Hellraisers Journal: International Socialist Review: “On the Picket Line at Little Falls, New York” by William D. Haywood, Part I

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Quote Red Flag Song, ISR p519, Jan 1913—————

Hellraisers Journal – Wednesday January 1, 1913
“On the Picket Line at Little Falls, New York” by Big Bill Haywood, Part I

From the International Socialist Review of January 1913:

HdLn Little Falls by BBH, ISR p519, Jan 1913

[Part I of II.]

WITH facts for a fulcrum and sentiment for a lever, we can move the world!

The world of labor is being slowly moved by economic conditions such as present themselves at Little Falls, N. Y., where women and children and men are struggling for bread. The facts regarding the situation there inspired Helen Keller, the world’s prodigy, to give voice to the heart pulses expressed in the letter printed on the opposite page.

By the rarest good chance John Macy,  whose wife is the teacher and companion of Helen Keller, came to Little Falls. A member of the Industrial Workers of the World, he took up his part of the battle by getting the books and accounts of the strikers in shape, by writing articles and reports. It was through him and other mediums that the details of the strike and its attendant miseries reached the blind girl at her pleasant home at Wrentham, Mass. Sitting at her desk and surveying the mysterious lines in “The Hand of the World,” she sees what philosophers, politicians and priests cannot see; have never seen. She reads unerringly the destiny of labor. Understanding the need of toil, she reaches out and puts in the hand of the world, not a dole of charity but a token of love-part of labor’s own.

Letter fr Helen Keller to Little Falls Strikers, ISR p518, Jan 1913

John Macy read her letter to the strikers at a regular meeting held at Slavoc Sokel hall. Helen Keller has never spoken to such an audience before. There were none but workers there, men and women, boys and girls, who knew but  little English and were of many tongues.

It was explained to them that they were listening to the words of a girl who was deaf and blind; one who had overcome afflictions more severe than their own. They could not understand the meaning of many of her words. But they were like a mother’s crooning, soothing a wounded child. The letter was a heartfelt greeting from a sincere friend. They felt the sentiment and the sympathy it contained. Their eyes streamed with tears. They burst into a hearty cheer. Helen Keller will get a set of resolutions signed by the strikers in many languages.

She may never see the embossed words or names attached to the resolutions, but she will know their meaning-they are written by “The Hand of the World.”

Other remarkable letters were received by the strikers, one from a “friend” who had been saving his money to buy an overcoat. He had laid by ten dollars. He sent it all to the strikers saying he could get along without an overcoat if the money would help the strikers to win more bread. It is such sentiment and support that has instilled in the Little Falls strikers the spirit of solidarity that knows no defeat.

Some who sympathize with the Industrial Workers of the World principles and methods have sent letters with money and others have come in person to render what assistance they can to the strikers.

Ben Legere, ISR p520, Jan 1913

After the trouble precipitated by the police on October 30th, last, the organizers on the ground, Ben J. Legere and Phillipo Bocchino, with nearly all the members of the strike committee, were thrown into jail where they have been held ever since, awaiting the action of of the grand jury.

After a farcical hearing, Legere and Bocchino were committed to jail and held for bail of $15,000. Murlando, one of the strikers, was held in the sum of $10,000 and the others in some instances ranging from $50 to $5,000. The story of the so-called riot was told in the following proclamation issued by the strikers:

The blood-thirsty, murderous cossacks have shown their hand.

Police thugs of Little Fall throw off the mask and do the dirty work for the gang of bloodsuckers who own the mills in Little Falls.

Today in Little Falls was seen a spectacle which has not been witnessed before anywhere outside of Russia.

Today the gang of fiends in human form who wear the disgraceful uniform of the police in Little Falls, deliberately went to work and started a riot.

It was the most brutal, cold-blooded act ever done in these parts. Nothing under heaven can ever justify it and the soul of the degenerate brute who started it will shrivel in hell long, long before the workers will ever forget this day.

The workers in the mills of Little Falls have been on strike for four weeks against an inhuman oppression of the mill-bosses. An incompetent law has been used by these mill-owners to reduce the wages of the workers from fifty cents to two dollars a week.

Hundreds of these workers were already existing on a starvation wage averaging about $7 per week.

They resisted this robbery by the mill-owners.

They went on strike.

The police showed at the beginning that the filthy money of the mill-owners can corrupt all authority by attempting to suppress free speech in Little Falls. Several speakers were arrested. Then the strikers organized in the Industrial Workers of the World.

They began peaceful picketing at the mills where many American workers, mostly girls, were playing the part of scabs.

The strikers, with a band and banners bearing appeals for support, began to parade each morning before the mills to encourage the other workers to come out. They did not interfere with the scabs in any way and by this means of peaceful demonstration the strikers won over every day some of those who were working.

The mill-bosses were baffled. They could not understand this new and peaceful mode of picketing. As the strikers kept moving at all times the police could find no excuse to interfere. But today the craven brutes MADE an excuse.

Every day more workers joined the picket-line. The first day one of these blood-thirsty police animals tried to start a riot by slugging a girl who stepped from the line to speak to a friend. He was number three who showed his cowardice and animal ferocity today by cruelly clubbing helpless prisoners and defenseless strikers.

Continue reading “Hellraisers Journal: International Socialist Review: “On the Picket Line at Little Falls, New York” by William D. Haywood, Part I”

Hellraisers Journal: Supreme Court Sets Aside Pennsylvania Law for Protection of Anthracite Miners, Held to Be Confiscatory

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Mother Jones Quote, Life Cheaper Than Props, Trinidad CO, Sept 16, 1913, Hse Com p2630—————

Hellraisers Journal – Sunday December 31, 1922
Pennsylvania Law for Protection of Anthracite Miners Set Aside by Supreme Court

From the Duluth Labor World of December 30, 1922:

COURT DECLARES LABOR ACT VOID
———-
Pennsylvania Mine Cave-In Law
Held to Be Confiscatory
———-

Spangler MnDs Death Pit, Wlgtn DE Eve Jr p1, Nov 9, 1922

The United States Supreme court has set aside the Pennsylvania law which prohibited the mining of anthracite coal in a manner that would endanger the lives or injure the property of persons-occupying houses situated on the surface soil. Justice Brandeis dissented.

The court held that the law deprived coal owners of valuable property rights without compensation. Under the decision, coal owners can mine coal without any regard for cave-ins that endanger lives and property, unless the coal that is necessary for props is paid for.

In his dissenting opinion, Justice Brandeis said:

If by mining anthracite coal the owner would necessarily unloose poisonous gases, I suppose no one would doubt the power of the state to prevent the mining without buying his coal field. And why may not the state, likewise, without paying compensation, prohibit one from digging so deep or excavating so near the surface as to expose the community to like dangers? In the latter case, as in the former, carrying on the business would be a public nuisance.

[Photograph and emphasis added.]

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Hellraisers Journal: Women Workers of the Mills of Little Falls Testify Before the State Board of Arbitration; Live in Abject Poverty

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Quote EGF Organize Women, IW p4, June 1, 1911—————

Hellraisers Journal – Sunday December 29, 1912
Little Falls, New York – Women Working in Textile Mills Live on Slave Wages

From the Binghamton Press and Leader of December 27, 1912:

ARBITRATORS HEAR HOW WOMEN
SLAVE IN LITTLE FALLS MILLS
———-
Eating While Working, Wool Winder
Has Made as Much as $7 in a Week
———-

Little Falls, Strikers at Slovak Hall, Matilda Rabinowitz, ISR p459, Dec 1912

Little Falls, Dec. 27.-Three members of the State Board of Arbitration, acting as mediators in the Little Falls textile strike, which has lasted for months, began taking testimony today.

The strikers were heard first, all witnesses being members of the union. They declared they had quit work because their wages were hardly sufficient for them to live on.

Mary Sroka, two years in America, testified that by working from 7 a. m. to 6 p. m. and taking very little time for luncheon, she had once made $6 in a week of five days. Sometimes, she said, she made only $2.50 and $3. She was an inspector in the finishing room of the Phoenix Mills.

Mrs. Suie Mizerak, a winder of wool, testified that she worked from 6 a. m. to 8 p. m., eating her meals as she worked, and made from $5 to $7 a week.

Stanislawa Cououn, an 18-year-old girl, testified that she received $1 a day for her work as a folder.

Agnes Kalolaka, a spinner, said she received $7 a week before the 54-hour law went into effect; thereafter, she received $6.37.

[Photograph and emphasis added.]

Continue reading “Hellraisers Journal: Women Workers of the Mills of Little Falls Testify Before the State Board of Arbitration; Live in Abject Poverty”

Hellraisers Journal: From the Spokane Industrial Worker: New Pamphlets Now Available from IWW Headquarters

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Quote EGF, Compliment IWW, IW p1, Nov 17, 1909—————

Hellraisers Journal – Saturday December 28, 1912
New Pamphlets Now Available from I. W. W. Headquarters in Chicago

From the Spokane Industrial Worker of December 26, 1912:

Ad for Pamphlets: Firing Line, Ettor n Giovannitti bf Jury, IW p7, Dec 26, 1912

On the Firing Line

Extracts from the Report of the General Executive Board
to the Seventh Annual Convention
of the Industrial Workers of the World
Held in Chicago, Ill., Sept. 17 to 27, 1912
-I. W. W. General Executive Board: Thomas Halcro
F. H. Little, Ewald Koettgen, George Speed

Ettor and Giovannitti Before the Jury
          at Salem, Massachusetts, November 23, 1912

IWW pamphlets Firing Line, Ettor n Giovannitti Jury, from Ad IW p7, Dec 7, 1912

Continue reading “Hellraisers Journal: From the Spokane Industrial Worker: New Pamphlets Now Available from IWW Headquarters”

Hellraisers Journal: From the Industrial Worker: Little Falls Textile Strikers Send Their Children Away to Schenectady

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Quote Helen Schloss, Women w Hungry Souls, Black Hills Dly Rg p2, July 15, 1910—————

Hellraisers Journal – Friday December 27, 1912
Little Falls, New York – Textile Strikers Send Children to Socialists in Schenectady

From the Spokane Industrial Worker of December 26, 1912:

SENDING THEIR CHILDREN AWAY
[-by Phillips Russell]
———-

Article Little Falls Strikers Send Children Away, IW p1, Dec 26, 1912

Continue reading “Hellraisers Journal: From the Industrial Worker: Little Falls Textile Strikers Send Their Children Away to Schenectady”

Hellraisers Journal: “Oklahoma Kate” Calls for Marriage and Motherhood Strike until Industrial Conditions for Women Improve

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Quote T Roosevelt Letter re Race Suicide to Marie Van Horst Oct 18, 1902—————

Hellraisers Journal – Thursday December 26, 1912
Boston, Massachusetts – Kate Barnard Calls for Strike on Matrimony and Motherhood

From the Duluth Labor World of December 21, 1912:

TOO MANY BABIES IN AMERICA NOW?
———-
Oklahoma Kate Tells Effete Boston There Is
No Need for More Race As It Is Now.
———-

OVER-WORKED MOTHERS FIRST
CAUSE OF CRIME
———-
Calls Strike On Matrimony and Motherhood Until
Women Are Granted Better Conditions.
———-

Kate Barnard, Marriage Strike, NY Eve Wld p24, Dec 19, 1912

BOSTON, Dec. 19.—”Don’t get married, girls; go on a mother strike until industrial conditions for women are better,” was the appeal made here today by Miss Kate Barnard, prison commissioner of Oklahoma, where she is sometimes called “Oklahoma Kate.”

[Miss Barnard declared:]

We have no need for more of our race as it is at present. I have decided not to marry until women are far better off industrially and politically, and I’m not an old woman, either.

Miss Barnard is—well, perhaps she might be 30—or thereabouts—and she is very pretty.

Where Crime Starts.

[Said Miss Barnard;]

The first cause of crime is the overworking of mothers and those who some day will be mothers.

She told how Oklahoma got its child labor law, which has been a model for 17 states since, and said this and the compulsory education law were aimed directly at conservation of humanity and reduction of crime.

[She declared:]

It’s a farce to pass a child labor law or a compulsory education law unless you provide against poverty, keeping children out of school.

She told how her bill provides that if a widow has children at work, they can be taken from the mill and sent to school and the state will pay their wages, just as though they were at work. There are 5,461 children now at school in Oklahoma under this provision.

”Last” But Five Years.

Miss Barnard described child labor in glass factories where little workers “last” from three to five years.

[She cried:]

And I say that the American girls have no time for matrimony until this is changed. We don’t need any more of the race until we can clear up what we have.

Ida Tarbell, the well known magazine writer, also spoke. She has concluded that married women and girls who enter industrial life without pressing need form one of the worst dangers to civilization in this coun­try.

Miss Tarbell has been paying special attention to the question of the minimum wage for women and to­day declared:

The minimum wage for women in Boston should be set at $9 while in New York it should be $1 higher. I’d hate to have any girl I cared about working in New York for less than $10.

Discussing the observations she has made while gathering material for a new series of articles on the new business ethics of today. Miss Tarbell said:

How They Live a Mystery.

Plenty of girls in New York are living on $6 a week and are keeping straight on it, too. It can be done, but how the girls do it is a mystery. Those girls living on those few meager dollars and living right are the heroines of the age.

The girl who lives at home and accepts a position for $5 or $6 a week is the girl who makes it hard for the homeless and self-supporting girl to make a living—makes it hard for her to remain a good girl.

The woman who works for less than a living wage is the woman who marries and continues to work. She is the most vicious element in a workaday world. We’ve got to realize that marriage and the home are something more than two people living together and supporting themselves. We’ve got to realize what a function it is in the great scheme of things.

The whole basis, of our social development is the family. In the first place there are children to be considered. A woman must give up her work or race suicide is the result. Of course from the economic view point the couple are much better off if the woman stays at home and the man works. If they are both working the aggregate earnings are more, but the aggregate expenses are comparatively greater also and there is no conserving done; none of the countless things that make a dollar have a dollar’s purchasing power.

[Photograph and emphasis added.]

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Hellraisers Journal: From The Coming Nation-Alfred Segal: Striking Miners Are Winning the Fight at Eskdale, West Virginia

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Quote Mother Jones, Revolution Is Here, Speech Cton WV, Sept 21, 1912, Steel Speeches p116—————

Hellraisers Journal – Monday December 23, 1912
American Flag Stands Tall Over Miners’ Tent Colony at Eskdale, West Virginia

From The Coming Nation of December 7, 1912:

Winning the Fight at Eskdale
———-

By Alfred Segal
———-

WV Eskdale Tents Flag, Cmg Ntn p5, Dec 7, 1912

THERE was a tremendous excitement in the little village of Eskdale, W. Va.

An American flag waves over the main street of Eskdale (perhaps to give assurance that Eskdale is really in America and not in Russia); but on the same street you see little children barefoot, now in November, because they haven’t any shoes, and you see the families of striking miners, evicted and driven into the highways by the Coal Dukes, living under tents because they have no homes. You are ashamed to enjoy the meager comforts of your hotel room after you have lived a day with the misery of Eskdale.

Two rods from the tents stand the coal hills with their fabulous wealth-the fine tables set by nature for all her children and yet within sight of the feast they are starving.

Well, the heart of Eskdale was beating like a trip-hammer. Word had come down through the hills that the governor had declared martial law over the strike district and that the soldiers were coming.

The echoes of gun-shots were rolling down into the valley. They came into Eskdale like the rumble of cannon. Somewhere up in the hills there was another battle on between miners and mine guards-one of those fights that make the quickly-dug, rude graves that you can find in lonely places in the coal hills.

Oh, yes, it’s lawlessness all right. But you can see it and hear it and some people can understand it. For years and years West Virginia has been ruled by respectable, invisible lawlessness which controlled courts, ran the legislatures and elected United States senators and is now responsible for the barefoot little children and the homeless exiles in the tents.

The soldiers were coming.

It runs through Eskdale’s mind that what it wants is a living wage, justice and fair-dealing and here the governor was sending the soldiers.

The shot echoes crashed without pause down the valley, waking sleeping babies under the tents and arousing strange stirrings in the hearts of the men and women of Eskdale, needing bread, but hungering only for freedom.

And then the distant toot of the engine which was pulling the martial law special and the soldiers, broke upon the village. Eskdale crowded to the railroad track. The train rumbled past toward the depot.

In the first car were the soldiers, guns held firmly in front of them, ready for work.

And in the second car-

“Scab, scab,” cried a boy, shrill-voiced.

He pointed at a window in the second car-at a face, soiled, weary-eyed, unshaven, crowned with a battered hat. And behind this face there was another and another-a whole car-load of such faces.

“Scab, scab”-the men and women took up the cry. They could not understand that these men were like themselves the dupes of the system.

Martial law had come into the strike zone with a shipment of strike-breakers whom it was protecting, with orders to shoot to kill if one of them was molested. The state of West Virginia had become a strike-breaking agency.

And to the inhabitants of its hills, the state had given so little protection through all these years. They had asked for laws that would emancipate them from the tyranny of the mine guard system-and had been denied. They had asked for compensation laws that would protect their families against the consequences of fatal accident in the mines-and had been denied.

And here were the strike-breakers come to take their jobs and to live upon their hills under protection of their militia.

“Scab, scab,” they jeered.

[Hunger Squad Pitched Against Hunger Squad]

I was there and spoke to the strike-breakers-men and boys recruited from the hunger squads of the East Side of New York, none of them miners, weary with the futile search for work at their trades, and desperate enough to throw themselves at adventure as strike-breakers for the sake of a job.

The despair of hunger, you see, knows no state lines. It recruits the strike-breaker in New York. It scourges to violence the striking miner of West Virginia. Hunger squad is pitched against hunger squad.

Continue reading “Hellraisers Journal: From The Coming Nation-Alfred Segal: Striking Miners Are Winning the Fight at Eskdale, West Virginia”