills ormining hamlets. Itsucceeds admirably. McLachlanemerges in thesepages as the archetypal working-classleader. Frank weavesus through McLachlan ’sScots backgroundand culture,accenting the material and socio-political forcesthat turnedhim froma Christian pietist into arevolutionarysocialist. Theunion, always McLachlan ’sconnectionto the laboring people, isnever far from view; concentratedcapitalism, universally the causeof destitution and oppression, the ever-presentbackdrop againstwhich events unfold and ideasand strategicdirections develop. This is apanoramic history oftransatlantic class formation that worksits readerthrough backgroundsof Robert Burns, William Wallace, and Bible readingsat the Scots dinnertable, into the coalpits ofCanada ’seasternprovince and the grimy conditions ofthe mining villages,where only the rigorousbudgeting of the ªminer ’s®nancierº(the working-classwife) kept food on the table. Thevery books (oftenfrom the publishing house ofCharles H.Kerr)McLachlan thumbed and the pedagogiesof his household comeinto view, as do his loving commitments to wifeand family, workerand union. And thereis Jim ’swrysense of humor. An inmate onceasked McLachlan why he was in jail:

ªSedition,ºsaid Jim. Theprisoner drew back in amazement and awe. ªIsthat something to do with women?ºhe whispered! ªSometimes,ºsaid Jim. ªHowmany times did you do it?º ªDozens,ºsaid Jim. (340)

But most decisivelywe witness the making ofa class-strugglesocialist and areoften caught up in the theaterof revolt that McLachlancultivated consciously. Thebook beginswith an almost lyricaldescriptive physicality, atropeFrank returnsto at the beginningof most chapters: ªMcLachlan removedhis coatand rolledup his sleeves.His pipe issueda streamof smoke. Hestood at the centreof the stage¼ .ºFrank relieson such creativelicense to setthe stagefor the drama of McLachlan’smessage:ª ¼to demonstratethe pro® tsof the coaloperators, he croucheddown on the edgeof the stageand followedan imaginary trailof silver dollars fromend to end, fromCape BretonIsland to VancouverIslandÐ and back.ºThe author wants us to be there,with ªourJim,º ªFighting Jim,ºthe miners ’ McLachlan(3). And weare. The myth is remade,and powerfullyand positively so. Thereare times, when readingof how Jim McLachlangave his shoes to aman who neededthem more, oremptied his pocketsto those who had less,or sat at his table grievingthe prematuredeath of adaughter,or served his jail time with honor and asenseof class duty, orbent overhis deskwriting aletterof hurt resignationto Tim Buck and the Communist Party ofCanada, that this book brings tearsto the eyes.The best that the workingclass produces is humbling indeed,and oneregards it, in comparision with so much that is now held up forintellectual emulation, dressedin the politics ofa cheap gildedcelebrity, with genuineappreciation. ªWemay thank them forthese years of heroic culture,ºwas EdwardThompson ’sconclusionto The Making ofthe English Working Class . McLachlan elicitsa likeresponse. Isthe myth enough? Probably not. Thetroubling featuresof Frank ’sbook lienot in what is presented and engagedwith, but what is not. This is largelya matterof politics, and in the caseof McLachlan Frank almost always opts forthe preservationof his subject ’smythology when facedwith the needof confrontingthat subject ’sambiguities and ambivalences, orexploring more critically the contextof choiceand commitment that McLachlanlived within. Onestrand in this tighteningweave is the 402 BookReviews dualism, unmistakably present,between union leaderand revolutionarysocialist. Frank preservesthe myth ofMcLachlan in arguingthat ªFighting Jimºwas simultaneously both. On onelevel he was, and it is most certainlythe casethat it is possible to serveworkers ’ tradeunion interestsand promote the causeof revolution. But it is atough rowto hoe. Itwould be the rareindividual who neverstumbled in this rocky® eld. To readFrank on McLachlan,however, and to grapplewith this issue,is toconfront what seemsa subtle avoidance. Twoexamples alone must suf®ce in ashort review.The ® rstinvolves the lateryears of the early revolutionarysocialist period, when McLachlan ’saf®liations wereto the Socialist Party ofCanada, oftendescribed as an ªimpossibilistºorganization hostile to tradeunionism and dedicatedto the singularend of overturning the capitalist order.Historians know wellthat the revolutionarysocialism ofthese years was moreopen-ended than the moreextreme rhetorical statements of SPC stalwarts. But that doesnot resolveevery contradiction. When, in 1918,McLachlan accepted appointment as the sole union representativeon aRoyal Commission investigatingclass upheavals in the shipbuilding and steel industries,and endedsigning a reportdenounced for its ªbarrenrecommendations,º there was revolutionarycriticism of the mining leader ’sªremarkableacquiescence.º Frank ’sdefenseof McLach- lan proceedsfrom a strawman alreadyknocked down, arguingthat to seeMcLachlan as ªacompliant labour leaderwhose only aim was to disciplinethe labour forcein the interestsof wartime cooperationº would be misleading(145). Thecritique, however, was much moresubtle, and its meaningmore complex than Frank allows. What Frank doesis not somuch engagewith the issueof what McLachlan ’sreasoningwould have been and whetheror not it was, in actuality, pursuit ofa properpath, as drownsuch interrogationin the mythology, pepperinghis paragraph with profusequotes ofMcLachlan ’sprose, all ofwhich assailed the capitalist administration ofthe coalindustry. But noneof thisÐ McLachlan ’swordsor Frank ’s reproductionof themÐ reallyaddresses how it was that arevolutionarysocialist could sit as alabor representativeon acommission weighteddown with bourgeoispersonnel, destined to waterthe meaningof ª labour unrest,ºjust as BESCO would laterwater its stock, contributingin some ways to the verybourgeois hegemony he was committed to destroying.Frank similarly de¯ectsMcLachlan ’s responseto what the mining leadercalled the potential importation ofª coolielaborº into the Nova Scotia coal®elds on toMcLachlan ’sdemand that ifcapital wantedto employ Asian workers,it should hand overthe governanceof the mines to the union, burying the problem ofª raceºin the rhetoricof a workers’ controlthe bossescould hardly have beenexpected to welcomewith open arms (144±146). Theissue is not ªdenunciationºof McLachlan, but ofa rigorouspolitical dialoguewith his activities and ideas, ameasurementof them with the yardstickof revolutionary socialism ’scontemporaryarsenal of thought. Asecondproblematic areathat demands amorecritical discussion is the changingcharacter of Communist Party activity. Itmoved froma robust program ofinternationalism and classstruggle in the early-to-mid 1920sinto ªturnsºand adaptations underthe Stalinization ofthe Comintern in the later1920s. This was most emphatically evidentin the shift fromthe ultraleftsectarianism of the ªThird Periodº(1929± 1935) to the inauguration ofthe popular frontin the mid-1930s. Frank ’s depictionof this problematic periodis almost adefensebrief for the Stalinist trajectoryof Communist politics, be they international, Canadian, ortrade union. Centralissues are skirted, and it is surelyastounding to hearthat MauriceSpector, long-timeCentral Committee member, and co-founderwith James P.Cannon ofa LeftOpposition in North America, was expelledfrom the CPC in 1928ª forfailing to reportfully on the newapproach [ThirdPeriod] after his returnfrom meetingsof the Internationalº(442± 443). Itis hard to imaginea moreeuphemistic renditionof this expulsion: Spector, as virtually everyonewho readthe Worker or the Toronto Star knew, was turfedout ofthe party he had doneso much to build becausehe embracedTrotsky ’sviewsin 1928rather than those ofStalin. Preciselybecause Frank doesnot delvedeeply enough into the natureand meaningof Stalinism, its tradeunion policiesand what the turnto the popular frontsacri® ced and squandered, his treatment ofMcLachlan ’sresignationfrom the Communist Party ofCanada in 1936has the toneof a sad denouement.The conclusion to his book, which rightlyenough insists on seeingMcLachlan as a revolutionaryCommunist, is neverthelessunduly ¯at, retreatinginto alanguageof generalityÐ ªempowermentand transformationºÐ that McLachlanhimself would hardly have used(535). ªOld Jimºpreferred, I think, the languageof class war; he marchedwith the international ªmillions who are out forthe completeoverthrow of the presentrotten systemº (467). Hewas the stuffof myth, and deservedlyso. Wecan thank David Frank formaking this so apparent.

BRYAN D.PALMER, Professorof History, Queen ’sUniversity, Kingston, Canada BookReviews 403

MexicanWorkers and theState: From thePor® riato toNAFTA NORMAN CAULFIELD, 1998 Fort Worth: TexasChristian Press pp. x 1 180, $24.95

Norman Caul® eldhas writtena provocative examination ofthe formation and evolution ofthe Mexican government’slabor policiessince the latter19th century.What ismost compellingabout this short book is the roleplayed by Mexicanelites in servingas intermediariesfor U.S. capital overthe course ofthe late19th and 20th centuries.Acting in aclassic comprador fashion, theseelites fostered an open-door investmentpolicy favorable to U.S. investors.In the processof constructing railroads, oil production, and mining by U.S. ®rms likeDoheny Oil, Phelps Dodge,and AmericanMining and Smelting, newclass relations were formed, in particularan industrial workingclass. Out ofthis economicmodernization (without changingarchaic land tenuresystems or moving the Mexican economy toward independenteconomic growth), classtensions rose to the surfacewhich threatened not only U.S. capital, but the privilegedintermediary position ofMexican elites as well.In that both entitiesfaced the same class-basedopposition, U.S. capital and Mexicanelites more often than not joined forcesto counteractthe working-classthreats. Inso doing, corporationssought and receivedthe support ofthe U.S. government.However, foreign investors, the Mexicanelites, and the peripatetic State Department couldnot respondadequately to the challenge.Enter the Gompers-ledAFL. Sincethe closeof the 1910Mexican Revolution, the AFL (underGreen, Meany, and now Sweeney) has provided the necessarysupporting roleto effecta satisfactorystrategy to insurea harmonious relationbetween Mexico ’sworkingclass and national and, in particular, foreigncapital. Thesuccess of this strategyover the courseof the 20th centurycannot be explainedwithout recognizingthe central rolethat U.S. capital, backed by the White House,and theirstrategic ally, the AFL-CIO, have played in Mexico’sinternalpolitics. Although Caul® elddoes not say so, the evidencepresented in the work indicatesthat no signi®cant labor policy initiated and implemented by the Mexicangovernment in the 20th centurycan be understoodapart fromthe signi®cant power wielded by the U.S. Caul® eldsuccinctly traces U.S. involvement in Mexico ’sinternalpolitics, showing the closelinkages betweenthe economicinterests of the northernneighbor and the usually compliant policiesimple- mentedby Mexicanelites. One can easily infer that in the ®nal analysis that intimate collaboration was constructedupon the open-door investmentpolicy demanded by U.S. capital and backedby the State Department. Meanwhile, the Mexicanworking class was coercedinto joining government-controlled unions orremained outside of any union structure;most had no choicebut to join. Thosewho resisted enduredstate-sponsored violence, intimidation, jailing, threats, bribery, etc.It should also be notedthat the genesisof the state-sponsoredunion central,the CTM(the Confederacion deTrabajadores de Mexico ) and its severalprecursors going back to 1918,can be tracedto Gompers ’ involvement in the Mexican government’sdesignsfor controlling the workingclass. Muchof the motivation forGompers, as for investorsand elites,was the elimination ofleftist leadership as wellas independentunion movements desiringto break away fromgovernment control. Although Caul® elddoes not say as much, this readerfound substantial evidenceto arguethat U.S. capital played afargreater role than that ofthe interestedinvestor. Since the Por®riato (1876±1910) U.S. capital has demonstratedall the markings characteristicof 19th centuryimperial powers. That imperial hegemonybene® ted from the collaboration ofMexico ’selitesand the interventionsof the AFL. TheMexican working class, as Caul® eldpoints out, has foughtmany battles to achieveits own independentagenda, yet it has neversucceeded except for brief periods in the faceof the policepower ofthe government.Through the twistsand turnsof Mexican labor politics, the workingclass has alternatelyresisted and suborneditself. Each act of de® anceÐ often taken against U.S. capitalÐ brought out repressionor bribery. Overthe longterm, the tensionhas remainedconsiderable, the workingclass continually challengingthe Mexicanstate ’spowerand, in the bargain, U.S. economicpower. All too oftenresistance has remainedreformist. But forthose who venturebeyond and challengedirectly the position ofthe elitesand U.S. capital the pricecan be heavy. Creditmust goto the U.S. labor bureaucracyfor keeping labor safefrom leftist and independentlyminded folk. Thereare numerous examplesof critical decisions taken by the Mexicangovernment relating to labor that, in effect, protectedforeign capital. Overall, the AFL leadership followedin stepwith those criticaldecisionsÐ fromthe post-revolutionary yearsto the endof the Cold WarÐand lenttheir considerable services. Morerecently, AFL-CIO PresidentSweeney ’sactiveand unconditional support forPresident Clinton ’s recentspeech at Davos, Switzerland, on (among otherthings) co-optingthe opposition to the WTO exempli®es the subordination ofthe AFL-CIO to U.S. capital and its preferredforeign policy. GILBERTG. GONZALEZ, Department ofEthnic Studies, University ofCalifornia, Irvine 404 BookReviews

TheSeed was Planted: The Sa ÄoPaulo Rootsof Brazil ’sRural Labor Movement,1924± 1964 CLIFF WELCH, 1999 UniversityPark: Pennsylvania State UniversityPress pp. xxiv 1 412,$65.00 (cloth); $25.00(paper)

Although ruralworkers compose asigni®cant percentage of all workersin many Latin American countries,historians have tended,until quite recently,to ignoreattempts to unionizethem. Partly this isdue to the low visibility that theseefforts often assumed, exceptfor periodic ¯ areups, and partly due to the dif®culty in ®ndingsources. In his well-writtenbook, CliffWelch has givenus an important addition to agrowing,if still small, groupof studies of the unionization ofrural workers. Welchargues that those who seethe ruralactivism in Brazilof the 1980sand 1990sas resultingonly fromthe ªnewsocial movementsº are incorrect. He shows that ruralunions ’ inclusion ofseasonal wage laborers (boÂias-frias Ðcoldlunches) was not newand that rurallabor activism doesnot datefrom the heatedperiod between the late1950s and the military coup of1964, but ratherthere existed a tradition ofactivism datingback to the 1920s.This argumentis fully convincingand extremelysatisfying to a historian in the sensethat, although changeoccurs, it builds upon the past. Thebook is aresultof prodigious labor and athoughtful useof source material. Welchstudies ruralworker protest and organizingin the keystate of Sa ÄoPaulo, but he focuseson the Alta MogianaregionÐ the areaaround the cityof Ribeira ÄoPreto,a keyzone for agricultural productionÐ between1924 and 1964.The author shows the changingnature of agricultural production from coffeeas the dominant croptowards cotton and then sugarwith theirdiffering labor demands and the shift fromthe dependenceon colonos (a system that combined sharecropping with wage labor and piecework) to the boÂias-frias .Welchplaces these changes within the frameworkof national politics. Hestresses the importance ofthe opportunities fororganizing rural workers provided by national legislationand contactwith national authorities. Healso examinesthe national ruralworker movements. InBrazil, wherenational politics areoften crucial, this attention to the largerscene may be necessary,but in some ways it is the book ’sonly major weakness. Although informative, at times the examination ofnational policy seemsto weakenthe focuson Alta Mogiana. As the author admits, wesee the ruralmovements largelythrough the eyesof the leaders,because ofthe natureof the sourcesavailable. Still, Welchhas useda Herculeannumber ofsources. He depends heavily on newspapersand interviewswith keyparticipants, but has consultedarchives and awiderange ofother primary and secondarymaterials. Hisability to weavetogether these disparate materials to createa balanced narrativeis truly impressive. This is particularly so when his closereading of his biased sourcespermits him to discussthe internecinecon¯ icts that rentthe rurallabor movement with agooddeal of impartiality. Akeyto Welch ’svision ofthe ruralworkers ’ movements in SaÄoPaulo is asenseof historical memory. Through the longdormant periodswhat had occurredbefore was rememberedby some and this experiencewas built upon. Welchsees the lackof grassroots leaders as acrucialweakness. Therefore, the Communist Party played akeyrole by providing leadershipand continuity. TheCommunists also createda legacyby attempting to organizeall ruralworkers, not just the colonos,who areusually seen as beingalmost the only participants in movements beforethe 1980s. Dueto what the readerlearns about ruralagitation priorto the late1950s, the scopeof upheaval that marks the yearsbefore the military coup of1964 is not asurprise.For the ®rsttime political and social controlby the elitesof rural Brazil was challenged.The radicalization of elements of the societyinspired by the Cuban Revolution contributed, as did attempts by the governingpopulists to freerural voters fromtheir dependence on largeland ownersand insteadtie them to organizationswhich dependedon the government.With the governmenthelping to createa window ofopportunity, various groupsbegan competingto organizerural workers: factions of the Catholic Church, the Communist Party and those inspiredby the charismatic FranciscoJulia Äo. TheRibeira ÄoPretoregion saw intensecompetition betweendifferent church factions and the Communist Party. What would have happened ifthe 1964 military coup, partially inspiredby fearof what was happening in the countryside,had not occurredis an open question, but undoubtedly socialand economicrelationships in ruralBrazil would have been verydifferent. Still, despitethe collapseof the ruralmovements in the wakeof the military takeover, as Welchindicates, the battles ofthe 1960shave shaped the burgeoningrural movements ofthe 1980s and 1990s. CliffWelch has made amajor contribution. Hehas helped restorethe historical rootsof the Brazilian ruralmovements and underlinedtheir importance and complexity. Hehas demonstratedthat it is BookReviews 405 possible to writea book ofthis naturethat is regionalin its focusbut also tightly tiedto the national scene.It should be emulatedby historians ofBrazil and also by those ofother Latin American countries.It is abook wellworth reading.

JOELHOROWITZ, Professorof History, Saint Bonaventure University