Hellraisers Journal – Tuesday April 16, 1912 Mother Jones News Round-Up for March 1912, Part II Found in Spokane, Washington and in Missoula and Butte, Montana
From The Daily Missoulian of March 28, 1912:
From the Spokane Daily Chronicle of March 28, 1912:
WOMAN SUFFRAGE, BAH! SAYS MOTHER ———- “Mother Jones” Has No Use for Equal Rights Issue. ———-
“Woman suffrage-bah! The mere thought of the movement makes me tired.”-“Mother” Jones.
“Mother” Jones, who has championed the interests of working men, women and children for over a quarter century and who has promoted strikes in various sections of the nations is a socialist but by no means a suffragist.
[She asserted at Machinists’ union headquarters this afternoon:]
The woman’s place is in the home, molding the character of her children, if she has any, and preparing them to meet the issues that will confront them later in life-educating them to the economic problems that affect them,” she asserted at Machinists’ union headquarters this afternoon.
Why, the men haven’t learned yet to vote intelligently and just the same as men are now selling out their votes for a schooner of beer to cunning politicians, the woman’s vote will be influenced with a bouquet or a box of candy.
Calls It Worthless Cause.
Women are simply wasting their time upon a worthless cause in their struggle for the ballot, for as soon as the economic system has become straightened out the way it ought to be, woman will be the equal of man anyway.
That time will come when the great army of working people have become awakened to their power and have taken possession of the machinery of production and the greedy capitalistic class that is now grinding out the lives of the little children of the poor for profit have been made to step down and out.
The employing class is scared almost to death of the working men and women of the nation right now, and if the workers only knew it, they would not be in want over night.
While the working people of the world are no more than a day or two from the poorhouse the year round, as a rule, the poodle doge of the rich are having banquets given in their honor and are treated better than children of the poor.
Prohibitionists say that the prevalence of the drinking habit among the working people is the cause of so much poverty, yet government statistics show that the average workingman has but $12 a year to spend for such luxuries as an occasional drink of liquor.
She 80 Years Old.
All over the nation the working people are gradually waking up and though I will be 80 years old on the first of May, I hope to see the time that the economic system has changed completely and that the working class is in power.
“Mother” Jones spoke in behalf of the striking shopmen on the Harriman railway system Wednesday night at the armory building and will leave tonight over the Great Northern for the east, expecting to be in Minneapolis in a short time.
Despite her advanced age, “Mother Jones is a splendid specimen of vigor and health and her voice is still steady and strong.
Hellraisers Journal – Monday April 15, 1912 Mother Jones News Round-Up for March 1912, Part I
Found in Illinois, Denver, Colorado and Tacoma, Washington
From The Sibley Journal of March 1, 1912:
Walker to Head Miners.
The closing day of the Illinois Mine Workers’ state convention was featured by the announcement of election from the vote held December 14, 1911.
It was generally thought at that time that all the officers would be re-elected. There was but one exception in this, Paul Smith defeating Adolph Germer for the vice presidency. President Walker and Secretary Treasurer McDonald were re-elected by large majorities…..
Aside from the announcement of the election results, a two-hour address by ”Mother” Jones, a woman, eighty years old, who is a Socialist lecturer of national prominence and called the “Miners’ Mascot,” in which she denounced woman suffrage, was the feature. She declared that women are not mentally equipped to acquire a proper knowledge of politics, and she attributed the defeat of the recall in Colorado to the women voters. In closing her address, “Mother” Jones detailed the conditions brought about by the railroad strike in Colorado and asked the miners of Illinois to donate a benefit fund of $1,000 to the strikers. A committee was named to investigate the matter…..
[Photograph added.]
From The Illinois State Journal of March 2, 1912:
From the Denver Rocky Mountain News of March 5, 1912:
NORTHERN COLORADO COAL
STRIKE ENDS IN 8 MINES
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6 KILLED, 10 MAIMED 100 BEATEN, BLOODY RECORD OF WAR ———- Strikebreakers’ Refusals to Quit Fields Cause of Most Serious Outbreaks. ———-
“Six men killed, ten maimed for life and more than 100 waylaid and beaten.” This is the record of bitterness between the opposing forces of the labor war in the Northern coal were from the ranks of both strikers and strike breakers…..
One of the striking features of the struggle occurred a few months ago, when “Mother Jones,” a well known national figure in the labor world, went into the district to organize the wives and sisters of the striking miners. She received an enthusiastic reception, but when the women attempted to carry out their ideas the strikers objected so strenuously that they were forced to abandon their militant plans for a campaign.
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From the Denver United Labor Bulletin of March 21, 1912:
“MOTHER” JONES LEAVES DENVER. ———-
“Mother” Jones, who has been in Denver for several days, addressed the Federated Shopmen in their convention in Machinists’ hall this week. She is preparing to tour the northwest in the interests of the shopmen. She will go to Tacoma and then travel East as far as St. Paul.
Hellraisers Journal – Saturday April 13, 1912 San Francisco, California – Joe Hill Speaks on Conditions in San Diego Jail
From the Spokane Industrial Worker of April 11, 1912:
FREE SPEECH DOINGS IN CALIFORNIA
(By Caroline Nelson).
The free speech protest in Building Trades hall Last Sunday [March 31] was a great success; $175 were collected to carry on the fight in San Diego.
Austin Lewis delivered one of his masterly addresses. He showed that street speaking of the I. W. W.’s was an absolute necessity. Without street speaking the migratory worker could not be reached, because he would not go to any hall. Without street speaking there would have been no organization among the lumber workers and section laborers, and therefore no strikes or fights for better conditions. In street speaking pamphlets, circulars and propaganda sheets are given out and find their way to camps where they do their work.
The last speaker was a released speaker from San Diego, Fellow Worker Hill. He explained that he had just come from the hospitality of the M. & M. [Merchants and Manufacturers Association] in San Diego, that owing to that hospitality he was physically unable to make any lengthy speech.He looked as though he had just risen from a sick bed. His face was pale and pinched. Dressed in overalls he bespoke the low standard of living that our modern civilization imposes upon our most intelligent workers; for he spoke more intelligently and eloquently than many a widely heralded upper class jaw smith, who has had nothing to do all his life but to wag his tongue and to look up references. He nailed the widely circulated lie that the upper class have bought out all the workers who have any intelligence, and that every intelligent man can get work.
Fellow Worker told how they practiced sabotage in San Diego in the jail in the form of building battle ships, as they called it, by hammering on the iron doors. The court was located on the second story over the jail and terrible noise made by the hungry prisoners prevented them from holding a session in the upper region. They sent word down to the prisoners to be quiet or they couldn’t hold court. The prisoners’ replied that it was their intention that no court should be held until they were fed.
Hill brought down the house when he proposed that the army of fifty thousand unemployed of San Francisco move on the San Diego, to free the men now in jail there which the M. & M. intend to railroad to the pen. The San Diego jail and bull pen are full now. They are running up the expenses of the tax-payers fearfully and an army of invaders would scare them stiff, and prevent the sending of the ten men now on trial to the penitentiary. But unless something was done quickly these men would be sent over the road; for there is nothing our ruling class doesn’t dare when it comes to strike terror to the hearts of the workers. They violate every law on the statute books, and trample in the dust every human right that is supposed to be sacred. They hold no law sacred except when it protects them in their piracy.
Hellraisers Journal – Friday April 12, 1912 Farewell Tribute for Michael Hoey, Martyr of San Diego Free Speech Fight
From the Spokane Industrial Worker of April 11, 1912:
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MICHAEL HOEY–MARTYR
(By Laura Payne Emerson).
Fellow Workers: I count it an honor to be accorded the privilege of paying a tribute, on this occasion, to our martyred dead fellow-worker, Michael Hoey. He was a soldier in the war for industrial freedom. Early in life he joined the forces that were making for better conditions for his class, the working class, and to the day when he fell mortally wounded, and was carried from the field of battle, never did he falter.
It was in San Diego, Cal. A fight for free speech was on. An infamous ordinance had been passed by the common council denying the natural and constitutional right of free speech and public assembly to certain citizens. Many brave souls had undertaken to test the odious law by attempting to speak on the streets, and had met the policeman’s club and the jail. Among those on the fire line in that contest was Michael Hoey, a man sixty-three years of age. When told by a friend that he was too old to enlist in such a fight, and that he should leave it to younger and more vigorous men, he replied:
I have nothing to give but myself and life is not worth living when all liberty is gone.
That night, amid a cheering crowd, his fine face appeared for a moment, while his voice was raised in a last appeal to his class to stand firm for human rights! Then!! Burly guardians of the law snatched him down, and with kicks and clubs, jail and starvation, silenced his voice forever.
Hellraisers Journal – Thursday April 11, 1912 Passaic, New Jersey – Haywood and Thompson Barred from Aiding Strikers
From the Passaic Daily News of April 6, 1912:
HAYWOOD WILL BE ARRESTED ON SIGHT
Four in center: Charles Rothfisher (hands in pockets, jailed yesterday), James P. Thompson, general organizer of Chicago I. W. W.; Frank PlessDomo (in front, arms folded), Big Bill Haywood, holding paper.
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[Haywood May Arrive Tomorrow or Monday.]
William D. Haywood and James P Thompson, national and general organizer of the Industrial Workers of the world, who are conducting the New England textile strikes and recently took a hand in the strike here, have practically been barred from Passaic and Bergen Counties and from authentic sources it was learned today that they will be arrested if they attempt to address striker here.
Since their meeting hall was closed by the Bergen County authorities, who also ordered the owners of all halls to refuse their use for strikers’ meetings, Haywood and Thompson will be forced to meet in this city if they intend to have any part in the labor strife here. Saloonkeepers and others controlling halls have been notified not to rent their places to either of these men……
Hellraisers Journal – Tuesday April 9, 1912 San Diego, California – Fellow Worker Michael Hoey Murdered by Brutal Jailers
From the Appeal to Reason of April 6, 1912:
LABOR WAR IN WEST ———-
By Telegraph to the Appeal.
The Sacramento Star March 28, 1912
San Diego, Cal., March 31.-Michael Hoey died at Agnes hospital Thursday as a result of being kicked in the stomach and groin while a prisoner. The coroner’s jury refused to allow attending physicians and witnesses to testify.
The police interfered with a monster funeral parade, arresting the standard bearers and confiscating a red flag. There is great public indignation.
Fred H. Moore, attorney for the Free Speech league, published a letter to the chief of police warning him that kidnaping, deporting, beating up and horrible brutality of unbooked men must cease. Many men have been beaten insensible in cells. Joseph F. Tierman, union reporter, was slugged. Automobiles are employed in the fight against the working men and men are beaten and kicked and left twenty-five miles in the hills.
Monster mass meeting was held by trade unionists, Socialists, Industrial Workers last night and speakers were madly cheered. Moore introduced resolutions to boycott merchants who assist the masters in the fight. Fifty thousand unemployed have left San Francisco to join in the fight. Two hundred and fifty dollars was collected at the mass meeting held at Labor Temple at Los Angeles. To the present the fight has cost the city $30,000. Judge Sloan presides over the superior court and prejudiced grand jurors are admitted, among them Adam Witcher, who advised beating the speakers with pick handles and the tarring and feathering of Industrial Workers. Judge Sloan admits the findings of this jury as right, although contrary to the rulings of the supreme court in a similar case. He admits this is not justice, but says it is law.
Prisoners in the city jail are denied food and water until forced to drink from the toilet. Stool pigeon of the capitalists destroyed jail property and charged the offense to free speech prisoners. Of this there is positive proof.
The M. and M. association met in Grant hotel in December. Harrison Gray Otis being present, and decided to annihilate the Industrial Workers and Socialists in San Diego at all hazards.
The district attorney refuses to prosecute the police on the charge of murder, though backed by many affidavits. An effort will be made to have the superior court compel prosecution.
Two hundred men have just left Los Angeles for San Diego and more are coming later.A monster mass meeting will be held at Frisco labor temple tonight, some of the speakers being Fremont Adler [Fremont Older?], Austin Lewis, and J. E. Morgan. It is the first time in the history of the movement that Socialists, Industrial Workers and trade unionists are united, realizing their common cause against the effort to exterminate laborism on the coast. The capitalist press predicts conditions similar to those in England. Three hundred men, women and children have so far been arrested.
Funds are needed to carry on the fight, and should be sent to the treasurer of Free Speech League, San Diego, Cal.
Hellraisers Journal – Saturday April 6, 1912 Lawrence Textile Strikers Win Great Victory with I. W. W., Part IV of IV
From the International Socialist Review of April 1912:
ONE BIG UNION WINS
By LESLIE H. MARCY and FREDERICK SUMNER BOYD
In the eighth week of the strike the bosses made an offer of five per cent wage increase. The A. F. of L. scabs accepted it and went back. The I.W. W. strikers turned it down flat. The offer was made on a Thursday, and it was hoped that thousands of strikers would break ranks and stampede to the mills on the following Monday. When the mills opened they had actually fewer scabs, and looked out on a picket line numbering upwards of twenty thousand.
At the end of the following week the bosses discovered they meant an average increase of seven, and later seven and a half per cent, and that they would amend the premium system, paying fortnightly instead of by the month as had been the practice, resulting in the loss to a large part of the workers of the entire premium. Again on the following Monday the mills had still fewer scabs, and the picket line was stronger than ever.
When the Committee of Ten left for Boston on March 11th, for the fourth and final round with the bosses, every one realized that the crisis had been reached. Led by the indomitable Riley the Committee forced the mill owners to yield point by point until the final surrender was signed by the American Woolen Company.
The Committee reported at ten o’clock at Franco-Belgian Hall the next day. The headquarters were packed and hundreds stood on the outside. Words are weak when it comes to describing the scenes which took place when the full significance of the report became known. For the workers, united in battle for the first time in the history of Lawrence, had won. The mill owners had surrendered—completely surrendered.
A great silence fell upon the gathering when Haywood arose and announced that he would make the report for the sub-committee in the temporary absence of Chairman Riley. He began by stating that tomorrow each individual striker would have a voice in deciding whether the offers made should be accepted. He said:
Report of Committee.
The committee of 10 reported in brief that the workers will receive a 5 per cent increase for the higher paid departments and 25 per cent for the lower paid departments. There will be time and a quarter overtime and the premium system has been modified so that its worst features are eliminated.
Your strike committee has indorsed this report and has selected a committee to see all the other mill owners who will be asked to meet the wage schedule offered by the American Woolen Company. In the event that the other mills do not accede to the demands, the strike on those mills will be enforced.
You have won a victory for over 250,000 other textile workers, which means an aggregate of many millions of dollars each year for the working class in New England. Now if you hope to hold what you have gained you must maintain and uphold the Industrial Workers of the World, which means yourselves.
Hellraisers Journal – Friday April 5, 1912
Lawrence Textile Strikers Win Great Victory with I. W. W., Part III of IV
From the International Socialist Review of April 1912:
ONE BIG UNION WINS
By LESLIE H. MARCY and FREDERICK SUMNER BOYD
5,000 to 20,000 Strikers Formed the Endless Chain Picket Line Every Morning from 5 to 7:30 A. M., Rain or Shine.-Boston Globe
Brute force was not, however, the only weapon used by the bosses to try to crush the workers. They had allied with them the A. F. of L., the Catholic church and the Civic Federation a very holy trinity!
Two days after the strike was called John Golden, a member of the Militia of Christ, wired Mayor Scanlon, who had called for militia, asking whether he could be of any assistance to the authorities in suppressing the “rabble,” which he described as anarchistic. Golden and the Lawrence Central Labor Union, affiliated with the A. F. of L., joined in praising the authorities for importing soldiers, and declared that their presence was necessary for “the preservation of order.”
Neither by word nor deed did Golden or the C. L. U. condemn the authorities or their tools for the barbarities and atrocities committed. Vice President Ramsden of the C. L. U., whose two daughters were scabbing in the Arlington mill, when interviewed by the writer was loud in his praises of the militia and the authorities, referred to the I. W. W. as an anarchistic organization that fomented violence and lawlessness, and declared it should be suppressed. He asserted that there was no strike and no organization-only a rabble. When he was asked about the dynamite plot engineered by the bosses through their tool John J. Breen, he naturally refused to comment.
Golden publicly declared that the program of the I. W. W. had acted very much to the advantage of the Textile Workers Union, as it was bringing the latter in closer touch with the mill owners, who understood that it would be more to their interests to deal with the organization, he, Golden, represented rather than with the revolutionary and uncompromising I. W. W.
After having wired, proffering his assistance to the chief of police, Golden got busy in other directions. The mule spinners, numbering according to their own officials, some 180 men, were the only body organized in Lawrence that was affiliated with the A. F. of L. Golden’s union did not have a single member in the whole city. Nevertheless he, in conjunction with Joe R. Menzie, president of the C. L. U., issued circulars to all C. L. U. bodies asking for funds to aid the strike and expressly asking them not to send assistance to the I. W. W.
Then the C. L. U. opened a separate fund. So, too, did Father Melasino, and a man by the name of Shepherd appeared on the scene with some sort of free lunch counter, also appealing for funds.
These various appeals for financial assistance, all made in the name of the strikers of Lawrence, and all calculated to injure the I. W. W. succeeded in diverting large sums of money, the C. L. U. benefiting largely at the expense of the I. W. W. Several times committees from the I. W. W. went to the C. L. U. with evidence that money had been misdirected, but restitution was invariably refused.
Here it may be said that in the seventh week of the strike the C. L. U. strike relief station was practically suspended, applicants being told that the strike was off and that they should return to the mills.
Golden’s next move was to endeavor to organize rival labor unions based on the many crafts in the mills. For several days strenuous attempts were made to divide the workers in the old, old way. Meetings were called by Golden and Menzie, a great deal of money was spent on so-called organizing which had been contributed to the relief funds, and every effort was made to break the solidarity of the workers and get them to return piecemeal.
These efforts failed, the only result being that when the bosses made an offer of five per cent increase over the cut rates—equivalent to an increase of one and one-eighth per cent—a handfull of double-dyed scabs whom Golden had secured to do his work went into the mills.
Golden has shown himself in this fight in his true light, and all the world knows him for a traitor to the working class, and his craft unions are a thing of the past. What Golden did was merely in accord with the policy and doings of the official A. F. of L., and many of the rank and file of the Federation have already woke up to the game of their alleged leaders.
The Ironmolders’ Union that was affiliated with the Lawrence C. L. U. denounced in a resolution the doings of Golden and his gang and withdrew their affiliation. A motion denouncing Golden and his tactics was lost in the Boston Central Labor Union by a vote of 18 to 16. The Central Federated Union of New York City, one of the slimiest haunts of the professional labor crooks in America, even passed a resolution virtually telling Golden to keep his hands off. The Philadelphia Textile Workers’ Union, which had received the Golden appeal, reprinted the I. W. W. appeal for funds and sent several thousand dollars to the I. W. W. war chest.
The latest development in Philadelphia is that 2,000 textile workers have requested I. W. W. organizers to go there and organize a local. All over the country local A. F. of L. unions have denounced Golden and his official friends, and the rank and file of the A. F. of L. has gone on record solidly in favor of their class and against their officials.
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—————Day after day waiting for news from the entombed miners-Photo by A. P. Risser
Carrying out one of the 85 victims of the explosion-Photo by Paul Thompson, N. Y.
General view of the town of Jed, W. Va. Scene of the Disaster-Paul Thompson, N. Y.
—————The free speech protest in Building Trades hall Last Sunday [March 31] was a great success; $175 were collected to carry on the fight in San Diego.
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—————Four in center: Charles Rothfisher (hands in pockets, jailed yesterday), James P. Thompson, general organizer of Chicago I. W. W.; Frank Pless Domo (in front, arms folded), Big Bill Haywood, holding paper.
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