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Hellraisers Journal, Tuesday August 22, 1916
El Paso, Texas-Mother Jones Speaks to Street Car Strikers
From El Paso Herald of August 17, 1916:
Don’t be afraid that the militia ever will shoot me. I don’t know of a more joyous death than in fighting the battles of you laboring men.
I’m not afraid of the militia; most of them are only little kids.
A hundred years ago employers enslaved men by owning their bodies. Today they enslave them by controlling the sources from which they get their bread.
The nearer you get to Jesus, the safer you are.
We laboring people are not going to submit to a military despotism.
If this thing goes on there will be another Bunker Hill in your city within a year.
You working people make the bullets and bayonets with which you are killed when you strike.
The destiny of this nation lies in its women. No nation can grow greater than its women.
Why do you city officials allow these hired gunmen here?
These are some of the “punches”delivered by “Mother” Jones in a speech at Cleveland Square Wednesday night on the El Paso street car strike. Meantime a crowd of 3000 people cheered, jeered, groaned or listened in impressed silence. A drizzling rain that threatened to burst at any moment into a thunder storm was ignored by the big gathering of laboring men, soldiers, welltodo residents of the neighborhood, women, girls and children.
Before “Mother” Jones was given a chance to speak, the crowd endorsed a resolution by the Central Labor union condemning the El Paso Electric railway company and petitioning the mayor and city council to suspend the ordinances regulating jitney busses until there is a settlement of the present strike.
Has Snow White Hair.
The El Paso municipal band furnished music for the occasion and “Mother” Jones was escorted to the speaker’s stand by a committee consisting of Wm. J. Moran. Ponder S. Carter, W E. Lunsford. Lee Pollard and others. “Mother” Jones, a small woman who with her snow white hair and spectacles, exemplifies her cognomen, received an ovation as she approached the platform. Many in the big crowd were deceived by “Mother” Jones’s years and her small stature, for she proved a dynamic spellbinder with a voice that carried to the outermost listener. She herself declared she is 84 years old. but she looks a dozen years younger.
Wm. J. Moran acted as master of ceremonies, introducing both Ponder S. Carter and “Mother” Jones.
Clubwomen, churches, the missionary movement, the militia, the United States senate, the nation’s court system, “the stupidity of the workingmen,” “the indolence” of their wives, the “piracy of the rich high class burglars” and the city officials all came in for stinging lashes from “Mother” Jones’s sharp tongue.
“Take Out Electric Meters.”
[She said:]
If 4000 of you labor men and sympathizers with the street car strikers would take the electric meters out of your homes and use candles for a while you’d soon bring the pirates to time. But your wives won’t let you. Shame on them! They would rather sell their babies into bondage than do without the comforts of electric lighted homes.
You women must organize if you want your men to earn a decent living wage. It is up to you. Think of your babies and their future. The employers have unions, pretty good ones too. And they stand together like all high-class thieves.
21 Cents An Hour.
You street car men pay 50 cents for the privilege of sitting in a room and waiting for the privilege of being called out to work. No slaves ever had to do that. Would any of you city officials work for 21 cents an hour? No, not one of you. Then why do you expect the street car men to work for such a wage?
While the wives of you street car men are wondering where the next meal is coming from, the wives of your masters are strutting about with their dresses cut to here (“Mother” Jones indicated a point near her waist line) and their hands loaded with diamonds. These diamonds are the blood of your little children whom they have robbed and starved.
Belongs On Firing Line.
I tell you it is the women who must organize to help the men. We want no Sunday school people. We want practical men and women. I do not belong in the church or the parlor or the club-room. I belong on the firing line. At the same time, I do not believe in murder or violence. The day of brute force and violence has passed. We must get what we want by other means.
The avenues by which we make our bread are taken away from us and then we go to China and tell the Chinese what fine Christians we are. Every state is calling for an extra penitentiary. We have Christianity on one side and robbery and thievery on the other.
Guest of State.
You fellows fill the jails. There would be no jails but for us. The other fellows don’t know how to build them. I have been arrested as many times as you have. I had the men in uniforms take care of me. I wasn’t like you, a guest of the city; I was a guest of the state.
I went to the strike in West Virginia. They sent the militia with me. I am not afraid of the militia: most of them are only little kids. One of the most pathetic sights I have ever seen in my life was when I trained my boys up there near the militia camp. I took them over to the church in the face of the militiaman. The nearer you get to Jesus, the safer you are. The state paid $600,000 to the militia to crush those miners, but they did not do it.
Sentenced To Penitentiary.
I was sentenced to five years in the penitentiary there. For five weeks I was the only military prisoner. Their scheme was to get rid of the best men by putting them in prison.
I want to ask why you allowed the gunmen and scabs to come here. You yourselves patronize the ‘scabs.’ You will have a union card in your pocket and a scab hat on your head. Why don’t you look to see if the things you buy from your merchants have the union label?
Compliments President.
“Mother” Jones gave a striking picture of the scenes at Ludlow. Colo., during the coal miners strike and described the shooting down of the men by the militia. She complimented president Wilson, but said she hoped senator Borah, of Idaho, would be president some day because of the stand he had taken toward labor.
“MOTHER” JONES TO SPEAK AT COURTHOUSE TONIGHT
“Mother” Jones, who is here in the interest of the labor situation and especially the street car strike, will speak at the 41st district courtroom this evening at 8 o’clock.
The labor union men who are in charge of the meeting have invited the business men and merchants to hear the woman labor speaker.
SOURCE
El Paso Herald
(El Paso, Texas)
-Aug 17, 1916
http://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn88084272/1916-08-17/ed-1/seq-2/
IMAGE
Mother Jones, El Paso Herald headline, Aug 17, 1916
http://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn88084272/1916-08-17/ed-1/seq-2/
See also:
For more on Mother in El Paso during August of 1916-
Mother Jones speaks: collected writings and speeches
-ed by Philip Sheldon Foner
Monad Press, 1983
https://books.google.com/books?id=T_m5AAAAIAAJ
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The Preacher And The Slave – Mischief Brew
Lyrics by Joe Hill