Story Behind the Song
Originally written in 1992 about Columbus's erroneous claim to have discovered a new world, and updated as a celebration of the multi-national working class and its struggles.
Lyrics
Boat People
Pardon me, bud, I thought you understood,
we’re all boat people here--
Our union’s a union of immigrants,
our history’s crystal clear.
We’re many songs and many flavors,
our color is the rainbow sign,
And we learn each other’s language,
as we walk the picket line.
Chorus:
Some of us came on slave ships,
some in a birch-bark canoe.
Kayaks, rafts, slow boats and fast,
airships and steamships too,
Some landed on the banks of the Rio Grande,
some on Plymouth Rock,
But all of us are boat people,
the new kids on the block.
The folks who built the railroads
were a multinational team.
Chang and Mike drove a million spikes
and bridged a thousand streams.
Hans and Vlasek made the steel,
Giovanni dug the coal,
Vanderbilt took the profits,
but we made the engines roll. (Chorus)
In Lawrence, Massachusetts, back in 1912,
Women and children went on strike,
the boss said, “Go to hell!”
Our slogan was Bread and Roses
in fifteen different tongues,
The fight was rough, but we all hung tough,
and that Wobbly union won. (Chorus)
From the fields of California
to the slaughterhouse of St. Paul,
We all say, “ˇSi, se puede!”
when la migra comes to call.
They call us Chiapas rebels,
the Mau Mau, the Viet Cong,
In other words, we’re union,
and the union makes us strong. (Chorus)
There’s an army along the Rio Grande,
a navy off Key West,
And the only green card they want to see
is American Express.
But we sail into the sweatshops,
and we rally on the streets.
We’re rockin’ solidarity
in the belly of the beast. (Chorus)
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