You ought to be out raising hell. This is the fighting age. Put on your fighting clothes.
-Mother Jones
```````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````
Wednesday May 12, 1915
Washington, District of Columbia - Mother Jones, Haywood, and Darrow Will Testify
From The Washington Times of May 9, 1915:
LABOR AND LAW WILL BE PROBED THIS WEEK
-----
"Mother" Jones, William [D.] Haywood,
and Clarence Darrow to Testify.
-----
Chairman Frank P. Walsh
of the Commission on Industrial Relations
``````````
With "Mother" Jones, militant friend of the miners, William W.[D.] Haywood, head of the Industrial Workers of the World, and Clarence Darrow, the man who defended the McNamaras, as witnesses, the Commission on Industrial Relations this week will begin the second leg of its investigation into labor conditions. The general subject of "labor and the law" will be treated.
Chairman Walsh has announced that former President Taft and Alton B. Parker, one-time Democratic candidate for President, will not appear before the commission this week as planned. Their engagements will not permit, it is explained. John D. Rockefeller, jr., and officials of the Colorado Fuel and Iron company will not appear before the commission until next week, when the investigation of the Colorado strike is reopened.
Clash Coming To a Head.
The clash between Chairman Walsh and Mr. Rockefeller over the former's action in making a newspaper attack on the Rockefeller interests for political activity in Colorado, will come to a head at this meeting....
[Photograph added.]
MOTHER JONES SPEAKS IN ALLENTOWN, PENNSYLVANIA
From The Allentown Leader of May 10, 1915:
STIRRING ADDRESS BY MOTHER JONES
-----
Raps "Sentimental Efforts, " and Tells Women
to Get Down to Meal Ticket Work.
-----
Declaring that the government was not at Washington or Harrisburg, but at 26 Broadway, eighty-three-year-old Mother Jones, prominent labor agitator, advised the working class to act immediately, as the time for action was here, before a large audience in the Orpheum Theatre yesterday afternoon. She was introduced by Councilman Wheeler.
Hale and hearty and lacking any of the deficiencies of advanced years, Mother Jones spoke in a loud, clear voice and there was no trace of nervousness during her entire address. At times she would become excited and wave her arms about in a manner which emphasized her words.
Mother Jones particularly appealed to Allentown women saying that they should lend their assistance to the industrial movement. In speaking of woman's suffrage, she said that women should first learn how to use the ballot.
"Get away from sentimental efforts," fairly shrieked the aged woman, addressing the women, "such as social settlement work, temperance movements, charity and foreign missions and learn what causes the ownership of our bread by a few."
The speaker flayed the "high class robbers," as she called the capitalists, who she claimed were taking the instruments of manufacture away from the masses and were concentrating them among about six men who were ruling the destines of the United States.
Mother Jones referred to the conditions in the coal fields of Colorado and West Virginia. She gave her story of the burning of the tenet colony in Colorado, when 11 children and two women lost their lives.
Winifred Wavrek played several violin solos, accompanied by his mother, Mrs. John Wavrek.
Mother Jones was presented with a handsome bouquet at the close of her talk by members of the local Socialist party.
-----
[Photograph added.]
From The Allentown Democrat of May 10, 1915:
MOTHER JONES URGES IMMEDIATE STRIKE
-----
Makes One of Her Characteristic Speeches
in Orpheum to Large Audience.
-----
Mary Jones, known throughout the industrial world more familiarly as Mother Jones, the acknowledged friend and champion of the working class, held an audience of several hundred persons spellbound at the Orpheum theatre yesterday afternoon.
Mother Jones at times resides at Denver, Colorado, but as she put it, her home is also on the industrial battlefields most of the time. She spoke on the Colorado outrages and of conditions existing in West Virginia when the big strikes were on and the laborers were without organization.
To be organized thoroughly was the duty of the working man, she stated, and it was their duty to cement their relation or the industrial interests would crush the masses and make them worse than any slave.
She stated that the workers are standing in the dawn of the greatest era this world has ever seen and that now is the appointed time to strike. Continuing she asserted that the time was fast approaching when the "high class burglars," as she called the capitalists were taking the instruments of manufacture away from the masses and were concentrating them among about six men, who were ruling the destinies of the United States.
The speaker stated that the women had a great work to accomplish and that if they would see that the men sent the proper men to the judicial halls, conditions would be different. Today she asserted, the government was not at Washington or Harrisburg, but was at 26 Broadway.
She advocated the women giving up their foolish connections with the so-called peace commissions, temperance and social clubs and mission societies and get down to real work.
The horrors attending the big conflicts between capital and labor were graphically described, how the laborers were shot down by the hired tools of the wealthy and how women and children met the same fate. Mother Jones stated that first of all she was for a peaceable settlement of all troubles, but that if the interests were going to use force, she advocated the oppressed to retaliate with force.
She described how she had led meetings over which there was imminent danger of a massacre being committed, but that [no?] blood had ever been shed at these gatherings.
She asserted that the money being spent for the maintenance of state police and militia in the oppressed territory, which amounted to about $800,000 a year, should be spent for the upkeep of schools, which would return untold benefits. This end will only be attained by the cooperation of the men and women and by sending the proper men too the halls of justice.
"Meet your congressmen at the depot," she said "and erect a platform and make them tell what they have done. Don't go there and shout our welcome and leave the men think[ing?] that you are satisfied," she stated.
In numerous cases cited by the speaker, she brought out the horrors of the situation and advised that as a first duty, the men and women of the working class educate themselves and they will soon reap the harvest of their work.
Councilman R. J. Wheeler was the chairman of the afternoon and introduced a booklet selling for 25 cents, on "Standard Oil and People or Who Owns America." He explained that it was the idea of the Socialist party to educate the people-not only to have them hear lectures, which would be forgotten....
Mother Jones was presented with a handsome bouquet of carnations by the local Socialist party, under whose direction the lecture was given.
If it were not known that she is 83 years old, it would be hard to believe the fact, so clear and strong is her voice and active is she.
-----
[Photograph added.]
~~~~~~~~~~
SOURCES
The Washington Times
(Washington, District of Columbia)
-May 9, 1915
http://www.newspapers.com/...
The Allentown Leader
(Allentown, Pennsylvania)
-May 10, 1915
http://www.newspapers.com/...
The Allentown Democrat
(Allentown, Pennsylvania)
-May 10, 1915
http://www.newspapers.com/...
IMAGES
Frank P. Walsh from Harpers Weekly
of Sept 27, 1913
http://books.google.com/...
Mother Jones, Boston Glob, Jan 30, 1915
http://www.newspapers.com/...
Mother Jones, New York Tribune, Jan 29, 1915
http://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/...
See also:
Standard Oil or The People
-by Henry H. Klein
New York City, 1914
(This could be the booklet to which Councilman Wheeler refers.)
http://babel.hathitrust.org/...
`````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````
This Land Is Your Land - Woody Guthrie
As I went walking I saw a sign there
And on the sign it said "No Trespassing."
But on the other side it didn't say nothing,
That side was made for you and me.
In the shadow of the steeple I saw my people,
By the relief office I seen my people;
As they stood there hungry, I stood there asking
Is this land made for you and me?
-Woody Guthrie
`````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````