You ought to be out raising hell. This is the fighting age. Put on your fighting clothes.
-Mother Jones
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Thursday October 14, 1915
From the Chicago Day Book: Strike Reports by Jane Whitaker and Carl Sandburg
From the front lines of the Great Chicago Garment Workers strike, lead by the Amalgamated Clothing Workers of America, we offer the fine reporting from recent editions of
The Day Book which includes the reporting of Jane Whitaker and Carl Sandburg.
There is also a report of the City Council's investigation into police conduct toward the strikers and well as a report on the grand parade of strikers, men, women and children, 15,000 strong:
The striking garment workers scored a big victory, the police and private detectives were forced to back water and the trust press were plainly made out liars when 15,000 men, women, babies and children paraded, in perfect order, through the loop district this afternoon [October 12th].
From The Day Book of October 11, 1915:
The clothing bosses' plan of turning their shops into lodging houses for the strikebreakers as a cheaper method than hiring taxis to take them, home got a bump today when State Factory Inspector Oscar F. Nelson filed charges against three firms with Judge Flanagan in the municipal court, charging violation of act which prohibits people sleeping in quarters where garments are made.
Nelson charges that a personal inspection be made with deputies Friday night showed that 20 people were sleeping in the shop of the Scotch Woolen Mills, Halsted and Adams; 15 in Edw. E, Strauss' shops, 409 S. Market st, and 4 in the shops of the Great Central Tailoring Co., 833 W. Adams st.
Nelson says he will have deputies out every night hunting violations of this law and every firm found violating it will be hauled in court.
While the city slept 2,000 strikers met in Hod Carriers' hall at 4 o'clock this morning and arranged the day's picketing. Several sluggings were reported before 7 o'clock and a number of arrests were made. Two men were slugged in front of Lamm's and two in front of the Royal Tailors.
Women spies working among the girl strikers to discourage them is the report of J. Gilckman, shop chairman. He says several women have entered Hod Carriers' hall claiming to be members of the Political league of the University of Chicago, and have engaged the girls in conversation, telling them that they are waging a hopeless fight. When cornered the women have been unable to show credentials.
Strikers are wearing red buttons with the slogan, "We are out to win," in anticipation of the parade tomorrow, when it is expected 15,000 will be in the march through the loop led by Sidney Hillman, president of the clothing workers' union and "Mother" Jones.
Shops meeting will be held in Hod Carriers' hall at 9 o'clock, followed by a mass meeting to assemble strikers, who will meet the groups from the North and South Sides of the city.
That he police department of Chicago is on trial not only in this strike, but to determine what is to be their attitude in future strikes, was the statement of Ald. Kennedy before a council committee when it opened its session to investigate charges of police brutality to girl strikers in the clothing industry.
Kennedy's statement was brought forth by the declaration of Chief of Police Healey that his presence was not necessary before the committee, as he had turned the entire matter over to Ass't Deputy Schuettler.
"This is too serious a matter for any one to be absent," Kennedy said. "It is too far-reaching. It affects not only this strike, but what the police attitude is to be in future strikes."
Twenty girls and men alleged to have been slugged while picketing were waiting to testify, and Wm. Cunnea, attorney for the strikers, stated he had 140 cases to present.
Prompted by Schuettler, Ass't Corporation Att'y Chas. Haft said he did not think any testimony should be heard until the policemen who are accused can be present, and it was agreed that the witnesses will then be cross- examined by Ass't Corp. Counsel Leon Hornstein representing the city and the police department.
Cunnea wanted to know if it was the intention to bring in any of the sluggers who have received police protection. Healey said he knew of no sluggers being protected by the police.
"Perhaps you know of some detective agencies who have sluggers stationed in front of some of the shops?" Cunnea asked.
Healey did not, but Schuettler said he had information that Shippy, Hunt & Dorman and P. J. Hardy Detective Agency had special men in front of some of the shops.
A motion was introduced by Ald. Martin that the police be ordered to stop slugging, but the chief pleaded that the police department should not be "defamed" by passing such an order.
The meeting adjourned until police charged with having slugged strikers can be present.
From The Day Book of October 11, 1915:
FROM EARLY MORNING UNTIL NIGHT-
HISTORY OF A DAY WITH THE STRIKERS
BY JANE WHITAKER
"They call us 'foreign agitators,' and we are glad to be called that. We come from the country where we are taught the class struggle in our childhood; it is bred in our bones to fight oppression because we have always had to fight it. We are used to the Cossacks; they do not frighten us. So long as we have souls in our bodies we will go on fighting and when we stop fighting it will be because our souls are dead."
"If we lose this strike it means for the men that they might as well jump in the river, but with girls it is a case of selling their bodies because we cannot live on what we have been making. We have got to win."
The words were spoken by a man and a girl, a slender man with a fire in his eyes that makes one almost believe he is being consumed in his ardor for the cause of his people, and a girl who without emotion pointed out what must be the fate of girl strikers if they lose," and the two sounded the keynote of one day and every day in the clothing workers' strike.
Before '6 o'clock in the morning their struggle is on each day. They are picketing the shops while the bosses sneak strikebreakers in through the alleys that are blocked by the bosses' police force that the strikers may not interfere.
At 9 o'clock they are at the different halls attending shop meetings. At noon they are again on the picket line girls and men and before they return some one will have been slugged or perhaps even shot and there will be an added current of intensity as they come back into the halls again.
At 3 o'clock the most interesting meeting of all to me is held, the mass meeting of girls. The hall is well filled. Mingling with the strikers are women who are attempting to help, clubwomen and sometimes girls from the University of Chicago who have been brought there in the hope that they may assist the strikers.
"I have been in the class struggle since I was 13. My best friend is in Siberia and has five years to remain there if his strength holds out. My mother begged me to come to this country because she said she didn't want to lose me and she would feel I was safe here."
One of the chairmen of the board of trustees of the Cutters' union, J. Glickman, is speaking. What he says is simple, but there is such pathos through the very simplicity of it that a girl who has never before come in touch with the class struggle save as it is written in the books she has studied at the university wipes tears out of her eyes.
"My two brothers are on the battlefield of Europe. I do not know if they are alive. I have not heard from my mother in five months and I do not know if she is alive. I do not want to think and so I try to forget in this struggle. I am with a house that has signed up with the union, Hart, Schaffner & Marx, where the men and women have decent conditions through the union, but I am out to help you.
"They call us foreign agitators. But I tell you this, it is because we have been fighting all our lives that we are able to understand the class struggle.
"Your American-born man, do you know his' condition? He works in a department store for $12 or $13 a week. He cannot marry or, if he does, his wife must work with him. They have no home. I see them eating together, morning, noon and night in restaurants.
"I speak to him of the, class struggle. He doesn't know what I mean. He can tell me the baseball score in a flash, but he doesn't know how many women are working for starvation wages and how many starve to death. He isn't class conscious.
"We have bodies that must be fed, but a body without a soul is what they put in Dunning. It is the soul in us that keeps us struggling for better things for ourselves and for each other. They may slug us-we are used to that; they may kill us-we have seen our brothers killed in Europe, but they have got to kill our souls before they stop us fighting for our rights."
He stops. A girl mounts the platform. Simply she tells what is the alternative to men and to women if the struggle is lost and she calls on them to go out and picket the shops, not heeding the cops or the sluggers.
They go. On the West Side, in the Loop, on the North Side, on the South.
Ellen Gates Starr of Hull house had intended going to the Royal Tailor's shop, where she knows there is a bad situation for girls, where brutes of sluggers maul and police officers insult But at noon a man was slugged in front of Lamm's and so Ellen Gates Starr elects to go to Lamm's.
There is nothing of the society woman condescending in Ellen Gates Starr. There is nothing of the "upper class." She is not even an "outsider." She is one of the strikers in heart and act. She walks up and down, up and down. Her face looks cold, sometimes she looks very weary-she walked up and down a few hours at noon and this is night.
They are her sisters and her brothers-these strikers. She fought side by side with the waitresses; she is fighting side by side with the clothing strikers.
The "scabs" are being taken home in automobiles through the alleys by the bosses. The young boys try to go back that they may protest to men and women who are selfishly and without self-respect trying to help the bosses by acting as strikebreakers. Six husky policemen drive the boys back, pushing them around roughly.
Ellen Gates Starr is on the spot, "Why are they not permitted to go through the alley?" she asks. It is public property."
The officers dare not answer her as they would like, though when she is beyond hearing they say things they dare not say in her hearing, and once again the picketing goes on with Miss Starr promising to ascertain by the next day if the strikers are not permitted in an alley in which strikebreakers are permitted by the bosses' police officers.
Miss Starr calls to me: "We haven't quite enough women to cover all the shops with the strikers. Many of the clubwomen are doing splendid work, but we need more. Do you know of any serious women who can be depended on to take care of some one shop each day?"
We talk a few moments, walking as we talk, for we dare not stop. A wagon passes and the driver leans out: "Keep it up," he calls. "We're with you."
It is cold. Boys and girls shiver. The patrol wagon waits at the corner in the hope that it will get a load, but Ellen Gates Starr walks up and down until the last picket leaves the street
From The Day Book of October 12, 1915:
The striking garment workers scored a big victory, the police and private detectives were forced to back water and the trust press were plainly made out liars when 15,000 men, women, babies and children paraded, in perfect order, through the loop district this afternoon.
Public opinion has butted in long enough to force at least a little fair play. Chief Healey's men lined the walks along the marching route, but their clubs hung at their sides and they merely looked on. Possibly an occasional "Move along" was snapped, but orders were a little changed for a day.
Stories in the trust press that only 5,000 workers were on strike were knocked in the head. Three times that many trudged along before the very eyes of the bosses. Their protest was great. A parade of that kind carries a punch. And the bosses in the garment industry looked down on the bunch and the "punch" from upstairs office windows.
Three weeks ago today the strike was called. Then more than 25,000 people were called out With almost no exceptions the independent shops have signed up. The strikers who marched this afternoon are those employed by the Clothing Manufacturer's ass'n who have refused to recognize the strikers' union and to arbitrate.
One strong punch in the clothing workers' parade was in banners that were strung throughout the strikers' ranks. Every banner told a story. One set was directed to the former bosses, another to citizens of Chicago and a third to strikebreakers. Here is how they read:
TO OUR FORMER BOSSES
This strike is the result of your unfair treatment of us.
You knew the conditions that were imposed upon us they were unbearable.
You skimped our wages as much as you could we barely existed.
You overworked us in rush seasons, underworked us in slack and always underpaid.
You are more concerned with profits than you are with human life.
Your profits have stopped because the labor-power has stopped.
You have your employers' unions, but refuse to recognize our union.
Our union is the only agency that will secure for us decent living.
Our revolt is against poverty and all the misery that poverty brings.
We want to work and live in decency, according to American standards.
TO CITIZENS OF CHICAGO
We and the bosses are two parties to a trade-we want this trade to be fair.
The bosses do not want a fair trade-they want profits at any price.
The bosses think more of profits than they do of human life.
We can make a fair deal and can enforce it only by having a strong union.
Both parties need unions to secure and maintain right relations in trade.
The bosses have strong unions, but refuse to recognize our union.
We want a square deal-nothing more-we must have it in order to live.
Overwork and underpay cause poverty, misery, disease and death.
Citizens df Chicago, can you afford to support an underpaid industry?
This problem concerns, all citizens of Chicago-help us solve it!
TO STRIKEBREAKERS
Whether you are called scabs, sluggers,cops or what not-you are men.
All men are alike, only some men see the truth more clearly than others.
Some men see straight, think straight and act straight.
Some men see straight, but think crooked and act crooked.
Some men do not see straight and that is one reason why we parade.
Lincoln said: "A bond of sympathy should unite all working people."
The strikebreaker says: "The dollar of the boss is stronger than sympathy."
The strikebreaker betrays his follow men. In doing so he betrays himself, also.
Fellow workers, don't scab! There is nothing in it for you and it hurts us.
Men! Search your hearts. See straight! Think straight! Act straight.
-----
The parade was divided into four divisions.
The one from the Southwest Side started from 22d and Troy and went up 22d to Ashland over on Ashland to Jackson.
The West Side division marched from Apollo hall, Blue Island and 12th, to Racine and down Racine to Taylor. There another group formed in line and marched on Racine to Polk to Ashland and over Ashland to Jackson.
The Northwest division marched fromWood and Blucher on Wood to Jackson and over Jackson to Ashland.
The Middle West Side group formed in line at Hodcarriers' hall and marched over to Peoria and Harrison and turned south to Van Buren. Continuing down Van Buren they turned south on Ashland to Jackson.
From Ashland and Jackson the parade went east to Canal, south on Canal to Harrison, east on Harrison to Franklin, down Franklin to Van Buren, east on Van Buren to Michigan, down Michigan to Jackson, down Jackson to Market, over on Market to Adams, down Adams to, Canal, back to Jackson and down Jackson to Green and over on Green to Harrison, where they disband.
From The Day Book of October 12, 1915:
BIG CLOTHING BOSSES FORCED TO COME
THRO' TO THE COUNCIL POLICE COMMITTEE
We are to hear from the higher-ups in Chicago Clothing industry strike.
Heads of B. Kuppenheimer & Co., The Royal Tailors, Kuh, Nathan & Fischer and Lamm & Co. are to be called before the council police committee to answer for rank actions of their private detectives.
At the tail end of a twelve-hour session of the police committee Ald. Martin sprung a resolution calling for an explanation from the big clothiers. In spite of Ald. Stern's objections it carried. So some of the big bosses who have tipped back in their easy chairs and watched men with "special" stars rush the striking men and girls will have to come through and tell about their end of the rotten methods which have been employed.
Twenty witnesses were heard during the session, which lasted well into the night. "Fool question" asking was sidetracked from the start when Ald. McDermott kicked on Corporation Counsel Leon Hornsteins way of cross-examining.
A majority of the witnesses told of being slugged while walking in front of some of the shops. These slugging stories are really what caused Ald. Martin's resolution calling for the big bosses to "fess up."
Wm. Cunnea, counsel for the strikers, did not attempt to cross-examine policemen who were accused of slugging. "I have spent too much time in law to want to cross-examine a policeman," he said. "We are not filing charges against these men. We are simply trying to show a condition and find out what is responsible for this condition."
After Cunnea had told Ald. McCormick that the law did allow peaceful picketing he asked Chief Healey if there was not a conference in his office between his commanding officers and himself over the strike. Healey replied no, but later changed his answer to yes. He admitted Martin Isaacs had visited him regarding the strike, but denied that he had made any suggestions as to how the strikers Should be handled. He said he could not substantiate the charges made by Ellen Gates Starr and other clubwomen regarding the slugging of strikers by police.
Not all of the policemen who were called before the committee were there to reply against slugging charges.
Patrolman Herman Klank, Shakespeare station, told how he arrested a strikebreaker named Frank Smith, who was carrying a shoemaker's hammer tied to his wrist Smith was charged with disorderly conduct. When brought up before Judge Sullivan he testified he was a presser working at Mayer Bros, and was discharged. Klank then created a sensation, saying that Capt Duffy had told him "that it was no use bringing in those fellows." Klank did not arrest any more strikebreakers.
Capt Duffy was called by Ald. Buck to explain his order. He admitted saying "words to that effect" and that he thought the offense (carrying the hammer where it could be used) was of so slight a nature the arrest should not have been made.
Throughout the hearing the word "slugger" was used. Ald. McCormick asked Att'y Cunnea just what the word "slugger" meant. Cunnea took a Tribune want ad and read:
Wanted strong, husky men for guards.
Must be 5 feet 10. Good pay.
Apply at Inter Ocean Hotel.
Patrolmen A. C. Anderson testified how he was transferred from Royal Tailors when he refused to take orders from one of the "sluggers" employed by that firm. He had forbid the slugger to hit anyone in his presence.
Chief Healey demanded to know the name of the officer who transferred him. Anderson named Serg't Dillon of Sheffield avenue station. Dillon will be called before Chief Healey this morning to explain his order.
Miss Ellen Gates Starr told how Harry Waxman had been slugged in the presence of policemen who did not attempt to interfere; how they had obtained John Doe warrants for these two men and how they were taken into custody by Detectives O'Connor and Hans of the Desplaines street station. The next morning she called up the station and was told the men had not been arrested. A short time later she was told they had been arrested but not booked. An hour later the sergeant told her the men had been booked and discharged in court for want of prosecution.
Waxman, who was present, showed his bandaged head to the aldermen and stated that the detectives had not informed him as to when the "sluggers" would be arraigned in court.
"These facts combine to make it appear that the police are helping these private policemen as much as possible," Miss Starr said. "In my opinion these hired gunmen are the crux of the whole matter. If we could find a way to censor them we would find a way out of this situation."
After the meeting was adjourned until Thursday morning different aldermen made comments on the proceedings so far.
"We have developed some valuable information which will probably result in a different attitude by the police in future strikes," said Ald. Kennedy.
"It is the healthiest thing the council ever did," Ald. Rodriguez stated. "It has been brought out that the police do not know what their attitude is in a strike. We must get them away from their 'bosses' viewpoint'."
"We have made great progress," said Ald. Lynch, chairman of the committee. "I think that hereafter equality will be given to strikers."
"The attitude of the aldermen are most favorable for us," Att'y Cunnea said. "In my opinion this will turn out to be the best investigation the city council ever authorized."
"I'm going to keep my eye on the police who testified here," said Ald. McDermott. "No monkey business goes, such as transfers to the opposite part of the city from their homes. I think we are doing a whole lot of good."
"The findings of this committee will have an important bearing on the police department," said Ald. Buck. "I think the chief and his first deputy will derive a great deal of knowledge of their own department at these meetings."
-----
[Emphasis added.]
From The Day Book of October 12, 1915:
CLUB WOMEN MAY GO TO JAIL IN PROTEST OF
POLIGE VIOLENCE ON GIRL STRIKERS
BY CARL SANDBURG
Mrs. Medill McCormick, daughter of Mark Hanna, is making a spectacle of herself.
She says she and a lot of other club women are going to line up with the women and girls on strike and do the same things the strikers are doing, so as to get arrested and thrown into the lousy police cells of Ha Desplaines street stations.
Some of us understand exactly why Ruth Hanna McCormick wants to pull this stunt.
It's a deep wish many of us have that somebody would tell us how this city can get common decent human feelings of fair play into Chicago police handling strikes.
I saw girls and women yesterday in the city hall with black and blue marks on their arms where Coppers had wrenched and mauled those arms.
I talked with a dark-eyed, dark- haired, beautiful little Jewess whose mouth was slapped and her lips were rough and swollen where the dirty fist of a copper had made a swipe on her face.
She was better looking than some movie actresses I've seen and I wondered what kind of a mother and what kind of sisters the copper had who used his mitt on this little Jewess.
I talked with Mrs. Maud Cain Tavlor, Mrs. Charles Merriam and Mrs. A. H. Schweitzer, club women who say they heard coppers jeering at girls and women on strike: "Who're you going with tonight? Have you cats got your fellows for tonight?"
Two strikers have been shot by policemen while so far not one policeman has got a bullet or a brick from the strikers.
The violence is all one-sided and the strong-arm work and the coarse-mouthed language is all to the batting average of Charles Clarence Healey, police chief appointed by Mayor Thompson to drive the crooks from Chicago.
Mrs. Armour's jewel burglars are loose enjoying their swag, cooling their heels in fun somewhere, sneezing like jeewhillikins when they mention the name of" Chief Healey and Healey's, job of driving the crooks from Chicago.
One daring woman like Ellen Gates Starr, battling on the picket line with the strikers, going to jail in the waitresses' strike and right at the front in this garment workers' strike, is worth more money in human returns to Chicago than Healey and Luthardt and P. D. O'Brien and McWeeney and the whole bunch that's now running the police department.
In first jury trial yesterday of striking garment worker the police couldn't prove disorderly conduct and the jury said "Not guilty," so another false alarm is chalked up for Healey.
And if you want 'to see more Healey false alarms just watch the jury verdicts just watch these cases of strikers charged with disorderly conduct, conspiracy, unlawful assembly, etc.
All this is part of the regularly organized game of the police force as an adjunct and annex of the Illinois Manufacturers' ass'n and the Association of Commerce with the high strategic aim of whacking, battering and hammering into nothing the hopes of the strikers for a living wage and a union.
Police thumping heads of strikers are driving deeper info the life of Chicago the slums, tuberculosis, prostitution and crime that follow in sure and inevitable percentages the low wages of any class of low-paid workers.
These are the facts that have roused Ruth Hanna McCormick and her chums so that in a strike of women and girls they are about ready to go to jail.
Some of us are mighty glad there are such women alive and battling on the picket line with strikers. And we hope they shame down the barbarous heads of the Chicago police force who have sanctioned from day to day the last ten days the beating and manhandling of women and girls putting up a grave struggle for a living wage.
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SOURCE
The Day Book
(Chicago, Illinois)
(Also source for image of headlines.)
-Oct 11, 1915
http://www.newspapers.com/...
http://www.newspapers.com/...
-Oct 12, 1915
http://www.newspapers.com/...
http://www.newspapers.com/...
http://www.newspapers.com/...
IMAGE
Amalgamated Clothing Workers of America, emblem
https://books.google.com/...
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Working Girl Blues - Hazel Dickens and Alice Gerrard
Well, I’m tired of workin’ my life away
And givin’ somebody else all of my pay
While they get rich on the profits that I lose
And leavin’ me here with those workin’ girl blues
I-dee-o-lady, workin’ girl blues
And I can’t even afford a new pair of shoes
While they can live in any old penthouse they choose
And all that I’ve got is the workin’ girl blues
-Hazel Dickens
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