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The Hardhat Riot: Nixon, New York City, and the Dawn of the White Working-Class Revolution
One of the New York Times "100 Notable Books of 2020.""Perhaps the best book ever on how Democrats lost the white working class." --James CarvilleIn May 1970, four days after Kent State, construction workers chased students through downtown Manhattan, beating scores of protesters bloody. As hardhats clashed with hippies, it soon became clear that something larger was underway--Democrats were at war with themselves. In The Hardhat Riot, David Paul Kuhn tells the fateful story of when the white working class first turned against liberalism, when Richard Nixon seized the breach, and America was forever changed. It was unthinkable one generation FDR's "forgotten man" siding with the party of Big Business and, ultimately, paving the way for presidencies from Ronald Reagan to Donald Trump. This is the story of the schism that tore liberalism apart. In the shadow of the half-built Twin Towers, on the same day the Knicks rallied against the odds and won their first championship, we experience the tumult of Nixon's America and John Lindsay's New York City, as festering division explodes into violence and Nixon's advisors realize that the Democratic coalition has collapsed, that this is their chance, because "these, quite candidly, are our people now." In this riveting story--rooted in meticulous research, including thousands of pages of never-before-seen records--we go back to a harrowing day that explains the politics of today. We experience an emerging class conflict between two newly polarized Americas, and how it all boiled over on one brutal day, when the Democratic Party's future was bludgeoned by its past.
409 pages, Kindle Edition
Published June 10, 2020
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July 31, 2020
For me, the first week of May 1970 was one of extreme personal conflict. On May 4th, the nation witnessed the death of four Kent State student at the hands of the Ohio National Guard. On May 8th New York City Mayor, John V. Lindsay ordered the lowering of the American flag to half staff at City Hall which provoked construction workers working on the World Trade Center and other sites in lower Manhattan to continue rioting that began on Wall and Broad Streets by attacking students, “hippies,” or anyone who looked like they disagreed with them. Pace College, at which I was a student became a target that continued the violence that construction workers had been perpetuating for what seemed like for hours. At Pace students were beaten, many to unconsciousness, chased into dorms, student centers and even the subways menaced by pipes, wrenches, and fists as the NYPD looked on in quiet amusement. Later that night I learned that my United States Army Reserve unit stationed at St. John’s University in Queens, NY had been activated to deal with anti-war demonstrators. The next day I found myself in riot gear, no longer a demonstrator, but a soldier ordered to defend our armory against students. These events have receded from my generation’s memory but have been rekindled by David Paul Kuhn’s superb new study, THE HARD HAT RIOT: NIXON, NEW YORK CITY, AND THE DAWN OF THE WHITE WORKING CLASS REVOLUTION.
At a time when we have a president who raps himself in law and order as Richard Nixon did in the late 1960s and early 1970s basing his support on the white working class it is useful to turn the page and explore when this group which had been part of the Democratic Party coalition since the New Deal switched to the GOP. Nixon was able to move the Republican Party from the “blue bloods” to the “blue collar” manipulating opposition to the war in Vietnam creating a new play book that is still be employed today - a focus on race, class, and ethnic hatred. Kuhn correctly points out that 1968 was the “biggest year for students since 1848 – the year of student led revolutions in Europe.” Kuhn builds upon the occupation of Columbia University led by SDS militants to explain the radicalization of college students across America, the Democratic National Convention in Chicago as well as the Moratorium movement against the war.
Kuhn effectively explains the rise of a counter movement to those who opposed the war and the corporations and politicians who supported it. He explores how blue-collar workers, many of whom fought in World War II and Korea, came to see college students as children of privilege, who had the socio-economic advantages that they did not have. The war itself was being fought in the majority by children of blue-collar workers who were patriotic and believed in fighting against the communist threat. Construction workers were the epitome of the blue-collar class as events unfolded in early May and they “saw privileged kids venting rage on working class guys trying to maintain order.” For Kuhn what transpired was a developing class war which he carefully argues.
Kuhn does a good job explaining historical events including the various movements that were against the war. His analysis is important because it places the shootings at Kent State and events that followed in their historical context. One of the most important issues was the decline of manufacturing in northern cities like New York which under Mayor Lindsay, the darling of progressives accelerated with increased immigration from Puerto Rico, and migration of southern blacks. New York, like other cities would suffer from “white flight,” as education declined, crime and air pollution increased. The plight of urban areas became part of the deindustrialization of America. At this time, I was a high school student and experienced a subway strike, a garbage strike, and a teacher’s strike all within a 12-24 month period. I witnessed muggings, racial unrest, and increased crime in my Brooklyn neighborhood, all fodder for Nixon’s “law and order campaigns” in 1968 and 1972.
The decline of New York City is carefully explained, and Kuhn disagrees with the argument that it was due to “white flight” as he points out that blacks were trying to migrate to the suburbs in as much as whites. As a result, the city became a haven for white collar jobs, but its labor force was blue collar. Many historians argue that Nixon developed a “southern strategy,” but Kuhn argues that it was more of a “Middle America” strategy focusing on events and policies that hurt “the Silent Majority” in the middle of the country. The anti-war movement, poverty, urban unrest, all led to class conflict which Nixon was able to exploit. People saw upper class rich kids demonstrating while they suffered economically. The result Middle America represented by blue-collar workers found their voice in Richard Nixon as opposed to John Lindsay, who represented the elitist liberal establishment.
In all, most soldiers who fought in Vietnam were whites with blue-collar or poorer backgrounds. This led to more affluent whites being less likely to serve and die in Vietnam. The military had traditionally offered a pathway to societal respect, Vietnam killed that. In examining the rise of John Lindsay in New York it is clear his appeal was based on social class in terms of poverty, racism, and the anti-war movement making him the darling of the New Left. The problem was that “high minded sympathy did not extend to the city’s [white] blue collar workers.” The result was the creation of a disaffected blue collar working class that would explode in early May.
Kuhn exhibits a firm grasp of labor and immigration history and how they affected the development of New York from the 1840s onward. In his discussion, Kuhn emphasizes socio-economic status, ethnicity, race, and religion. As the decades passed especially after World War II, blue collar workers categorized elites as looking down on them and “saw hypocrites telling them to bear burdens that others benefited from more and had not yet answered for, or would not, or could not afford to ever face, and yet still stood on soapboxes and morally judged them.”
Lindsay just exacerbated blue collar anger with his support for the anti-war movement and praising demonstrators in his speeches. Lindsay’s New York was part of the tense emotions that Kuhn captures that existed across America. With fire bombings on campuses, demonstrations, and riots in reaction to Nixon’s invasion of Cambodia producing incendiary rhetoric on the part of the President in a country that was a tinderbox.
When May 7, 1970 arrived with the funeral of Jeffrey Miller, one of the four students killed at Kent State it was clear trouble was afoot as protestors and construction workers skirmished on Wall Street and rumors persisted that these workers were planning to teach these “kids” a lesson. This would come to fruition the next day and forms the core of Kuhn’s narrative.
Kuhn relies on NYPD archives which include 324 interviews that were conducted after the events of May 8th. What was clear is that the police tended to ignore the rioting and violence perpetuated by construction workers against students and anyone who appeared as if they supported them. He is able to piece together a coherent narrative of the mayhem that transpired on Wall Street, Broadway, culminating at City Hall Park and Pace College. The demonstrators believed in the false assumption that police were there to protect them. I myself witnessed repeated beatings while police turned away. If I were to compare my memory of events at City Hall and Pace, they dove tail completely with Kuhn’s description. Kuhn is to be commended for delving into the archives and recreating what can only be described as construction workers run amuck, beating people, many indiscriminately for hours while New York’s finest, even when people pleaded with them to intervene, did extraordinarily little.
An area of interest for me is the investigation that took place after the rioting and what emerged. It is clear from Kuhn’s presentation that the NYPD’s probe of its own department buried evidence of police malfeasance and minimized witness consensus. It contained numerous rationalizations for their lack of law enforcement. It blamed what transpired on “understaffing, the instigating students, the limited range of handheld radios, the unprecedented nature of the confrontation.” Further, the NYPD found no evidence that labor leaders planned the riot, and that it caught fire based on hard hats being antagonized by “hippies.” Kuhn concludes that the hard hat “tantrum” was essentially spontaneous and not, as some believed, part of some grand conspiracy.
The biggest winner from the events of May 8 – 20 was Richard M. Nixon. The hard hats would become part of his base, poached away from the Democrats. The GOP, the party of big business was now making inroads with labor. One of Kuhn’s most important themes deals with blue collar activism which buoyed Nixon by the end of the summer, 1970. Patrick Buchanan, then one of his advisors argued that Democratic swing voters were law and order believers, conservative on social issues like busing, crime, affirmative action, but progressive on domestic issues, i.e., Medicare, social security. Buchanan successfully argued that if the Republicans held the political center, they would win big in 1972, which turned out to be the case. Union heads like George Meany and Peter Brennan swung their support to Nixon as the hard hat riot created the initial bond between a Republican president and Democratic union members that continued under Ronald Reagan, the Bushes, and formed the base of support for Donald Trump.
Kuhn has written a masterful and riveting study. At times repetitive, particularly when describing the hard hat riot, but this should be overlooked when evaluating the overall depth and quality of Kuhn’s narrative. Kuhn has written the seminal work on the topic which should stand the test of time. If you are seeking an explanation for class conflict that evolved decades later into an issue exploited by Donald Trump in Wisconsin, Michigan, and Pennsylvania to win the White House, Kuhn’s research and ultimate outcome should open your eyes.
At a time when we have a president who raps himself in law and order as Richard Nixon did in the late 1960s and early 1970s basing his support on the white working class it is useful to turn the page and explore when this group which had been part of the Democratic Party coalition since the New Deal switched to the GOP. Nixon was able to move the Republican Party from the “blue bloods” to the “blue collar” manipulating opposition to the war in Vietnam creating a new play book that is still be employed today - a focus on race, class, and ethnic hatred. Kuhn correctly points out that 1968 was the “biggest year for students since 1848 – the year of student led revolutions in Europe.” Kuhn builds upon the occupation of Columbia University led by SDS militants to explain the radicalization of college students across America, the Democratic National Convention in Chicago as well as the Moratorium movement against the war.
Kuhn effectively explains the rise of a counter movement to those who opposed the war and the corporations and politicians who supported it. He explores how blue-collar workers, many of whom fought in World War II and Korea, came to see college students as children of privilege, who had the socio-economic advantages that they did not have. The war itself was being fought in the majority by children of blue-collar workers who were patriotic and believed in fighting against the communist threat. Construction workers were the epitome of the blue-collar class as events unfolded in early May and they “saw privileged kids venting rage on working class guys trying to maintain order.” For Kuhn what transpired was a developing class war which he carefully argues.
Kuhn does a good job explaining historical events including the various movements that were against the war. His analysis is important because it places the shootings at Kent State and events that followed in their historical context. One of the most important issues was the decline of manufacturing in northern cities like New York which under Mayor Lindsay, the darling of progressives accelerated with increased immigration from Puerto Rico, and migration of southern blacks. New York, like other cities would suffer from “white flight,” as education declined, crime and air pollution increased. The plight of urban areas became part of the deindustrialization of America. At this time, I was a high school student and experienced a subway strike, a garbage strike, and a teacher’s strike all within a 12-24 month period. I witnessed muggings, racial unrest, and increased crime in my Brooklyn neighborhood, all fodder for Nixon’s “law and order campaigns” in 1968 and 1972.
The decline of New York City is carefully explained, and Kuhn disagrees with the argument that it was due to “white flight” as he points out that blacks were trying to migrate to the suburbs in as much as whites. As a result, the city became a haven for white collar jobs, but its labor force was blue collar. Many historians argue that Nixon developed a “southern strategy,” but Kuhn argues that it was more of a “Middle America” strategy focusing on events and policies that hurt “the Silent Majority” in the middle of the country. The anti-war movement, poverty, urban unrest, all led to class conflict which Nixon was able to exploit. People saw upper class rich kids demonstrating while they suffered economically. The result Middle America represented by blue-collar workers found their voice in Richard Nixon as opposed to John Lindsay, who represented the elitist liberal establishment.
In all, most soldiers who fought in Vietnam were whites with blue-collar or poorer backgrounds. This led to more affluent whites being less likely to serve and die in Vietnam. The military had traditionally offered a pathway to societal respect, Vietnam killed that. In examining the rise of John Lindsay in New York it is clear his appeal was based on social class in terms of poverty, racism, and the anti-war movement making him the darling of the New Left. The problem was that “high minded sympathy did not extend to the city’s [white] blue collar workers.” The result was the creation of a disaffected blue collar working class that would explode in early May.
Kuhn exhibits a firm grasp of labor and immigration history and how they affected the development of New York from the 1840s onward. In his discussion, Kuhn emphasizes socio-economic status, ethnicity, race, and religion. As the decades passed especially after World War II, blue collar workers categorized elites as looking down on them and “saw hypocrites telling them to bear burdens that others benefited from more and had not yet answered for, or would not, or could not afford to ever face, and yet still stood on soapboxes and morally judged them.”
Lindsay just exacerbated blue collar anger with his support for the anti-war movement and praising demonstrators in his speeches. Lindsay’s New York was part of the tense emotions that Kuhn captures that existed across America. With fire bombings on campuses, demonstrations, and riots in reaction to Nixon’s invasion of Cambodia producing incendiary rhetoric on the part of the President in a country that was a tinderbox.
When May 7, 1970 arrived with the funeral of Jeffrey Miller, one of the four students killed at Kent State it was clear trouble was afoot as protestors and construction workers skirmished on Wall Street and rumors persisted that these workers were planning to teach these “kids” a lesson. This would come to fruition the next day and forms the core of Kuhn’s narrative.
Kuhn relies on NYPD archives which include 324 interviews that were conducted after the events of May 8th. What was clear is that the police tended to ignore the rioting and violence perpetuated by construction workers against students and anyone who appeared as if they supported them. He is able to piece together a coherent narrative of the mayhem that transpired on Wall Street, Broadway, culminating at City Hall Park and Pace College. The demonstrators believed in the false assumption that police were there to protect them. I myself witnessed repeated beatings while police turned away. If I were to compare my memory of events at City Hall and Pace, they dove tail completely with Kuhn’s description. Kuhn is to be commended for delving into the archives and recreating what can only be described as construction workers run amuck, beating people, many indiscriminately for hours while New York’s finest, even when people pleaded with them to intervene, did extraordinarily little.
An area of interest for me is the investigation that took place after the rioting and what emerged. It is clear from Kuhn’s presentation that the NYPD’s probe of its own department buried evidence of police malfeasance and minimized witness consensus. It contained numerous rationalizations for their lack of law enforcement. It blamed what transpired on “understaffing, the instigating students, the limited range of handheld radios, the unprecedented nature of the confrontation.” Further, the NYPD found no evidence that labor leaders planned the riot, and that it caught fire based on hard hats being antagonized by “hippies.” Kuhn concludes that the hard hat “tantrum” was essentially spontaneous and not, as some believed, part of some grand conspiracy.
The biggest winner from the events of May 8 – 20 was Richard M. Nixon. The hard hats would become part of his base, poached away from the Democrats. The GOP, the party of big business was now making inroads with labor. One of Kuhn’s most important themes deals with blue collar activism which buoyed Nixon by the end of the summer, 1970. Patrick Buchanan, then one of his advisors argued that Democratic swing voters were law and order believers, conservative on social issues like busing, crime, affirmative action, but progressive on domestic issues, i.e., Medicare, social security. Buchanan successfully argued that if the Republicans held the political center, they would win big in 1972, which turned out to be the case. Union heads like George Meany and Peter Brennan swung their support to Nixon as the hard hat riot created the initial bond between a Republican president and Democratic union members that continued under Ronald Reagan, the Bushes, and formed the base of support for Donald Trump.
Kuhn has written a masterful and riveting study. At times repetitive, particularly when describing the hard hat riot, but this should be overlooked when evaluating the overall depth and quality of Kuhn’s narrative. Kuhn has written the seminal work on the topic which should stand the test of time. If you are seeking an explanation for class conflict that evolved decades later into an issue exploited by Donald Trump in Wisconsin, Michigan, and Pennsylvania to win the White House, Kuhn’s research and ultimate outcome should open your eyes.
January 26, 2021
This is an important read for serious students of American politics and helps explain how the white working-class drifted from a Democratic Party increasingly ran by wealthy white elites no longer advocating for labor issues and the like in favor of cultural and economic liberalism. David Paul Kuhn does an excellent job with setting the background to the Hardhat Riot, giving a retroactive play by play, and connecting the riot to larger societal issues.
I grew-up in a family of veterans so the anti-war protesters of the Vietnam Era were generally frowned upon and seen as rich kids who were either engaged in performative rebellion against daddy or were just scared. Of course this is a limited view. While many Vietnam War protesters fit that description many, such as Muhammad Ali, were motivated by deep ethical and human rights concerns. What is accurate, and can't be brushed off as just the opinions of some Irish and Italian construction rubes, is that the bulk of the hippies were from the upper economic classes and were either squandering their privilege or just slumming it for a few years until they settled into a life of suburban comfort and sending their kids to wealthy white public districts or private schools.
In the end, as Kuhn notes, even the hard hatters have to admit the war in Vietnam has failed and he brilliantly points out how they would later be used by a Nixon Administration (and later Reagan) which certainly wasn't made up of "working men" nor did it have an authentic love for organized labor to say the least.
However, I have to admit to taking some degree of pleasure in reading about wealthy college radicals getting their butts kicked all over Lower Manhattan by hardened working-class men. They waved the flags of the VC, Mao, and Che.... well those were all hard men and killers who fought and bled in rough terrains and conditions. You commute from your comfortable suburban home to a campus and all of the sudden turn into a hippie revolutionary. The construction workers gave them a test and they failed. The hippies weren't really about that revolutionary life (save for a few such as the Weathermen).
In light of the picture painted of the Hardhat Riot it's easy to see how the Democratic Party easily threw working-class America under the bus in the decades to come. The Lindsey coalition was predicated upon a white cultured elite for finance and Black and Latino populations for votes (for which they'd receive the bare minimum in return).
Yet the hypocrisy of this era rings true today making the book current. White gentrifiers moving into neighborhoods and planting Black Lives Matter signs in their lawns on property that once housed Black families. Those, such as the Manhattan elite depicted in the book, who rightly rail against the racism of Trump supporters, and then actively gentrify and work to keep their kids schools as white as possible. What was stop and frisk for? Who did it benefit? Not working-class whites, Blacks, or Latinos. Stop and frisk was designed to protect white hipsters in Brooklyn and their parents in Manhattan, many who felt "the Bern" and stanned "The Squad". Many of this young generation after racking up a couple of useless degrees begin fancying themselves as revolutionaries (gentrifying a Black neighborhood is normally the next step). They move to the neighborhoods that their very capitalist wealth and families have afforded them and yap about revolution. Revolution is Tweeting for most. When the street action comes many of these upper-class white revolutionaries supposedly in a "class struggle" against their parents? I guess???? Are the leading fire starters to Black and immigrant owned businesses in the name of their revolution fantasy (which they'll probably drop in a few years after coming to the realization they're rich and white and it's time to live it up).
I also thought of Trump's terrorist mob storming the United States Capitol. These weren't hard men, veterans of WWII and Korea included, and not from ethnic urban neighborhoods. This was a suburban and exurban mob largely made up of dudes who had rarely, if ever, been in a fist fight and can't change a flat tire. These were dudes who aspired to be like the men of the Hardhat Riot, but instead are forced to listen to Joe Rogan and Alex Jones podcasts and take to social media to kvetch. The Capitol rioters, unlike those in 1970, were joined by women some being veterans and others being Qanon loons. As evidence of the pathetic wimpy suburban guy nature of the Trump Mob just Google some Proud Boys fights and Portland action. Not exactly Ali-Frazier or Hagler-Hearns.
In closing one truism the book illustrates is the hardhats saw the hippies, radicals, bosses, Lindsey, and Wall Street crowd as all being part of one elite and they themselves as common people and the working-class. Of course they were right. It was their friends and family dying in Vietnam and more than likely their children on the Frontlines in the battle against COVID-19 and working as essential employees. The fact that the Democratic Party lost this constituency, and now increasingly much of the Latino working-class, means that generations of misinformation and right-wing propaganda, including racial and religious nationalism, has been allowed to fester and thus 50 years after the events so brilliantly detailed by Kuhn we find ourselves in a very similar place and have fewer reasons to be optimistic about the future.
This book helps explain how we've arrived to the truly awful place we are today.
I grew-up in a family of veterans so the anti-war protesters of the Vietnam Era were generally frowned upon and seen as rich kids who were either engaged in performative rebellion against daddy or were just scared. Of course this is a limited view. While many Vietnam War protesters fit that description many, such as Muhammad Ali, were motivated by deep ethical and human rights concerns. What is accurate, and can't be brushed off as just the opinions of some Irish and Italian construction rubes, is that the bulk of the hippies were from the upper economic classes and were either squandering their privilege or just slumming it for a few years until they settled into a life of suburban comfort and sending their kids to wealthy white public districts or private schools.
In the end, as Kuhn notes, even the hard hatters have to admit the war in Vietnam has failed and he brilliantly points out how they would later be used by a Nixon Administration (and later Reagan) which certainly wasn't made up of "working men" nor did it have an authentic love for organized labor to say the least.
However, I have to admit to taking some degree of pleasure in reading about wealthy college radicals getting their butts kicked all over Lower Manhattan by hardened working-class men. They waved the flags of the VC, Mao, and Che.... well those were all hard men and killers who fought and bled in rough terrains and conditions. You commute from your comfortable suburban home to a campus and all of the sudden turn into a hippie revolutionary. The construction workers gave them a test and they failed. The hippies weren't really about that revolutionary life (save for a few such as the Weathermen).
In light of the picture painted of the Hardhat Riot it's easy to see how the Democratic Party easily threw working-class America under the bus in the decades to come. The Lindsey coalition was predicated upon a white cultured elite for finance and Black and Latino populations for votes (for which they'd receive the bare minimum in return).
Yet the hypocrisy of this era rings true today making the book current. White gentrifiers moving into neighborhoods and planting Black Lives Matter signs in their lawns on property that once housed Black families. Those, such as the Manhattan elite depicted in the book, who rightly rail against the racism of Trump supporters, and then actively gentrify and work to keep their kids schools as white as possible. What was stop and frisk for? Who did it benefit? Not working-class whites, Blacks, or Latinos. Stop and frisk was designed to protect white hipsters in Brooklyn and their parents in Manhattan, many who felt "the Bern" and stanned "The Squad". Many of this young generation after racking up a couple of useless degrees begin fancying themselves as revolutionaries (gentrifying a Black neighborhood is normally the next step). They move to the neighborhoods that their very capitalist wealth and families have afforded them and yap about revolution. Revolution is Tweeting for most. When the street action comes many of these upper-class white revolutionaries supposedly in a "class struggle" against their parents? I guess???? Are the leading fire starters to Black and immigrant owned businesses in the name of their revolution fantasy (which they'll probably drop in a few years after coming to the realization they're rich and white and it's time to live it up).
I also thought of Trump's terrorist mob storming the United States Capitol. These weren't hard men, veterans of WWII and Korea included, and not from ethnic urban neighborhoods. This was a suburban and exurban mob largely made up of dudes who had rarely, if ever, been in a fist fight and can't change a flat tire. These were dudes who aspired to be like the men of the Hardhat Riot, but instead are forced to listen to Joe Rogan and Alex Jones podcasts and take to social media to kvetch. The Capitol rioters, unlike those in 1970, were joined by women some being veterans and others being Qanon loons. As evidence of the pathetic wimpy suburban guy nature of the Trump Mob just Google some Proud Boys fights and Portland action. Not exactly Ali-Frazier or Hagler-Hearns.
In closing one truism the book illustrates is the hardhats saw the hippies, radicals, bosses, Lindsey, and Wall Street crowd as all being part of one elite and they themselves as common people and the working-class. Of course they were right. It was their friends and family dying in Vietnam and more than likely their children on the Frontlines in the battle against COVID-19 and working as essential employees. The fact that the Democratic Party lost this constituency, and now increasingly much of the Latino working-class, means that generations of misinformation and right-wing propaganda, including racial and religious nationalism, has been allowed to fester and thus 50 years after the events so brilliantly detailed by Kuhn we find ourselves in a very similar place and have fewer reasons to be optimistic about the future.
This book helps explain how we've arrived to the truly awful place we are today.
July 16, 2020
So, if you want to try to understand how Donald Trump was able to get elected in 2016, you have to go back to 1970s. 1970 was the beginning of the nadir for the blue collar worker. Or truly, the nadir would probably been serfdom, but the blue collar had risen to the middle class after literally centuries of struggle, riots, voting, striking, etc. The working man had risen as high as they were going to and now they were beginning to free fall back to if not poverty, then definitely back to living pay check to pay check in a rental. In, then, come the college students protesting the war in Vietnam. The blue collar worker himself had taken his turn defending that flag in the Pacific or in Europe and these spoiled kids were burning that flag. So, the workers that were building the twin towers and other buildings brutally attacked the hippies. It was a blood bath, and the police quietly stood by. If you want to understand how and why George Floyd and the entire very long list of African American victims of police brutality happened you have to read this book. Policemen are blue collar workers. They operate from that standpoint and their relationship with other groups comes from that vantage point. One interesting thought that went through my head was that the Twin Towers had a bloody beginning and a bloody end.
July 12, 2024
The events covered in this book fall under the category of events I THINK I should remember, as I was eleven and a half at the time and I certainly remember media coverage of the "incursion" into Cambodia (I was a precocious military history buff), and the shootings at Kent State University (I grew up about twenty miles away from the school), but it would have been easy at the time to regard what went down in New York City as just one more damn thing. By 1970 people might well have been as inured to riots in the U.S. as we are to mass shootings in the current day.
Having said all that about my personal context, I must say that Kuhn has done a signal service in terms of hunting down the background information on what seems like a salient event rapidly consigned to that special black hole reserved for circumstances that generate cognitive dissonance, and where most of the clashing factions appear not especially admirable in retrospect. Not the politicians who have since made a career of exploiting class resentment, not the student protestors who now do look callow and self-serving, and not the construction workers and their fellow travelers who gave into their sense of victimhood (with varying degrees of justified anger and ill-informed narcissism) and just identified an easy target to "take it out on." Maybe it's all a commentary on how the political parties that we have in the United States haven't really represented much of anything in terms of higher values in a long time; apart from the short-term greed of late-stage capitalism and the suburban middle-class desire for insulation from conflict and turmoil. The U.S. is so not mentally ready for the next great emergency, the sort that crumbles institutions; but I digress.
Besides that, Kuhn also performs a lot of work in terms of reconstructing the flavor of the time, as when you have to be as old as 65 to have a real memory of a happening, a lot of reconstruction is in order. That might be my one issue with this narrative; Kuhn has to do so much explanation of the historical lay of the land that the more specific story does seem like it's going to get lost in the details.
So, while a rather dense work dealing with a down and dirty time that most people would rather not confront intellectually, I found this very worthwhile; maybe even a "must read."
Having said all that about my personal context, I must say that Kuhn has done a signal service in terms of hunting down the background information on what seems like a salient event rapidly consigned to that special black hole reserved for circumstances that generate cognitive dissonance, and where most of the clashing factions appear not especially admirable in retrospect. Not the politicians who have since made a career of exploiting class resentment, not the student protestors who now do look callow and self-serving, and not the construction workers and their fellow travelers who gave into their sense of victimhood (with varying degrees of justified anger and ill-informed narcissism) and just identified an easy target to "take it out on." Maybe it's all a commentary on how the political parties that we have in the United States haven't really represented much of anything in terms of higher values in a long time; apart from the short-term greed of late-stage capitalism and the suburban middle-class desire for insulation from conflict and turmoil. The U.S. is so not mentally ready for the next great emergency, the sort that crumbles institutions; but I digress.
Besides that, Kuhn also performs a lot of work in terms of reconstructing the flavor of the time, as when you have to be as old as 65 to have a real memory of a happening, a lot of reconstruction is in order. That might be my one issue with this narrative; Kuhn has to do so much explanation of the historical lay of the land that the more specific story does seem like it's going to get lost in the details.
So, while a rather dense work dealing with a down and dirty time that most people would rather not confront intellectually, I found this very worthwhile; maybe even a "must read."
October 14, 2020
There are some valuable elements to The Hardhat Riot: a sometimes gruesomely detailed play by play of the May 7, 1970 riot in lower Manhattan, a cogent take on the long-term erosion of Democratic support among blue collar workers.
But Kuhn does a bad job with an absolutely central part of the story: the riot wasn't spontaneous; it was orchestrated by the most conservative (in Nixonian terms) labor leaders. They didn't have trouble recruiting for the riot, but they also didn't represent a majority opinion within the labor movement. Penny Lewis's Hardhats, Hippies and Hawks and Chris Appy's Working-Class War and American Reckoning are much much better on the core issues.
But Kuhn does a bad job with an absolutely central part of the story: the riot wasn't spontaneous; it was orchestrated by the most conservative (in Nixonian terms) labor leaders. They didn't have trouble recruiting for the riot, but they also didn't represent a majority opinion within the labor movement. Penny Lewis's Hardhats, Hippies and Hawks and Chris Appy's Working-Class War and American Reckoning are much much better on the core issues.
October 19, 2020
I had conflicting feelings about this book. The writing was good, especially in the scenes of the riot itself. The author is also able to put it into a good context.
The problems was the author's attempts to excuse and even glorify the behavior of the rioters and police. He spends a lot of time explaining why they were outraged and then trying to connect it to later peaceful protests and those themes are important. He also states repeatedly that they were provoked by shouting and uses derogatory terms for the people being beaten up, repeatedly referring to them as long hair. Shouting at someone does not give license for violence.
At heart, this was a group of middle age men who engaged in wanton violence directed at kids and whoever else they randomly attacked, often using construction tools. They showed up at the protest with the purpose of hurting people and wrapping them in the flag does not change or excuse that. It also does not excuse the police who stood by and often encouraged the rioters and then whitewashed their actions in the official report.
This had more in common with white race riots of the early 20th century in which they set out to attack black people with the complicity of the police then it does with legitimate protest movements.
The problems was the author's attempts to excuse and even glorify the behavior of the rioters and police. He spends a lot of time explaining why they were outraged and then trying to connect it to later peaceful protests and those themes are important. He also states repeatedly that they were provoked by shouting and uses derogatory terms for the people being beaten up, repeatedly referring to them as long hair. Shouting at someone does not give license for violence.
At heart, this was a group of middle age men who engaged in wanton violence directed at kids and whoever else they randomly attacked, often using construction tools. They showed up at the protest with the purpose of hurting people and wrapping them in the flag does not change or excuse that. It also does not excuse the police who stood by and often encouraged the rioters and then whitewashed their actions in the official report.
This had more in common with white race riots of the early 20th century in which they set out to attack black people with the complicity of the police then it does with legitimate protest movements.
January 26, 2021
A compelling read. If you're interested in the nadir of liberalism in the 1970s, the culmination of the culture wars or the bad old days of New York City, this is the book for you.
December 4, 2020
As I was reading this book, I kept thinking of the Buffalo Springfield lyrics:
There's battle lines being drawn
Nobody's right if everybody's wrong
Young people speaking' their minds
Getting so much resistance from behind
This perfectly summarized this sociological-economic-political book written mostly about America in the 60s & 70s. I was a college student when Kent State happened. I went to a university that went on strike and closed for the remainder of the semester. I lost my student deferment and was drafted, although never served. Those were tumultuous times.
The author does a really good job of capturing the feelings and emotions of this time period. Unfortunately, aLthough the country had moved well past it, Trump brought back a lot of the same divisiveness that occurred back then.
There's battle lines being drawn
Nobody's right if everybody's wrong
Young people speaking' their minds
Getting so much resistance from behind
This perfectly summarized this sociological-economic-political book written mostly about America in the 60s & 70s. I was a college student when Kent State happened. I went to a university that went on strike and closed for the remainder of the semester. I lost my student deferment and was drafted, although never served. Those were tumultuous times.
The author does a really good job of capturing the feelings and emotions of this time period. Unfortunately, aLthough the country had moved well past it, Trump brought back a lot of the same divisiveness that occurred back then.
October 4, 2020
Here is a fantastic book that explains, with great storytelling and without the ideological screeds that pollute too much of our writing about politics, how presidents from Nixon to Reagan to Trump came to win the white working class. It is a refreshingly judicious book, backed by fascinating new research on how blue-collar whites saw the New Left and even on subjects so well documented and yet not in the respect that this book does, such as why Vietnam epitomized the under covered class strife in American life. And it’s a great read, to boot. I highly recommend!
July 21, 2020
How did we end up here?
Great look at how the Democratic party swung to the far left and lost the white middle class base. Explains how we are where we are today.
Great look at how the Democratic party swung to the far left and lost the white middle class base. Explains how we are where we are today.
December 19, 2021
DID NOT FINISH, SO GO AHEAD AND IGNORE ME IF YOU THINK THAT MATTERS A WHOLE LOT
So.....I had to stop at page 94 out of cognitive dissonance. This means that I stopped in the middle of a scrambled egg analysis of Mayor Lindsay's re-election campaign, but before I arrived at the actual riot. Maybe the book has value in those pages and after, it may since so many seem to adore this book and praise it for being gripping. The cover blurb where Jill Lepore considers this book "Riveting" - The New Yorker, is what sold me on this since Lepore is an author I respect and in the past I followed her reviews closely.
But not after this one.
The breaking point for me was the following (p 94):
Throughout the book up to that point Kuhn's cherry picking approach to sources was already supplying a very busy jam factory, but I can withstand some decontextualization and careful misreading. However, this particular passage is simply and overtly dishonest, and it's demonstrable bullshit.
For those who haven't read Cleaver's memoir, or know little of his life, this passage was written of his life prior to going to prison. It is a description of his embittered and violence-driven outlook borne of the injustice of his life as a black man in a white man's country, the pointlessness of trying to play by rules that ensured he would always lose. This section is written as a graphic and intentionally shocking contrast to his views after conversion to Islam, so Kuhn's attempt to paint this as the message Cleaver still endorsed in 1968... well it's dishonest bullshit. Equally dishonest is Kuhn's use of clipped quotes from reviews of Cleaver's entire memoir and present them also as endorsements of rape.... I just really don't have the words.
Now this wasn't even close to the first place where Kuhn played the propagandist. Kuhn is the kind of a bullshit artist who simply cannot help but misread a source or quote intentionally to make it something he thinks is outrageous. Because it's within my area of expertise I was particularly nonplussed with Kuhn's completely ahistorical presentation of post-war White Flight as merely a matter of government determined market forces, nothing racist there. His motives for this dishonesty are overt, he clearly wants to be seen as a Working Class Whisperer in the mold of that other equally dishonest Ivy League bullshitter J D Vance.
Also, oh my god, please stop pretending that there was a Golden Age of the Working Man where politicians really cared about their plight. If ever there was an age where unions held sway and the concerns of the blue collared was listened to closely it was because the very close encounter with Eat the Rich social unrest during the Depression and the perennial need to buy their votes made politicians careful to appease the workers. Beginning with FDR this was the Democrats. As for there not being a racial basis for the White Blue Collar vote, consider that they were loyal Democrats so long as policies continued to support segregation and second class citizenship for blacks. This is illustrated best by how the policies of the Great Society were explicitly written to support poor whites, pulling millions out of poverty. Still the White Working Class were willing to abandon the Democratic Party that had demonstrably improved their lives so much in the Johnson administration, to join the party that demonized the Civil Rights Act and explicitly linked it to 'urban' chaos, and as the GOP became ever more a white christian nationalist organization the greater its appeal for these voters. THAT'S how we got to Trump, not through Lindsay.
Then there is this odd project Kuhn has in making the vicious attacks upon the protestors appear kind of justified, kind of heroic, and totally all American. This is kind of chilling (meaning I think he is an apologist for vigilantism when it fits his politics).
But in the end I find Kuhn to be simply unreadable, his writing is unstructured and chaotic, and his arguments are fatuous. His favored tactic is quoting nonsense from some Known Liberal with a pretense of objectively exposing ignorance or hypocrisy. He sneers at these Ivy League Limo Liberals for not being truly of the working class and understanding their struggles, but his wholehearted approval is for that other set of Ivy Leaguers from the upper crust, those who made a name and a living opposing liberals. The pity is that none of this was necessary. The Hardhat Riot was a seminal moment, and certainly one that caught the popular gestalt. Like Altamont just five months before, the Hardhat Riot took the shine off of the Age of Aquarius. Long before I grasped any of the politics I was reading references to the riot in Mad Magazine, who even used it as late as 1981 as a shorthand for the dawn of the Reagan Era. Kuhn needlessly undercuts his own credibility to bolster his case that wilding white working class in 1970 are a direct portent to wilding white working class at Trump rallies in 2016? Or is it to demonstrate a cynical and ill informed vacuum in liberal ideals? I really can't tell, and it isn't worth my time to find out.
Jill Lepore, what were you thinking?
So.....I had to stop at page 94 out of cognitive dissonance. This means that I stopped in the middle of a scrambled egg analysis of Mayor Lindsay's re-election campaign, but before I arrived at the actual riot. Maybe the book has value in those pages and after, it may since so many seem to adore this book and praise it for being gripping. The cover blurb where Jill Lepore considers this book "Riveting" - The New Yorker, is what sold me on this since Lepore is an author I respect and in the past I followed her reviews closely.
But not after this one.
The breaking point for me was the following (p 94):
So graffitists were "Van Gogh." Theft and occupation could be 'liberation." Riots were sometimes "demonstrations." The "highest patriotism" was exhibited by antiwar activists, rather than the boys fighting for their country. A Molotov cocktail could be a "protest." Even rape could be justified as "insurrectionary."
"Rape was an insurrectionary act," wrote Eldridge Cleaver in his 1968 memoir Soul on Ice, "It delighted me that I was defying and trampling upon the white man's law, upon his system of values, and that I was defiling his women." The Times called the book "brilliant," and christened it one of the ten best books of the year. The Nation: "Remarkable." The Atlantic:"Passionate and eloquent." The Washington Post was not as gaga. Still, it closed by extolling Cleaver's "brave and necessary adventure".
Throughout the book up to that point Kuhn's cherry picking approach to sources was already supplying a very busy jam factory, but I can withstand some decontextualization and careful misreading. However, this particular passage is simply and overtly dishonest, and it's demonstrable bullshit.
For those who haven't read Cleaver's memoir, or know little of his life, this passage was written of his life prior to going to prison. It is a description of his embittered and violence-driven outlook borne of the injustice of his life as a black man in a white man's country, the pointlessness of trying to play by rules that ensured he would always lose. This section is written as a graphic and intentionally shocking contrast to his views after conversion to Islam, so Kuhn's attempt to paint this as the message Cleaver still endorsed in 1968... well it's dishonest bullshit. Equally dishonest is Kuhn's use of clipped quotes from reviews of Cleaver's entire memoir and present them also as endorsements of rape.... I just really don't have the words.
Now this wasn't even close to the first place where Kuhn played the propagandist. Kuhn is the kind of a bullshit artist who simply cannot help but misread a source or quote intentionally to make it something he thinks is outrageous. Because it's within my area of expertise I was particularly nonplussed with Kuhn's completely ahistorical presentation of post-war White Flight as merely a matter of government determined market forces, nothing racist there. His motives for this dishonesty are overt, he clearly wants to be seen as a Working Class Whisperer in the mold of that other equally dishonest Ivy League bullshitter J D Vance.
Also, oh my god, please stop pretending that there was a Golden Age of the Working Man where politicians really cared about their plight. If ever there was an age where unions held sway and the concerns of the blue collared was listened to closely it was because the very close encounter with Eat the Rich social unrest during the Depression and the perennial need to buy their votes made politicians careful to appease the workers. Beginning with FDR this was the Democrats. As for there not being a racial basis for the White Blue Collar vote, consider that they were loyal Democrats so long as policies continued to support segregation and second class citizenship for blacks. This is illustrated best by how the policies of the Great Society were explicitly written to support poor whites, pulling millions out of poverty. Still the White Working Class were willing to abandon the Democratic Party that had demonstrably improved their lives so much in the Johnson administration, to join the party that demonized the Civil Rights Act and explicitly linked it to 'urban' chaos, and as the GOP became ever more a white christian nationalist organization the greater its appeal for these voters. THAT'S how we got to Trump, not through Lindsay.
Then there is this odd project Kuhn has in making the vicious attacks upon the protestors appear kind of justified, kind of heroic, and totally all American. This is kind of chilling (meaning I think he is an apologist for vigilantism when it fits his politics).
But in the end I find Kuhn to be simply unreadable, his writing is unstructured and chaotic, and his arguments are fatuous. His favored tactic is quoting nonsense from some Known Liberal with a pretense of objectively exposing ignorance or hypocrisy. He sneers at these Ivy League Limo Liberals for not being truly of the working class and understanding their struggles, but his wholehearted approval is for that other set of Ivy Leaguers from the upper crust, those who made a name and a living opposing liberals. The pity is that none of this was necessary. The Hardhat Riot was a seminal moment, and certainly one that caught the popular gestalt. Like Altamont just five months before, the Hardhat Riot took the shine off of the Age of Aquarius. Long before I grasped any of the politics I was reading references to the riot in Mad Magazine, who even used it as late as 1981 as a shorthand for the dawn of the Reagan Era. Kuhn needlessly undercuts his own credibility to bolster his case that wilding white working class in 1970 are a direct portent to wilding white working class at Trump rallies in 2016? Or is it to demonstrate a cynical and ill informed vacuum in liberal ideals? I really can't tell, and it isn't worth my time to find out.
Jill Lepore, what were you thinking?
April 19, 2021
My Booktube
I do think this book is very insightful and gives a really good look into the politics of the late 60's into 1970. However, a major flaw is just how long winded certain chapters feel as well as the entire section of part 2. Part 2 could have been easily cut in half, since a lot was just repeated information that felt very redundant by the end.
Although I will say some of the stats presented fucking flabbergasted me. Especially in regards to how the hippie movement wasn't necessarily as big as pop culture gives it credit for. Or how BAD the balance of rich/poor was in regards to who went to war in Vietnam (spoiler: hardly any rich/elite schools & people had major Vietnam losses lmao). Or how the working class was (and is) neglected by Democrats even to this day, just because ??? Which makes it really easy for people like Trump to sweep in and just collect those votes.
I do think this book is very insightful and gives a really good look into the politics of the late 60's into 1970. However, a major flaw is just how long winded certain chapters feel as well as the entire section of part 2. Part 2 could have been easily cut in half, since a lot was just repeated information that felt very redundant by the end.
Although I will say some of the stats presented fucking flabbergasted me. Especially in regards to how the hippie movement wasn't necessarily as big as pop culture gives it credit for. Or how BAD the balance of rich/poor was in regards to who went to war in Vietnam (spoiler: hardly any rich/elite schools & people had major Vietnam losses lmao). Or how the working class was (and is) neglected by Democrats even to this day, just because ??? Which makes it really easy for people like Trump to sweep in and just collect those votes.
January 28, 2021
This book gave me great insight to understand how the anti-protestors were perceived. It also gave me a greater understanding of how the transformation of the White collar worker to the GOP. Also, it was quite fitting for me to read after the riot at the Capitol.
January 16, 2025
this book was objectively well-written and interesting but the author had palpable disdain for student anti-war protestors that bothered me. still feels like a relevant read to understand trump and how we need to reconstruct the left to build a winning coalition
July 18, 2020
Kuhn does a stellar job of examining the nation’s political culture of the late 60s and early 70s focusing on the hard hat riot in 1970. Kuhn writes convincingly that the emerging Democratic Party coalition of educated whites, poor minorities and youth, alienated working class Whites. That alienation was exploited by Nixon and, later, the GOP. In essence, the polarization in our nation is one of economic class. Yet, even as the alienated working class Whites embraced the GOP, their fortunes continue to decrease. Tragically, the hard hats, while violent, were not too far away from the values of the protesting youth (largely children of wealthy Whites), at least as far as the Vietnam War goes. And, ironically, Nixon proved to be quite liberal as he passed many progressive laws in concert with the Democratic Congress he had to work with. Here’s a concept for aspiring politicians: listen to the people and find commonality, says the naïf.
February 15, 2022
David Paul Kuhn's The Hardhat Riot revisits the working class backlash to the antiwar movement in the early '70s, culminating in a violent confrontation between protesters and pro-war construction workers in New York. In the first book-length treatment of this episode, Kuhn avoids the general characterization as an inexplicable paroxysm of reactionary bloodlust or a false flag instigated by the Nixon Administration. Instead, Kuhn examines the event through a broader lens of disillusionment: the Democratic Party, once the tribunes of the white working class, seemed to be embracing race-based "identity politics" and pandering to the youth-driven antiwar movement; the Great Society, far from resolving poverty, seemed to them merely punishing white workers for their corporate malefactors' bigoted practices. Vietnam threw these clashes into stark relief; wed to old-fashioned ideas of hard work and patriotism, conservative Americans grew frustrated with protesters as either drug-addled dropouts or privileged brats abusing opportunities they never had. Thus the outbreak of violence in New York, following the Kent State shootings of May 1970, was an extension of very real rage that needed little stoking from the Powers That Be. Though Richard Nixon, seeing the white working class as the backbone of his "New Majority," certainly exploited the event, inviting the rioters to the White House and later appointing their leader, Peter Brennan, as Secretary of Labor.
Kuhn does a fine job narrating this event, a genuinely violent and disturbing riot which modern readers can't help equating to a more recent insurrection (complete with the storming of a government institution); his empathy, if not sympathy for their mindset fits better than the dismissal that usually accompanies accounts from liberal writers. I wager that Kuhn leans conservative, and he does seem at times to downplay the violence and bigotry of the "hardhat" class that accompanied their legitimate grievances, treating this almost as an aberration rather than part of a broader campaign of right wing violence. Generally though, he's commendably evenhanded assessing not only the hardhats but the shortcomings of the antiwar movement which triggered them. He happily concedes the antiwarriors being in the right and also unfairly demonized, both by conservatives of the time and later writers, but that the radical rhetoric of their fringes couldn't help alienating Middle America. Thus the hardhats weren't supporting the war so much as raging against a system that abandoned them, and a culture that developed beyond their comfort zone. The reader can decide for themselves whether Kuhn is too sympathetic or accommodating; this reader, who does not identify as conservative, found this book a compelling, useful illumination of this largely-forgotten event.
Kuhn does a fine job narrating this event, a genuinely violent and disturbing riot which modern readers can't help equating to a more recent insurrection (complete with the storming of a government institution); his empathy, if not sympathy for their mindset fits better than the dismissal that usually accompanies accounts from liberal writers. I wager that Kuhn leans conservative, and he does seem at times to downplay the violence and bigotry of the "hardhat" class that accompanied their legitimate grievances, treating this almost as an aberration rather than part of a broader campaign of right wing violence. Generally though, he's commendably evenhanded assessing not only the hardhats but the shortcomings of the antiwar movement which triggered them. He happily concedes the antiwarriors being in the right and also unfairly demonized, both by conservatives of the time and later writers, but that the radical rhetoric of their fringes couldn't help alienating Middle America. Thus the hardhats weren't supporting the war so much as raging against a system that abandoned them, and a culture that developed beyond their comfort zone. The reader can decide for themselves whether Kuhn is too sympathetic or accommodating; this reader, who does not identify as conservative, found this book a compelling, useful illumination of this largely-forgotten event.
May 14, 2021
Thoroughly researched and engaging to read, but there's a pervasive conservative bias in the writing that I found distracting and a little grating. I'm not sure the author is even totally aware he's doing it but he seems to share the perspective of the hardhat rioters, at least a little bit, that their violence toward antiwar protesters was justified because much of the antiwar movement was middle-class and college-educated. This book embraces the idea that criticizing the war was the purview of the privileged, and that the counterculture was a bunch of spoiled brats. Kuhn's able to make this case by avoiding examples of the antiwar activism on the part of people who don't fit this image, by not taking seriously police violence and state-sponsored harassment of groups like the Black Panthers. In the end, he conflates the perceptions Silent Majority voters had with the truth and doesn't really address how Nixon etc. mobilized that resentment. So it's an interesting read but needs to be read with a critical eye, and not just as support for the idea that white working class men are the most "forgotten" people in American history.
February 19, 2023
I imagine that there will be readers who might wonder why a story about a Hardhat Riot, in which some NY construction workers beat up some college students and anti-war activists back in 1970, would be considered a significant event today. Well, David Paul Kuhn answers that question in his book "The Hardhat Riot: Nixon, New York City, and the Dawn of the White Working-Class Revolution". Kuhn's point is that the event is symbolic of the significant change in the make-up of both major political parties which occurred at that time.
There was a lot of unrest in the Country in the 1960's. There was the unpopular and ongoing Vietnam war, the assassinations of Martin Luther King, President Kennedy and Attorney General Robert Kennedy. There was widespread anti-war and student protests, a new and radical hippie culture, inner-city race riots, SDS (Students for a Democratic Society) bombings, "burn-the-bra" femininests fighting for women's liberation, rising inflation, the National Guard killing of student protesters at Kent State University, etc. These events upset many citizens, especially older conservatives in middle America, but even younger white blue-collar workers began to feel alienated from their liberal Democratic peers.
A regional shift in voting preference was most evident in the South. At that time, segregation and Jim Crow laws were widespread. Southern voters had been solidly Democratic for years. But today, the South and many white blue-collar workers have shifted Party affiliation to the G.O.P. This huge shift began sometime after LBJ's presidency, accelerated during Nixon's term, and became firmly in place by Reagan's presidency. Was the Southern Dems switch to the GOP en masse a result of LBJ's civil rights and voting rights legislation, or is there more to that idea? "The Hardhat Riot" tries to help answer that question.
Democratic President LBJ, who pushed for Civil Rights reforms, later remarked that the Democratic Party probably lost the South for a generation as a result the those new laws. While the evidence is there that there was a large decline in the Democratic Party's support in the South following the Voting Rights and Civil Rights legislation, Kuhn introduces another piece of the puzzle of why the Democratic Party lost members to the Republican Party between the late 60's and the late 70's.
In the 70's, GOP candidates positioned themselves as law-and-order candidates, supportive of the flag and the military, for the working man, etc. The Democrats were the party of the poor, blacks, progressives, laborers, union members, and the young. But during these tumultous times, the Democrats became associated with student protests and violence, taking over college campuses, being anti-military, anti-war, favoring amnesty for draft dodgers, permissive behavior, soft on civil unrest, racial protests, etc. Protesting college students were considered spoiled and coddled, upsetting veterans of WWII and Korea who fought for the Country and cherished the symbol of the Flag. Hardhats had enough. Their wages were only marginally above those on welfare. They worked every day in rain, snow, and freezing weather for a Country they loved. Anti-war Democratic candidates like Eugene McCarthy, George McGovern, Walter Mondale, etc. stood in contrast with GOP "law and order" and anti-intellectual candidates. Author David Kuhn uses the Hardhat Riot in NYC to exemplify how and why white working class Democrats began to turn against liberalism and to become alligned with the Republicans, the Party previously most closely associated with Big Business. This marked a dramatic shift in political Party make-up in a very short period of time, and we see the continuation of this shift in the electorate from the election of Ronald Reagan in 1980 to Donald Trump in 2016, that those shifts show no signs of changing to this day.
There was a lot of unrest in the Country in the 1960's. There was the unpopular and ongoing Vietnam war, the assassinations of Martin Luther King, President Kennedy and Attorney General Robert Kennedy. There was widespread anti-war and student protests, a new and radical hippie culture, inner-city race riots, SDS (Students for a Democratic Society) bombings, "burn-the-bra" femininests fighting for women's liberation, rising inflation, the National Guard killing of student protesters at Kent State University, etc. These events upset many citizens, especially older conservatives in middle America, but even younger white blue-collar workers began to feel alienated from their liberal Democratic peers.
A regional shift in voting preference was most evident in the South. At that time, segregation and Jim Crow laws were widespread. Southern voters had been solidly Democratic for years. But today, the South and many white blue-collar workers have shifted Party affiliation to the G.O.P. This huge shift began sometime after LBJ's presidency, accelerated during Nixon's term, and became firmly in place by Reagan's presidency. Was the Southern Dems switch to the GOP en masse a result of LBJ's civil rights and voting rights legislation, or is there more to that idea? "The Hardhat Riot" tries to help answer that question.
Democratic President LBJ, who pushed for Civil Rights reforms, later remarked that the Democratic Party probably lost the South for a generation as a result the those new laws. While the evidence is there that there was a large decline in the Democratic Party's support in the South following the Voting Rights and Civil Rights legislation, Kuhn introduces another piece of the puzzle of why the Democratic Party lost members to the Republican Party between the late 60's and the late 70's.
In the 70's, GOP candidates positioned themselves as law-and-order candidates, supportive of the flag and the military, for the working man, etc. The Democrats were the party of the poor, blacks, progressives, laborers, union members, and the young. But during these tumultous times, the Democrats became associated with student protests and violence, taking over college campuses, being anti-military, anti-war, favoring amnesty for draft dodgers, permissive behavior, soft on civil unrest, racial protests, etc. Protesting college students were considered spoiled and coddled, upsetting veterans of WWII and Korea who fought for the Country and cherished the symbol of the Flag. Hardhats had enough. Their wages were only marginally above those on welfare. They worked every day in rain, snow, and freezing weather for a Country they loved. Anti-war Democratic candidates like Eugene McCarthy, George McGovern, Walter Mondale, etc. stood in contrast with GOP "law and order" and anti-intellectual candidates. Author David Kuhn uses the Hardhat Riot in NYC to exemplify how and why white working class Democrats began to turn against liberalism and to become alligned with the Republicans, the Party previously most closely associated with Big Business. This marked a dramatic shift in political Party make-up in a very short period of time, and we see the continuation of this shift in the electorate from the election of Ronald Reagan in 1980 to Donald Trump in 2016, that those shifts show no signs of changing to this day.
April 15, 2021
Fifty years before the recent Capitol riot, hundreds of construction workers in lower Manhattan marched against and beat to a pulp anti-war demonstrators mourning the murders four days earlier of four students at Kent State. Targeting anyone with long hair, and armed with steel boots and metal tools, the construction workers cornered Pace University students and pummeled them and then broke into university buildings. They marched to city hall and threatened to overrun it until city officials raised the American flag, which had been flying at half mast to honor the Kent State victims, to its full height. The NYPD did little of nothing to protect the victims of the construction workers' wrath.
Kuhn's project is not only to explain the context and origins of the blue collar riot but to tie it to the Democrats gradual loss of the blue collar vote that ultimately culminated in the election of Trump and the Capitol riot. However, he spends much of the time on facts, developing a minute-by-minute account of the riot from largely contemporary sources that is compelling and detailed, if occasionally repetitive. He also fleshes out conditions in New York at the time, the polarizing figure of then-Mayor John Lindsey, and the reaction of Nixon's White House to the realization that the blue collar vote was available for the the taking.
What Kuhn does not quite succeed in doing is providing a good understanding for the motivations of the construction workers--and in particular their blistering hate. (Most of this failure seems to be due to the fact that are far more contemporary accounts (in the form of complaints and affidavits) by victims than by the rioters themselves.) Kuhn hints at certain hypotheses: we learn, for example, that the Vietnam War was fought mainly by working men (in part on account of the college deferment from the draft) and he seems to suggest that resentment about this was a motivation for the violence. The rioters' idolization/fetishization of the flag seems to have played a part ("people died for that flag") as they reacted to both hippies' desecration of the flag and the city's decision to lower it to half mast in honor of "people who hate our country" (anti-war protestors). Lastly, the sense that the hippies were spoiled and wasting opportunities like college that the hardhats never had and thus needed a spanking played some part. Kuhn convincingly argues that the hardhats were not for the most part hawks interested in countering the anti-war message of those they attacked. Many also opposed the war and resented being described as "pro-war" in media accounts that followed. But they felt going to war was nonetheless an obligation of citizenship. Racism also infuses these events, but Kuhn never quite unpacks its actual role.
Kuhn's account is slightly colored by a cynicism regarding how coastal elites continue to treat working class Americans up to and including 2016 (calling people racists, he mentions at one point, turns out not to be a particularly effective way of winning them over to your point of view), but he is mainly evenhanded and adheres scrupulously to the primary sources.
While there are some significant differences, the chilling similarities to the forces that produced the Capitol riot make understanding the hardhat riot critically important.
Kuhn's project is not only to explain the context and origins of the blue collar riot but to tie it to the Democrats gradual loss of the blue collar vote that ultimately culminated in the election of Trump and the Capitol riot. However, he spends much of the time on facts, developing a minute-by-minute account of the riot from largely contemporary sources that is compelling and detailed, if occasionally repetitive. He also fleshes out conditions in New York at the time, the polarizing figure of then-Mayor John Lindsey, and the reaction of Nixon's White House to the realization that the blue collar vote was available for the the taking.
What Kuhn does not quite succeed in doing is providing a good understanding for the motivations of the construction workers--and in particular their blistering hate. (Most of this failure seems to be due to the fact that are far more contemporary accounts (in the form of complaints and affidavits) by victims than by the rioters themselves.) Kuhn hints at certain hypotheses: we learn, for example, that the Vietnam War was fought mainly by working men (in part on account of the college deferment from the draft) and he seems to suggest that resentment about this was a motivation for the violence. The rioters' idolization/fetishization of the flag seems to have played a part ("people died for that flag") as they reacted to both hippies' desecration of the flag and the city's decision to lower it to half mast in honor of "people who hate our country" (anti-war protestors). Lastly, the sense that the hippies were spoiled and wasting opportunities like college that the hardhats never had and thus needed a spanking played some part. Kuhn convincingly argues that the hardhats were not for the most part hawks interested in countering the anti-war message of those they attacked. Many also opposed the war and resented being described as "pro-war" in media accounts that followed. But they felt going to war was nonetheless an obligation of citizenship. Racism also infuses these events, but Kuhn never quite unpacks its actual role.
Kuhn's account is slightly colored by a cynicism regarding how coastal elites continue to treat working class Americans up to and including 2016 (calling people racists, he mentions at one point, turns out not to be a particularly effective way of winning them over to your point of view), but he is mainly evenhanded and adheres scrupulously to the primary sources.
While there are some significant differences, the chilling similarities to the forces that produced the Capitol riot make understanding the hardhat riot critically important.
February 3, 2021
I found this book to be a very readable review of some ideas about how the American working class has come to be the foundation of the Republican party and Trumpism.
Kuhn center's the book on the "Hardhat Riot" of May 8th 1970, an event that I remember mainly by it's reference in an episode of "All in the Family." In the wake of the Capitol riots, this book brings together important observations about the riot as an example of class conflict.
He travels well trod ground, ably, towards several underlying aspects of the riot. First, he depicts the background of the Anti-War movement leading up to Kent State by way of the Columbia occupation, Moratorium Day, and the 1968 Democratic convention. The decay of NYC that Kuhn describes is now an underappreciated topic. The dizzying decline in the city's services and the anxiety it provoked is difficult to convey to younger generations. Suffice it to say that absolutely nobody at the time was predicting that NYC's decline was temporary. When over 2000 New Yorkers per year were being murdered in the early 1990's, it was hard to believe that Times Square was about to be turned into Disney World and Buscwick would soon become the East Village. (On the topic of dissecting the failure of civic life in NYC during this period, I like Jim Sleeper's "The Closest of Strangers: Liberalism and the Politics of Race in New York" 1990). A third, shorter, background chapter deals with the history of immigration in NYC (prolly could have omitted this).
The great original research contributed to the meat of the book, the story of the riots. He obviously spent a lot of time going over police records and re-assembling the timeline of the events around May 8th. It gets repetitive, but it works as a picture of what actually happened that day. A lot has been written about the failures of the Anti-War movement and Kuhn relishes each and every excess. The alchemy of protestors who flew Viet-Cong flags and desecrated American flags, Jane Fonda posing on the North Vietnamese anti-Aircraft guns, and returning (mostly working class or poor) American servicemen subjected to the most ruthless scorn provoked righteous outrage from average Americans. Kuhn stresses many times that the riots were in no sense "Pro-War" but rather Anti-Anti-War.
I've read other reviewers complain that Kuhn is arguing that the Anti-War protesters brought the violence on themselves. I'm more inclined to give him a pass on that one. He seeks to describe the riots, what provoked them and what explained the passive, even approving, response by the NYPD. Like QAnon, Trumpism, Birtherism, and 2020 election denialism, these events happened and we can seek to understand them or just vilify them.
I think Kuhn says enough about marauders like "KO Joe" to signify to the reader that he doesn't approve of the hardhats' violence. But KO Joe is, after all, just a guy. Shouldn't we wonder why he acted as he did? Some degree of young male recklessness, to be sure, but Kuhn adds to the long, well-hashed story of how the American blue-collar class switched parties. The combination of limousine liberalism, radical chic, and catering to special interests proved to be provocative to the loyal middle class Democratic rank and file. Kuhn cites mayor John Lindsay as exhibit number one. He makes a persuasive argument that the highly nepotistic trade unions were singled out for integration at a time when nobody was insisting on the integration of Lehman Brothers or law firms. The double standard wasn't lost on the working class. He credits Pat Buchanan for his early recognition of the disconnect between liberal elites and the blue-collar Democratic base and the aggressive use of “cultural issues” to expand that cleavage.
Personally, I think both parties sold out the labor unions. And now unions are so weak as to be an after-thought in American political life.
I could go on about this book and its implications. I guess that's a positive review in itself. Whether you agree with Kuhn or not, the book is thought provoking and weirdly timely for a history of a riot 50 years ago.
Kuhn center's the book on the "Hardhat Riot" of May 8th 1970, an event that I remember mainly by it's reference in an episode of "All in the Family." In the wake of the Capitol riots, this book brings together important observations about the riot as an example of class conflict.
He travels well trod ground, ably, towards several underlying aspects of the riot. First, he depicts the background of the Anti-War movement leading up to Kent State by way of the Columbia occupation, Moratorium Day, and the 1968 Democratic convention. The decay of NYC that Kuhn describes is now an underappreciated topic. The dizzying decline in the city's services and the anxiety it provoked is difficult to convey to younger generations. Suffice it to say that absolutely nobody at the time was predicting that NYC's decline was temporary. When over 2000 New Yorkers per year were being murdered in the early 1990's, it was hard to believe that Times Square was about to be turned into Disney World and Buscwick would soon become the East Village. (On the topic of dissecting the failure of civic life in NYC during this period, I like Jim Sleeper's "The Closest of Strangers: Liberalism and the Politics of Race in New York" 1990). A third, shorter, background chapter deals with the history of immigration in NYC (prolly could have omitted this).
The great original research contributed to the meat of the book, the story of the riots. He obviously spent a lot of time going over police records and re-assembling the timeline of the events around May 8th. It gets repetitive, but it works as a picture of what actually happened that day. A lot has been written about the failures of the Anti-War movement and Kuhn relishes each and every excess. The alchemy of protestors who flew Viet-Cong flags and desecrated American flags, Jane Fonda posing on the North Vietnamese anti-Aircraft guns, and returning (mostly working class or poor) American servicemen subjected to the most ruthless scorn provoked righteous outrage from average Americans. Kuhn stresses many times that the riots were in no sense "Pro-War" but rather Anti-Anti-War.
I've read other reviewers complain that Kuhn is arguing that the Anti-War protesters brought the violence on themselves. I'm more inclined to give him a pass on that one. He seeks to describe the riots, what provoked them and what explained the passive, even approving, response by the NYPD. Like QAnon, Trumpism, Birtherism, and 2020 election denialism, these events happened and we can seek to understand them or just vilify them.
I think Kuhn says enough about marauders like "KO Joe" to signify to the reader that he doesn't approve of the hardhats' violence. But KO Joe is, after all, just a guy. Shouldn't we wonder why he acted as he did? Some degree of young male recklessness, to be sure, but Kuhn adds to the long, well-hashed story of how the American blue-collar class switched parties. The combination of limousine liberalism, radical chic, and catering to special interests proved to be provocative to the loyal middle class Democratic rank and file. Kuhn cites mayor John Lindsay as exhibit number one. He makes a persuasive argument that the highly nepotistic trade unions were singled out for integration at a time when nobody was insisting on the integration of Lehman Brothers or law firms. The double standard wasn't lost on the working class. He credits Pat Buchanan for his early recognition of the disconnect between liberal elites and the blue-collar Democratic base and the aggressive use of “cultural issues” to expand that cleavage.
Personally, I think both parties sold out the labor unions. And now unions are so weak as to be an after-thought in American political life.
I could go on about this book and its implications. I guess that's a positive review in itself. Whether you agree with Kuhn or not, the book is thought provoking and weirdly timely for a history of a riot 50 years ago.
September 23, 2021
On May 8, 1970 in New York, blue collar construction workers, fed up with anti-war protests by college students who many of them felt were spoiled brats, attacked demonstrators and raged through midtown Manhattan. The construction workers were referred to as "Hard Hats" after the protective head gear they wore at work, and the riot that day became know as the Hard Hat Riot.
Starting shortly before noon that day and through the afternoon construction workers attacked student protesters rallying at Federal Hall; laid siege to City Hall, where they demanded the US Flag be raised; and rioted, causing property damage to nearby buildings including Trinity Church and the newly built main building of Pace University.
By some estimates more than 20,000 people were in the streets engaged in street fights. Around 100 people were injured. Only six were arrested. Many claimed the police did little to contain the rioting construction workers.
This event took place four days after students protesting at Kent State University in Ohio were fired on by National Guardsmen, killing four. One of those killed was from Long Island, and funeral proceedings for him helped fuel an increase in anti-war activism in the city. There had been smaller clashes between the construction workers and student protesters in the few days proceeding the riot of May 8. In honor of the dead Kent State students New York Mayor Lindsey had ordered flags around the city lowered to half mast.
David Paul Kuhn's 2020 book The Hardhat Riot is filled with detail about the events of that day, as well as analysis of what led up to the riot, and what impact it has had on American politics. Kuhn's book provides a context for the Riot and it's place in American politics that helps shed light on political trends that resonate to this day.
An immediate effect of the riot was a rally on May 20 of 150,000 construction workers. This "anti anti-war" rally was skillfully built on by the Nixon campaign as part of it "Silent Majority" re-election strategy.
That strategy began the pivot of the Republican party from it's business oriented past to a party focused on the white working class and cultural issues. Meanwhile the Democrats were waging an internal struggle between the old style liberalism of Roosevelt and the New Deal, and the New Left's more radical leanings. As this internal struggle continued, the Democrats put less and less focus on "white ethnic" voters.
As Kuhn lays it out, the Hard Hat Riot was a turning point where the white working class began their shift from the Democratic Party to the Republican Party.
The Hardhat Riot is an illuminating book, well researched and important for understanding current trends in national politics. Much of it is politics are amazingly contemporary. I rate it Four Stars ⭐⭐⭐⭐.
Starting shortly before noon that day and through the afternoon construction workers attacked student protesters rallying at Federal Hall; laid siege to City Hall, where they demanded the US Flag be raised; and rioted, causing property damage to nearby buildings including Trinity Church and the newly built main building of Pace University.
By some estimates more than 20,000 people were in the streets engaged in street fights. Around 100 people were injured. Only six were arrested. Many claimed the police did little to contain the rioting construction workers.
This event took place four days after students protesting at Kent State University in Ohio were fired on by National Guardsmen, killing four. One of those killed was from Long Island, and funeral proceedings for him helped fuel an increase in anti-war activism in the city. There had been smaller clashes between the construction workers and student protesters in the few days proceeding the riot of May 8. In honor of the dead Kent State students New York Mayor Lindsey had ordered flags around the city lowered to half mast.
David Paul Kuhn's 2020 book The Hardhat Riot is filled with detail about the events of that day, as well as analysis of what led up to the riot, and what impact it has had on American politics. Kuhn's book provides a context for the Riot and it's place in American politics that helps shed light on political trends that resonate to this day.
An immediate effect of the riot was a rally on May 20 of 150,000 construction workers. This "anti anti-war" rally was skillfully built on by the Nixon campaign as part of it "Silent Majority" re-election strategy.
That strategy began the pivot of the Republican party from it's business oriented past to a party focused on the white working class and cultural issues. Meanwhile the Democrats were waging an internal struggle between the old style liberalism of Roosevelt and the New Deal, and the New Left's more radical leanings. As this internal struggle continued, the Democrats put less and less focus on "white ethnic" voters.
As Kuhn lays it out, the Hard Hat Riot was a turning point where the white working class began their shift from the Democratic Party to the Republican Party.
The Hardhat Riot is an illuminating book, well researched and important for understanding current trends in national politics. Much of it is politics are amazingly contemporary. I rate it Four Stars ⭐⭐⭐⭐.
January 19, 2021
Great analysis of events leading up to and after this violent day. I'm think for me that these books that focus on a singular event help the author to make their point much easier to understand. It focuses all the analysis so it doesn't get out of hand and it is easy to follow all the threads in this. He breaks it down from U.S. > New York City politically, since NYC is a harbinger of all that is to come for the U.S. I would find it hard to find fault in any analysis, it's so clearly written. The chaos of the riot is clearly written and thoroughly sourced from archives that few have looked at apparently.
Really is amazing that most people were against the Vietnam war but the anti-war protesters were so obnoxious that they got Nixon elected and seemingly shifted politics in the U.S. They were so horribly misguided in their tactics it is astounding-just a complete miss. In wanted to provoke an attack on themselves to generate sympathy, they completely lost the pr war ahead of that. Goes to show how powerful the marketing is if you want a movement to succeed and more importantly don't be obnoxious. It really seems everything hinged on how people didn't like their rude and awful behavior. Lack of a basic manners and decency(as a tactic) changed the country! I mean rationally that's not as important as kids dying in Vietnam(literally life or death) but it appears to have hijacked the entire conversation. It's absurd but that's what appears to have happened. People could only seem to focus on that and not actually talking about getting out of Vietnam. The book quotes polls that say the vast majority of those who wanted the war to end also hated the anti-war protesters more(based on their tactics I'm sure). Not sure how raising a North Viet flag would have been a good idea ever. The hardhat riot and lack of police protection was an extreme overreaction for sure. It was criminal and the attackers should've been arrested. I don't think the people encouraging the hardhat violence really understood how violent it was.
Considering I've never heard much of this event, the societal amnesia seems to point to how ashamed everyone was of the riot and the protestors' tactics.
Really is amazing that most people were against the Vietnam war but the anti-war protesters were so obnoxious that they got Nixon elected and seemingly shifted politics in the U.S. They were so horribly misguided in their tactics it is astounding-just a complete miss. In wanted to provoke an attack on themselves to generate sympathy, they completely lost the pr war ahead of that. Goes to show how powerful the marketing is if you want a movement to succeed and more importantly don't be obnoxious. It really seems everything hinged on how people didn't like their rude and awful behavior. Lack of a basic manners and decency(as a tactic) changed the country! I mean rationally that's not as important as kids dying in Vietnam(literally life or death) but it appears to have hijacked the entire conversation. It's absurd but that's what appears to have happened. People could only seem to focus on that and not actually talking about getting out of Vietnam. The book quotes polls that say the vast majority of those who wanted the war to end also hated the anti-war protesters more(based on their tactics I'm sure). Not sure how raising a North Viet flag would have been a good idea ever. The hardhat riot and lack of police protection was an extreme overreaction for sure. It was criminal and the attackers should've been arrested. I don't think the people encouraging the hardhat violence really understood how violent it was.
Considering I've never heard much of this event, the societal amnesia seems to point to how ashamed everyone was of the riot and the protestors' tactics.
August 9, 2022
I found this a compelling and informative description of the hard hat riots in new York in 1970, their aftermath and nixon’s use of them to help his election. The author makes a pretty convincing case drawing a line from nixon’s actions/philosophies and how they were subsequently used by Reagan/George w. bush and perhaps even moreso by Trump.
Battle between two democratic constituencies in 1970 new York, blue collar working men vs. anti war, emblematic of shift in politics and democrats losing white blue collar working vote
Developing theme of liberals/intellectuals looking down at working class, categorizing their fears as racist
Early battles between students, police in Columbia in new York, Chicago convention
Rise in crime as national concern in 1970, new York described as bastion of crime, failure or downplaying of crime by mayor Lindsay. Lindsay re-elected as 3rd party candidate without blue collar white support.
Class division about who fought and died in Vietnam war
Kent state and battles between liberals firebombing structures
1970 riot in wall street with hardhats/construction workers attacking liberal protesters, cops somewhat standing by, or not responding, somewhat helping in parts, at federal hall, city hall, pace college
Subsequent clashes in other states
National patriotic day in Washington, d.c.
Nixon co-opting the unions and use hard hats as a symbol for strategy to appeal to middle America for re-election, Reagan/bush/trump using similar themes.
Battle between two democratic constituencies in 1970 new York, blue collar working men vs. anti war, emblematic of shift in politics and democrats losing white blue collar working vote
Developing theme of liberals/intellectuals looking down at working class, categorizing their fears as racist
Early battles between students, police in Columbia in new York, Chicago convention
Rise in crime as national concern in 1970, new York described as bastion of crime, failure or downplaying of crime by mayor Lindsay. Lindsay re-elected as 3rd party candidate without blue collar white support.
Class division about who fought and died in Vietnam war
Kent state and battles between liberals firebombing structures
1970 riot in wall street with hardhats/construction workers attacking liberal protesters, cops somewhat standing by, or not responding, somewhat helping in parts, at federal hall, city hall, pace college
Subsequent clashes in other states
National patriotic day in Washington, d.c.
Nixon co-opting the unions and use hard hats as a symbol for strategy to appeal to middle America for re-election, Reagan/bush/trump using similar themes.
October 21, 2020
If you have read the news lately, you’ve seen the word “unprecedented” used to refer to the chaos in our cities and times. Thanks to David Paul Kuhn I now know this is not true. Kuhn’s detailed narrative centered on the 1970 hardhat riot and portrays the struggle between the different classes idea of country, involvement in war, and economic success or lack of. It shows us that we didn’t get where we are today, without some missteps along the way. The blue collar whites were all but abandoned by democrats. Trump picked them up in 2016 to win the presidency.
My thoughts...The challenge as a democracy is to give everyone opportunities to thrive. No one is expendable and we all can contribute. The value of knowing history immeasurably builds hope for today.
Favorite quote...
“Recession is when your neighbor loses their job.
Depression is when you lose your job.”
Recovery is when Jimmy Carter loses his.”
Ronald Regan
My thoughts...The challenge as a democracy is to give everyone opportunities to thrive. No one is expendable and we all can contribute. The value of knowing history immeasurably builds hope for today.
Favorite quote...
“Recession is when your neighbor loses their job.
Depression is when you lose your job.”
Recovery is when Jimmy Carter loses his.”
Ronald Regan
February 9, 2021
The Republicans continually vote against the interests of the white working class, and the Democrats continually offend them The book tells the riveting story of the democrats in the 1960s underestimating the work needed to engage with and represent much of the white working class, or simply losing the will to do that work, and the Republican cynical efforts that resulted in their gaining the support of that group. Between those parts, is the first book length description of the May, 1970 riot in New York City. This was a local riot, largely spontaneous, and done without the internet, but the story of a riot by angry conservatives shutting down an historic building and the government trying to function inside it will have obvious parallels to another event that happened shortly after the book was written. The author shows a gift for bringing out the best of the humanity of many of the controversial, failed, or evil persons who participated in these events.
April 16, 2021
Fascinating telling of the Hardhat Riot (which I knew little about) in lower Manhattan in May 1970 and its consequences on NYC and national politics. As a downtown resident, I enjoyed the context provided by the building of the Twin Towers, the second skyscraper era in this part of NYC, and the creation of BPC. Kuhn provides a generally unbiased look at how Nixon and the Republican Party exploited the disenfranchisement of the white working class by liberal Democrats. In terms of the general state of cultural, societal and political forces in America today, I am left with the view that things haven't changed much in 50 years. While the immense research performed by Kuhn is obvious and appreciated, the very lengthy and sometimes repetitive telling of the riot scenes brought my rating down to a 3+.
July 3, 2021
The Hardhat Riot: Nixon, New York City, and the Dawn of the White Working-Class Revolution is a top notch historical analysis of a seismic shift in America's political allegiances. Kuhn lays out various contexts and backgrounds for the political leaders of the late 60s, political and societal trends, what made up the working class in larger cities, how de-industrialization affected urban manufacturing, along with the events in Vietnam that polarized so many folks at home.
This book is profound and important. It doesn't lay out easy answers. The Hardhat Riot provides multiple perspectives on a complicated series of events and how they helped solidify the "Silent Majority's" support for conservative politicians.
This book is profound and important. It doesn't lay out easy answers. The Hardhat Riot provides multiple perspectives on a complicated series of events and how they helped solidify the "Silent Majority's" support for conservative politicians.
Read
August 19, 2023I found this book facinating, especially in light of the last 7 years. I have gone around and asked just about anyone I could find that was at least 10 when this happened to see if they had a memory of this event, out of about 20 people only 1 has any memory of it or even heard of it.
Too often in politics election outcomes are seen as representing immediate events but Kuhn's thesis that the left was fractuing on lines of class and education all the way back to the late 1960's as epitimized by the Hardhad Riot that occurred in NY right after Kent State is persuasive. As a person that follows politics pretty closely seeing these issues with 50 years of history is a reminder that sometimes we miss what is happening in front of us.
Too often in politics election outcomes are seen as representing immediate events but Kuhn's thesis that the left was fractuing on lines of class and education all the way back to the late 1960's as epitimized by the Hardhad Riot that occurred in NY right after Kent State is persuasive. As a person that follows politics pretty closely seeing these issues with 50 years of history is a reminder that sometimes we miss what is happening in front of us.
January 25, 2025
The central narrative of the riot itself is gripping and engaging. Part two is a real page turner. However, parts one and three I felt were too biased in the direction of the silent majority. Only a passing reference to My Lai gives any indication that the anti-war protestors were protesting not just American lives lost, but the hundreds of thousands of innocent Vietnamese and Cambodian people who were killed by American soldiers or American bombs. The new left was certainly misguided in many of their methods and the left today has wisely evolved past their tactics, but the root of their discontent came from the belief that the lives of Southeast Asians mattered just as much as Americans, a view not widely shared by much of the rest of their compatriots
December 7, 2020
I wanted to love this book. I really did. But I got bored with the monotony of the play-by-play of the actual riot and found myself thinking that what I was spending so many minutes reading would be more interesting, and a better of use of my time, to watch. So I quit at some point in the fracas.
The lack of a central figure hurts the book, too. Too many characters creates a haphazard superficiality that kept me distant instead of pulling me in, which is a shame because the story demands to pull in the reader. But that just didn’t happen, at least not to this reader.
Maybe someone will adapt this book into a screenplay and give us an interesting movie.
The lack of a central figure hurts the book, too. Too many characters creates a haphazard superficiality that kept me distant instead of pulling me in, which is a shame because the story demands to pull in the reader. But that just didn’t happen, at least not to this reader.
Maybe someone will adapt this book into a screenplay and give us an interesting movie.
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