You ought to be out raising hell. This is the fighting age. Put on your fighting clothes.
-Mother Jones
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Tuesday May 26, 1914
From The New York Times: James Lord, "We will go after the Rockefellers themselves."
When a union leader, high in the ranks of both the United Mine Workers of America and of the American Federation of Labor, makes this statement on a public stage in New York City:
we will send forth a trumpet call to labor which will bring us 50,000 fighters
Then, clearly the union miners of this nation have stood all that they can stand.
The New York Times featured the following story today at the top of the front page:
MINER THREATENS THE ROCKEFELLERS
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Will "Go After Them if the Militia Wolves Are Turned Back Among Us."
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SPEECH AT LINDSEY MEETING
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Colorado Judge says He Still Hopes to Interview John D., Jr.-
Letter Went Astray.
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James Lord, a mine worker from Colorado, who at present is head of the mining department of the American Federation of Labor, told an audience in Beethoven Hall at a meeting held in behalf of the Colorado strikers last night, that if President Wilson takes away the federal troops "and turns the militia wolves back among us, we will go after the Rockefellers themselves."
The miners' organizer said he spoke as a man who had spent all of his life below ground and came from people who had been in the mines for generations back. He said he spoke for all the Colorado miners who had gone out on strike.
And what I want to tell you here plainly, so that you may have full warning, [he said] is that our present policies in Colorado are worn to a frazzle, and will never be resorted to again if President Wilson takes away the troops and turns the militia wolves back among us.
We have sued for peace and have appealed to an imbecile Governor in vain, just as we prayed to President Wilson in vain for months before he finally sent the troops when at last we were in a position to fight back
We do not know why he sent the troops, but if it was to drive us back to the old slavery he won't be able to do it. If he tries, or if he surrenders us to the militia, then it stands to reason that we will not again try to fight the hired gunmen of John D. Rockefeller. Instead, we will go after the Rockefellers themselves.
Can Get 50,000 Fighters.
And: God being my witness, we will send them back to the hell from which they came. We had forty guns in camp when they trained the machine guns on the women and babies at Ludlow. But in a week we had 2,000 guns and men were pouring in from all directions. Let the militia come back among us and harm so much as the hair of a single mother's head and we will send forth a trumpet call to labor which will bring us 50,000 fighters.
We are desperate and are driven to the weapons of desperation. We have heard of investigations until the very word 'investigate' has become a hiss and a by-word among us. We know this without more investigation that we have gone as far as it is honorable for men to go in permitting fiends in the name of law and order to murder our babies and our women. We would not be men if we allowed that kind of thing to go on forever.
No; we have not made the Rockefellers feel what we feel. The only way we could do that would be to capture the wife of the elder Rockefeller and burn her alive slowly before his eyes. And the only way we could make the younger Rockefeller see would be to capture his babies and burn them slowly before himself and their mother.
Then and then only then would the Rockefellers see. They are the greatest criminals in the world, and the only decent thing they have left to do would be to out in humility and shame and drown or hang themselves.
Friends, over every tent they fired, over every tent beneath which a baby was burned to death, flew an American flag when they turned on their machine guns.
Women Weep for Dead Children.
We have women who were reared in religious families and who have said their prayers each night for years. Yet today they weep for their children who are not and cry out that the very God Himself is a 'scab,' he treat them so badly.
If the worst comes to the worst and we go in for the job we may have to do, we will neither ask for mercy nor give mercy. If we pass the limit of decency which we have reached it will be an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth. Like Rockefeller, we will apply a Bible lesson. We do not consider President Wilson a friend of labor, but in this matter we pray that he may prove himself big enough to do the right thing.
Of six men and women speakers who addressed the meeting all but Judge Ben B. Lindsey of Denver assailed President Wilson as a man without a heart for labor's problem. Judge Lindsey said he had hopes that President Wilson not only would force arbitration upon the mine operators and the miners, but that he also would take account of the fact that in this country there are two governments, and that he would "bring the head of the industrial government in New York to his feet crying for mercy."
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Hopes Still to See John D., Jr.
Judge Lindsey brought out a fact which somewhat surprised his hearers. It was that he still had some faint hope that he would be able to hold an interview with John D. Rockefeller, Jr., before leaving for Colorado. He explained that some of his correspondence seeking an interview had been answered by John D. Rockefeller instead of by Mr. Rockefeller, Jr.
I have received a letter from John D. Rockefeller, Jr. [he said] which told me he did not receive any request for a hearing from me, and so had not refused any such request. In this letter the younger Rockefeller told me that my telegram had been delivered to his father, and had been answered by his father in the negative.
Oh, very well, I can stand it not to see him, but I have answered, making a plain request to John D. Rockefeller, Jr., and I will wait over here for a reasonable time, in order that I may receive an answer. Some folks say I am foolish to do this, but I am going to take the chance.
Red Cross Badges as Targets.
Before Judge Lindsey spoke Pearl Jolley [Jolly], a Red Cross nurse, told how her Red Cross badges were made the targets of militia fire and Mrs. M. H. Thomas told how she helped to get the women and children away from Ludlow while their tents were burning down.
Judge Lindsey laid great emphasis upon the stories of the two women, which were replete with intimate details of the battle, and then he held aloft a big package of papers.
They will tell you the militia did not do this, [he said] but from what you have heard here you can stand up and tell all who say that that they lie. I tell you hate begets hate and force begets force.
The Rockefellers have been more careless than any other miners in America in allowing coal dust to accumulate in the mines. And so the killings in the Colorado mines have been larger than in other mines from coal dust explosions.
I tell you now the Rockefellers are spreading coal dust through the air of all industrial America. I came to ask John D. Rockefeller, Jr., to help in our movement to sprinkle down this coal dust.
He wouldn't help with the sprinkling. Well, then, as a very fundamental law of nature, it must follow that the match will soon be struck and the coal dust will go off over all of us
Rockefeller, Jr. is not himself a bad man. They who are around him, who have built up the system, give him a few toys to play with while they operate the system in his name. They let him fuss with a Sunday School or two, they let him try to abolish white slavery in a city or two, they let him make donations to college professors.
But they don't let him tackle the problem of solving our industrial ills. The whole miserable situation is ridiculous, and the most amazing thing about it is the stupidity of the men higher up who are riding so blindly through State Governments they have corrupted to the that terrible fall that awaits them.
Many I. W. W. men and Anarchists were in the audience. A number of detectives also were present.
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[emphasis added]
Carlo Tresca
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And on page two of today's Times we find these two related articles:
THREAT TO RECALL LINDSEY.
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Judge Says He's Ready for Another Fight for His Judgeship.
Special to The New York Times.
DENVER. Col., May 25-The Law and Order League of Denver to-day started a petition for the recall of Judge Ben B. Lindsey because of his attitude in the strike situation. An interview he is said to have given in Chicago and his representations to President Wilson form the basis of the proposed recall.
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Judge Lindsey, when told last night of steps for his recall in Denver, said:
It doesn't disturb me a bit. It's the same old gang I've been fighting in Denver for fifteen years, and I'm not afraid of them. I came East as the result of a general mass meeting in the State Capitol, where a committee was appointed to try to make some arrangements for settling the mining situation.
I don't know what was meant by the Chicago interview. My recommendations to the President were that a commission should be appointed to offer to settle the question by arbitration, and that in case arbitration were refused the mines be held by military force until a settlement could be made.
But the Rockefeller crowd is opposed to all arbitration, and this is only one more move in their campaign against me. This merely means another attempt for a recall. But let them come; I'm not afraid of them. I've beaten them before and I'll do it again
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TRESCA REDS GOING TO WAR.
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I. W. W. Leader Promises Men for Colorado Battle Ground.
Carlo Tresca, a leader of the Industrial Workers of the World, announced yesterday that as soon as the Federal troops were withdrawn from Colorado and the militia returned to that territory an army of "Reds" wold be on the spot to protect the striking miners and to take part in the war. He also said that he would send a telegram today to Mr. Rockefeller on the situation...
SOURCE
The New York Times
(New York, New York)
-of May 26, 1914
http://select.nytimes.com/...
http://select.nytimes.com/...
Photos:
1). Officials of United Mine Workers of America:
Frank Hayes, Ed Doyle, and James Lord
http://www.flickr.com/...
2). Carlo Tresca, 1910
http://en.wikipedia.org/...
3). Judge Benjamin B Lindsey
http://en.wikipedia.org/..._(jurist)
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A Miner's Life- Kilshannig
Stand up tall and stand together;
Victory for you prevails.
Keep your hand upon your wages
And your eye upon the scale.
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