Their only crime is
Loyalty to the Working Class.
-Eugene V. Debs
Hellraisers Journal, Tuesday March 12, 1907
Girard, Kansas – Eugene V. Debs Fights for Our Idaho Comrades
From the Appeal to Reason of March 9, 1907:
KIDNAPING CASE IN CONGRESS
—–Appeal Succeeds in Placing Facts of the
Moyer-Haywood Case on Record
in Washington.
—–BY EUGENE V. DEBS.
Staff Correspondent Appeal to Reason.
—–
Washington, D. C., March 2.-At the opening of congress this morning, the Moyer, Haywood and Pettibone case was introduced, together with petitions for investigation and the dissenting opinion of Justice McKenna, of the supreme court. Senator Carmack, of Tennessee, presented the case on the floor of the United States senate, with the request that it be admitted to the records, and this was consented to.
The introduction of the conspiracy was a great surprise to most of the senators, but when the statement was made that the demand for an investigation was backed by two millions of organized workers, the unanimous consent which was necessary, and without which it would have failed, was given by the senate, excepting that Heyburn, of Idaho, requested that the decision of the supreme court be included with the dissenting opinion of Justice McKenna, to which no objection was made on our side.
The foundation is now laid for a congressional investigation and both senators and congressmen agree that, in obedience to the demands of organized labor, this will certainly to be authorized by the next session of congress. Senator Carmack has been particularly helpful in this matter and Senator Lafollette, of Wisconsin, has also treated me with great courtesy.
With this impending congressional investigation, which will develop all the facts in the conspiracy and reveal the whole horrible truth to the people, it is now perfectly safe to predict that Moyer, Haywood and Pettibone will soon have been rescued from the clutches of their kidnapers and would-be murderers and walk forth free men without a blemish upon their honor.
—–
Quick Work in Short Time.
When I first arrived and called on Senator Carmack, of Tennessee, whom I had previously met and knew to be a man of fair mind and friendly to organized labor and to the working class in general, he advised that I at once procure as many petitions in the form of protests and demands for investigation in behalf of organized labor as were obtainable. The time being short I used the telegraph freely in making the requests and within twenty-four hours the petitions, protests and demands began to roll in in an amazing volume and within a week I had demands for investigation representing upwards of two millions of organized workers.
These came from officers of international and local unions, central bodies and other organizations without number, most of them being duly authenticated with official seals and signatures. These made an enormous heap and have been filed with the dissenting opinion of Justice McKenna in the United States senate by Senator Carmack.
In this connection it should be stated that I was officially commissioned by the Western Federation of Miners, through their general officers, to represent the organization before the congress in the demand for an investigation of the Moyer and Haywood affair. I was thus in position to act as the special representative of organized labor in its petition to congress, and Senator Carmack was able to say in the petition that the investigation was demanded by two millions of organized wage-workers. Nothing less than the expiration of congress could have prevented the measure from going through. As it is, the matter is now of record and by this means will be brought to the attention of great numbers of people who otherwise would never have seen it; and it will especially be the means of getting into wide circulation Justice McKenna’s dissenting opinion.
Then, again, the foundation has been laid for future action in the way of congressional investigation, this being contingent, of course, upon the continuance of the prosecution of our comrades in Idaho. It can be safely predicated that unless the case is abandoned there will be an investigation by congress and there will be such developments as will make the mine owners wish they had never resorted to the crime of kidnaping to further their infamous ends.
It should also be said that, although there is not a Socialist in congress, there are quite a number of men in both branches who speak out boldly in condemnation of the kidnaping of our comrades. While they do not pretend to decide the question of guilt or innocence, they insist that, whatever the circumstances may have been, there could have been no possible justification for the crime of kidnaping on the part of the state authorities, who were sworn to execute the law and not to trample it under foot.
The democratic members of congress declare that if it comes up again they will take hold of the case and make of it a political issue. They insist that every man prominently connected with the kidnaping, without a single exception, is a republican, and that the responsibility for it therefore rests with the republican party and its leaders must show cause why organized labor should not fix the responsibility accordingly. They go further and say that they will make kidnaping a political issue in the national campaign next year, and that they will make the leaders of the republican party explain how it is that their party, that professes to be so friendly to the working classes, is in league with the mine owners, and not only this but in conspiracy with them to destroy the labor movement they profess to patronize by kidnaping and conspiring to murder its official leaders.
Appeal Known in Washington.
It is quite sure that it is here at Washington that we must converge our efforts if we expect to save our comrades by peaceable means. On the kidnaping proposition we have a large number of outspoken friends in both branches of congress, and if the trial has not been abandoned by the time congress meets again, an investigation is sure to be made; and, in connection with it, there is apt to be a test fight on the floors of congress greater than any seen in many a day. You would be surprised to see how many there are, here who know of the APPEAL, and especially among the men who are high in public life.
They have all heard of it, most of them have read it, and not a few are subscribers. I am not much surprised at this, for I know that special efforts have been made since the APPEAL has taken hold of the kidnaping cases to have them brought to the attention of men prominent in politics and other affairs. Every senator and every member of the house has been lately reading the APPEAL, and those I have talked to have read of the Moyer and Haywood case, and are well informed in regard to it. It is this special propaganda of the APPEAL here in Washington during the last thirty days that has prepared the way for congressional action. President Ruzvlt and his cabinet, the supreme court, members of congress, and other high officials, have been getting the APPEAL regularly, and are all more or less familiar with the contents, especially with respect to what is doing on the part of the working class with reference to the rescue of our Idaho comrades.
The personal suffering of our comrades is a thing which we all regret; but it is certain that no incident in all the history of organized labor has been fraught with greater benefit to the labor propaganda or contributed more to the solidarity of the working class. The kidnapers have unwittedly aroused the workers of the whole nation, and have hastened by many days the cause of emancipation.
[Photograph added.]
SOURCE
Appeal to Reason
(Girard, Kansas)
-Mar 9, 1907
https://www.newspapers.com/image/67586825/
IMAGE
HMP, Pettibone Moyer Haywood, AtR, Feb 16, 1907
https://www.newspapers.com/image/67586811/
See also:
From Cripple Creek Strike by Emma F Langdon:
“Kidnapping Case Before Congress” & “Eugene V. Debs”
http://www.rebelgraphics.org/wfmhall/langdon31.html
The Painter and Decorator, Volume 21
Brotherhood of Painters, Decorators and Paperhangers of America
Jan-Dec 1907
https://books.google.com/books?id=YNufAAAAMAAJ
P&D Feb 1907
“A Matter of Life or Death”
-case of Haywood, Moyer and Pettibone
https://books.google.com/books/reader?id=YNufAAAAMAAJ&printsec=frontcover&output=reader&source=gbs_atb&pg=GBS.PA71
Full Text: “Dissenting Opinion of Justice McKenna”
https://books.google.com/books/reader?id=YNufAAAAMAAJ&printsec=frontcover&output=reader&source=gbs_atb&pg=GBS.PA72
Pettibone v Nichols, 1906
-scroll down to 217 for Justice McKenna dissenting.
http://moses.law.umn.edu/darrow/documents/Pettibone%20v%20Nichols.pdf
Eugene V. Debs: a Biography
-by Ray Ginger
Chapter 13, Page 266
Collier Books, 1962
https://books.google.com/books/about/Eugene_V_Debs.html?id=fZ_aAAAAMAAJ