The Hardhat Riot: Nixon, New York City, and the Dawn of the White Working-Class Revolution

“Hey, hey, whaddya say? We support the U.S.A.!” (141). On May 8, 1970, following the U.S. invasion of Cambodia and the killing of four unarmed students at Kent State University, student protestors picketed the New York Stock Exchange, and John Lindsay, the dapper liberal, soon-to-be-ex-Republican mayor of New York, ordered flags to be flown at half-staff. Angered at the affronts to American patriotism, construction workers building the massive World Trade Center headed south to confront protestors. They then hoisted the American flag at Federal Hall, bloodied the hippies in the crowd, with only minimal police intervention, and turned northward to City Hall. After a tense standoff and more rioting in the streets, Lindsay’s staff eventually agreed to raise Old Glory. “Our flag, all the way up, the American flag at full-mast,” said one hardhat. “This is the Silent Majority, but they are not silent anymore. They can’t take those hippies...