Hellraisers Journal – Thursday August 8, 1912
Mother Jones Speaks at Mass Meeting, Demands End of Rule by Gunthug
August 4, 1912, Montgomery, West Virginia Mother Jones Speaks to Six Thousand Miners at the Baseball Park
West Virginian August 5, 1912
Fellow Workers: Let me say this to you, that not one person wins a strike, that it takes the combined forces of the oppressed, the robbed, class to get together and win a strike. The operators, the money power, never in all of human history have won a strike. You have never lost a strike, that is, the workers have not. You have simply rolled up your banners and retreated for a while until you could solidify your army and then come back and ask the pirates, “What in hell are you going to do about it?”
This hero worship must stop. We don’t owe any debt of gratitude individually.
Now, we are here today, as we have been—this is the outcome of an age-long struggle. It did not begin yesterday nor today. It is an age-long struggle, and it has crossed the oceans to you. It is about to crystallize, it is about to come aboard. The ship is sailing, it calls for pilots to come aboard. I want to say to you that all the ages of history have been ages of robbery, oppression, of hypocrisy, of lying, and I want to say to you tyrants of the world—(Railroad train whistling)—They got that gang to blow off hot air. (Applause.) I want to say to you tyrants of the world that all the centuries past have been yours, but we are facing the dawn of the world’s greatest century, we are facing the dawn of a separate century.
This, my friends, is indicative of what? No church in the country could get up a crowd like this, because we are doing God’s holy work, we are breaking the chains that bind you, we are putting the fear of God into the robbers. All the churches here and in heaven couldn’t put the fear of God into them, but our determination has made them tremble.
What happened on Paint Creek? Did the church make the operators run and go hide in the cellar? (Applause.)
I don’t know who started the racket, but I know that Mr. Operator began to shake, the marrow in his back melted, and he had to go into the cellar to hide himself.
Now, my friends here, twelve years ago I left the great battle that closed in the State of Pennsylvania, and came in here. We had fought a tremendous battle there. We fought that battle until Mr. Hanna said, “These workers are men and women, we have got to do something, we have got to blind them, we have got to hoodwink them some way. Let us start the Civic Federation.” The Republic hurrahed for peace and harmony is coming. Mark Hanna stood at the top of the game. We had them trembling, and they didn’t know where to get off at.
And so they got the Civic Federation, they got Morgan, Belmont, and the labor leaders. I said, “That is only a ‘Physic’ Federation, what are you joining it for?” There are some fellows in the labor movement, when their heads get swelled, they sit down with the thieves. They had their feet under the table, twenty-six thieves and twelve labor leaders, and you stood for it. I begged them not to join it, and some of them left it. They stuck their feet under the table and drank champagne, and the bloody thieves, when we had the women fighting for bread, that gang of commercial pirates were feasting on our blood in New York. And then we stand for it. And when those fellows come along you say “Hurrah” and the whole gang drunk.
Now that wouldn’t do. They got the women so as to keep the labor leaders up in tune. They got women to join. They got a welfare department in their Civic Federation, and after a while the leaders and parasites and bloodsuckers they thought they would hoodwink us. One went up to Washington, it was…Morgan’s daughter. I happened to be in Washington. They were running to the free soup bowls to get a lunch. An Irish machinist ran in and had a piece of bologna that long (measuring on her arm about a foot), and a chunk of bread in the other hand. One of the women said to him, “Oh, my dear man, don’t eat that, it will give you indigestion.” He said, “The trouble with me is I never get enough to digest, indigestion, hell.” The half of you fellows never get enough to digest. You never got a good square meal in your life, and you know you never did. But you furnish the square meals for the others who rob and oppress you.
When I came here ten or twelve years ago, we marched those mountains. The mine owners threatened to kill me, to shoot me. I am never much afraid of their shot. We have some men that will run away, but you will never get me to run, don’t worry about it at all. They said I ought to be gotten out, I ought to be shot, locked up in an asylum. We marched the mountains, every one who took up Christ’s doctrine—not the hypocrites but the fighters. We organized, you organized, we got together, we fought, we got you double what you had. We made a settlement with these operators. You became friends for the time being. But the mine owners have their tools, their paid lying, treacherous dogs amongst you, and you were betrayed, and you can’t deny it for I can prove it. Mind you, I am not looking for office I am looking for your interests and your children’s interests, and when you don’t have an office you are watching the pendulum of every fellow that has. When I find out that they are false to you they have to get down and out. I don’t care who it is that is at the head of your organization, if I find they are false to you they will get down and out, for I won’t let up until they do. (Applause.)
You need not give me any advice (to someone in the audience who offered some advice).
It was Aristotle who said to Alexander, many ages ago-he said, “Alexander, don’t bother with the outside enemy, your real enemy is inside your own ranks.”
And so it is. We could clean up the mine owners overnight if you were true to your standards.
You lost your organization. Scabs and union men work together. You destroyed your charter. Go down to that hell-hole, there isn’t another like it in the United States. I went up to that hole one night. I looked at the riches, and wondered at the men who call themselves Christians, who give to the Salvation Army, to the church, to the temperance brigade, to every other shouting gang that comes along—I wondered how those blood- sucking pirates could sleep in their beds, with that horrible outcome of their exploitation. Women sat on the porch, and these pirates said “Keep that burning hell before them to keep them in subjection.” They said, “The more hell you keep, the more of their blood will decorate my head and arms.” One woman, the wife of one of the blood-suckers, got diamonds to buckle her shoes with. She went to church and said, “Jesus, I made the other fellows give it up.” (Laughter and applause.)
And so, if you, who are here, were true to each other, we would not have to have this meeting today. But you have started, and I want to congratulate you. I want to say here, my friends, that is what brought me into West Virginia. I was in a fight all winter. I traveled fourteen states, and fifteen thousand miles in your behalf, inside of seven months. I went down to Mexico, and I made arrangements with the Mexican Government—I want you to listen, Mr. Operator, get your skull ready because there is a very little will go into it—I had an audience with the Mexican governor, and I said, “I want to come in and organize the men that slave, that have been oppressed, crushed. We want to educate, elevate them.” The Mexican governor said, “Mother Jones, you can come into this nation and bring any organizers you want. I will take your word, from my experience with you you will not work with those who will not do their duty.” I said, “I may be rushed with cannon.” Immediately, he had the wires touched, and said, “If they arrest you or your organizers, they will have to be turned loose.” That was in despotic Mexico. We chased the President out because he was a tyrant.
Not so long ago in this State-I came into your state and found the Baldwin bloodhounds, and find your wives and children thrown out like dogs on the street. They beat you up, put into their hands weapons to beat you with, to beat any of us, yet I didn’t find the courts saying, “Stop it.” I didn’t hear of the Governor saying, “Stop it.” No. Why? Because the powers that be are the courts. I want to say, if the judge is here, I know Judge Bennett is. That judge in Charleston went off on a visit. I guess his skull needed a fish to give it something to do. The Governor [Glasscock] went to Chicago, then when he heard there was a racket on Paint Creek, he got sick and went to Huntington. (Applause.)
Now, my friends, I want to say here, I have dealt with courts; I have dealt with the detectives and spotters. I have been from one end of the nation to the other, even in Mexico—I have been in Washington fighting for these poor unfortunate wretches-I have seen more freedom in Mexico than I have seen in America under the Stars and Stripes. We appealed seven years ago to the Governor and he said, “I can’t do anything.” We appealed to the sheriff, and he said, “I can’t do anything.” But the State was in jeopardy. We pictured the guards and the outrages to them. Let me say this to you, when the Governor occupies the chair and can’t do anything, he ought to get down and out and put somebody in that can. (Loud applause.)
I had business with the Governor [Waite of Colorado, 1894] in the West. The corporations asked for the militia. The Governor said, “You will get no militia from me.” “Give me the job,” said I, “and I will attend to them.” The Governor said, “You will do it too fast, Mother,” said he. He went down himself and surveyed the whole state of affairs. He went to the miners’ union and got their story; then he went to the operators and heard their story—he walked twelve miles in the rain and snow. He called to the militia and said, “Take care of those miners, in their jobs, and if the tools of the corporation dare to raise their hands against them, blow their brains out.” They went down and the strike was settled in no time.
The sheriff called for the troops, like your sheriff did. When you had the trouble here on Paint Creek he got under a table, and said, “For God’s sake, hide me.” The mine owners, we put the fear of God into their carcass, and they said “Hide me” too. Don’t you see you have got them, if you will only be wise. I have seen those fellows tremble. I have been in strikes, and I didn’t come in yesterday. I worked in the mines, but I didn’t dig coal, but I did help to load it. I went in on the morning on the day shift, before daylight, and I went in on the night shift, with these poor slaves. I found the children perishing and the wives dying, there was nothing in the house, the company had stopped everything. They have brought the same thing in here. They have brought on war. The organization was a baby then, and they worked long hours and got poor pay, they didn’t get enough to get a jag on when they worked full hours. We began to educate them. I went into the mines to put literature into the hands of those slaves. I was the first one who came over here and put literature into your hands in this class struggle. My friends, I have stuck to the job.
I have been maligned, and the women I was fighting for have turned their noses in the air, and have said, “Oh, that horrid old woman.” And those women love the dogs better than they love humanity! They decorate themselves in new costumes made of the blood of your children and your wives, and now when you kill a handful of guards they raise a great howl. You are to blame because you didn’t clean them up. (Loud applause.) When you go at it again, do business. I don’t know whether you are an operator or not, but if you are take your medicine. (Loud applause.)
One of these cats came down on the train from Cabin Creek the other day. She said, “You are Mother Jones, are you?” I said, “Yes, what about it?” She said, “What are they doing on Paint Creek?” I said, “Go up and find out.” She was one of the corporation cats.
Now, then, we are here, my friends, in protest against a system of peonage such as the world has not dealt with in all its ages. You are building jails, you are paying millions and billions of dollars to take care of the criminals you have made. You operators rob the workers, and your wives live in luxury, they turn their skirts away from the workers. One poor slave said to me—he was sitting down on the steps of a church—he said, “Mother, I have worked ever since I was a boy, and they have got it all. This is all that is left, this old worn out frame.” Just then he saw an operator, his family and wife in a carriage, and he said, “I have got to run, I will be discharged if they see me talking to you.” Down in Harrison County, West Virginia, I held a meeting. The operators sent me word,” If you come down to our mining camps, we will have you shot.” I said, “Is that so?” “Yes,” they said, “the mine owners said, they will have you shot.” When I got off the train, I said, “All right. I will go.” I said, “If you are a lap dog for a mine owner, you can be one for me. You go down and tell the operator I am going down to rouse his slaves, and he can shoot me and be damned.” Did he shoot me? Not on your life. I told him to come to the meeting. That is the way I pray.
I told Judge Jackson how I prayed. When the time comes in the history of this struggle that a mine owner or Baldwin guard will intimidate me I want to die that hour.
In the old chattel slavery days the old black mammy took up the battle and dug through the earth, and said to the young slaves, “Come and dig with me.” They made a tunnel to get away. Do you black fellows do that today? No, you don’t. There are a few of you would do it. But the most of you won’t do it. What did your mammy do? What did your fathers do two generations ago? They rose up and defied law, property rights, courts, and everything. He said, “Bring your blood-hounds, but we are human, we will be free.” And they did free themselves. Why? Because the nation rallied to them, the nation saw you were determined to free yourselves.
When you men will rise and say this is our fight, it will be done. We asked the courts and they wouldn’t do it; we asked the Governor and he wouldn’t do it; we asked the sheriff and he wouldn’t do it; we asked the officers of the law, and they wouldn’t do it. They said they would do it, and you see how they have been doing it.
The Governor was able to do something when the operators wanted him. The sheriff said, “Oh, God, we are up against it.” The mine owners said, “Ha, Ha, we will get the troops in.” They telegraphed to Pennsylvania [where the West Virginia National Guard was then on joint maneuvers] to accommodate the operators, the Governor and the sheriff telegraphed immediately for them to come back. Can you deny it? No, you can’t deny it. I have got the goods on you.
I want to say, men, if you organize to a man-Don’t the churches have a right to go up Cabin Creek and talk about Jesus? Have you? If the ministers have a right to go and talk about Jesus, I have got the right to go and talk about what Jesus did (laughter), where you have got guards to beat our brains out.
Let me say to you, my friends, let me say to the Governor, let me say to the sheriffs and Judges in the State of West Virginia, this fight will not stop until the last guard is disarmed. (Loud applause.)
Forty thousand men, forty thousand braves, said to me, “We are ready for battle, Mother, if they don’t do business.” So we are, my friends, and the day of human slavery has got to end. Talk about a few guards who got a bullet in their skulls! The whole of them ought to have got bullets in their skulls. How many miners do you murder within the walls of your wealth-producing institutions! How many miners get their death in the mines!
A fellow said to an operator, “Why don’t you prop the mines?” “Oh,” he said, “Dagoes are cheaper than props.” Every miner is a Dago in their estimation, every miner that they can rob.
You go into the mines and work ten or twelve hours, ten years ago. We made a fight and brought it down to nine. Up New River you work ten and twelve, and when you get your statement there is nothing on it. You look at it and scratch your head, and say, “Bookkeeper, I dug more coal than this.” He will say, “Get to hell out of here.” Then you shrug your shoulders and off you go, instead of taking the bookkeeper by the back of the neck and knocking his head against the wall. Oh, that is terrible, I know. I know the Gazette and the Mail say, “Oh, she is horrible.” Yes, but I am dealing with a horrible condition. When you take the conditions from these fields we will be as tame and polite as your wife when she hammers hell out of you. (Applause.)
Some of you fellows with only one arm—some of you traitors to your class, with one arm on you—they had taken one off to beat you with-went in and cheered for that gang yesterday. You cheered for McKell. Let me tell you about McKell. The old man McKell was a pretty decent man. I will give everybody credit whether against me or for me. When you had that strike in 1902 I went up to Glen Jean. The Baldwin guards were at Thurmond.
I said to the Baldwin guards, “Don’t you come up, I am going up to see McKell to do business with him tonight, don’t you come on the train,” and the conductor said, “If you do I will tell Bill Baldwin and you will lose your jobs.”
I went up to his home. I know your ears are cocked. I know your ears are cocked, to tell him, but tell him to come here and I will tell him. He started a tirade of insult and abuse of the miners. I told him I didn’t come there—it was his house—I didn’t come there to quarrel, I came to negotiate a settlement. I said, “If we can’t discuss this matter in a peaceful, intelligent way, I will go.”
I keep a tab on those fellows. I am not like you, take a glass of whisky and say, “Oh, hell, it is all right.” (Laughter and applause.)
Then they call themselves independent Republicans! Independent monkey-chasers! (Laughter and applause.) They say they will take off the guards and call the Legislature in extra session. They need not call the Legislature. They know it, but they think you don’t know it. All they need is to tell the sheriff to disarm the guards.
I want to call your attention to another fellow. When [an organizer] was beat up by the Baldwin guards, [the corporation tool], who was nominated for sheriff yesterday, had the information right in his hands. Then the miners of the country had to pension him owing to the fact of the brutal assassination of the guards. This man Malone knew it. It was right at his door. I keep an eye on those crooked politicians. He says we will have to do away with the Baldwin guards. He runs a detective agency with Dan Cunningham, who went up to murder the miners at Stanaford Mountain. They went with labels on their breasts. It is enough to make anybody disgusted. No wonder these mine owners beat your wives, no wonder your children will rise up and curse you. It is time for you to stop it. You are not dealing with a rotten politics, you are dealing with a system that is old and strong.
Let me say to you it needs men of America, men of a great state, it matters not to me whether you are a judge or whether you are a merchant, you are still a citizen of this state. Let me say to you, my friends, there is a feeling abroad in the land, I have traveled over it, and I know the pulse of the workers. I know the pulse of the intelligent people.
I want to say to you here, my friends—you needn’t go so near God Almighty to take a picture, come here to take it (this was spoken to a young man who went up on top of the grand stand to take a photograph of the crowd)—There is a spirit abroad in the land, there is an under-current going on, and unless the wise men of the nation get together and save her I want to say to you, my friends, a cry in the night from the hungry mob is an awful teacher, you need but a sword for a judge and a preacher.
Oh, men of America, I want to say to you, we are dealing too much with the intellect. A nation that does not deal with the heart of man will perish. In fifty years you have produced more wealth than it took five hundred years in Babylon, Greece and Rome to travel the same road you are traveling today. They didn’t take warning. What happened?
I went to a place in New York. A lawyer of Wall Street said, “Mother Jones, I would like to show you a picture. Will you go?” I said, “I am twenty-one years old, I will take care of myself.” There is a place there if you turn your nose inside of it it will be snapped off. The government knows it but you guys don’t know anything about it. I went in. It cost $2.50 for hanging your cloak up. I sat down at the table. My cloak wasn’t worth $2.50, so I kept it on. We ordered supper. Now this place is where the opera houses and theaters are built and opened. It is supported by the blood-sucking tribe of Wall Street gamblers. There came in a woman between two fellows. The lawyer said to me, “Mother Jones, do you know how much the cloak on that woman cost?” “I don’t know,” said I, “It looks like Russian sable. If it is, it cost twenty thousand dollars.” “That cloak,” said he, “cost $50,000.00. Those fellows paid for it and they never worked a day in their lives.” I said, “They never paid for it.” I said, “My boys paid for it.” (Applause.) Then they sat down and feasted like Belshazzar did long ago.
Then came along another gang. They sat down at a table, and got so full and debauched they upset a table and smashed everything on it. When they did there was a check written out instantly for a thousand dollars. $1.50 will pay for what is on your table. Put that down (to the reporter). Oh, you bloodsuckers, well know it. So them blood-suckers up in New York well know it.
My friends, you are exploited, you are robbed, you are plundered. You have submitted to it, you haven’t protested. You grunt but you don’t fight as you ought to do. You don’t have to kill the guards, all you have to do is to go to the ballot box and vote them out of business. (Applause.)
Now, my friends, after I left you, before, when I was in Utah a poor creature came to me one morning. Her husband was among the revolters. He was carried off to the jail with one hundred and twenty-five or thirty others. The wife came to me, she held in her arms a babe, and said, “Mother Jones, do you see my Johnnie?” I said, “Yes, I see your Johnnie,” and the tears streamed down her breast. She said, “Oh, Mother, you know my Johnnie isn’t strong, I was afraid he would get hurt or killed in the mines. We got a lot from the company and I took in boarders, I was trying to pay for a shelter, so if anything happened to John I would have a shelter for the children. Do you see my Johnnie, he was born at 11 o’clock at night, and I got up at half past four in the morning and cooked breakfast for eleven men to go into the mines. Now, they have got my John, my home, my health.” She says, “Mother, tell me, my God, what am I going to do?”
I want to say to this audience, I knew at five o’clock in the evening those blood-hounds were coming in to arrest those men next morning. I said to the boys, “Go up in the mountain and bury your guns.” I didn’t want a clash. “Bury your guns.” They said, “No, Mother we will need them.” I said, “No, boys, go and bury them.” At half past four in the morning I heard the footsteps. I went to the window. The first I saw was the Mormon sheriff. I said, “What is the trouble?” He said, “We have come to get these dogs.” I said, “What have they done?” He said, “They don’t go to work.” “No, they won’t,” said I. They arrested those men, that were in tents at the foot of the range, and drove them up the road without a particle of clothing on them.
Put that down (to the reporter). And they know it is true. They hit them with their guns, and their ribs shook like aspen leaves. They begged to put on their clothes. “Oh, no,” they said, “Go to work.” And the profane language that was used was horrifying—they were church members. The ministers can say “hell-fire” and “damnation,” but if you are not a church member you mustn’t use it.
Those wretches were taken into court and tried, and that woman perished with her babe and four children. They don’t murder, do they? They don’t murder, do they?
With the bleached bones of these people you build your churches, your Y.M.C.A.’s, and your institutions. You have robbed and plundered these people, and they will build it into churches, and they will be churches, too, and the love of God will be there-or will it be the love of capitalism or the operators. Look into the churches, and see the big fellow at the front singing “All for Jesus.” They murder for Jesus, they rob for Jesus, and own the government for Jesus, and scare hell out of the sheriff for Jesus. (Loud applause and laughter.) Get behind those fellows. They say, “Our Father in Heaven.” You can hear them forty miles, crying to heaven, “Give us today, Oh, Lord, give thy son his daily bread,” and “Oh, Lord Jesus, fix it so I can get three or four fellows’ bread.” (Laughter.)
Now, my friends, you can’t blame those people after all, coming down to it. They couldn’t change the system if they wanted to. We, the people, have got to do it.
I will give you an illustration. I want to ask any man here, is this government today the same kind of government it was sixty years ago, when the immortal Lincoln was in Washington?
(Cries from the crowd: “No, No, No, No.”)
Well, it wouldn’t fit in. The government of forty or fifty or sixty years ago wouldn’t fit in.
Government changes as the field of production changes. It has done that all down human history. It had to change with the field of production. Literature changed and the newspapers are more vicious today than they were fifty or sixty years ago. Public opinion is moulded from what you read in the papers and magazines and what you hear in the pulpits. And your religion is not what it was fifty or sixty years ago. Then the Catholic bishops did not visit Washington and wine and dine with the Presidents. They do it now.
It is essential, because they have got the power and the people have multiplied. Religion changes without changing the order of production.
I want you to bear that in mind, my friends. Your judges are owned and controlled by the ruling class. You need not expect any justice in the courts; I don’t. I don’t look for justice.
Did you have a Salvation Army sixty years ago? No, you didn’t. Why? They weren’t needed. Capitalism hadn’t developed. Did you have the Holy Jumpers fifty years ago? No, you didn’t. Did you have the Holy Rollers? No. Did you have the Sanctified Saints? No. They weren’t needed. Why weren’t they needed? Because capitalism hadn’t developed. It was when they reached in for the private ownership of the industries that the master class added those auxiliaries to their bulwark.
I have made a great study of those things, my friends, and I will prove it to you. I happened to be in El Paso after a strike. One hundred and fifty of our men were murdered. I was going through Arizona at that time. One hundred and fifty men were murdered. They hung others upon the trees. I went to El Paso. I said to the boys, “I will go down and cross the line from El Paso. I will get the information I want.” I went into Mexico, and as I was going I met three miners coming over the bridge. The boys said to me, “Mother, for God’s sake, where did you come from?” I said, “I thought they had you murdered.” They said, “No, we have been in the range three days and nights, we haven’t had anything to eat.” I said, “I will give you some money, go up and make yourselves at home. I am going to hold a meeting on the corner tonight.” So, I went up, and the boys met me. We got $18.50 collection. I gave them $5.00 apiece, and said, “Now we will go and eat, and while we are eating we will talk things over.”
So while we were going down the street there was a mob howling and yelling at each other, calling each other liars. I thought the whole town of El Paso was going to be torn to pieces. So I stuck my head in. Directly I caught on to the game. I said to a policeman, “What is it? Why are they fighting?” He said, “I know what the fighting is about, it is about Jesus.” He said, “The Salvation Army occupies this corner, the Holy Rollers that corner. There is only two corners. These fellows get all the money. They want to swap corners, and let the Salvation Army take that.” I said, “Isn’t the money for Jesus? What difference does it make?” He said, “Don’t you think Jesus ever sees that money.”
I don’t know whether you ever watched women when they get religion the first time. They get up to heaven without being sent for. I went in and watched it. It was funny for me. Those things have a wonderful philosophy for me. The Holy Rollers were over there rolling for Jesus, and the Holy Jumpers were over there jumping for Jesus. The money belonged to Jesus. I gathered up all I could, I kept watching. I went to the policeman and said, “I have got a lot of Jesus’ money, what shall I do with it?” He said, “You will keep it.” I said, “Well, that is what I thought I ought to do.” While those people in their hearts meant well, they didn’t understand that they were the machine of capitalism hoodwinking the people while the chains of slavery were woven around them.
I know a lot of you will go off and condemn me, but you condemned Christ, you condemned every man and woman that ever dared to raise their voice in behalf of truth and justice, and you will do the same with me. But I don’t care what your comments are. There will be a judgment day, and YOU WILL PAY THE PENALTY. (Applause.)
I want to tell you that.
I want to say, my friends, it is a fine illustration; every avenue is commercialized today by the ruling class of the age in which we live. We write slander we rob each other and say it is right; we rent each other out to the ruling class to beat us.
(A voice: “That is what we do.”)
I want to say, my friends, it is time to stop it. Say, brave boys, say, the star that rose in Bethlehem has crossed the world, it has risen here; see it slowly breaking through the clouds. The Star of Bethlehem will usher in the new day and new time and new philosophy—and if you are only true you will be free—if you are only men-if you only go home and leave the saloons alone. Mother knows how often you need a drink-
(Cheers from the audience and clapping of hands, particularly notice- able of one woman.)
You needn’t clap your hands. It is to your disgrace. You needn’t do it. If you understood the philosophy you would keep your hands down, and use your head to the best interests of the race. If you knew their aching backs, their swimming heads, if you knew the empty stomachs, if you knew the food that goes into their mouths you wouldn’t clap your brutal hands like a thug, you wouldn’t do it, my sister woman, you wouldn’t clap your hands at these poor boys. They often need a drink. Many times they are often worn and exhausted.
Like the big brewers in Milwaukee, when I went there to reach out a helping hand to three hundred girls they had enslaved. One of the brewers said to me, “Mother Jones, I saw a terrible picture in Massachusetts, you don’t see it here.” He said, “I saw a woman on the side walk and the little boys and girls were throwing pebbles at her and bullying her. You don’t see it here.” I said, “There is a cause for that. Don’t you know there is an underlying cause for that? Don’t you know that Massachusetts has been a manufacturing state for some generations. Wisconsin is an agricultural state,” said I. “Don’t you know that the grandfather of this woman went into those slave pens of capitalism and in her infancy she was ground into profit, she never had a square meal, never had anything to develop her nerves. All the brutes gave her was to develop the muscle and bones for profit. Don’t you know the mother and father of this creature also went into that slave pen? Don’t you know we have made a fight to bring the hours down from sixteen to ten, from ten to eight?” “We have made a fight to give them a little more food to develop them. Don’t you know your class have robbed them, and when this woman came into the world she was starved and a nervous wreck? Your own girls here you are robbing and their children will be the same.”
If this woman could stay in her home and plant love there, and girls’ instinct, they wouldn’t throw stones at this object of pity.
This woman was a nervous wreck. If she didn’t get a drink of liquor she would have been in the insane asylum, and us paying six million dollars a year for the support of them!
Look at the class pirates that sail the high seas and don’t need the riches. We will stop drinking when you give us what belongs to us. When you take us out of your shacks and give us what belongs to us, we don’t need anybody to howl for us.
Often I have had to give my boys a drink, they had to have it. A fellow met me on the street one day, he had asked half a dozen people for a drink. He said, “Give me ten cents, I want to get a drink.” I said, “Here is fifty cents, go and get a bed and supper.” The man looked at me, and shook hands. Eight years afterwards that man came up to me on the train and said, “I believe your name is Mother Jones.” I said, “Yes, sir, it is; what about it?” He said, “I want to grasp your hand, I would have died one night but for you.” I was blank. “What about it?” said I. He went on to tell me. “Now,” said he,” if there is anything on earth I can do for you, I am in business, I am worth over seven hundred thousand dollars today,” said he, and he handed me money for the Mexican refugees. If I had let that man go that night he would have stolen, because he had to have that drink. The police would have clubbed him and put him in jail and degraded him.
Let us know the cause of the suffering race. Let us put less feathers on the outside of the skull and a little more intelligence on the inside. (Applause.)
Away back in Palestine they were robbing and plundering them. There was a humble carpenter that came. It was not the leaders that came to him, it was not a member of the church that came to him, it was not a society woman, she would shun him then as she would now, if he came to her. It was that woman crushed by economic wrongs that came to wash his feet with her tears and wipe them with her hair—then he gave her the hope, the light of the future economic age. It was she in gratitude that fell at his feet and paid tribute to him—it was on her sacred head he placed his hands.
It has ever been the humble that have done the world’s enlightening. It has been those that have been pointed to with scorn that have had to bear the brunt.
I have had to measure steel in the dead of night with the blood-hounds of the ruling class. I have measured steel with them in the lonely hours of the night. It is the society women that dragged me out of bed in the night, when fighting for you, and with the bayonets in the hands of seven of them, put me out of the state and told me never to come back. If women were true they wouldn’t raise men to do such acts.
(Cries from the crowd: “You are right, You are right.”)
No, they wouldn’t, my friends. It was Miss Helen Gould, the great philanthropist, that hired blood-hounds to come in in the morning. She took them out of the penitentiary, they came in at 4 o’clock where I was locked up. I never undressed myself for eighteen nights. He planted his gun under my nose and said: “Tell me where I will get three thousand dollars of the miners’ money, or I will blow your brains out.” I said, “They wouldn’t be any use to you after you got them out.” I was alone at four o’clock in the morning. He was a big ruffian. Helen Gould took him out of the penitentiary, like these guards up here, to shoot me if I dared to interfere with profit.
He said, “Where is the money?” I said, “Up in Indianapolis.” I said, “Write to them, they are good fellows, they will send it to you.” He said, “Haven’t you got any money here? How do you pay these bills? Haven’t you got any money?” I said, “Yes, I have some money.” He said, “Out with it or I will blow your brains out.” I pulled it out—I am generous-out I came with the money. I took 50 cents out, and, says I, “That is what I have got, but I am not going to give it to you.” He said, “Is that all? How are you going to get the money which is in Indianapolis when you get out?” I said, “I will telegraph for it when I need it.” He said, “If you don’t shell it up I will kill you.” I said, “I am not going to shell it up.” He said, “Why?” I said, “I have got Helen Gould’s small-pox, and when I get out of there I will need the money to get a jag on to roast them off.”
I suppose if you were there you would clap your hands and say, “Shoot her.” None of your chatter, blackguards, we don’t need it. We will open up without anybody to tell us, when these blood-sucking pirates give you what belongs to you. Now, boys, we are facing the day when human liberty will be yours. I don’t care how much martial law the Governor of West Virginia proclaims, I have had martial law proclaimed where I was more than once, but I didn’t stop fighting. When he pulled off his martial law I began it again, and he had to bring them back. Do you see how you can do the business? If they proclaim martial law, bury your guns. You can tell him that if you see him. If the Governor proclaims martial law, bury your guns. I have been up against it. They hauled me into court.
Stand by the militia, stand by the boys. Don’t allow no guards to attack them. (Cries of: “That is right, That is right.”) Stand shoulder to shoulder with them.
I want to say here in behalf of General Elliott. I know him well. I have had some experience with his manhood. I want to say to you he will never hurt the workers. He will only do what he is forced to do. But don’t you force him to do anything. He won’t do it if he can help himself. It was General Elliott who arrested me in Clarksburg when he was United States Marshal, by the order of Judge Jackson. General Elliott did not undertake to send me to jail, nor did he send a deputy with me. There was nine of us. He sent a young man, who is now on the Evening Mail in Charleston. When we got off in Parkersburg, the young man and I were going one way, and four or five deputies and eight boys were going another way. I said, “The boys are going the wrong way.” “No,” he said, “they are going to jail.” He said, “We engaged a room for you at the hotel.” I said, “I would rather go board with Uncle Sam, I have better company than at the hotel.” (Laughter and applause.) I said, “My colleagues and I have fought this battle for years, and when they are jailed, I will be jailed, and when they are hung, I will be hung.” So I went to jail. Major Elliott gave the jailer orders, and I was treated courteously. His wife and daughter came down to the trial, and went out with me; they offered their home for me to rest. I shall always remember Major Elliott, I don’t care what position he holds he won’t hurt you, and he will tell the Governor.
Be true to the boys. We will capture the militia some of these days. We will join the militia and say to the blood-sucking fellows, “Get off your perch.” (Laughter and applause.)
I know some very good operators, but they are dictated to by the syndicates, the oligarchy in Washington, so they can’t help themselves.
You are to blame, and no one else. You have stood for it. You don’t stand in your union. If you would, when you were organized up New River, you wouldn’t have this condition today. Don’t blame the Governor. I blame him for violation of the law, that is what I blame the Governor for. (Applause.)
I am going to be with you, I am going to stay with you, I don’t care what the papers say, they can jump on me, but they never weaken me. I am just as strong as ever. One corporation lap dog on Paint Creek, one of the C. & O. agents, I will clean him up when I get to Huntington. I won’t say anything about his generosity. When you give those fellows a little bit of office—What are you looking at that watch?-That will watch you devils well, my boys.
I was in court when the judge condemned a man and said, “You are a bad fellow.” The fellow said, “I am not half as bad, not half as mean, nor half as wicked as the judge”—then he stopped, and the judge got furious. The fellow continued-“as he thinks I am.” The judge said, “Connect your sentence.”
Now, my boys, we are facing a new day. I am one of those who believe as the immortal Hugo did. I read Hugo’s works when I was young. Hugo was my idol, he was inspiring. He said so many grand things. I felt that he had the agony of the race in his body.
So, my boys, I said, we are in the early dawn of the world’s greatest century, when crime, brutality and wrong will disappear, and man will rise in grander height, and every woman shall sit in her own front yard and sing a lullaby to the happy days of happy childhood, noble manhood of a great nation that is coming. She will look at her mansion and every room will be light and there will be peace and justice.
I see that vision today as I talk to you. Oh, God Almighty grant-Oh, God almighty grant-God grant that the woman who suffers for you suffers not for a coward but for a man. God grant that. He will send us another Lincoln, another Patrick Henry. God grant, my brothers, that you will be men, and the woman who bore you will see her God and say, “I raised a man.”
(Cries from the audience: “Right, Right, Right,” and applause.)
[Resolutions]
The miners and citizens of Fayette and Kanawha Counties, in Mass-Meeting assembled in the Town of Montgomery, West Virginia, make the following resolution:
Resolved: That we most earnestly denounce certain officials of Kanawha County, State of West Virginia, because they failed to do their duty under the laws of West Virginia, which has resulted in the most cruel, inhuman treatment of the United Mine Workers, of their wives and children by certain Baldwin guards, in the County of Kanawha. Because we know that if the Judge of the Circuit Court of Kanawha County, and the Judge of the Intermediate Court of said county, had, at the time the oppressions were being committed against defenseless miners, their wives and children, had called a special session of the grand jury to indict certain criminals, that if the prosecuting attorney had prosecuted them as they should have been prosecuted, and as other criminals in said county, and sent them to the penitentiary, the trouble would all have been settled and peace would reign.
We declare that said officials have disregarded their sworn duty, that had they regarded their duty it would have saved the state enormous expense.
We denounce the coal operators of Fayette County as unworthy of confidence by the people. They have met in political conventions and denounced in strong terms the guard system of West Virginia. At the same time they are contributing to the salaries of these guards, who have caused such outrages to be committed on many mine workers of this state.
We denounce the candidates for office who have gone into those conventions, because they have not the courage to demand that there should be steps taken to get rid of the Baldwin guards of West Virginia.
Be it Resolved Further: That we now, seeing as never before the vast importance of the laborers of the country vote as one man to elect the officers of this state, that the laborers meet and organize.
These resolutions are drawn up by the citizens and miners of Montgomery, so that they will go to the Governor and state officials.
Now, the Judge said if the operators would quit paying the Baldwin guards they would leave the State. The operators don’t pay the Baldwin guards, they don’t pay them a penny. If it had to come out of their pockets the Baldwin guards would be gone long ago. The miners are robbed in the weighing of coal, in rent, and in the store, they pay the Baldwin guards. (Applause.)
You are the fellows that have got the right to clean up the Baldwin guards because you are the fellows who pay them.
There was a poor black fellow down here at Nashville who couldn’t afford to pay the rent in a rotten shack that you couldn’t put a hog in. He said he couldn’t do it, and went in a coke oven to sleep, and the company charged him $2.50 for sleeping in the coke oven.
What is the matter with you people of West Virginia? What is the matter with the Governor? What is the matter with the whole of you? There isn’t another state in the union stands for it-not a one. Poor black wretch, just because his skin is black. It was an accident that the lawyer’s skin wasn’t black. If you work long for the coal companies you won’t have any skin about you.
Stand by the guards, be sure to do that, let them hammer you. Let them put your wives into the creek, and make them walk it. One fellow said the guards haven’t troubled me, they never bother me, put every body out of the houses, but let me stay. So his wife was going to give the nation another citizen. They walked in and put the whole bunch out. He was boasting what lovely fellows the Baldwin guards are. Then that gave him a blow. It depends on how you get hit.
They have got to go out of the State. And if the men of the State of West Virginia are too cowardly, if they will give their wives and children up to the blood-hounds to be beaten and abused we will bring enough men in to clean them up, who are not afraid of your guards, who are not afraid of your Governor. When our women are insulted, who are the mothers of the nation, no blackguard will come along to beat them that we will not beat them back. We are not afraid of the Governor.
Don’t drink. Go home and be good boys.
Resolved that a copy be sent to the Governor; a copy to Judge Burdett.
Don’t send a copy to the poor sheriff-
(Cries of: “Send him one.”)
Oh, the poor fellow, he might take a fit.
Taylor and this Morton up here, who have been telling you what they will do-the dirty cowards-they went into the cellars, and said, “Put the dirty clothes all over my back.” God knows there couldn’t be anything dirtier than they are.
—————