We have no fight with capital.
All we want is the full equivalent for
the things which we produce.
Capital can take the rest.
-Big Bill Haywood
Hellraisers Journal, Monday March 2, 1908
Brooklyn, New York – Haywood Speaks at Congress Hall
From The Brooklyn Daily Eagle of February 28, 1908:
W. D. HAYWOOD SPEAKS.
—–
Discusses Goldfield Strike and Labor and Capital,
and Finds Fault With the President.
—–
A meeting of the Socialist party of the Twenty-third Assembly District was held last night [Thursday February 27th] at Congress Hall, Vermont and Atlantic avenues. William D. Haywood of the Western Federation of Miners was introduced as the main speaker of the evening by Chairman Barnet Wolff of the local organization. In his opening remarks Mr. Haywood said that on account of having had to do so much talking up to this time he was so hoarse he would be unable to enter into a lengthy discourse on the principles of Socialism, but would try and favor the audience with as much information as to the present condition of the laboring classes as possible.
In speaking of the miners strike at Goldfield he said that the present situation was brought about in the beginning by the mine owners who were “tenderfeet,” who followed the “pioneers,” the laboring classes, to Goldfield, and gobbled up all the mines, and when the miners were in their power sought to reduce the wages of the workingman and practically starve them into submission or drive them to desperation.
The owners, Mr. Haywood said, also issued a script [scrip] payment, which they would not guarantee, and this, among others, was a cause of the present condition there.
His advice to the unemployed was when they found that they had no visible means of support to maintain their homes and families, and in the event of public charities failing to support them, the best thing he knew of was to go to jail, as experience had taught him that a man in jail is sure of three square meals a day and a place to sleep, and a man in a bread line stood little chance of getting either of them.
In comparing capital with labor, he said that the difference was that capital did not want to work and was not willing to provide means to let the laboring classes earn a decent living, and judges not knowing the class struggle as it stands were not in sympathy with labor.
The attitude of President Roosevelt toward the laboring people was the next point that the speaker brought out, and he stated that the president did not seem to be the friend of labor, but instead assumed the role of a dictator and only worked for the protection of capital under disguise of public peace and welfare, and showed this in ordering the troops to Goldfield. At this point a resolution was drawn, protesting against the presence of the troops, and a committee appointed to lay the matter, in the form of a written communication, before the President.
Another example of the dictatorial way in which the President carries on the affairs of the country was shown by Haywood, who declared that the President ordered Ambassador O’Brien to Japan with an olive branch, and sent Admiral Evans and his warships to the Pacific Coast in hopes this would be the means by which Japan would accept the peace offering. To prove that this is the manner in which Mr. Roosevelt is carrying out his policy, the speaker referred to the stand which the President has taken in regard to the nomination of the next presidential candidate. He said that it looked to him as if Roosevelt was going to hand down the crown from himself to Taft without the help of the people at the polls on next Election Day. The speaker here grew so hoarse that he concluded his remarks by saying that he would have to surrender the floor to some of the others present.
Among other speakers of the evening were Solomon Fieldman, Jacob Rankin and C. H. Vander Porten.
———-
[Photograph added.]
From Pennsylvania’s Reading Times of February 26, 1908:
REPORTER CHARMED
—–THE TRICK IS DONE BY THE PRETTY ADVANCE
AGENT OF WILLIAM D. HAYWOOD.
—–
She has pretty, pearly teeth, a wealth of brown hair and a clear-cut, attractive face, so when she walked up to the desk at the American House yesterday afternoon, and wrote in a bold hand, “Luella Twining, Denver, Col.,” the clerks sat up and smoothed back their hair. They looked startled and rubbed their eyes, as the slip of a young woman announced:
I am the advance agent of William D. Haywood, of the Western Federation of Miners. If reporters call, show them to my room.
A reporter for the Times soon called and found Miss Twining awaiting him, dressed in a pretty frock and looking all the world like a butterfly of society, instead of the serious young student and speaker on economic and industrial problems.
“Ah, Miss Twining-charmed,” said the reporter, blushing and trying to hide his natural admiration. Miss Twining was gracious and offered him a seat.
“Miss Twining, what are the subjects on which Mr. Haywood will address the people, when he speaks here on the 5th of next month?”
[She replied:]
Subjects?
[And she said:]
Well, mainly, he will discuss the beneficial results emanating from an equal and fair distribution of the accumulated hoards of the diabolical capitalistic class.
The reported paused, gulped and proceeded.
“What is your theory of the phenomena of the aurora borealis-that is, what, er-I mean, do you believe that Roose-ahem, pleasant day, Miss Twining?” Miss Twining’s eyes had got in their work. She thought that it was a pleasant day. Furthermore, she was of the opinion that William D. Haywood was a martyr to principle, and she hoped and believed, that the people of Reading will give him a great reception when he speaks at the Auditorium in March.
And they will if they know Miss Twining and are certain that she will be there-and she says she will.
———-
[Photograph added.]
SOURCES
The Brooklyn Daily Eagle
(New York, New York)
-Feb 28, 1908
https://www.newspapers.com/image/53877544/
Reading Times
(Reading, Pennsylvania)
-Feb 26, 1908
https://www.newspapers.com/image/44701503/
IMAGES
HMP, Haywood in Cell, Colliers, June 22, 1907
https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=pst.000068357771;view=2up;seq=372
Luella Twining ab 1907
http://korzybskifiles.blogspot.com/2014/09/chapter-22-just-work-work-work-part-3.html
See also:
Tag: Big Bill Haywood
https://weneverforget.org/tag/big-bill-haywood/
Tag: Goldfield Miners Strike of 1907-1908
https://weneverforget.org/tag/goldfield-miners-strike-of-1907-1908/