The fellows who are now in palaces
ought to be in jail.
The fellows who are in jail
ought to be in the palaces.
-Mother Jones
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Hellraisers Journal, Friday August 21, 1908
-Mother Jones News Round-Up for July 1908, Part II
–Found Speaking at Denver Convention of W. F. of M.
On July 18th, Mother Jones was present in Denver at the Sixteenth Annual Convention of the Western Federation of Miners when she was invited to address the delegates gathered there. She was introduced by John M. O’Neill and spoke at length. The following summary of her remarks is taken from The Denver Post of July 19th (see full article below.)
MOTHER JONES, PEACEMAKER AT MINERS’ CONVENTION
[From Speech by Mother Jones]
The Western Federation has paved the way for labor to come together. The crucial time is on now with the guns of capital trained against you from Washington. Did not labor of the world stand behind you in your troubles? Take the United Workers of America by the hand and thank God you are getting together. Forget the little worries over the check-off system. When we all get together we will kick the check-off boss overboard.
When you join the United Mine Workers of America you will put some warm blood into them. Don’t forget, too, that they have good members and plenty of them.
We are working in a new century and must abandon the old things for the new. Women should organize as strongly as the men. I lined up 3,000 women in the Eastern mining camps and they took away the guns of the sheriffs and their dude deputies. These dudes carried little guns on their hips and sported miniature mustaches.
Do not wait for a written document from the other side in labor peace pacts. Take Tom Lewis by the hand. They were forced to adopt the check-off system when they were up against it. Feel that the United Mine Workers are still your brothers. The peace that Christ teaches should rule between your organizations.
———-
From The Denver Post of July 19, 1908:
MOTHER JONES IN DENVER SEEKING
TO UNITE MINERS
—–
“Mother” Jones is in Denver. She came to attend the convention of the Western Federation of Miners and visit her friends, Charles H. Moyer, George Pettibone and John M. O’Neill of the Western Federation. She is one of the most unique and picturesque characters in the country and probably has a wider acquaintance among the working people than any other labor advocate. She has talked and traveled in the interests of unions for a quarter of a century.
JAILED MANY TIMES.
She acquired the title of “Mother” because for years she was an organizer of the United Mine Workers of America in the East and was really a mother to that infant organization. Few large labor conventions are held in America without “”Mother” Jones being called on for an address.
She has been thrown in jail a dozen times, deported from many states, been the subject of sweeping injunctions and refused admission to halls in many cities.
She was busy n Colorado in 1901 [1903-1904] and was deported for her activity in behalf of the miners. She is now 72 years of age and is traveling and speaking every day. Her home is in Chicago, but she is seldom there. Before taking up the cudgels for labor she was nurse in the sorely afflicted yellow fever districts of Tennessee. She lost her husband and family [her four little children] by the awful scourge.
In the mining camps of Virginia she was enjoined from organizing miners. She disobeyed the injunction and was arrested. Judge Jackson, appointed a federal judge by Abraham Lincoln, refused to punish her. She will probably take the stump this fall for the Socialist presidential ticket and will speak in the larger cities of the country. Mary Jones is her given name, but everywhere she is known as “Mother.”
“Mother” Jones was given a tremendous ovation when she started to speak at the Western Federation meeting yesterday. She was escorted to the platform by John M. O’Neill, editor of the Miners’ Magazine, at whose home she is staying while in Denver. She put herself on report with the audience by stating that she felt ill at ease with her escort. She had been used to bayonets as an escort in Colorado. She was harking back to the troublous days of 1904 when she made the remark.
LABOR MUST GET TOGETHER.
In part, she said:
I came here from Texas and Oklahoma to congratulate you. Your organization stands exonerated before the twentieth century. You were the victims of the ruling class. Labor must come together in the mines, in the fields, on the railways and everywhere. You are not here to fight out small issues. The time is ripe to line up for big things.
The capitalists have their tools in all conventions to help grind you down. The farmers’ unions, which I have been talking to recently in Texas and Oklahoma, are honeycombed with the tools of capitalists. I want you to stop all of this small talk, It is not Lewis [Tom L Lewis, President of the U. M. W. of A.] you are fighting, it is not Mitchell, it is not Gompers. We are a mighty army and the ones responsible. The battle is still on in earnest. As long as you indulge in small personalities like you have today you are working for the enemy. As long as you are divided you are not doing your duty.
If Lewis came here offering you peace terms stand with him for God’s sake. If Teddy Roosevelt came here with a plan to unify and advance the worker I would be with him. But poor Teddy don’t come to us and we are all undesirable citizens.
The Western Federation has paved the way for labor to come together. The crucial time is on now with the guns of capital trained against you from Washington. Did not labor of the world stand behind you in your troubles? Take the United Workers of America by the hand and thank God you are getting together. Forget the little worries over the check-off system. When we all get together we will kick the check-off boss overboard.
When you join the United Mine Workers of America you will put some warm blood into them. Don’t forget, too, that they have good members and plenty of them.
WORKING IN NEW CENTURY.
We are working in a new century and must abandon the old things for the new. Women should organize as strongly as the men. I lined up 3,000 women in the Eastern mining camps and they took away the guns of the sheriffs and their dude deputies. These dudes carried little guns on their hips and sported miniature mustaches.
Do not wait for a written document from the other side in labor peace pacts. Take Tom Lewis by the hand. They were forced to adopt the check-off system when they were up against it. Feel that the United Mine Workers are still your brothers. The peace that Christ teaches should rule between your organizations.
Japan is grasping the spirit of the workingmen’s revolution, the spirit of peace, joy and unity.
In our social cesspool of today the women are not cultivated. They are simply the tools of the master. What do you think of a mother that gives dog and monkey banquets while the child is home with a nurse that has no interest in it? Thus we see the degeneration of the mothers and the placing of the child into the factories to come out deformed and helpless.
If our government becomes corrupt we must blame our women. If woman is a failure in the labor world as elsewhere it is because we have thrown boquets at her and made her believe she was the biggest thing that went down the pike.
Her appearance at the convention in the role of peacemaker is considered providential by the leaders of both organizations.
———-
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SOURCE & IMAGES
The Denver Post
(Denver, Colorado)
-July 19, 1908, page 2
https://www.genealogybank.com/
See also:
Official Proceedings of the 16th Annual Convention
of the Western Federation of Miners
-July 13-29, 1908
Denver, Colorado
-Pages 1-439/1303
Note: page 444/1303 begins 1909 Convention.
https://books.google.com/books?id=0aM0AQAAMAAJ
Fifth Day, July 17th, 1908
https://play.google.com/books/reader?id=0aM0AQAAMAAJ&printsec=frontcover&pg=GBS.PA316
Afternoon Session
https://play.google.com/books/reader?id=0aM0AQAAMAAJ&printsec=frontcover&pg=GBS.PA321
Resolution #59
https://play.google.com/books/reader?id=0aM0AQAAMAAJ&printsec=frontcover&pg=GBS.PA324
Resolution No. 59. with report of Resolution Committee read as follows:
No. 59.
Whereas, At the time in which the Western Federation of Miners was in sore distress, having arrayed against it the united power of the Mine Owners’ Association and the Citizens’ Alliance, the executives of the states of Colorado and Idaho, the moral support of the president of theUnited States, the united efforts of the capitalistic press, all for the purpose of confounding public opinion to the end that our officers might be executed, our treasury depleted, and our entire organization forced down to inglorious defeat. and at that time there came to our aid Mother Jones, Miss Luella Twining, J. Edward Morgan, and others, without whose efforts our cause must certainly have been lost for want of the financial assistance which they aided us in securing, therefore be it
Resolved, That we formally convey to Mother Jones, Miss Luella Twining, J. Edward Morgan, and others, our most sincere and heartfelt thanks, which we find language is inadequate to express.
WILLIAM E. TRACY.
Denver, Colorado, July 17, 1908.To the Officers and Delegates of the Sixteenth Annual Convention, W. F. M.:
Gentlemen—We, your Committee on Resolutions, recommend that Resolution No. 59 be adopted as amended and spread on the minutes of this convention.
GEO. HEATHERTON, Chairman,
F. G. CLOUGH, Secretary,
JOHN MITCHELL,
J. E. HINTON,
J. E. DAHL,
P. W. FLYNN,
M. L. TOMPKINS,
Resolution Committee.Moved by O’Leary, seconded by McLellan, that report of committee be concurred in. Motion carried.
Sixth Day, July 18, 1908
https://play.google.com/books/reader?id=0aM0AQAAMAAJ&printsec=frontcover&pg=GBS.PA328
Afternoon Session
https://play.google.com/books/reader?id=0aM0AQAAMAAJ&printsec=frontcover&pg=GBS.PA332
Mother Speaks
https://play.google.com/books/reader?id=0aM0AQAAMAAJ&printsec=frontcover&pg=GBS.PA334
Moved by Randall, seconded by Callahan, that the rules be suspended and Mother Jones be invited to address the convention. Motion carried.
Editor John M. O’Neill introduced Mother Jones, who at length addressed the convention. In her brilliant and eloquent address, Mother Jones urged upon the delegates the necessity of unity amongst the workers.
Moved by J . A. MacKinnon, seconded by Rigley, that a rising vote of thanks be accorded to Mother Jones for her eloquent address. Motion unanimously carried.
Seventh Day July 20, 1908
https://play.google.com/books/reader?id=0aM0AQAAMAAJ&printsec=frontcover&pg=GBS.PA334
Afternoon Session – Mother Speaks Again
https://play.google.com/books/reader?id=0aM0AQAAMAAJ&printsec=frontcover&pg=GBS.PA339
Moved by Clark, seconded by Custis, that the rules be suspended and that Mother Jones be asked to address the convention before her departure from the city.
Mother Jones then proceeded to address the delegates and in her eloquent portrayal of labor’s struggles, she pointed out the absolute necessity of eliminating from labor organizations the internal strifes which she said, more than other things robbed the industrial organization of the workers of its power in resisting organized capital.
Moved by McCabe, seconded by Locke, that Mother Jones be voted a standing vote of thanks. Motion carried.
After the delegates had bidden farewell to Mother Jones, Brother Moyer called the convention to order and the regular business was resumed.
Note: also search text with “Mother Jones” for more on her fund raising efforts on behalf of Haywood, Moyer, and Pettibone during 1907. She was paid $100 during Aug 1907: “Organizer, Minnesota.” VP Mahoney, in his report, mentions her trip to the Iron Range of Minnesota during the summer of 1907 (previously covered by Hellraisers.) Mahoney and Mother both spoke at a meeting in Duluth on the evening of Aug 18, 1907. Remember that results beginning on page 444/1303 are from the 1909 Convention.
Tag: Haywood-Moyer-Pettibone Case
https://weneverforget.org/tag/haywood-moyer-pettibone-case/
Hellraisers Journal: Whereabouts and Doings of Mother Jones for August 1907, Part II,
Found on Minnesota’s Iron Range, and in Chicago, & Cincinnati
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