Shelton Stromquist is an emeritus professor of history at the University of Iowa and a past president of the Labor and Working-Class History Association. He is the author of Claiming the City: A Global History of Workers’ Fight for Municipal Socialism.
One of the great labor scholars of the 20th century, David Montgomery was determined to place workers at the center of US history. For Montgomery, rigorous historical analysis couldn’t be divorced from engagement with the working class.
On this day in 1871, the Paris Commune began its brief history before a conservative government drowned it in blood. While it lasted, the Commune sketched out a new way to run a major city based on democracy and the public good, not private profiteering.