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Hellraisers Journal – Monday February 17, 1902
Mother Jones News Round-Up for January 1902, Part II
Found Speaking at Indianapolis United Mine Workers Convention
From The Indianapolis News of January 21, 1902:
MOTHER JONES TALKED.
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A Speech to the Convention While
Waiting for Miss Meredith.
While the convention awaited the coming of Miss Meredith to make charges against the national officers, this forenoon, the committee called for “Mother Jones” and she responded in a stirring speech.
She said it was a critical time for the miners’ organization, and she urged cautious and intelligent action on the part of the organisation in order to accomplish its purposes. She related, in an interesting way, her experiences in strikes and in the mining districts in the East.
One characteristic incident was of a time when a strike was on and the mining company’s policeman called on her to keep her from taking the miners’ part.
“Who are you?” she asked the policeman.
“The company’s watchman,” the officer replied.
“Well,” replied “Mother” Jones, “the company doesn’t own me. I’m responsible to God Almighty and He and I stand in on this question.”
This met with vigorous applause from the miners.
She urged greater respect for the Mine Workers’ organization, and censured the man who refused to pay dues to the national organization.
[She exclaimed:]
You poor, benighted, brainless creature that you are. You poor, ignorant, slaving serf. If the company offered you a barrel of beer, you would take it and fill your stomach; but won’t pay 25 cents to help the national organization.
She said the miners must be intelligent enough to emancipate themselves.
You have emancipated the mules that work with you and demanded that they shall be turned out to grass, but you nave not emancipated yourselves. The mule enjoys the air and grass, while you still toil down in the bad air of the mine working more than eight hours a day.
In a pathetic way she told of miners’ children, and in conclusion she said:
I plead with you men to go home and do your duty as men. Young men miners who work in the mines all day long and come out at night and never read a book. You don’t seem to study your coal trade only over men whom you have to deal with. Study your work and be prepared to take your post. You must be ready to go to jail, and must be willing to face bullets or even be hanged for your principles.
[Note: Miss Meredith charged that President John Mitchell and Secretary-Treasure William B. Wilson had minimized embezzlement committed by ex-Secretary W. C. Pearce, which charges were unanimously rejected by the Convention]
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CHILD does not blossom into maturity in a day, nor can a weakling to transformed into a Hercules over night. It requires the lapse of many years in the one instance as in the other. And several decades may pass before a city or a nation attains its majority. Yet there is no telling for how long a time the elements have been gathering for some mighty upheaval; how soon, when the surface of things seemed as calm as ever, there would break out an eruption such as would rearrange all that seemed stable and permanent.
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