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Hellraisers Journal – Wednesday March 30, 1904
Denver, Colorado – Mother Jones to Governor Peabody: “You Don’t Own This State”
Mother Jones was deported by the military on orders of Governor Peabody on Saturday March 26th. With other organizers of the United Mine Workers of America, she was put aboard a Santa Fe train bound for La Junta, Colorado, some 65 miles north and east of Trinidad. They were all given deportation papers which warned them never to return. Mother sat all night in the station at La Junta, and the next morning, with the assistance of a sympathetic railroad conductor, she was able to board a train to Denver. From her hotel room, near the Governors office, she wrote the following letter:
Mr. Governor,
You notified your dogs of war to put me out of the state. They complied with your instructions. I hold in my hand a letter that was handed to me by one of them, which says “under no circumstances return to this state.” I wish to notify you, governor, that you don’t own the state. When it was admitted to the sisterhood of states, my fathers gave me a share of stock in it; and that is all they gave you. The civil courts are open. If I break a law of state or nation it is the duty of the civil courts to deal with me. That is why my forefathers established those courts to keep dictators and tyrants such as you from interfering with civilians. I am right here in the capital, after being out nine or ten hours, four or five blocks from your office. I want to ask you, governor, what in Hell are you going to do about it?Mother Jones
[Emphasis added.]
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