Militarism, Empire, and Labor Relations: The Case of Brice P. Disque

Although war and militarization have loomed large in the history of the United States for well over a century, labor historians have only infrequently examined the relationship between American labor and the military. The career of General Brice Pursell Disque suggests the complex flow of ideas and personnel back and forth between labor relations in the military and in the civilian economy. First involved with the management of labor as an officer during the Spanish-American War, Disque went on to serve as a prison warden, the head of an army effort to suppress labor radicalism in the timber industry during the First World War, and in business posts involving collective bargaining. Through Disque we can begin to see the multiple connections between labor relations in the so-called free market of the private sphere and in the decidedly unfree arenas of military and penal life.