Coal, People, Politics,
Industrialism run amok.
If Charles Dickens had lived in West Virginia as it was
transformed by industrialization, the bleakness of life
spawned by laissez-faire capitalism would have been his
theme. Scholarly research has portrayed southern Appalachia
as a rural, agrarian ideal corrupted by industrialzation.
See Ronald Eller's Miners, Millhands, and Mountaineers:
Industrialization of the Southern Appalachian South.
As is discussed in the "Forests"
section of this web site, absentee ownership of land and
resources is the rule in West Virginia. After the Civil
War "outsiders," seeking wealth from timber, coal,
oil, and gas, bought and gained control of most of the state's
mineral rights. With money and jobs they nurtured a political
system that kept, and still keeps, their interests protected.
Life and limb were sacrificed to profit-seeking, almost
all of which (profits) went out of state. Dependent upon
jobs provided by the outsiders, local workers remained in
areas with little infrastructure, a puny tax base, poor
schools, inadequate health care, and politicians beholden
to the outsiders.
Disasters and deaths. The
social cost to West Virginians of coal mining is
a subject of novels, scholarly books, movies, family stories,
and political tales; yet, it is too often downplayed when
policy issues arise about coal mining. Too often lives are
lost before long-needed, major reforms are made in laws
governing coal mining. From 1883 through 1969 a total of
21,311 West Virginia miners died on the job.
Coal-waste dams leak and
burst . Of the many coal-mining tragedies which have
beset West Virginians, the most noticeable during the age
of television has been the deadly1972 Buffalo Creek
flood. A mountain of water burst forth from a "gob
pile" (coal-impoundment) dam along Buffalo Creek in
Logan County. Once again the nation's eyes were on death
and destruction in West Virginia. Death (125 people),
emotional trauma, property damage (500 homes destroyed),
publicity, excuses ("act of God"), litigation,
then reform (SMCRA). For more: http://www.wvgazette.com/static/series/buffalocreek/.
More recently in October
2000, Martin County in eastern Kentucky entered the
national spotlight. An A.T. Massey Coal Co. subsidiary has
a 72-acre coal waste dam that is located near a coal preparation
plant, which is on top of abandoned underground coal mines.
A leak in the dam occurred which released about 250
million gallons of thick coal slurry through the underground
mines into two tributaries of the Tug Fork of the Big Sandy
River which enters the Ohio River at Kenova, West Virginia.
One huge mess! It would be like pulling the plug
in a gargantuan bath tub.
A massive cleanup followed
the befouling of these streams. In February 2001 MSHA revoked
the permit to operate the Kentucky impoundment as did the
Kentucky Natural Resources Cabinet. The federal EPA is developing
a restoration plan. In April 2001 American Rivers declared
the Big Sandy River as the seventh most endangered river
in the U.S. WVDEP in June 2001 sued Massey's Martin County
Coal Co. concerning the spill.
Serious questions have been
raised about proper inspection and enforcement by two federal
agencies -- MSHA and OSM. In particular, because there was
a prior breach of the same sludge pond dam, one wonders
if other measures should have been taken.
At least 220 coal-waste dams
in Appalachia are located on top of or adjacent to underground
coal mines. MSHA once again is examining 77 [32 in W.Va.]
or more such dams, having moderate breakthrough potential
into underground mines. MSHA data can be found at:
http://www.msha.gov/impoundments/impoundmenthp.htm . WVDEP
required operators of 51 coal waste dams to prove their
The National Research
Council, a part of the National Academies, which includes
the National Academy of Sciences, is studying what to do
about coal waste dams. The study was authorized by Congress.
The panel appears to be weighted with members who have ties
to the coal industry.
Whether it's fatalistic or
realistic, other sludge-holding facilities will fail. In
Summer 2001 Massey operations in West Virginia had sludge
spills in June (30,000 gallons), July (50,000 gallons),
and August (15,000 gallons).
What are we willing to destroy to keep coal mining
jobs? Take Blair Mountain in Logan
County, for example. To that rough, horseshoe-shaped
ridge in 1921 about 15,000 union coal miners marched to
wage war with Logan County Sheriff Don Chafin and his nonunion
forces. The story engaged the American people. President
Harding sent in federal troops to quell the dispute. The
encounter was one of the most important episodes of our
national labor history. Arch Coal wants to decapitate
Blair Mountain to remove its coal. Hobet Mining's
project will produce jobs. At what cost to all
Politics. The influence
of the coal industry in West Virginia politics
remains strong, as can be seen by Governor Underwood's approval
of 1998 legislation allowing strip-mining companies to fill
in double the acreage of valleys without mitigation,
a bill opposed by federal regulators and many within West
Virginia's DEP. In the twentieth century being governor
usually meant being beholden to the coal industry.
One is reminded of the fate
of Governor William Marland , the son of a coal miner.
Three days after his inauguration in 1953, he startled the
Legislature by proposing to tax natural resource industries
so that schools and road-building could be funded. He
said the state was "slowly being relegated to a poor
status from both a cultural and economic viewpoint."
Coal was too strong for Marland whose attempt failed
as did much of his governorship thereafter. He was followed
in office by Cecil Underwood, who was friendlier to coal
producers than was Marland. Equally shocking, in 1965, on
national television news, Marland, a recovering alcoholic,
was interviewed after he was discovered driving a taxicab
in Chicago. Defeated and forlorn, Bill Marland died not
long after his re-emergence into public awareness.
In the early twentieth century
two governors had proposed a severance tax on coal -- Governor
Albert White in 1902 and Henry Hatfield in 1914. Both acknowledged
the vast wealth leaving West Virginia from coal mining.
Both strongly criticized the millionaires who lived in large
northeastern cities and who paid little or no taxes on their
Not until the 1970s did
the coal severance tax become law. It essentially
is a sales tax on coal (5% of the price) and acts as a natural
resource depletion allowance, being (75%) distributed to
the coal-producing counties. For thin-seam coal, which
is the kind recovered in destroying mountaintops, the tax
is only 1% to 2%. Unfortunately, the money tends not to
be spent for economic development.
Just imagine how different
West Virginia would be today had our elected representives
enacted a substantial severance tax to fund education and
roads a hundred years ago. What a pity!
Jobs. Interestingly enough,
as coal production in the Mountain State attains record
highs, coal mining jobs have shrunk by over
eighty percent since the late 1940s. In 1999 about
15,000 working coal miners were employed in West Virginia
in contrast to almost 125,000 employed coal miners in 1948,
with equivalent tonnage production. While mining jobs have
declined precipitously, trade-service jobs in West Virginia
have increased from 127,000 to 392,000 in the same period
of time. Most of these jobs are low-paying.
In recent years independent
contractors have employed persons with specialized skills
in the production of coal in numbers larger than the number
of coal miners. Coal mining still provides about 50,000
direct jobs, including miners, mine contractors, and mine
supply companies. Employment in strip mining is relatively
small compared to the amount of coal produced and serves
as financial incentive for coal companies to avoid deep
mining and strip the coal instead.
For many decades education and coal mining jobs have been
like oil and water -- they didn't mix. Strong backs didn't
require strong minds. The social price has been a stubborn
cultural disdain among too many people in the coal fields
for a sound education.
To the chagrin of the state
Chamber of Commrce, West Virginia's productivity continues
to fall behind. Why? The cause is not the work ethic but
is our lack of educated, skilled workers, according to a
2001 Marshall University study entitled "The Myth of
Economic Diversification." Productive states are those
with skilled workers producing expensive products.
Money. In the pursuit
of public support numbers are the coal industry's
strong suit. The following figures primarily
are for 1996. West Virginia's low sulphur coal gave
it the highest coal income in the country, although the
state's tonnage, which was 16 % of all U.S. mined coal,
was second to that of Wyoming. Total coal sales of $3.62
billion were close to the $3.98 billion from all mauufacturing
activities in West Virginia. Coal companies and
electric utilities, which burn the coal, paid almost 60
percent of all state business taxes.
In the southern coal fields,
coal mining is a dominant employer -- Boone County
(42%), Mingo County (30%), and Logan County (13.6%).
Coal miners' wages are almost double the average wage of
other West Virginia workers. Coal mining creates a
multitude of jobs in other industries such as power generation,
steelmaking, and other machinery manufacturing. Big Coal
gets what it wants in these counties, and that does not
include diversifying the local economy.
Politicians are loathe
to take actions which hold down or eliminate coal-mining
jobs. Miners and their families vote; mountains
and streams do not. Regulators, subject to influence
by elected officials, shift and waffle and delay to accomodate
the wishes of public office holders.
When Arch Coal in late 1998
announced hundreds of future layoffs at its (Hobet Mining)
proposed 3,100-acre mine in Logan County, if EPA
contiuued to block issuance of a Clean Water Act permit,
the screams could be heard throughout West Virginia and
in politicians' offices. The state DEP caved in fast
and issued its permit contingent upon the federal permit.
EPA apparently was poised to accomodate the coal industry
which knows how to make power plays. The third branch
of government, the judiciary, stepped into the fray to decide
the outcome. [See "Valley fills"].
Fate. The pity
is that mountaintop-removal advocates are doomed players
in a drama greater than they are. The amount of
West Virginia coal is finite and the mining process continues
to evolve in a way requiring less miners. When the
coal goes, so will the workers and their communities and
West Virginia is dotted
with hundreds of lifeless communities and shrinking towns
once dependent upon coal mining. Just travel to McDowell
County, if proof is required [population: 1950 - 98,887;
1990 - 35,233], or read the best-selling book Rocket
Boys or see the movie based on that book, October
Exhaustion of resources and
death of dependent communities are the ultimate fate
of every extractive industry on the planet. West Virginia
historian John Alexander Williams calls coal a curse for
the land and the people.
Big Coal and other out-of-state
landholders own huge tracts of land throughout the state.
Only they can decide its usage.
upon coal as the bedrock of West Virginia's economy is unwise
and shortsighted. Destroying our mountains and
streams for short-term profits and jobs is a legacy which
future generations of residents and visitors will only wonder:
"How could they possibly have done that?" "It's
money that matters..." goes the old Randy Newman song.
And so it is in this land of capitalism.
The future. We are
living through a once-in-a-lifetime experience -- a shift
to a New Economy, an information based
technology economy. America is no stranger to dramatic
shifts in its economy.
The agrarian economy
began to change in 1845 when cheap steel enabled the Industrial
Revolution. By 1870 the new industrial economy was
displacing its predecessor and the transition resulted in
a series of panics, crashes, and deflation. Mass production
slowly became the social currency helping to unite disparate
groups of immigrants and easing the economic pain.
Our society's open, fluid approach integrated university
research and production of goods; technology was harnassed
for the consumer. Cheap oil, readily available by
1918, fueled the changes.
By 1929 the mass consumption
economy was displacing the industrial economy and that
transition found railroads going bankrupt and steel mills
closing. In time the great American middle class developed.
Around 1981 when IBM introduced its personal computer, the
new information based technology economy began, based on
Today more than fifteen
percent of the total national economy is the New Economy.
Coal is not part of the New Economy. In West
Virginia we better prepare for the New Economy, one without
coal as a significant economic force. Since 1950
goods-producing jobs in West Virginia have fallen by fifty
percent while service-producing jobs have increased almost
The mountains of West Virginia
have withstood much in their many millions of years of existence.
They possess an enduring mystery that envelops all
who come within their fold. In the end they will prevail
over those who exploit their essence for money.
Last updated on Tuesday, September 4, 2001