editorial

Extractive industry, predominantly the mining and stripping of coal, has dominated West Virginia’s economy, politics and, unfortunately, more and more its landscape since the out-of-state opportunists dreaming of financial empires first came here about 100 years ago. They came to wheedle away lands from the populace living here then to take over the incredible natural wealth that should have been the legacy of West Virginians.

I want to talk mostly about mountain top removal mining.

I live in northwest Raleigh County way up in a "holler." The land has had a chance to recover somewhat from the earlier logging frenzy and misguided attempts to plant crops on steep slopes.

It is very beautiful here with blooming dogwoods, the song of birds and the trees celebrating and reaffirming the natural world they're with new raiment of green.

However, not far from my "backyard" are tracts of ugly reclaimed strip mine sites, a deep mine gone defunct except to spew out acid drainage, and valley fills – a little farther out, active mountain top removal sites. Every so often a blast goes off from one of those sites that shakes the foundations of my dwelling as well as my tranquillity.

There has been a dominant theme for the past century – the exploiters, read King Coal, and the politicians in tandem arrayed against ordinary citizens.

Back in the 20's the coal companies decided that it was better for profits to stop beating up on and shooting disgruntled miners (they would do this "legally" by having their hired thugs deputized, or getting the governor to bring in the militia). Part of the reason was that they couldn’t get away with it any more – the leadership of persons like John L. Lewis and a new sympathy to the working man ushered in by the New Deal with protective laws put a stop to the extreme measures. Insidiously, the coal companies have used a much more effective approach where an atmosphere of thought control was established. There were three aspects to this; propaganda, putting the blame on others, and fear.

With the wealth to control the distribution of information, they contrived to ensure that every local institution in towns heavily dependent on coal – the newspapers, the Chambers of Commerce, the Boards of Education, local radio stations were able to perpetuate the myths that coal mining brought jobs and prosperity, that without coal the whole region would be permanently in economic disarray, that to oppose coal was seen as being in some way unpatriotic, that the dangers of black lung and water pollution were overblown, that wells and springs drying up were caused by unknown factors, but certainly not by mining. In the case of mountain top removal that the mountains that had nourished those that lived in them were somehow ugly and useless, and flat land was much more desirable. Joseph Goebbels, Hitler’s minister of propaganda, said that if you tell a lie often enough people will believe it.

They say jobs. Since the advent of mountain top removal strip mining jobs are disappearing at a phenomenal rate, especially union jobs. It is the corporation’s drive to maximize profits that makes it desirable for them to eliminate as much payroll as they can. In the last decade mining jobs losses have dropped about 55% – largely because of unceasing mechanization, especially in strip mining. According to Larry Gibson, at the rate the mining jobs are being lost there won’t be any in ten years.

Cecil Roberts as president of the UMWA is stuck in a dilemma – in the environmentalists’ struggle to curb mountain top removal mining, he has opted to go for the support of the union’s natural enemy, the coal companies. Those companies that still hire union miners are catering to the union to get their good will –using them for their ends just as they use everybody and everything they can for gain.

If the miners were having problems from layoffs due to being replaced by machines, it was easy to throw off the blame to someone else. Well, it’s those outside agitators coming in to mind the business of West Virginians!

At first the outside "agitators" were union folks who ran a tough gauntlet in trying to bring truth to the mining communities. Now the "outsiders" are environmentalists. The coal folks have established another myth that those opposing mountain top removal mining are from out-of -state. Actually it is the owners of the mining companies that are from out of state in most instances.

Then the fear element is pervasive in keeping the coalfields residents from going against coal. The coal companies have achieved through their buildup of a pro-coal atmosphere in finding that a goodly number of aggressive folks will voluntarily do their bidding by using threats and harassment to bring into line anyone with too many anti-coal complaints. It takes a lot of guts to oppose coal in the coal fields.

I don’t know of anyone of my out-of-state friends who are not at least puzzled by the attitude they see of West Virginians allowing this horror to continue. So why don’t you stop it? They have no idea how entrenched King Coal is in this state with most of the media more or less sympathetic to their plunder. They have no idea of the intimidation visited on those who would dare defy coal. When the law enforcement is allied with Big Coal, who can get any protection from those who would use threats of violence to get disgruntled citizens to keep quiet.

Now we have a new governor. And yes, guess what – he, too, has taken to heart the coal bible which has been handed down from every other governor of this state, and from this he’s got the coal religion. (No matter that Big Coal gave handsomely to his campaign).

Gov. Bob Wise a few days ago offered a vigorous defense of mountaintop removal coal mining and praised the rejection of federal court-ordered limits on valley fill size. The governor said that he recently visited a mountaintop removal site and stood at the toe of a large valley fill.

"The water coming out at the end into a small pond was the same quality or better quality than it was before," Wise said. "And, there was flat land that was available for housing or for development or for other activities."

That is the standard mantra without even a new twist to it. As uncreative as a lead pipe.

With the new life being bred into coal and with new technologies that can mine out the thin seams, my insecurity here in the hollow increases by the day. I can envision no southern West Virginia mountains left if the supposedly 200 years supply of coal is fully mined out – it will all be leveled and "reclaimed."

Plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose. The more things change the more they stay the same.