Hellraisers Journal – Wednesday June 23, 1920
Williamson, West Virginia – Mother Jones Speaks at Public Meeting, Part II
Williamson, West Virginia – Sunday Evening June 20, 1920
-Mother Jones Speaks at Public Meeting in Front of Courthouse.
SPEECH OF MOTHER JONES at WILLIAMSON, PART II.
[Mother Jones on Agitators.]
The West Virginian June 22, 1920
I went to a meeting and the secretary of the steel workers went with me. He got up to speak. They took him. The next fellow got up; they took him. I got up. They arrested me. I wouldn’t walk. They had to ride me. A big old Irish buck of a policeman said, “You will have to walk.” “No, I can’t.” “Can you walk?” “No, I can’t.” “We will take you down to jail and lock you up behind the bars.”
After a few minutes the chief came along.
“Mother Jones?”
“Yes, sir.”
“There is some of the steel managers here want to speak to you.”
“All right, let the gentlemen come in. I am sorry gentlemen, I haven’t got chairs to give you.” (Laughter.)
One good fellow says, “Now, Mother Jones, this agitation is dangerous. You know these are foreigners, mostly.” “Well, that is the reason I want to talk to them. I want to organize them into the United States as a Union so as to show them what the institution stands for.”
“They don’t understand English,” he says.
I said, “I want to teach them English. We want them into the Union so they will understand.”
“But you can’t do that. This agitation won’t do. Your radicalism has got to go.”
I said, “Wait a minute, sir. You are one of the managers of the steel industry here?”
“Yes.”
“Wasn’t the first emigrant that landed on our shore an agitator?”
“Who was he?”
“Columbus. Didn’t he agitate to get the money from the people of Spain? Didn’t he agitate to get the crew, and crossed the ocean and discovered America for you and I?
“Wasn’t Washington an agitator? Didn’t the Mayflower bring over a ship-full of agitators? Didn’t we build a monument to them down there in Massachusetts. I want to ask you a question. Right today in and around the City of Pittsburgh I believe there has assembled as many as three hundred thousand people [bowing the knee to Jesus during Easter season.] Jesus was an agitator, Mr. Manager. What in hell did you hang him for if he didn’t hurt your pockets?” He never made a reply. He went away.
He was the manager of the steel works; he was the banker; he was the mayor; he was the judge; he was the chairman of the city council. Just think of that in America—and he had a stomach on him four miles long and two miles wide. (Laughter.) And when you looked at that fellow and compared him with people of toil it nauseated you.
You ought to be out raising hell.
This is the fighting age.
Put on your fighting clothes.
-Mother Jones
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Hellraisers Journal, Friday October 6, 1916
New York, New York – Mother Jones on Scene of Turbulent Strike
Mother Jones arrived in New York City on Tuesday evening to assist the striking street carmen who are now threatened with the importation of scabs. At noon on Wednesday, she spoke to the strikers at Lyceum hall. According to The Brooklyn Daily Eagle, she said, in part:
Boys, I have come to New York to help you win your fight for better homes, to win more time in them and more comfort in them. You’ve been working here for 25 cents an hour for a lot of high class burglars who reward you if you are good boys by giving you another cent and hour. A lot of good a cent will do you.
O, boys, boys, there are so many of you and so few of the high class burglars. Get together and you can lick —- out of them. You can do it without the women but to make sure, have the women with you.
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