You ought to be out raising hell. This is the fighting age. Put on your fighting clothes.
-Mother Jones
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Wednesday June 2, 1915
From the International Socialist Review: On Big Bill Before Walsh Commission
This month's edition of the
Review includes an illustrated article on the appearance before the Commission on Industrial Relations of Big Bill Haywood, Secretary-Treasurer of the Industrial Workers of the World.
Fellow Worker Haywood explained the concept of class-struggle unionism which guides the practices of the I. W. W. He did not back down under the clever questioning of Commissioner Weinstock, business man of California:
...the big witness slipped a sizzler across the suave commissioner when the commissioner brought up what he said was the I. W. W. idea in making poor goods as a form of sabotage. Haywood said,"that's a complaint we have against the capitalist system."
Weinstock then contended that Haywood's doctrine would make a nation of thieves and liars, because of his advocacy of no contracts with bosses and nonrecognition of promises made under duress.
[Said Haywood:]
That's what you have now...That is what the capitalist class practices every day.
[Emphasis added.
From the International Socialist Review of June 1915:
SAYS LABOR WILL WIPE OUT CAPITAL
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Haywood Declares I. W.W. Would Not
Stop at Revolution.
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PICTURES ERA OF FREEDOM
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DECLARES NOTHING WILL HALT
CLASS STRUGGLE.
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Only Implacable War Ending With Great General Strike and Confiscation
of Means of Production Could Bring Workers to Ideal-
No Identity of Interest Between Labor and Men Like Rockefeller and Morgan,
Who Contribute Nothing to Production.
(From the Baltimore American)
Washington, May 12. — A revolution that would wipe out America's present industrial and political system and establish an ideal era of freedom was described to the federal commission on industrial relations as the ultimate object of the Industrial Workers of the World, by William D. Haywood, its secretary and treasurer.
A world in which labor, organized into a vast compact union, should control all the means of production and in which there should be no such thing as "capital" was held up by Haywood as his land of promise. He declared that only implacable war between labor and capital, ending with a great general strike and confiscation of the means of production, could bring the workers to that ideal existence.
For Revolution, He Says
[He told the commission:]
This is a class struggle that must go on...There can be no identity of interest between the workers, who have only their labor power, and such men as Rockefeller and Morgan and their stockholders, who contribute nothing to production. The struggle will go on despite everything this commission can do or can recommend to congress. The battle is inevitable. Labor must fight for what capital now controls, the means of production, tools, machinery and all of those things which should be controlled by labor alone.
I have had a dream of a new society some time in which there will be no struggle between capital and labor, in which every man will have free access to the land and the means of production and livelihood. There will be no government, no states, as we know them now. Congress will be made up not of lawyers and preachers, but of experts from all branches of industry, come together for the good of all the people.
Commissioner Weinstock questioned Haywood as to what methods would be employed to bring about this change.
[Said the witness:]
I believe in any kind of tactics...I don't care if it means revolution. That's all.
Would Tear Down New York
In reply to other questions Haywood said the I. W. W. differed with the trade unionists because it believed in the organization of a single great union instead of craft unions. Its ultimate purpose, he said, differed little from socialism.
[He added:]
I might say it is socialism with its working clothes on.
In the new era, Haywood said there would be no great cities.
"What is to become of New York, Chicago and the other great cities?" asked Commissioner Weinstock.
[Replied the witness:]
There would be no idle brokers, lawyers and financiers to occupy such cities.
"But what would you do with New York?"
Tear it down, or leave it as a monument to the foolishness of this age.
Haywood sketched the stormy incidents of his past life, telling of strikes in which he had participated, from the early troubles in Colorado and Utah to the recent outbreaks at Lawrence and Paterson. He continued his testimony the next day.
(From the New York Call)
William D. Haywood, secretary-treasurer of the Industrial Workers of the World, was on the witness stand nearly all of the afternoon.
Hastily Haywood sketched his life, beginning work in the mines at 9 and running down through a career of turbulence and strife to fifteen years ago, when he ceased working in the mines; then down to the present as an agitator. In this Haywood laid the background for an exposition of the purposes of his organization, carefully, though seemingly without forethought, building the basis for his position on the developments of his former industrial observations.
It was a dramatic story that "Big Bill" told—a story of strike after strike, hundreds thrown into jail, workers charged upon by soldiers, men and women beaten, court orders binding the workers and constant revolt against exploitation.
At the end of the recital he said:
This outlines the main strikes of the organizations I have been connected with, and, I think, clearly portrays that there is a class struggle and that the workers are on one side, with the capitalists on the other; that the worker has nothing but his labor power and that the capitalists have all of the forces of government and of law; that he can have the police for the asking, that he can have the militia and the regular army.
There are workers who have come to the conclusion that there is only one way to win. We don't agree with the statement that has been reiterated here that there is an identity of interest between employe and employer.
No Identity of Interest.
"We say there can be no identity of interest between the worker who produces all, and Rockefeller and Morgan, who, neither by brain or muscle, contribute to the productivity of the industries that they own. We say the struggle will go on in spite of anything this commission can do. It's for the things now owned and controlled by capital. We say these things should be owned and controlled by the workers alone.
Personally I don't think this can be done by political action. The wage working class is in the minority. They are not educated to the game of politics. While they are the only valuable units in society, their efforts must be confined to the shops where they work. I have dreams of a new society, in which there will be no battle between worker and capital, but where every man will have access to the land and to the machinery of production.
There will be no political divisions as we know them now, and no congress of lawyers. There will be experts and the machine will be made the slave of man instead of a use of machinery that now makes the man the slave. I think this can be done by direct action-that is, by organizing the forces of labor.
Haywood went on to explain direct action.
[He said:]
We propose by strength of numbers to declare ownership.
After this came a prolonged tilt with Commissioner Weinstock, in which the Pacific coast capitalist sought to break down Haywood's presentment as something that Americans would never stand for. While, of course, the real point is the tactics involved, rather than the picture of the ultimate painted by Haywood, Weinstock gathered together writings of I. W. W.'s and others presenting the collection as the program of Haywood's organization. Haywood neatly put "one over" on Weinstock by informing him that the first quotation made by the commissioner was the chorus of the national song of France, while the second was from a speech made in this city by Abraham Lincoln at a time when speculators were trying to force up food prices. Lincoln's advice was to break open the storehouses and take the food, according to the quotation.
Haywood Puts One Over
Again the big witness slipped a sizzler across the suave commissioner when the commissioner brought up what he said was the I. W. W. idea in making poor goods as a form of sabotage. Haywood said,"that's a complaint we have against the capitalist system."
He denied that he wanted the workers to do that. He wanted them to refuse to do it, as they do now, for the sake of the owner's profits. Whereupon Weinstock said, "Well, we'll cut out that part about inferior goods," much to the amusement of the audience.
Weinstock then contended that Haywood's doctrine would make a nation of thieves and liars, because of his advocacy of no contracts with bosses and nonrecognition of promises made under duress.
[Said Haywood:]
That's what you have now...That is what the capitalist class practices every day.
In every one of these highly amusing clashes on the broad question of right or wrong, such as relates to those cited here, Haywood had Weinstock fighting for wind.
Haywood said that his organization now has 15,000 members.
[Emphasis added.]
Profits Above the Law by Art Young:
By Art Young from Solidarity of June 7, 1913
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SOURCE
The International Socialist Review, Volume 15
ed by Algie Martin Simons, Charles H. Kerr
C.H. Kerr, July 1914-June 1915
http://books.google.com/...
ISR June 1915
https://books.google.com/...
"[Haywood] Says Labor Will Wipe Out Capital"
(Also source for images within article.)
https://books.google.com/...
IMAGES
International Socialist Review of June 1915
https://books.google.com/...
Graphic from International Socialist Review
https://books.google.com/...
Profits! by Art Young from Solidarity of June 7, 1913
https://books.google.com/...
International Socialist Review, June 1915
https://books.google.com/...
IWW Sabo-Tabby
http://www.iww.org/...
Sabotage by Elizabeth Gurley Flynn, April 1915
http://babel.hathitrust.org/...
See also:
The International Socialist Review, Volume 13
-ed by Algie Martin Simons, Charles H. Kerr
Charles H. Kerr & Company, July 1912-June 1913
https://books.google.com/...
"The Rip in the Silk Industry"
by William D Haywood
from the ISR of May 1913
https://books.google.com/...
Note: Sadly, there are many pages missing from Volume 13, but Haywood's entire article, "The Rip in the Silk Industry," can be read in "Rebel Voice." I highly recommend this book and consider it one of the best sources ever put together on the history and working class culture of the Industrial Workers of the World.
Rebel Voices: An IWW Anthology
-ed by Joyce L. Kornbluh
Charles H. Kerr Publishing Company, 1988
https://books.google.com/...
Chapter 7: Paterson 1913
https://books.google.com/...
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Wobblies singing Solidarity Forever
All the world that's owned by idle drones.
Is ours and ours alone.
We have laid the wide foundations,
Built it skyward stone by stone.
It is ours and not to slave in,
but to master and to own,
While the Union make us strong.
-Ralph Chaplin
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