Class conflict

United States

Class conflict was present in the earliest days of the U.S. with the struggles between slaveowners and slaves. Since slavery's abolition, class conflict is more often noted in labor-management disputes. In 1933, Edward Hamilton of the Airline Pilot's Association used the term "class warfare" to describe airline management's opposition at the National Labor Board hearings that year. Apart from daily forms of class conflict, there are also periods of crisis or revolution when the conflict takes on a violent nature and involves repression, assault, restriction of civil liberties, and assassinations or death squads.