You ought to be out raising hell. This is the fighting age. Put on your fighting clothes.
-Mother Jones
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Thursday September 24, 1903
Cripple Creek, Colorado - "This is no longer a constitutional court," General Engley.
Thus, spoke General Engley as he rose in the courtroom of Judge Seeds yesterday on behalf of the four miners who found themselves, yet again, hauled into court bound and shackled and surrounded by soldiers.
On Tuesday, the counsel for the military managed to delay proceedings until the next day. On Wednesday, yesterday, General Chase appeared in Cripple Creek surrounded by his usual display of military might: infantry, cavalry, sharpshooters on rooftops, and a Gatling gun pointed at the train depot.
The four miners, James Lafferty, C. H. McKinney , Charles Campbell, and Sherman Parker, were escorted into the court room, heavily shackled, with a line of infantry on each side. More soldiers followed with their bayonets on full display.
General Engley made this statement on behalf of the miners:
There has befallen my duty to make the closing arguments for the petitioners. When I filed the application for writs of habeas corpus and invoked the jurisdiction of this court for the issuance for the highest writ of right known to law, I supposed that these proceedings would be heard under constitutional guarantee; but it is not so. The court may say that it is, but the facts remain that the forces of intimidation are present. The constitutional guarantee that the court shall be open and untrammeled has been invaded.
This is no longer a constitutional court. It is an armed camp. The court has been surrounded by soldiery.
Arguments were made back and forth until, finally, Judge Seeds adjourned the court, and the four miners were taken back to the bullpen. Once more, denied their liberty although never charged with any crime.
Judge Seeds has ordered General Chase to appear with his prisoners by 2 o'clock this afternoon. The Judge states that the habeas corpus case will be decided at that time without further delay.
SOURCE
The Cripple Creek Strike
-by Emma F Langdon
(Part I, 1st pub 1904)
NY, 1969
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Wednesday September 24, 1913
Ludlow Tent Colony, Colorado - Evicted families arrive at Ludlow as rain turns to snow.
As the miners and their families were evicted from the company towns yesterday, Don MacGregor, a reporter from the Denver Express, was a witness and filed this report:
No one who did not see that exodus can imagine its pathos. The exodus from Egypt was a triumph, the going forth of a people set free. The exodus of the Boers from Cape Colony was the trek of a united people seeking freedom.
But this yesterday, that wound its bowed, weary way between the coal hills on the one side and the far-stretching prairie on the other, through the rain and the mud, was an exodus of woe, of a people leaving known fears for new terrors, a hopeless people seeking new hope, a people born to suffering going forth to new suffering.
And they struggled along the roads interminably, in an hour's drive between Tinidad and Ludlow, 57 wagons were passed, and others seemed to be streaming down to the main road from every by-path.
Every wagon was the same, with its high piled furniture, and its bewildered woebegone family perched atop. and the furniture! What a mockery to the state's boasted riches. Little piles of miserable looking straw bedding! Little piles of kitchen utensils! And all so worn and badly used they would have been the scorn of any second-hand dealer on Larimer Street.
Prosperity! With never a single article even approaching luxury, save once in a score of wagons a cheap gaily painted gramophone! With never a bookcase! With never a book! With never a single article that even the owners thought worth while trying to protect from the rain!
John Lawson, International Organizer for the United Mine Workers of America, was on hand through-out the day. When a superintendent taunted him by shouting, "A good day for a strike," Lawson replied:
Any strike-day would look good to the people from your mines.
At Ludlow, Lawson helped to set up the canteen and greeted arriving families with milk and hot coffee as the rain turned into a snow.
One thousand tents being shipped from West Virginia by the U. M. W. have been delayed. At the Ludlow Tent Colony, many miners and their families spent the night in the big central tent. Some were taken to local union halls, and others were given shelter in the homes of nearby union sympathizers. The Greek miners, many of whom are single men, spent the night camped out in the snowstorm.
SOURCES
Out of the Depths
The Story of John R. Lawson, a Labor Leader
-by Barron B. Beshoar
(1st ed 1942)
CO, 1980
Buried Unsung
Louis Tikas and the Ludlow Massacre
-by Zeese Papanikolas
U of Utah Press, 1982
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Tuesday September 24, 2013
From Global Post: "Protesting Bangladesh workers say wages not enough to buy food."
Protesting Bangladesh garment workers complained Tuesday they cannot even afford to feed their families as they staged a fourth day of street protests demanding a near-tripling of wages.
Police fired tear gas at several thousand workers who blocked major roads near Dhaka's main airport and at the key industrial hubs of Ashulia and Fatullah outside the capital in the latest demonstrations.
"Some 2,000 workers blocked roads at Ashulia. Industrial police fired tear gas to disperse them," local police chief Badrul Alam told AFP.
Read full article here:
http://www.globalpost.com/...
Dying for a Bargain:
Panorama investigates the human cost of cheap clothes.
H/T to Lib Dem FoP for this link:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/...
This link led me to the video above. Perhaps, eventually, we'll be able to watch the entire documentary online.
International Labor Rights Forum
http://www.laborrights.org/
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Woke Up This Morning with My Mind on Freedom
-The Weavers
Hallelujah!