Hellraisers Journal: Appeal to Reason Correspondent, John Kenneth Turner, Begins Series on “Government by Gunmen”

Quote Mother Jones, Powers of Privilege ed, Ab Chp III —————

Hellraisers Journal – Thursday May 14, 1914
Mother Jones Praises John Kenneth Turner’s Series, “Government by Gunmen”

From the Appeal to Reason of May 9, 1914:

John Kenneth Turner Opens Fire
On Government by Gunmen

Here follows the introductory article of the “Government by Gunmen” series. In investigating these facts John Kenneth Turner risked his life, as it required his association with gunmen, detectives and the riff-raff of capitalist society. Several times he was warned by friends to drop his investigations. A reformed gunman has written the Appeal urging us to suppress this series if we valued Turner’s life. But the author of “Barbarous Mexico” and the investigator of West Virginia and other recent labor wars, laughs at this threat. He believes that the publicity given to this series will not only protect him but all who are today in danger of being “eliminated” by the murderous detective agencies. Here then is the beginning of the “Government by Gunmen” series. And every week for nearly half a year we shall bring before the public bar the strongest indictment of Capitalism’s Invisible Army that was ever attempted in this country. The Appeal feels that our first and most important duty is to abolish Government by Gunmen. It must be done-it will be done.

By JOHN KENNETH TURNER
Staff Correspondent Appeal to Reason.

In the county jail at Marysville, Cal., a short time ago I talked with two young workingmen who were on trial for murder. A jury of twelve men-not working men-has since declared them guilty and a judge has sentenced them to imprisonment at hard labor for the rest of their natural lives.

Yet these two workingmen had not killed anybody. Nor had they planned or attempted to kill anybody.

One, Richard Ford, is ruined for life-torn from his wife and two little children forever-solely because he became the spokesman for 2,300 hop-pickers who went on strike against intolerable conditions.

The career of the other, Herman Suhr, is blasted-he too, is unfortunate enough to possess a wife and two children-solely because he signed a number of telegrams asking that organizers be sent to the hop-fields to enroll the 2,300 pickers in a labor union.

The arrest, the trial and the conviction of Ford and Suhr was a deliberate frame-up of a ring of capitalists, in which a private detective agency took a necessary and criminal part…..

Turner then goes on to describe visits to workingmen, similarly hunted, terrorized and framed-up by gunmen: in Clinton, Ill., in Kenosha, Wis., and in Hancock, Mich. Turner describes his experience in West Virginia and Colorado:

In the state of West Virginia, one year ago, I saw squads of private detectives hunting peaceable miners with guns and blackjacks. I saw many workingmen who had been cruelly beaten. One was beaten just outside my door at a hotel. Another individual, a justice of the peace, parted from me and a half hour later I saw him covered with bruises, his clothing torn from his back. I myself was hunted; twice my room was entered; once I narrowly missed a shooting affray.

In the county of Las Animas, Colorado, only a few weeks ago, I saw the same private detectives whom I had seen hunting miners in West Virginia, now hunting miners in Colorado, in the garb of state militiamen, carrying the rifles of the state. They paraded the streets; they entered people’s homes and robbed them; they insulted women. They filled the jails with miners. In the jail they practiced tortures equal to the rack and the thumbscrew of the inquisition. I saw them guarding a hospital on a hill, where they held in solitary confinement an old woman of eighty-two.

Yet these miners had not been guilty of any crime. They were attacked by companies of gunmen solely because they were on strike. The sole crime of the old woman is that she exhorted striking miners to be true. She-and they-are victims of a deliberate frame-up of a ring of great corporations, in which a private detective agency has played a necessary and criminal part…..

Detectives in the Ranks

Turner describes the infiltration by private detectives into the ranks of the U. M. W. of A., the I. W. W. and the Socialist Party:

In the city of Indianapolis, I attended an international convention of miners, and on the platform of that convention stood a miner’s tent in which there were 147 bullet holes made by a machine gun that was fired by a private detective.

In the same convention, operating as delegates upon the floor, were a score of private detectives who exerted themselves to block the proceedings and cause friction

In Washington, D. C., and other cities, I procured names of spies and agents of employers, who have worked their way to the heads of local unions, or even upon the executive boards of international organizations, in order to report and betray labor into the hands of its enemies.

In a certain eastern city I talked with a long-time professional labor spy, who detailed the processes whereby he and other private detectives, having divided among themselves all the offices in the local organizations of the Industrial Workers of the World and the Socialist party, exerted themselves to prevent a certain great strike of recent date, and, failing to prevent the strike, of how they broke the strike and defeated the honest working people…..

The Conspiracy Must Be Stopped

Turner conclude’s this week’s segment of “Government by Gunmen:”

The evidence is unmistakable of a nation-wide conspiracy to break up organization of labor, to discipline the workers, to suppress agitators, to outlaw strikes, to nullify the tendencies that have been working toward the establishment of a better society, and to stir the ship of capitalism into the safe harbor of an industrial feudalism-such as was prophesied by W. J. Ghent in a notable pamphlet a dozen years ago.

The facts prove-all abstract theories to the contrary notwithstanding-that the conspiracy is succeeding; that is, that government by gunmen is accomplishing the work that all other repressive agencies of capitalism have been intended to accomplish, but have failed to accomplish.

My conclusion is that this thing must be stopped before the labor movement can go on. That is, that government by gunmen is the supreme issue of the time, that government by gunmen must receive its death blow before the working class movement can take another step forward in this country. I believe that the year 1914 is a year of crisis in the struggle prophesy, I would say that this year will decide whether the people who work for a living will be beaten back into a state of permanent submission to the authority of Big Business, or whether they will grapple with the situation and emerge triumphant and well on their way toward the shining goal of Human Brotherhood…..

LETTER FROM MOTHER JONES TO THE APPEAL ARMY

Included in this week’s Appeal is the following letter from Mother Jones:

Mother Jones Praises
Turner’s Gunmen Articles

Mother Jones who is now visiting the Appeal in Girard, is enthusiastic over the publication of the Turner articles in this paper. Here is a message she has dictated to the Appeal Army:

Dear Comrades:-John Kenneth Turner’s articles on Government by gunmen should receive the widest circulation. Government by Gunmen must go. From my experience in the labor movement I am convinced that our worst enemy today is the private guards of the mine owners and the other exploiters. The injunction judge was our worst enemy yesterday. Today the capitalists hire murders and cutthroats to do their dirty work. When I was in Washington last week I urged members of Congress to have a federal law passed against the employment of private armies by individuals or corporations. I find some of them willing to pass such a law. But they will never act if the working people do not insist that such a law be passed. The pressure must come from the people. Turner’s articles, I am sure, will arouse the people to demand action from congress. Let us avenge the massacre of the women and children of Colorado with a lawful destruction of Rockefeller’s private army of gunmen. Let us restore to this country the constitutional rights and liberties of the people. Down with government by gunmen! It has no place in the United States in the twentieth century!

MOTHER JONES.

Ludlow Massacre, “Not in Mexico But in Colorado” by Rollin Kirby: