>>The existing government mandates - aka "laws" - exist as a compromise. They prohibit a company like Amazon from engaging in certain practices, and in exchange, some union practices are prohibited.
There is nothing of note that unions could do, that isn't enabled by contract-liberty-violating labor regulations and wouldn't break the law. Picketing Amazon's premises, and beating up replacement workers, as the illegal strikes of the past did, was justifiably punished by the state before the labor regulation era, and for that reason, unions had very little power.
All the power they acquired came from laws that abridged the freedom to contract.
>>The economic power of the Boston Journeymen Bootmaker's Society came from the ability to quit - collectively.
Industry would gladly give unions the power to collectively quit, if it meant they too would have their contract liberty restored, so they could choose to not employ unionized workers, or to replace them without government punishing them.
>>I'll counter when a decidedly not benign - the Ludlow massacre, where companies worked with the government to attack striking coal workers, including firing MACHINE GUNS at them and their families.
This leaves out a seminally important precursor to the attack on the striker's camp:
>>When leasing the sites, the union had selected locations near the mouths of canyons that led to the coal camps in order to block any strikebreakers' traffic.[17] The company hired the Baldwin–Felts Detective Agency to protect the new workers and harass the strikers.
"block any strikebreakers' traffic" means viciously attack and sometimes murder strikebreakers, who were there to replace them.
The strikers were a violent force, engaging in aggression. The only basis for their actions is a victimhood narrative that argues the employer and replacement workers do not have a right to their contract liberty when workers strike. If you accept this illiberal premise, then of course any violence that strikers engage in is justified, and any response is a "massacre".
Speaking of precursors, your own citation [17] points out the dead strikebreaker was found AFTER company guards had used the machine gun on the Death Special to kill a miner and injure two kids.
] Through various agencies the company was able to hire men to take a more aggressive stance against the striking workers, armed guards were supplied to harass strikers and union organisers. An armoured car with a mounted machine gun was even built which was appropriately named the ‘Death Special’ by the company guards. As tensions escalated between CF+I and the strikers, miners dug protective pits beneath their tents to shield themselves and their families against random sniping and machine gun fire from the company guards. On October 17th the ‘Death Special’ was used to attack the Forbes tent colony resulting in the death of one miner. A young girl was shot in the face and another boy’s legs riddled with machine gun bullets also. Confrontations between striking miners and scab workers were also resulting in additional deaths. On October 28th the Governor of Colorado, Elias M Ammons called out the National Guard to take control of the situation.
] The miners however, persevered. Union members and organisers were kidnapped and beaten, shots being fired into the camps from strike-breakers and the National Guardsmen were a constant occurrence and the harsh winter was taking its toll. Worried about the continuing cost of keeping the National Guard in the field, Governor Ammons accepted an offer from the Rockefeller family to put their men in National Guard uniforms.
] On March 10th the body of a strike-breaker was found near railroad tracks near the Forbes tents and the National Guard’s General Chase ordered the colony to be destroyed. The strike was reaching a climax, and National Guardsmen were ordered to evict the remaining tent colonies around the mines, despite them being on private property leased by the UMWA.
] Ludlow was the largest of the colonies, and on the morning of April 20th 1914, troops fired into the camp with machine guns, anyone who was seen moving in the camp was targeted. The miners fired back, and fighting raged for almost fourteen hours.
The mine owners were an even more violent force, also engaging in aggression. The Pinkerton detective agency is still prohibited by law from doing business with the government of the United States or of the District of Columbia.
> any response is a "massacre".
It's been widely called the Ludlow Massacre for over a century.
Your putting words into my mouth means you would rather use personal attacks than talk about the real issue, which is that the government laws are supposed to take the edge off both union AND corporate power.
If you take away laws that support union power without also taking away laws that prohibit otherwise legal union power, like the ability to negotiate for a closed shop, then you aren't actually in favor of contract liberty but of corporate power.
There is nothing of note that unions could do, that isn't enabled by contract-liberty-violating labor regulations and wouldn't break the law. Picketing Amazon's premises, and beating up replacement workers, as the illegal strikes of the past did, was justifiably punished by the state before the labor regulation era, and for that reason, unions had very little power.
All the power they acquired came from laws that abridged the freedom to contract.
>>The economic power of the Boston Journeymen Bootmaker's Society came from the ability to quit - collectively.
Industry would gladly give unions the power to collectively quit, if it meant they too would have their contract liberty restored, so they could choose to not employ unionized workers, or to replace them without government punishing them.
>>I'll counter when a decidedly not benign - the Ludlow massacre, where companies worked with the government to attack striking coal workers, including firing MACHINE GUNS at them and their families.
This leaves out a seminally important precursor to the attack on the striker's camp:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ludlow_Massacre#Strike
>>When leasing the sites, the union had selected locations near the mouths of canyons that led to the coal camps in order to block any strikebreakers' traffic.[17] The company hired the Baldwin–Felts Detective Agency to protect the new workers and harass the strikers.
"block any strikebreakers' traffic" means viciously attack and sometimes murder strikebreakers, who were there to replace them.
The strikers were a violent force, engaging in aggression. The only basis for their actions is a victimhood narrative that argues the employer and replacement workers do not have a right to their contract liberty when workers strike. If you accept this illiberal premise, then of course any violence that strikers engage in is justified, and any response is a "massacre".