Portside

News Too Good To Be True

75 YEARS AGO, ON JANUARY 1, 1950, a new age dawned for the science of determining the age of objects. The chemists and physicists who had only recently discovered that radio-carbon dating might be used to measure the age of things announced that after years of effort they had refined the technique so it could produce accurate results. With a sample of anything – plant or animal – that had once been alive, radio-carbon dating could measure how old it was. 

But that good news came with a shocking bad-news kicker. Radio-carbon dating could only be used to measure the age of pre-1950 samples, because widespread radioactive fallout from atomic-weapons testing had totally contaminated the environment, making radio-carbon analysis incapable of determining the age of samples of anything that was new. Not only anything that was new in 1950, but everything that would be new in the foreseeable future. Just when a fabulous new tool had been given to historical investigators, it became clear that the tool had been seriously damaged by radioactive fallout.

To make matters worse, fallout’s environmental impact was now known to be much worse than the bomb builders had been willing to admit, with frightening biological implications for everything alive.  

It took many more years of work, but eventually the time-scale calibration of radio-carbon dating was refined enough so it could be corrected for the radioactive contamination of weapons tests, but we will probably never know the extent of genetic damage it had inflicted on the biosphere.  https://www.radiocarbon.com/carbon-dating-bomb-carbon.htm

What’s Worse Than One Palmer Raid? 

JANUARY 2 IS THE 105TH ANNIVERSARY of the second of the infamous Palmer Raids, resulting in the arrest of more than three thousand people alleged to be radicals, non-citizens and just plain workers (plus scores of totally innocent bystanders) in more than 30 U.S. cities. It was the second such massive attack by federal, state and local law enforcement on progressive organizations in less than two months.

Because the January raid was bigger than November’s, it was the largest coordinated police action against civil liberties ever to occur in the U.S. up until then. Many hundreds of those arrested were brutalized and held in dangerously overcrowded and unsanitary conditions.

In addition to the arrests, police seized tons of political publications and printing equipment almost all of which was destroyed without legal justification. 

The event, which surely terrorized almost anyone in the country who was critical of government repression, was planned and orchestrated by the U.S. Department of Justice and its leader, Attorney General Mitchell Palmer. Like the November raid, its searches, seizures and arrests were characterized by violence and lack of judicial warrants. 

From a law-enforcement point of view, both raids were a failure because very few of the arrested were ever convicted of a crime or deported. But the raids' lawless brutality and destruction of property were a set-back to the targeted individuals and organizations. and sent yet another clear signal that civil liberties were no defense against illegal reactionary violence in the U.S. https://www.nyulawreview.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/08/4_0.pdf

Protest Genocide and Get Locked Up

JANUARY 3 IS THE 130TH ANNIVERSARY of the federal government imprisoning 19 leaders of the Hopi people on Alcatraz Island on sedition charges for opposing the forced education and assimilation of Indigenous children. https://calendar.eji.org/racial-injustice/jan/03

‘Great Society Is Great Hypocrisy’

JANUARY 4 IS THE 60TH ANNIVERSARY of the day that Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party activists made a dramatic challenge to the legality of Mississippi’s all-white Congressional delegation. More than 600 Black Mississippians traveled to Washington, D.C., to force the members of Congress to come face to face with the victims of their racism.

The confrontation took place in the tunnels that link the Capitol building to the nearby buildings containing the offices of members of Congress.  Almost all members use the tunnels to reach the Capitol, and each tunnel was lined with MFDP members, standing at 10-foot intervals, silently holding signs reading “We Are Not Allowed to VOTE” and “Oust the 5 Mississippi Racists” and “Great Society is Great Hypocrisy.” It was, as Stokely Carmichael reported, "an unexpected confrontation with reality," a "mute presence [that was] the most effective and eloquent of testimonies."

Later that day in the Capitol, Rep. William Fitts Ryan from New York City stood to challenge the seating of the all-white Mississippi delegation.  With the support of enough members to force a vote on the question, the House voted in favor of seating the all-white delegation 276-148. https://www.zinnedproject.org/news/tdih/mfdp-congress/

Just Can’t Keep ‘Em Down on the Farm

JANUARY 5 IS THE 105TH ANNIVERSARY of the day that the Census Bureau chose to begin the national head-count that occurs every ten years. It was the first U.S. census day ever that found less than half of the population living in a rural area. Officially, 49 percent of the population (or 52 million people) lived in a rural area.  In the most recent census, 20 percent of the population (or 66 million people) lived in a rural area. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rural_American_history  

A Writing Star Is Born

JANUARY 6 IS THE 90TH ANNIVERSARY of a major, but unanticipated, theatrical event, the premiere performance of Waiting for Lefty. It was the first-ever produced work by Clifford Odets, whose writing career started with a radical, realistic masterpiece that became a major hit.

The very first performance was a 1-night stand, part of a benefit series for New Theater magazine. With a cast that included Luther Adler, Roman Bohnen, Phoebe Brand, J. Edward Bromberg, Jules Garfield (who was John Garfield later), Ruth Nelson and Art Smith. The Morning Telegraph gave it a rave review, which concluded, "It has not been announced just where and when Waiting for Lefty will be presented again, but you can rest assured that it will be ... soon. A play like this does not die."

The Morning Telegraph was correct, when Waiting for Lefty opened on Broadway in March, it ran for 168 performances. https://www.broadstreetreview.com/features/as-fights-for-fair-labor-continue-waiting-for-lefty-is-a-timely-revival-at-quintessence-theatre-group

When Getting Elected Doesn’t Cut It

JANUARY 7 IS THE 105TH ANNIVERSARY of a very bad day (one of too many) for U.S. democracy. When the New York State Assembly opened, it refused to seat five Socialists who had been elected by voters in the Bronx, Brooklyn and Manhattan. Two of the five had been Socialist members of the previous assembly without any trouble.

Then on April 1, the Assembly voted to expel the five on the ground they had been "elected on a platform that is absolutely inimical to the best interests of the state of New York and the United States."

A special election to fill the vacant seats was held on Sept. 16.  All five ran, and won, again. On Sept. 20, when the five attempted to take their seats, three were expelled again and the other 2 resigned in protest. https://jacobin.com/2020/07/history-socialism-new-york-dsa-state-assembly

For more People's History, visit
https://www.facebook.com/jonathan.bennett.7771/