Lyr Add: Be a Friend to the Working Man

Subject: Lyr Add: BE A FRIEND TO THE WORKING MANN
From: DavidUsher
Date: 25 Feb 20 - 11:49 PM

BE A FRIEND TO THE WORKING MAN

Our country for a few years past has been in a sad state.
The trials of the working man and his family have been great.
It seems that strikes and riots are increasing every year,
And capitalists to our working men are getting too severe.
Now if the men in Washington would manufacture laws
To assist the workingmen, and help them in their cause,
To give them fair day’s wages, assist them when you can,
Live and let live be your motto, be a friend to the working man.

Chorus:
God never made a man to make of him a slave.
Remember that you cannot take your wealth all to the grave.
So give him fair day’s wages, lend assistance when you can.
Live and let live be your motto, be a friend to the working man.

We cannot all be millionaires, of that I am aware,
But you’d not have grand mansions if the working man weren’t there.
Remember that the rich and poor on each other do depend,
And that each man in his turn needs assistance from a friend.
So do to your fellow man what’s right who toils for daily bread,
Who strives to keep his happy home, and wife and children fed.
He envies not what the rich enjoy but does the best he can,
So you who fortune favours be a friend to the working man.

Should our country be in danger as it was some years ago,
‘Twould be the army of labour that would march to fight the foe.
They’d kiss their wives and babes goodbye, as oftimes done before,
And march off to the battlefield to defend the flag they bore.
It’s only right that they should fight, their cause is right and just
When kept down by wealthy capitalists and syndicates and trusts,
So let capital shake hands with labour to act the noble plan,
No strife there’ll be when this land so free is friend to the working man

according to this UCLA Posting, Tony Saletan, found this tune in sheet music at a museum in Lowell, Mass.

According to Tony in the video below, this a "Motto Song With Chorus" written in Lawrence, Massachusetts in 1895. I will contact him to see if he knows who wrote the tune.

This is the finest union song I have ever heard -- even better than Woody Guthrie's Union Maid song.

The words are useless without the tune -- which is an anthem in its own right. I posted Tony and Irene Saletan doing this song at the Fox Hollow Festival in 1971 from one of my live bootleg recordings. Sorry for the screaming baby in the recording, but that is the way folk singing works. I think that Ellen Kossoy Christenson and her husband were onstage but apparently not singing:

Be A Friend To the Working Man (audio video)

I thank Tony for this incredible find. It is a Guy Carawan "We Shall Overocme" moment. This tune should be belted out Seeger-style wherever jobs are being automated, replaced with H1-B contractors, or exported overseas.

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: BE A FRIEND TO THE WORKING MAN
From: DavidUsher
Date: 26 Feb 20 - 12:16 AM

Now that I think of it, I believe that Robin Christenson is playing banjo on this cut. That is his style of backup banjo. As I recall, Tony was not playing anything but was leading the song. I believe that Irene and Ellen were playing their guitars.