It is the historic mission of the working class
to do away with capitalism.
-The IWW Preamble
Hellraisers Journal, Sunday November 11, 1906
From The Labor World – I. W. W. Doomed, According to Max Hayes
From the Duluth Labor World of November 10, 1906:
MAX HAYES CLAIMS I. W. W. IS DOOMED
—–
Leading Trade Union-Socialist Says That
Industrial Workers Have Split.
—–
Convention Breaks up in a Row-
Riot Calls From the Police-
Much Havoc.
—–
Max Hayes, editor of the Cleveland Citizens says that the I. W. W. is doomed. [He?] sizes up the situation like this:
The Industrial Workers of the World appears to be doomed, and once more Dan DeLeon plays the role of chief smasher. After weeks of battle the Chicago convention finally wound up in a split, and while the few tired delegates who remained to the end were homeward bound the Sherman and Trautman factions had a beautiful scrap to see who would [hold?] the fort. There was slugging, police calls and injunction suits started, and at this writing Secretary Trautman, who is DeLeon’s man, seems to be trying to pick himself together in the ditch of defeat while President Sherman, who was deposed by his opponents, is grinning at the luckless secretary from a national office window.
It is a difficult matter to sift the facts from the sea of words that are printed in DeLeon’s Daily People, the circulars that have been issued by the Shermanites and the communications that have been rushed into print by the interested parties. It looks as though there was a lot of faking right from the beginning; that some of the so-called departments were on paper; that legally elected delegates were kicked out of the convention and contestants who represented nothing or organizations not in good standing were seated; that the constitution was flagrantly violated in a number of instances; that the delegates usurped the rights of the rank and file conferred through the referendum; that there were financial transactions that looked suspicious; that organizers manipulated to obtain funds for forming paper unions and loafing, etc., etc.
Very few of the prominent men who assisted in forming the I. W. W. last year were present at the second convention, and the Western Federation of Miners was the only important organization represented. It is quite likely that the miners will secede and thus leave DeLeon master of all he surveys. The latter is never happier than when he has smashed something and is permitted to “clarify” things according to his own notions until only the great and only Dan is left with a few retainers who crawl about on their bellies and shout “Allah be praised:” Dandelion DeLeon is a daisy.
———-
[Paragraph breaks and photograph added.]
Note: as reported in the Albuquerque Morning Journal of October 3rd, the delegates from the Western Federation of Miners bolted from the I. W. W. Convention on October 2nd:
SOCIALISM SPLITS LABOR ORGANIZATION
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Chicago, Oct. 2.-The national convention of the Industrial Workers of the World split on the rock of socialism today, when the delegates from the Western Federation of Miners, representing 25,000 men and the mainstay of the labor union, bolted. The seceders will organize under another name [the W. F. of M. will not be changing its name].
—–
[Photograph added.]
SOURCES
The Labor World
(Duluth, Minnesota)
-Nov 10, 1906
https://www.newspapers.com/image/49590938/
Albuquerque Morning Journal
(Albuquerque, New Mexico)
-Oct 3, 1906
https://www.newspapers.com/image/148642674/
IMAGES
IWW Label, 2nd Conv, Sept 17-Oct 3, 1906
https://books.google.com/books/reader?id=vQlQAAAAYAAJ&printsec=frontcover&output=reader&source=gbs_atb&pg=GBS.PA3
Western Federation of Miners Button
http://www.nps.gov/kewe/historyculture/museum-guide-5.htm
Max S Hayes (1866-1945), ab 1910, wiki
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Max_S._Hayes
See also:
Proceedings of the second annual Convention of the Industrial Workers of the World
Sept 17 – Oct 3, 1906
Industrial Workers of the World, 1906
https://books.google.com/books?id=vQlQAAAAYAAJ
For more on Sherman and Trautmann:
http://www.iww.org/headquarters/oldgst
For more on the Daily People:
https://archive.org/details/partypress19001900socirich
Max S Hayes
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Max_S._Hayes
https://www.marxists.org/glossary/people/h/a.htm
For more on The Cleveland Citizen:
http://www.worldcat.org/title/cleveland-citizen/oclc/17562806
Note: Max Hayes was invited to the January Conference of 1905 which proceeded the Founding Convention of the IWW, but declined to attend:
https://books.google.com/books/reader?id=b746AQAAMAAJ&printsec=frontcover&output=reader&source=gbs_atb&pg=GBS.PA5
Max Hayes to W. L. Hall, Dec 30, 1904-
From Proceedings of Founding Convention (the minutes of the January Conference were read into the proceedings.)
https://books.google.com/books/reader?id=ifRQAQAAMAAJ&printsec=frontcover&output=reader&source=gbs_atb&pg=GBS.PA99
CLEVELAND TYPOGRAPHICAL UNION NO. 53.
Cleveland, O., Dec. 30, 1904.
W. L. Hall:
Dear Sir and Brother:
For two important reasons I will be unable to be present at the conference to which you have so kindly invited me, viz.: “financial embarrassment,” and, secondly, I am not altogether clear as to what can be done or what it is proposed to do. You say, in the third paragraph, in substance, that the Socialist party must have its “economic counterpart,” etc., and in the fifth paragraph that it is your purpose to unite the workers on correct, revolutionary principles “regardless of any general labor organization of past or present.” This sounds to me as though we are to have another S. T. & L. A. [Socialist Trades and Labor Alliance] experiment over again; that we, who are in the trade unions as at present constituted, are to cut loose and flock by ourselves. If I am correct in my surmises it means another running fight between Socialists on the one side and all other partisans on the other. Let me say frankly that under no circumstances will I permit myself to be dragged into any more secession movements or fratricidal wars between factors of workers because they are not of one mind at this juncture. If there is any fighting to be done I intend to use my energies and whatever ability I may possess to bombard the common enemy—capitalism. Moreover, I intend to put in whatever time and means that I have to agitate on the inside of the organizations now in existence to dump conservatism over board and prepare to take their places “in the working class administration of the Co-operative Commonwealth.” Unless I am very much mistaken the rank and file of the trade unions are awakening as never before, and as soon as even a good-sized minority become thoroughly class conscious, the fossilized leaders will “go up in the air.”
From a strategic standpoint I would rather be inside the fort and take chances to secure the adoption of my plans than to be out side and regarded as an enemy. If the leaders of the S. L. P. [Socialist Labor Party, headed by Daniel DeLeon], so-called, had not made a number of glaring mistakes (as time has proven they did) the workers would have been won open to conviction long ago, and those of us who are active would not have been compelled to fight on the defensive. While not denying the right of men to secede, I question the tactics and especially when circumstances do not warrant such a move. At the present time the so-called pure and simple unions are throwing open their doors to a full and free discussion of all economic questions. I do not see that a purely Socialist union could do any more. And even if the present organizations changed their names next week and adopted high-sounding resolutions it would not mean any more Socialist votes unless the members understood our principles and changed their opinions.
Personally, I have absolutely no fear for the future as far as the present trade unions are concerned. While a few of the leaders are now “jagged” with power and a sense of their own importance, their peculiar performances makes their position insecure. If I am mistaken in my surmises and those who gather at your conference adopt ways and means to increase the activity and agitation in the trade unions in favor of progressive measures, and formulate plans to join and assist in the battle, nothing would please me more. In fact, I am sure that the conservative leaders would be more pleased to learn that they are to have opposition from the outside than that such opposition was becoming more formidable on the inside. I happen to know, for instance, that at every Federation convention there is more speculation and worrying about what the twenty or thirty odd Socialists intend doing than any equal number of men. Suppose the number of Socialist delegates were doubled or trebled?
Sincerely hoping that your conference will be able to grasp the full significance of the opportunities that confront our movement, and thanking you for the invitation extended, I am,
Yours fraternally,
MAX S. HAYES.[Photograph added.]
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
In fact the IWW still exists today:
“Tom Morello AKA The Nightwatchman performs Solidarity Forever
at the I.W.W. Organizing Summit Social Night.”