Readers of this blog will need no introduction to James Connolly or Tommy Mckearney. Eirigi, which is Irish for ‘uprising’, sponsored this 2nd Annual Connolly commemoration (below) at Arbour Hill over the weekend, the 92nd anniversary of Connolly’s excecution. Last year Bernadette McAliskey gave the inaugural speech.
I think that US socialists need to step up to the plate on Connolly. Though Connolly’s stamp on Irish politics in incontestable we rarely think of his role in the birth of our own modern workers’ movement. Connolly was instrumental in the early years and growth of both the IWW and the Socialist Party as well as the development of American Marxism.
Next year we should have our own Connolly commemoration in this spirit. Our movement is, in part, here because of Connolly. What would the history of the class struggle in the States be without his contribution to the development of the Wobblies and the SP?
We face many of the same needs that the working class faced in Connolly’s time; the need for political organization and the need for ’social unionism’. Connolly, in part answered in a way that gave rise to two of the seminal working class organizations in US history. What and how did Connolly confront the same questions needing answers today?
Connolly was an internationalist, truly. His vibrant life brushed whole continents, motivated and educated tens of thousands and shook the ground under the feet of our enemy.
This year Tommy McKearney, appropriately, was asked to give the speech presented here. He places Connolly in today and tomorrow with an unapologetically and inspiring speech on the continued necessity of the communist project in the face of modern capitalism. The same project for which Connolly died and lived; and how he lived!
James Connolly
A song by Patrick Galvin
Where oh where is our James Connolly
Where oh where is that gallant man
He is gone to organise the Union
That working men they may yet be free
Oh who then who will lead the van
Oh who then who will lead the van
Who but our James Connolly
The hero of the working man
Who will carry high the burning flag
Who will carry high the burning flag
Who but our James Connolly
Could carry high the burning flag
They carried him up to the jail
They carried him up to the jail
And they shot him down on a bright May morning
And quickly laid him in his grave
Who mourns the death of this great man
Who mourns the death of this great man
Oh bury me down in yon green garden
With union men on every side
So they buried him down in yon green garden
With union men on every side
They swore they would form a mighty union
That James Connolly’s name might be filled with pride
Where oh where is our James Connolly
Where oh where is that gallant man
He is gone to organise the Union
That working men they may yet be free
“Where, Oh Where is Our James Connolly?”
Readers of this blog will need no introduction to James Connolly or Tommy Mckearney. Eirigi, which is Irish for ‘uprising’, sponsored this 2nd Annual Connolly commemoration (below) at Arbour Hill over the weekend, the 92nd anniversary of Connolly’s excecution. Last year Bernadette McAliskey gave the inaugural speech.
I think that US socialists need to step up to the plate on Connolly. Though Connolly’s stamp on Irish politics in incontestable we rarely think of his role in the birth of our own modern workers’ movement. Connolly was instrumental in the early years and growth of both the IWW and the Socialist Party as well as the development of American Marxism.
Next year we should have our own Connolly commemoration in this spirit. Our movement is, in part, here because of Connolly. What would the history of the class struggle in the States be without his contribution to the development of the Wobblies and the SP?
We face many of the same needs that the working class faced in Connolly’s time; the need for political organization and the need for ’social unionism’. Connolly, in part answered in a way that gave rise to two of the seminal working class organizations in US history. What and how did Connolly confront the same questions needing answers today?
Connolly was an internationalist, truly. His vibrant life brushed whole continents, motivated and educated tens of thousands and shook the ground under the feet of our enemy.
This year Tommy McKearney, appropriately, was asked to give the speech presented here. He places Connolly in today and tomorrow with an unapologetically and inspiring speech on the continued necessity of the communist project in the face of modern capitalism. The same project for which Connolly died and lived; and how he lived!
James Connolly
Where oh where is our James Connolly
Where oh where is that gallant man
He is gone to organise the Union
That working men they may yet be free
Oh who then who will lead the van
Oh who then who will lead the van
Who but our James Connolly
The hero of the working man
Who will carry high the burning flag
Who will carry high the burning flag
Who but our James Connolly
Could carry high the burning flag
They carried him up to the jail
They carried him up to the jail
And they shot him down on a bright May morning
And quickly laid him in his grave
Who mourns the death of this great man
Who mourns the death of this great man
Oh bury me down in yon green garden
With union men on every side
So they buried him down in yon green garden
With union men on every side
They swore they would form a mighty union
That James Connolly’s name might be filled with pride
Where oh where is our James Connolly
Where oh where is that gallant man
He is gone to organise the Union
That working men they may yet be free
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