Hellraisers Journal – Friday June 13, 1913 Paterson, New Jersey – 15,000 Striking Silk Workers Cheer the I. W. W.
From the International Socialist Review of June 1913:
On the Paterson Picket Line
By William D. Haywood
[Part II of II]
Industrial Worker May 8, 1913
The night preceding this silent manifestation of protest against capitalist brutality the wildest demonstration of the strike took place in Armory Hall, where John Golden and Sarah Conboy, of the American Federation of Labor, escorted by manufacturers and policemen, came to try to repeat the infamous strikebreaking tactics they attempted a year ago in Lawrence. They came heralded by the local press, by the civil authorities, by the clergy, and the employers as the instruments through which the great silk strike would be settled. The armory had been obtained for them through state officials. The state militia had been called out and stood in the ante-rooms with guns loaded for action. Chief of Police Bimson and his entire force were on hand. The fire department had been ordered to hold themselves in readiness and had their hose attached to hydrants in the immediate vicinity.
The striking silk workers were invited to attend this meeting. It had been previously arranged that they would attend in a body and listen to what the A. F. of L. had to say, providing that they would be given a chance to reply to state the position of the strikers and the principles of the Industrial Workers of the World.
15,000 Cheer for I. W. W.
When organizers of the I. W. W. appeared in the hall, the 15,000 people present went wild. For minute after minute they yelled and cheered with ever-increasing -volume. The floor and gallery was a waving forest of the red membership books of the I. W. W. held aloft by what seemed to be countless thousands. After a time Organizer Ewald W. Koettgen of the I. W. W., appeared on the platform and announced that the I. W. W. speakers would not be allowed to present their side. Or rather, he intended to announce this, but he got no further than “I. W. W.”-when the audience leaped to its feet, and for perhaps fifteen minutes drowned every utterance with frantic cheers. Koettgen at last managed to make himself heard and said: ”Let’s all go home.” As one man the audience arose and began to file out. As these departed thousands on the outside who had not been able to enter, rushed in and soon the armory was again filled. Those who left went to their own halls where they greeted every utterance of their speakers with roars of applause.
For an hour and three-quarters Golden and Mrs. Conboy tried to speak, only to be drowned down by the unceasing cheers that the audience sent up for the I. W. W. In desperation Mrs. Conboy tried the appeal-to-home-mother-and-patriotism stunt and seizing an American flag, waved it from the stage, which act was greeted by another outburst of derisive cheers. When Golden finally made himself heard about 300 persons stayed to listen, the hall having been cleared by police clubs.
It was the funeral of the A. F. of L., so far as Paterson was concerned. It was remarked afterward that it was indeed fitting and appropriate that the A. F. of L. should choose an armory, the training quarters of the bayonet-carrying murderers of the capitalist class, as its own burying place.
Still Unbeaten.
The manufacturers could not get it through their heads that this armory meeting was a real expression of the sentiments of the strikers. They declared the workers had been kept out by threats and intimidation. They requested conferences with shop committees which were granted. The bosses asked that a secret ballot be taken, believing the strikers would all vote to go back to work. This ballot was taken as requested and to the amazement of the manufacturers, the strikers voted overwhelmingly to remain out until their demands were granted.
The workers had already passed an eight-hour law in their mass meetings and this law they declared the manufacturers must obey before there could be any talk of settlement. The bosses were informed this part of the controversy already had been settled by the workers who have declared unanimously they will not work more than eight hours. If the workers are loyal to themselves this law is court decision-proof, because there is no force that the boss can muster that can compel them to sell more than eight hours of their labor in any one day.
International labor day was celebrated by a mighty parade of Socialists and Industrial Workers of the World who with children in red dresses, women with red sashes, and men with red buttons, marched to Slate Mountain, where they picketed and had dancing and singing all day long.
The women have been an enormous factor in the Paterson strike. Each meeting for them has been attended by bigger and bigger crowds. They are becoming deeply interested in the questions of the hour that are confronting women and are rapidly developing the sentiments that go to make up the great feminist movement of the world.
With them it is not a question of equal suffrage but of economic freedom. The women are ready to assume their share of the responsibility, on the picket line, in jail, even to the extent of sending their children away. Hundreds of children already have found good homes with their “strike parents” in New York.
The Mother in Jail.
Among the strikers gathered in by the police was a woman with a nursing baby. She was fined $10 and costs with the alternative of 20 days in jail. She was locked up, but the baby was not allowed to go with her. In twenty-four hours the mother’s breasts were filled to bursting, but the baby on the outside was starving. He refused to take any other form of food. In a few more hours the condition of both mother and baby was dangerous, and Elizabeth Gurley Flynn went to see Recorder Carroll about the case. She told him unless the baby was allowed to have its mother it would soon die. Recorder Carroll’s reply was as follows:
“That’s None of My Business.”
On Saturday afternoon, May 10, a new trick was sprung.All the papers in New Jersey and New York broke loose with flaring headlines announcing that an attempt had been made to wreck an Erie express train in Paterson, by means of rocks piled on the tracks, and that the I. W. W. was “suspected.” This looks like a scheme similar to the planting of dynamite in Lawrence to discredit the strikers. Or it may be an attempt to influence the minds of jurors in the coming trial of Gurley Flynn, Tresca, Lessig, Quinlan and myself on indictments charging “incitement to assault,” riot, disorderly assemblage, and other high crimes.
Quinlan’s second trial begins the day this is written, the jury which tried him last week having failed to reach a verdict. He may get as high as seven years in prison if convicted. The authorities hope to convict Quinlan first and thus make the railroading of the others easy.
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