Some points have been missed. (1) The practices described do relate to more than one song we are all familiar with. For examples, CLICK HERE and also HERE. As we all know, convicts working in the fields or on railroads sang. From the description in the WSJ, I doubt they sang much in the mines. (2) I think what Sorcha means is that we all know that convicts on chain gangs lived under extremely harsh conditions and worked from sunrise to sundown. Pretty bad, but the conditions described in the mines were a whole lot worse than that. I did not try too hard to convey that, because I don't enjoy writing that kind of prose. If you don't believe me, you may want to try the original article. (3) The article was not specifically intended as an indictment of the South, it was an indictment of United States Steel.

If I wanted to draw a political conclusion about the modern world, it would be that prison labor is a bit suspect, and that private operation of prisons sucks.