———-
Hellraisers Journal – Friday March 14, 1919
Mother Jones News for February 1919
-Found in Speaking to the Miners of District 17 in West Virginia
From The West Virginian of February 4, 1919:
MOTHER JONES COMING BACK
TO THIS COAL FIELD
—–
Will Address a Mass Meeting
at Phillippi Sunday.
—–[…..]
“Mother” Jones, the miners’ friend, will soon be back in the Fairmont region according to the information received today by C. F. Keeney, president of District 17, United Mine Workers, who is now at the local office in Fairmont. “Mother” Jones will arrive in Charleston on Friday from California, where she interceded for Mooney before Governor Stephens, in the case that has attracted wide attention in labor circles. “Mother” Jones was sent to the Coast by the Illinois Federation of Labor.
While in the Fairmont region she will address three or four meetings in the interest of the miners in the Belington section, including a meeting at Junior mine. She will address a mass meeting of miners at Philippi on Sunday.
[…..]
Three Mass Meetings.
Three mass meetings are scheduled by the United Mine Workers for Sunday. In the afternoon “Mother” Jones will speak at Philippi.
At 1 o’clock in the afternoon President C. F. Keeney will address a mass meeting at Roaring Creek Junction.
A mass meeting at Junior mine will be addressed by Sam Ballantyne, an international organizer……
———-
[Photograph added.]
From The Wheeling Intelligencer of February 5, 1919:
Mother Jones Heads Protestants Against
State’s Police Force
—–CHARLESTON, W. Va., Feb. 4.-“Mother Jones, U. S. A.,” is the way it was put down on a local hotel register to-day. The militant and aged woman labor champion later to-day made public announcement that she came here from the Pacific coast to lead a delegation of District 17, United Mine Workers, into the halls of the state legislature to protest against the action proposed in a measure now before both houses looking toward the establishment of a state police force, patterned after Pennsylvania’s.
———-
From The West Virginian of February 8, 1919:
MOTHER JONES COMING
—–
She Will Go to Philippi to Make
an Address Tomorrow.
——[…..]
“Mother” Jones is expected in Fairmont late this afternoon. She left Charleston yesterday morning and it is thought she probably spent last night at Parkersburg and will come from Clarksburg to Fairmont by trolley. She will speak at a miners’ mass meeting at Philippi on Sunday afternoon at 1 o’clock. B. A. Scott, international board member, will accompany her to Philippi…..
From The West Virginian of February 15, 1919:
“Mother” Jones Speaks.
Just before fifty miners entered the capitol at Charleston to protest against the bill proposed to place a state constabulary in the State of West Virginia, “Mother” Jones stood on the front steps and protested against the bill. The miners term it the so called red flag bill.
From The Wheeling Intelligencer of February 15, 1919:
Patrol Bill Advance.
The big feature in the senate today was the advancing of the Hough state patrol bill, which followed a meeting in protest held in front of the capitol building, led by “Mother” Jones, the labor organizer, and participated in by members of District No 17, United Mine Workers of America.
“Mother” Jones’ address was chiefly an attack upon Senator Hough, and a severe chastisement of the miners for coming to the capitol to “beg.” In closing, she declared that she was 89 years old, but that she had a contract with God Almighty and she was going to stay here until she cleaned hell out of some of the hypocrites of the West Virginia legislature.
———-
From The West Virginian of February 26, 1919:
“Mother” Jones has left Charleston and is now on a trip to Washington, D. C., and New York City. Later she will go into the Kentucky field.
[Emphasis added to articles above.]
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
SOURCES
Quote Mother Jones, Contract w God Almighty,
-Charleston, Aug 1, 1912
Foner, Mother Jones Speaks, page 165
https://books.google.com/books?id=vI-xAAAAIAAJ
The West Virginian
(Fairmont, West Virginia)
-Feb 4, 1919
https://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn86072054/1919-02-04/ed-1/seq-4/
-Feb 8, 1919
https://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn86072054/1919-02-08/ed-1/seq-1/
-Feb 15, 1919
https://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn86072054/1919-02-15/ed-1/seq-1
-Feb 26, 1919
https://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn86072054/1919-02-26/ed-1/seq-4/
The Wheeling Intelligencer
(Wheeling, West Virginia)
-Feb 5, 1919
https://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn86092536/1919-02-05/ed-1/seq-1/
-Feb 15, 1919
https://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn86092536/1919-02-15/ed-1/seq-1/
IMAGE
Mother Jones, Kalamazoo Gz p9 gen, Dec 27, 1918
https://www.genealogybank.com/
See also:
Hellraisers Journal – Saturday February 22, 1919
Mother Jones News for January 1919-Found in Los Angeles, California
The “anti red-flag law” was later read into the 1921 Senate Hearings on the “West Virginia Coal Fields”:
“West Virginia Coal Fields”
Hearings Before the Committee on Education and Labor U.S. Senate, 67th. Congress, First Session Pursuant to S. Res. 80
-Chairman Senator William S. Kenyon of Iowa
(for more, search: “red flag”)
https://books.google.com/books?id=EQQ9AAAAYAAJ
July 19, 1921, Washington D. C.
https://play.google.com/books/reader?id=EQQ9AAAAYAAJ&printsec=frontcover&pg=GBS.PA261
Testimony of Albert E. McComas
https://play.google.com/books/reader?id=EQQ9AAAAYAAJ&printsec=frontcover&pg=GBS.PA302
TESTIMONY OF ALBERT E. McCOMAS.
[Member of Special State Police](The witness was duly sworn by the chairman.)
Mr. Bias [Attorney for mine owners of Williamson field]. Mr. Chairman and gentlemen of the committee, in the examination of Messrs. Mooney and Keeney [Vice-President and President of UMW District 17] it developed that each of them had opposed the adoption of what is known as the anti red-flag law, and I understand from the chairman that the committee would like to have that law in the record.
The Chairman. Yes. Of course, they explained their opposition.
Chapter 24 of the Laws of West Virginia, 1919, as passed by the Legislature of the State of West Virginia, reads as follows:
Chapter 24.—An act to foster the ideals, institutions, and government of West Virginia and of the United States, and to prohibit the teaching of doctrines and display of flags antagonistic to the form or spirit of their constitutions and laws.
Be it enacted by the Legislature of West Virginia:
Section 1. It shall be unlawful for any person to speak, print, publish, or communicate, by language, sign, picture, or otherwise, any teachings, doctrines, or counsels in sympathy or favor of ideals, institutions, or forms of government hostile, inimical, or antagonistic to those now or hereafter existing under the constitution and laws of this State or the United States or in sympathy or favor of the propriety, duty, or necessity of crime, violence, or other unlawful methods of terrorism as a means of accomplishing economic or political reform, or in sympathy or favor of the overthrow of organized society, the unlawful destruction of property or the violation of law.
Sec. 2. It shall be unlawful for any person to have in his possession or to display any red or black flag, or to display any other flag, emblem, device, or sign of any nature whatever indicating sympathy or support of ideals, institutions, or forms of government hostile, inimical, or antagonistic to the form or spirit of the constitution, laws, ideals, and institutions of this State or the United States.
Sec. 3. Any person violating any of the provisions of this act shall, for the first offense, be guilty of a misdemeanor, and upon conviction shall be fined not less than $100 nor more than $500, or imprisoned in the county jail not exceeding 12 months, or both, and for the second offense shall be guilty of a felony and upon conviction shall be confined in the penitentiary not less than one nor more than five years.
Mr. Bias. It is chapter 24 of the act of the Legislature of West Virginia for the regular session of 1919.
Mr. Montgomery [Attorney for UMW]. I want to say that every union man in the legislature voted for that law—every single one of them.
The Chairman. How many union men are there?
Mr. Montgomery. Over 20.
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