You ought to be out raising hell. This is the fighting age. Put on your fighting clothes.
-Mother Jones
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Wednesday February 17, 1915
From The Atlanta Constitution: "U. S. Judge Accused of Abusing Miners"
Fannie Sellins
From yesterday's edition of the
Constitution we find that Federal Judge A. G. Dayton, of the northern district of West Virginia, finds himself in a bit of hot water for he is now under investigation by a congressional committee.
Testimony has been offered before the committee that the Judge has shown bias in his dealings with members of the United Mine Workers of America. Among the many charges alleged against him are these: that he has charged the U. M. W. of A. with being a criminal conspiracy, and that he has ordered the destruction of miners' tents.
The Constitution further reported:
Judge Dayton, Bittner [President of U. M. W. District No. 5] continued, displayed violent emotion during the Colliers contempt cases, and would strike the bench with his fist and throw books around. He also said Judge Dayton had declared it a disgrace to American womanhood for Fannie Sellins, an organizer, to be connected with the United Mine Workers.
[emphasis added]
From The Atlanta Constitution of February 16, 1915:
U. S. JUDGE ACCUSED OF ABUSING MINERS
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Alleged Judge Dayton Said Union Officials Ought to Be in Jail.
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Fannie Sellins
Wheeling, W.Va., February 15-Direct testimony that Federal Judge A. G. Dayton, of the northern district of West Virginia, had spoken in a derogatory manner of the United Mine Workers of America, was presented here today to the congressional committee investigating charges against Judge Dayton. The committee arrived yesterday from Parkersburg, where testimony was taken last week.
James Oates, of Charleroi, Pa., a United Mine Workers organizer, testified he had heard Judge Dayton make the statement that the United Mine Workers as an association was a criminal conspiracy, and its officers ought to be in jail. Oates said Joe Hoblott, a foreign miner unable to speak English, had been arrested at Colliers, and the next day "railroaded to jail" for six months on a charge of contempt of Judge Dayton's court. The prisoner, Oates said, had been denied an attorney and an interpreter. While serving his sentence, he became insane, the witness added, and now is being cared for by the United Mine Workers.
Threatened to Jail White.
Oates declared that while the Colliers contempt cases were being tried he heard Judge Dayton say:
"If I had John P. White here I would give him twelve months in jail." White, president of the United Mine Workers, was at that time, said Oates, charged with contempt, but had not ben arrested.
Deputy United States marshals, Oates said, had torn down tents occupied by the striking miners on order of Judge Dayton's court.
Oates further declared miners cited for contempt were compelled to go to Philippi, W. Va., at their own expense before they finally were sentenced by Judge Dayton. Judge Dayton, he said, had shown anger and prejudice during the proceedings, and frequently had said in court that the non-union miners of west Virginia were better than the union miners, and he would not permit the United Mine Workers to exist within his jurisdiction.
"Criminal Conspirators."
Van Bittner, president of District No. 5, United Mine Workers, testified that during the contempt hearings no miners except the one on trial were allowed in the courtroom. He repeated statements attributed to Judge Dayton that the United Mine Workers were criminal conspirators, and said Judge Dayton had rebuked the mine workers' officials for wearing good clothes and living at the expense of the miners. He said he had been sentenced by Judge Dayton to serve sixty days "as a matter of general principle," and that Judge Dayton had accused him of being an agent of the Ohio and Pennsylvania coal operators who were trying to destroy the coal industry of West Virginia. He testified that court records in the mine cases did not show Judge Dayton's remarks, he having ordered them stricken out.
Judge Showed Emotion.
Judge Dayton, Bittner continued, displayed violent emotion during the Colliers contempt cases, and would strike the bench with his fist and throw books around. He also said Judge Dayton had declared it a disgrace to American womanhood for Fannie Sellins, an organizer, to be connected with the United Mine Workers.
Bittner said he believed his sentence was suspended by Judge Dayton with the expectation that Bittner would use his influence to call off the strike.
Frank Ledvinka, another organizer, gave testimony along the lines followed by Bittner.
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SAMUEL GOMPERS ON JUDGE DAYTON
For background on the controversy between the United Mine Workers and Judge Dayton, we offer a portion of an article written by Samuel Gompers, President of the American Federation of Labor, for the June 1914 edition of the American Federationist:
Judge Dayton’s Contempt Decisions
On November 11, 1913, the West Virginia-Pittsburg Coal Company filed a petition and several affidavits asking that Van Bittner, president of the Pittsburg district of the United Mine Workers, several employes of the coal company, and Myer Schwartz, a local Storekeeper who had leased to the United Mine Workers land upon which to hold meetings, be attached for contempt of alleged violation of the restraining order.
The injunctions and the suit brought, as we have already shown, were for the purpose of enabling the coal company to invoke the assistance of a federal court in its controversy with its employes concerning wages and hours of employment. Is not this condition sufficiently serious to cause thoughtful citizens to ponder upon the effect that such interference will have upon the attitude of the workers toward governmental authority and their respect for law and the judiciary? Injustice ever begets discontent and demands for reform. A wise and generous nation will give heed to these demands, how ever crude their expression. Sea captains might as well scuttle their ship as to ignore signs of approaching storms. The workers will not always patiently endure both burdens and injustice.
In March, 1914, some thirteen or fourteen of the employes of the company and three or four organizers of the United Mine Workers were tried at Philippi, West Virginia, a town situated at a distance of about one hundred and fifty miles from the company's mines, although the original chancery suit had been docketed at Wheeling, only a few miles from the mines.
Judge Dayton tried the cases, of course without a jury. Particularly significant of his judicial attitude is the fact that he permitted hearsay and all kinds of evidence to be introduced before him, declaring that he would later determine for himself what part of the evidence was legally admissible and what part should be excluded.
The court rested its decision upon the supposition that the United Mine Workers is an illegal conspiracy and took "judicial notice" that in the chancery cause of the Hitchman Coal and Coke Company versus John Mitchell et 211., an entirely separate and distinct case now pending in the United States Circuit Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit, the court had found and determined the United Mine Workers of America to be an unlawful organization; "an unlawful and criminal conspiracy both under common law and the federal Sherman trust act."
It follows that if a federal judge can “take judicial notice” that the United Mine Workers of America has been determined an illegal conspiracy in another case, now pending before the court, any findings of a court may be regarded as established for any other case, and any federal judge may “take judicial notice” that any other voluntary association of working people is “at common law and under the federal Sherman act" likewise an illegal conspiracy. If this precedent be established, any injustice may thus be perpetuated to the lasting injury of the working people, and, regardless of evidence in particular cases before a court, that court will be able to act upon “judicial notice” of what has happened in other cases.
These new abuses introduced by Judge Dayton constitute one more pressing argument for revision of the law and the practice regulating injunctions as well as the Sherman antitrust law. The application of the Sherman antitrust law to organizations of workers, and the issuance of injunctions to regulate personal relations are based upon the same fundamental principle—that labor power is property. The workers demand that they be recognized as freemen, that the rights be restored to them which were theirs before the courts applied law and legal principles in a manner that robs them of personal rights of free men.
In announcing his findings in the case, Judge Dayton called attention to a number of acts “committed" by the defendants as evidence of violations of the restraining order. Among them are these:
A few days after, on Sunday, Van Bittner and Oates appeared at the mine at Collier with a brass band of about thirty-five men, followed by a procession of some one hundred and twenty-five organization men and sympathizers, from Steubenville, Ohio, largely, who marched across the company's property and held a meeting on the public road, which meeting was addressed by Bittner.
Shortly afterwards, Oates rented from Myer Schwarz a small angle of unoccupied ground, possibly an eighth of an acre, surrounded on two or three sides by the company's property and an old road, about one thousand feet from the company's pit mouth, and erected two tents there over which was placed a large sign: "Headquarters of the United Mine Workers of America." For the rental of this ground for six months, Oates paid Schwarz $200.00, as he admitted, out of the organization funds, although the true rental value did not exceed for this six months ten dollars or twelve dollars at most.
All acts of the miners struggling to establish better conditions of life and work in West Virginia should be considered in their relation to the power of the mine operators. That power was made practically supreme by ownership of the property and land upon which the miners must live and move. It was maintained by supervision of post-offices; by control over stores and supplies; by ownership and control over schools and churches; by the company's mine guards, agents of detection and compulsion. These miners did not have one square foot of ground on which to exercise their guaranteed rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness; not one square foot for freedom of speech and the promotion of their own welfare and interest.
Yet under the vague, all-inclusive terms of a judicial order, a federal agent of justice assumes the power to punish free men for renting a strip of ground upon which to live, to organize a union, and to carry out the normal and lawful purposes of that union. Under that restraining order, the officials of the mine workers’ union are forbidden to give that organization friendly advice as to how to promote their interests or to aid them in efforts in any manner whatsoever! The purpose of this restraining order was to prevent organization among the workers, to prevent all methods by which the miners could make their protests effective, and to use the federal courts as a strike-breaking agency in order to assist the mine operators to “control” their men and to conduct their business in any manner that assured the highest dividends.
A funeral of a miner killed by the company’s hired thugs was made conspicuous as an illustration of the company's method of dealing with men who retained a spark of independence. This the judge particularly notices in his finding.
Judge Dayton points out that funds of the United Mine Workers were used to retain lawyers to defend the men before the courts; to pay the fines of men arrested and to furnish bail bonds. Could any judicial situation be more intolerable? What manner of justice does injunctive rule establish when it becomes unlawful to pay moneys demanded by the law?
In considering the defendants individually and in sentencing them Judge Dayton said:
Now the eighth paragraph of this finding will be to the effect that, while I do not deem it necessary in law to show further the connection of these men than that they joined this organization and were part and parcel of it, yet it will be in effect the setting forth of the individual acts of these defendants, and I propose to find these facts.
Frank Ledvinka was called before the court and declared guilty of the following:
This court will find that you are an organizer of the United Mine Workers, and have been for the last seven years a national organizer; that you come from Ohio for the purpose of organizing and carrying on this strike, after the decision in the Hitchman Coal Company case was decided and determined that the United Mine Workers was a conspiracy and an unlawful organization; that you divided with James Oates the authority and leadership in directing and controlling the activities of the strikers, made speeches in which you urged the inauguration and the prosecution of the strike; sent Harry Youshack to the home of one of the company’s employes to threaten him; aided in defending strikers who were arrested for assaulting non-union men; broke the promise you made to this court on December 2d; advised the strikers that they must fight, must stop the company's employes from working, must beat and assault them for the purpose of preventing them from working; that you were authorized, as stated, by Frank M. Hayes, International Vice-President of the United Mine Workers of America, to make this attempt to unionize the mines of the Pan Handle section of West Virginia, and did what was done in this strike in pursuance of that authority.
Fannie Sellins, a faithful, earnest girl, struggling to aid and improve the toilers’ working conditions, was called before the bar and thus addressed:
This court finds from this evidence that you are a paid organizer of the United Mine Workers; that you have made the false pretense of being engaged in religious and charity work; that you frequented the camp at Collier, which was not a fit place for any decent woman; spent most of your time with James Oates and Secundo Coliffe, aiding and assisting them in directing the activities of the strikers in preventing the company’s employes from working; made inflammatory speeches intended to incite the strikers to acts of violence; incited an attempt on the company's employes at the railroad bridge; aided in providing supplies for the camp at Collier, using funds of the United Mine Workers; aided in the defense of the strikers arrested for assaulting the company's employes; participated in the attempt to make the Moore funeral a means of inciting the strikers to acts of violence; that you advised the strikers to beat up the non-union men; that you advised the strikers to go to number three mine and beat and assault non-union men; that you led a mob of from one hundred and forty to two hundred men to intercept the company’s employes, north of Wellsburg, paid their fares on the cars to the place where they divided into three several troops for the purpose of intercepting the company's men whom you expected to come from work by one of the roads; that you advised the strikers to knock the heads off the non-union men, whom you designated as "scabs," preached to the strikers your defiance of the orders of this court and urged them to defy and disobey the court and its injunction; that you broke your promise made to this court on December 2d, and after promising to obey the injunction made a speech in which you proclaimed your defiance and your intention to continue to disobey the injunction.
This being the evidence, the sentence of this court is that you be imprisoned in the Marion County jail for a period of six months.
Miss Sellins asked, "May I say one word?"
Judge Dayton replied, “Not one word."
Then Miss Sellins said, “That evidence is all false."
To Tom Smith, Judge Dayton said:
This court finds from this evidence that you participated in the Moore funeral procession and assisted in the attempt to incite the strikers to violence by carrying banners with inflammatory inscriptions; that you aided in organizing and carrying on the strike at Collier, and in many of the acts done there in violation of the injunctions; that you were during a part of the time in charge and control of the camp at Collier and directed the picketing and other means of preventing non-union men from going to work; that you did picket duty yourself for the purpose of preventing non-union men from going to work; that you trespassed on the company's property, after being warned not to do so.
This court sentences you to five months in the Wetzel county jail. Bond, $2,500.00
The West Virginia mine operators have made efforts to induce immigrants to go to the state. Workers from countries where the standards of work and life are lower than in the United States, workers unacquainted with the American spirit of independence and self-protection, constitute for a time at least docile employes. For this reason, the mine operators have sent agents abroad and to the port of New York to direct immigration toward their mines. Some of these miners acquired American views and joined the strike for greater freedom, and because of that are now said to be in danger of deportation as “undesirables." One of these "undesirable foreigners" tainted by American ideals, Ernest Ewald, was found guilty as follows:
This court ascertains that you were an occupant of the tents at Collier from the time the camp was established, and stayed there for the purpose of picketing the approach to the mine and preventing non-union men from going to work there, and of intimidating those who were working; that you did picket duty for the purpose of preventing non-union men from going to work there; that you trespassed on the company's property and were fined by the local authorities for so doing; that you stopped men on their way to work at Collier, and caused them to turn back and go away; that you patrolled as a picket at the camp at night armed with a gun. You are a foreigner, I have no doubt but what you were misled into this, but nevertheless it is clear that you came to this country, where you can make twice as much for a day's wage as you can at your home, yet you preferred to follow this unlawful organization, instead of earning your living honestly in legitimate labor and the sweat of your brow, you preferred to take their hired pay of a few dollars a week and work against law and order and peace, and sobriety, and the rights of men and the rights of property, you preferred to do that. You will be sentenced to three months in the Monongalia county jail. Bond, $1,500.00.
Another foreigner was given this judicial interpretation of American liberty and justice:
This court finds from the evidence that you frequented the camp at Collier; that you did picket duty for the purpose of preventing the non-union men from going to work, and trespassed on the company's property at the mouth of the mine frequently.
You are a foreigner and came to this country for the purpose of improving your condition, you were making more money twice over than you could get in your own country, yet you preferred to join this unlawful organization and engaged in these unlawful practices, rather than to work and make the higher wage, honestly and uprightly, and under the law; you still remained there after you quit work, instead of going away and leaving this company to exercise its rights over its own property. I will sentence you to thirty days in the Hancock county jail. Bond, $500.00.
The language of Judge Dayton reflects mental bias and prejudice against the workers. He permitted to be laid before the court as evidence hearsay and other improper testimony. Witnesses for the prosecution were permitted to testify as to facts and occurrences not within their personal knowledge. Witnesses were permitted to testify in such a way that it was not possible to tell what statements were based on personal knowledge and what on information gained from others. Testimony of a prejudicial nature, not pertinent to the charges, was admitted in evidence. The court so ordered, saying that he would determine what should be accepted and what rejected. Yet in announcing his finding Judge Dayton said:
Now, gentlemen, touching the question of these motions that have been made, I want to say that I do not regard it as incumbent upon myself, as a judge, to go to the labor of setting forth in detail what part of this testimony is irrelevant, improper, and immaterial. There are seven hundred and fifty-nine pages of it. I do regard it as my duty to file in these cases a finding of fact from the material and relevant testimony, rejecting the consideration of that which is immaterial and irrelevant.
Judge Dayton’s methods destroy the definitive of rights of law and undermine the foundations of justice.
An appeal was taken to the United States Circuit Court of Appeals when the cases were argued during the first of May.
No more distressing, appalling proofs of need of reform of law relating to the injunctive process can be found than the injunctions issued by Judge Dayton. It is the abuses of judicial authority, jurisdiction and power that beget bitter, burning indignation against the methods and agents of justice. If we would prevent our courts from being brought into contempt, we must see to it that they are really agents of justice. No court should be prostituted to the service of the private purposes of individuals. No court should be used as a strike-breaking agency.
The restraining order, the temporary injunction, the contempt proceedings in Judge Dayton’s court show that the purpose for which the usurpatory power was invoked was not to prevent irreparable injury to property but to rivet the fetters on the workers to defeat an industrial movement to secure better wages and conditions of work and to prevent any weakening of the autocratic rule and domination of the mine owners.
These “judicial" proceedings are but a part of a great labor movement for the betterment of the miners of West Virginia, and can not be dissociated from their influence upon the ultimate determination of that movement fraught with such far-reaching consequences to the lives of our men, women, and children.
Both the restraining order and the temporary injunction forbid not only acts that may cause injury to property but broadly forbid any act that would enable the workers collectively or individually to work for their own interests. The purpose of the mine. operators is to perpetuate antiunion policies and conditions and to create such a situation that the miners shall be forced to work under conditions injurious to themselves.
Principles of justice of incalculable importance to workers are issues in these cases. Among them are:
The right of dissatisfied workmen and their sympathizers to organize; to conduct a strike for the purpose of securing better terms and conditions of employment.
The right to furnish and receive strike benefits.
The right of employers under the guise of the “sacredness" of contracts for personal services to prevent any one from approaching their employes to ask them to quit work and to join with fellow-workers for the protection and the promotion of the interests of all.
The right of a judge to issue orders restraining persons from doing that which they have a lawful right to do, and the right of a judge to punish them for violating such unlawful orders.
The Congress of the United States is now considering measures for the reform of abuses of the injunctive process. Those abuses American workers have felt more keenly than all other citizens. In the name of justice they demand the speedy enactment of law adequate to prevent future perversion of justice. They demand not only that organizations of workers be deemed lawful, but that they be accorded the legal right to such normal and necessary activities as will make organizations real forces for the betterment of human life.
Associated effort for self-help is the only protection upon which the workers can rely. It has done more than any other force for the uplift of the masses of our country. It will do more as the way is opened to greater opportunities. The workers demand these opportunities in the name of justice and humanity. They demand legislation that shall exempt them from the provisions of the Sherman antitrust act and protect them from abuses of the injunctive process.
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Fannie Sellins Memorial
SOURCES
The Atlanta Constitution
(Atlanta, Georgia)
-Feb 16, 1915
http://www.newspapers.com/...
American Federationist, Volume 21
American Federation of Labor, 1914
https://books.google.com/...
The entire article from the June 1914 edition:
"Judicial Labor-Phobia, in Antitrust Law,
Injunctions and Contempts"
-by Samuel Gompers
(Also source for banner image.)
https://books.google.com/...
The portion of the article used above:
"Judge Dayton’s Contempt Decisions"
https://books.google.com/...
IMAGES
Fannie Sellins X2
http://www.findagrave.com/...
http://en.wikipedia.org/...
Samuel Gompers
http://en.wikipedia.org/...
Fannie Sellins Memorial X2
http://www.liveauctiontalk.com/...
https://www.youtube.com/...
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WE NEVER FORGET
Mike Stout sings a song for Fannie Sellins
In labor's glorious history
was many a union maid
Who stood up to the bosses,
so staunch and unafraid.
Molly Jackson, Mother Jones
fought for a brighter way.
But let's sing of Fannie Sellins,
and remember her today...
She lived with tireless energy,
no duty would she shirk.
And though murderers cut short her life,
we carry on her work.
Though murderers cut short her life,
we carry on her work.
-Anne Feeney
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The Red Flag - Socialist Victory Choir
The people's flag is deepest red,
It shrouded oft our martyred dead,
And ere their limbs grew stiff and cold,
Their hearts' blood dyed its ev'ry fold.
Then raise the scarlet standard high.
Within its shade we'll live and die,
Though cowards flinch and traitors sneer,
We'll keep the red flag flying here.
-Jim Connell, 1889
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