Hellraisers Journal, Sunday April 8, 1917
From the American Socialist: Ryan Walker Comments of Militarism
“Russianizing America” by Ryan Walker:
The speculators, the employers,
the plutocracy…with lies and sophistries
they will whip up our blood until we are savage-
and then we’ll fight and die for them.
-Jack Reed
Hellraisers Journal, Saturday April 7, 1917
From The Seattle Star: “War Is Begun…Wilson Signs Declaration”
News of America’s entrance into the War in Europe displaced all news of the ongoing Tracy Trial from the front page of last evening’s edition of The Seattle Star:
———-
Regarding the ongoing Tracy Trial, we were able to find a small article on page two of the same edition of the Star with the headline:
“Jury Wants to Hurry the Case”
It appears that the Jury is getting bored as the Defense fights to save the life of Fellow Worker Tom Tracy.
———-
From The Masses of April 1917:
WHOSE WAR?
John Reed
The socialist sun is rising.
It is our only hope.
-Ida Crouch-Hazlett
Hellraisers Journal, Saturday April 6, 1907
Boise, Idaho – “How the Prisoners Use Their Time”
From the Montana News of April 4, 1907:
In Boise Prison
—–How Prisoners Use their Time-
An Interview With Moyer and Haywood in Jail
The guard turned the key, the iron doors clanked on their hinges and I stood in the midst of a ground floor room in the Ada county jail, shaking hands with Haywood. Golden sunshine flooded the apartment, the windows out upon the beautiful grassy sward of the courthouse lawn, the room was large and comfortable, even to a rocking chair, which was hospitably tendered me, books and writing materials were on the table, and I-well, I was relieved.
“Stone walls do not a prison make, Nor iron bars a cage.”
Those were my first words. Haywood smiled when I said them.
“Yes,” he replied, “I could have repeated them for you.”
The Ada county court-house stands in the midst of a beautiful square, in certainly one of the most exquisite mountain towns a tourist ever sees. It reminds one of the Colorado Spring. It has beautiful, level streets, a well-built business portion and a general air of “prosperity” and comfort. The snow-capped mountains lie around it, but do not encroach upon the town. The Boise river slips through a broad valley like a stream of molten silver. The little city has a population of about 15,000, and no one can tell you what supports them. It is not a mining town, it is not an agricultural town. It is not even on the main line of the railroad. But here is a bustling city, beautiful homes, and the state capital.
Next to the court-house is the red brick capital building-small but neat, and tastefully painted. The grounds are well-kept and decorated, and adorned with large healthy trees that are one of the chief beauties of the town.
Hellraisers Journal, Friday April 5, 1907
From the Montana News: Haywood Trial to Begin May 9th
A letter, recently released by the President of the United States, was published in the Washington Evening Star April 2nd, wherein the President declares that Eugene Debs, Charles Moyer, and Bill Haywood are “undesirable citizens.” This follows by only one day the news that Fellow Worker William D. Haywood will go on trial for his life in Boise, Idaho, on May 9th.
The following is the relevant part of the letter written by President Roosevelt to Congressman J. S. Sherman on October 8, 1906 regarding the President’s feud with E. H. Harriman. The last paragraph of the President’s letter reads:
So much for what Mr. Harriman said about me personally. Far more important are the additional remarks he made to you as you inform me, when you asked him if he thought it was well to see Hearstism and the like triumphant over the republican party. You inform me that he told you that he did not care in the least, because those people were crooks and he could buy them; that whenever he wants legislation from a state legislature he could buy it; that he “could buy Congress,” and that if necessary he “could buy the judiciary.” This was doubtless said partly in boastful cynicism and partly in a mere burst of bad temper because of his objection to the interstate commerce law and to my actions as President. But it shows a cynicism and deep-seated corruption which make the man uttering such sentiments, and boasting, no matter how falsely, of this power to perform such crimes, at least as undesirable a citizen as Debs, or Moyer, or Haywood. It is because we have capitalists capable of uttering such sentiments and capable of acting on them that there is strength behind sinister agitators of the Hearst type. The wealthy corruptionist and the demagog who excites, in the press or on the stump, in office or out of office, class against class and appeals to the basest passions of the human soul are fundamentally alike and the are equally enemies of the republic. I was horrified, as was [Elihu] Root, when you told us today what Harriman had said to you. As I say,if you meet him you are entirely welcome to show him this letter, although, of course it must not be made public unless required by some reason of public policy, and then only after my consent has first been obtained.
Why should the workingmen fight for
the robbers of Wall street?
Let them fight their own battles.
-Mother Jones
That old blood sucker,
the kaiser, ought to
be kicked off his throne.
-Mother Jones
Hellraisers Journal, Wednesday April 4, 1917
Des Moines, Iowa – Mother Jones Speaks Out on European War
Overnight, perhaps reacting to the War Resolution now before Congress upon the request of President Wilson for same, Mother reversed her stand regarding American involvement in the terrible slaughter now taking place between the waring nations of Europe. In an interview reported by the April 2nd edition of The Des Moines Register, Mother declared:
I hate war. We must not throw our American workingmen into olive drab uniforms, stick guns in their hands, and ship them over to France to be fresh slaughter for the cannons of the devilish kings of Europe.
If John D Rockefeller, Morgan, the Guggenheims, or Wall street wants to see Germany defeated, let them go over and fight in the allies’ trenches. Why should the workingmen fight for the robbers of Wall street? Let them fight their own battles, says I!
The next day, the Register reported that Mother had “abandoned her neutrality:”
That old blood sucker, the kaiser, ought to be kicked off his throne, and if he ever starts anything with this country we will lick hell out of him if I have to raise a regiment of 10,000 women myself.
Thus “Mother” Jones, firebrand speaker, abandoned her neutrality in a speech that held spellbound the miners of the thirteenth district, U. M. W. A., who were celebrating the nineteenth anniversary of the securing of the eight-hour day for miners at the Coliseum yesterday afternoon.
Hellraisers Journal, Tuesday April 3, 1917
Seattle, Washington – Prosecution Calls Ex-Sheriff Don McRae
Everett Defense News Letter of March 30, 1917:
SEATTLE, Wash., March 30th, 1917,-The case of the Prosecution in the trial of Thomas H. Tracy is drawing to a close. It is probable that the Prosecution will rest its case tomorrow, Saturday the 31st.
THE SHERIFF TESTIFIES.
EX-Sheriff Donald McRae, famous leader of the Commercial Club vigilantes, was one of the star witnesses for the Prosecution. His appearance and demeanor, however, were not calculated to impress the jury very favorably. McRae showed that he did not belie his reputation for toughness. His callous admissions of brutality in the affair of the launch “Wanderer” on Sept. 22nd, when Capt. Mitten and several passengers were taken off the boat and severely beaten up and jailed, aroused nothing but a keen sense of loathing in the court.
In the matter of the Beverly Park atrocity, McRae also claimed ignorance. He admitted that he had helped to kidnap 41 workingmen and drive them in autos to Beverly Park but, when questioned about the gauntlet-running that took place there, he maintained that he had driven straight back after unloading his human freight, and therefore had witnessed nothing.
WEIRD CONCEPTION OF
SHERIFF’S DUTIES.The hot cross-examination of Attorney George Vanderveer, for the Defense, disturbed the ex-sheriff a good deal. There were some startling revelations of the manner in which the County officials had taken up the government of the City of Everrett, probably because the Sheriff and his deputies were more willing to carry out the mandates of the lumber barons than were the city officials. The arbitrary jailing of men for no earthly reason other than that they were union men or believed in Free Speech, the beating-up and deportation of others,-all this without any formal charging or commitment-these things were painfully drawn from the enraged but helpless ex-Sheriff by the persistent cross-examination.
Hellraisers Journal, Monday April 2, 1917
From the International Socialist Review: “The Deadly Parallel”
“The Deadly Parallel” was first published in Solidarity, organ of the Industrial Workers of the World, on March 24, 1917, and is republished in this month’s edition of the Review:
I have no country to fight for;
my country is the earth,
and I am a citizen of the world.
-Eugene V. Debs
Hellraisers Journal, Sunday April 1, 1917
From The Masses: “The Way of Ancient Rome” by Art Young
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