The governor of Colorado...would betray God Almighty Himself if it was made of
pecuniary or political benefit or demanded by the corporations.
-Mother Jones
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Monday October 4, 1915
From the Duluth Labor World: "Mother Jones Raps Colorado Governor"
In this weeks edition of
The Labor World, we find an account of the activities of Mother Jones while in Colorado a few weeks ago. Mother, who is a
former schoolteacher, took up her ruler and applied a few good raps upon the knuckles of Governor Carlson:
The governor of Colorado is a lapdog of the corporations and absolutely has betrayed the people who elected him, and his action in so doing has proven to me that he would betray God Almighty Himself if it was made of pecuniary or political benefit or demanded by the corporations.
I've rather felt sorry for Governor Ammons. He was a poor, unsophisticated country weakling, and we can forgive him for his errors. But this new governor had an example before him. He has no excuse for prostituting the honor of the state as he has done by turning his authority over to the corporations.
He went east and attempted to draw pay from the state while he was preaching the doctrine of the Colorado Fuel & Iron company in Brooklyn.
By the time that
John D. Jr. arrived in Colorado, Mother had left state. As reported in
The Washington Times of September 30th, she regrets not being there in Colorado with the younger Mr. Rockefeller in order to show him what he really needs to see:
Dancing with the mine boss' wife, and borrowing the mine superintendent's nightgown when he sleeps in his cabin will not put any more food in the stomachs of the underpaid miner and his wife and babies...It will not end the injustices suffered by the men who have been treated as serfs, and who lived through the horrible scenes at Ludlow when their wives and babies were murdered by the hired gunmen of the mine owners.
I wish I had known Rockefeller was coming out when I was in Colorado two weeks ago. I should have staid out there and made it my business to see that Rockefeller saw the things he should see and heard the things they are keeping from him now...He can't expect to learn anything about conditions on a excursion like this that is personally conducted by his hired men.
From The Labor World of October 2, 1915:
MOTHER JONES RAPS COLORADO GOVERNOR
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Declares He Is Lapdog of Corporations-
Says Rockefeller Don't Trust Him.
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John Lawson & Mother Jones
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DENVER, Sept. 30 - "Mother" Jones returned to Denver a few days ago to meet "her boys," and was vigorous and full of ginger, not withstanding her 83 years. She left later for Trinidad to confer with John R. Lawson and Louis Zancannelli [Zancanelli], confined in the Las Animas county jail under sentences of life imprisonment imposed by Judge Hillyer after farcical trials.
While in Denver "Mother" Jones expressed her opinion of Governor Carlson of Colorado in scathing language.
[She said:]
The governor of Colorado is a lapdog of the corporations and absolutely has betrayed the people who elected him...and his action in so doing has proven to me that he would betray God Almighty Himself if it was made of pecuniary or political benefit or demanded by the corporations.
[Continued "Mother" Jones:]
I've rather felt sorry for Governor Ammons...He was a poor, unsophisticated country weakling, and we can forgive him for his errors. But this new governor had an example before him. He has no excuse for prostituting the honor of the state as he has done by turning his authority over to the corporations.
He went east and attempted to draw pay from the state while he was preaching the doctrine of the Colorado Fuel & Iron company in Brooklyn.
I tell you Rockefeller holds such minions as this in utter contempt. He knows that they who have betrayed the state would betray him as quickly were the opportunity offered. He knows that the governor and his kind would betray God Almighty himself.
No sane person can understand the workings of the governor's mind which led him to attack the supreme court. I suppose now he will criticize Judge Graham for granting the union men separate trials in Boulder county.
This court of inquiry the governor and his crowd has called to whitewash the militia is the most ridiculous thing of all. It shows that even political coyotes' fear public opinion. But the governor is mistaken if he believes he can fool the public into believing the verdict of a hand-picked court, the members of which are as much implicated as those they are investigating.
Look at the man the governor has chosen to head his court-Colonel Boughton-a strutting egotist, struck by his own shallow importance.
I'll talk to their court if they call me, and I'll tell them more than they want to know.
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[Photograph added.]
From The Washington Times of September 30, 1915:
JOHN D., JR., SCORED BY "MOTHER" JONES
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"Is Making a Bigger Fool of Himself On This Trip,"
Says Laborite.
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"John D. Rockefeller. jr., is making a bigger fool of himself than ever on this trip of his through Colorado" "Mother" Jones, widely known as the "miners' Angel of Mercy," said today. "And I'll tell him about it the first time I see him," she added with earnestness.
"Mother" Jones called at the Department of Labor today to pay her respects to Secretary Wilson. The purpose of her visit in Washington is to endeavor to see President Wilson and intercede for the structural iron workers imprisoned at Leavenworth for complicity in labor dynamitings. Applications for pardons for President Ryan and his associates in prison are pending.
It was in response to a challenge made by "Mother" Jones when she visited 26 Broadway a year ago that John D. Rockefeller decided to visit Colorado and learn for himself the condition of the miners employed by the Rockefeller coal interests there.
"But this trip won't do Rockefeller any good," Mother Jones today insisted. "I told him to go to Trinidad alone, call all his miners together in a mass meeting, and hear their grievances. Instead he is out there surrounded by his satellites, Mackenzie King, and the rest, and he is seeing only what they want him to see, and hearing only the things they want him to hear.
"Dancing with the mine boss' wife, and borrowing the mine superintendent's nightgown when he sleeps in his cabin will not put any more food in the stomachs of the underpaid miner and his wife and babies." "Mother" Jones continued, referring to some of the spectacular features of Rockefeller's visit to the coal camps. "It will not end the injustices suffered by the men who have been treated as serfs, and who lived through the horrible scenes at Ludlow when their wives and babies were murdered by the hired gunmen of the mine owners.
"I wish I had known Rockefeller was coming out when I was in Colorado two weeks ago. I should have staid out there and made it my business to see that Rockefeller saw the things he should see and heard the things they are keeping from him now." "Mother" Jones added. "He can't expect to learn anything about conditions on a excursion like this that is personally conducted by his hired men."
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[Photograph added.]
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SOURCES
The Labor World
(Duluth, Minnesota)
-Oct 2, 1915
http://www.newspapers.com/...
The Washington Times
(District of Columbia, Washington)
-Sept 30, 1915
http://www.newspapers.com/...
IMAGES
Mother Jones on Cover of
United Mine Workers Journal
of Jan 21, 1915, Repaired by JtC
(thank you, Johnny!)
http://books.google.com/...
John Lawson & Mother Jones,
Wichita Beacon, Kansas, Apr 22, 1915
http://www.newspapers.com/...
Mother Jones, The Brainerd (MN) Daily Dispatch,
Oct 1, 1915
http://www.newspapers.com/...
Ludlow Massacre, Crucified
http://john-adcock.blogspot.com/...
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Mary Elaine Petrucci speaks at Ludlow Memorial
WE NEVER FORGET
Song of Mary Petrucci at Ludlow - Tom Breiding
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