Remembering the West Virginia Miners

I don’t know a lot about the details of the Massey coal mining accident that killed 29 miners in West Virginia last week, but, from what I’ve been able to make out, it was a non-union mine owned by a heavily fined company that has experienced a higher than normal rate of accidents.  Massey was also the company that bankrolled the campaign of West Virginia judge Brent Benjamin, who then proceeded to rule in the company’s favor in a subsequent lawsuit.  (In a 5-4 decision, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that Benjamin should have recused himself, although Justice Roberts revealed his empathy for large corporations by refusing to acknowledge the conflict of interest.) 

Massey is also a company that seems to have no qualms about mountain top removal—as egregious an assault on the environment as any practice we have in this country.

For all the distance we’ve come since the 1930’s and earlier, the incident reminds us that we can always slide back again to a time when there were company towns and ruthless owners.  Unemployment will prompt workers to take all kinds of jobs and communities to tolerate all kinds of damage to their surroundings.  

All of which means that classics like John Steinbeck’s 1939 novel Grapes of Wrath may not be as dated as we like to think.  So in memory of the 29 miners and in sympathy with their families, I quote its great speech of hope, delivered at a point in the book when Tom Joad is on the run and when the family is being torn apart:

Whenever they’s a fight so hungry people can eat, I’ll be there. Whenever they’s a cop beatin’ up a guy, I’ll be there… I’ll be in the way guys yell when they’re mad an’–I’ll be in the way kids laugh when they’re hungry an’ they know supper’s ready. An’ when our folks eat the stuff they raise an’ live in the houses they build—why, I’ll be there.

Update: According to National Public Radio this morning, one way Massey and other coal companies have been avoiding paying fines for safety violations is by appealing every charge, thereby gumming up the works.