You ought to be out raising hell. This is the fighting age. Put on your fighting clothes.
-Mother Jones
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Friday February 10, 1905
Jacksonville, Illinois - Mother Jones Speaks to Local Socialist Organization
Now that Mother Jones is no longer employed by the United Mine Workers of America, we find her in Jacksonville, Illinois, speaking at the behest of the local Socialist organization. She spoke there of the miners and their struggle in Colorado, describing them as "perfectly law abiding and peaceable citizens," and she described her own expulsion from that state due to the part she played in assisting the striking miners.
It was due to her support for the southern coal miners, who are mostly Italian, and her opposition to the separate settlement made between the operators and the mostly English-speaking northern miners that she is no longer an organizer for the U. M. W. of A.
As to whether she was fired by John Mitchell or voluntarily resigned, the answer to that question depends on who is asked.
The issue created an uproar at the recent convention of the United Mine Workers when delegate Robert Randall took the floor to denounce John Mitchell:
For going against your orders and refusing to become a party in the betrayal of the southern miners is one of the reasons why you, Mr. Mitchell, have forced Mother Jones from the organization she has labored so faithfully to upbuild. Mr. Mitchell, Mother Jones' white haired head will soon be laid at rest; her voice so eloquent to plead the cause of the oppressed will soon be hushed; her heart that heat so warmly in sympathy for suffering humanity will stilled in death. But when she is laid-forever in the grave, no one can say that she ever betrayed, that she ever played false, the toiling and disinherited masses who are fighting the battle for labor’s emancipation
John Mitchell then gave his account of the controversy:
Mother Jones and I worked hand in hand through some of the most stirring strikes this country has ever seen. For several years Mother Jones has been paid a salary by this organization. It is true that when Mother Jones went to Northern Colorado she disregarded the advice given her, and it is true that I said she should not do it again, and that if she expected to be employed by us she must carry out the orders of the National Board and the national convention...[and she] would be in the employ of the organization now if she wanted to be.
As Mother travels the country speaking, she has been selling the latest book by Eugene Debs,
Unionism and Socialism. A book which
Hellraisers highly recommends.
From The Jacksonville Daily Journal of Illinois, February 9, 1905:
ADDRESS GIVEN BY "MOTHER JONES"
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Wednesday Evening at A. O. U. W. Hall-
Speaker Discussed Socialism
and Conditions in Various Mining Fields.
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Mother Jones at start of the March of the Mill Children
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"Mother Jones," known from one end of the country to the other as a friend of the working man and an earnest exponent of the cause of Socialism, lectured in the A. O. U. W. hall on the south side of the square Wednesday night before a good sized audience, under the auspices of the local Socialistic organization.
Dr. T. A. Wakely called the meeting to order and with a few appropriate remarks introduced the speaker of the evening, who entered at once upon her theme.
Mother Jones has done much work in the Colorado mining fields during the trouble there and told in a graphic manner of the sufferings which the miners, whom she characterized as "perfectly law abiding and peaceable citizens," had endured. She also described her own expulsion from the mining region and the injustice with which it was accomplished.
Child labor is an institution to which Mother Jones has devoted much of her attention, and in her remarks she was especially strong in her denunciation of the system which she says is responsible for children of tender years and weak women spending the best days of their lives in stifling and unsanitary factories, only to die in poverty and distress. The coal miners also have an especially warm place in her heart, and in strong terms she described their condition as she found them. The remedy for such a conditions is in the ballot, said she, and the working men of the country has the power to vote into his own possession all these things which his labor has created for others. The necessity for organization was urged and hope was offered by the assertion that the speaker has seen the Socialist organization in Chicago grow from ten persons to 50,000.
Mother Jones was heard with the closest attention and was frequently interrupted by applause. She is an aged lady, over 60, with hair of a silvery gray, yet she spoke with great vigor and enthusiasm, driving each point home in a telling manner. Her sincere feeling in the matters of which she spoke were evidenced in every gesture and in every expression of her face. At the close of the address a vote of thanks was proposed, which was promptly declined by Mother Jones with the assertion "that no one deserved thanks for doing what was his duty, but rather, those who do not do their duty should be given a vote of condemnation." The resolution was passed, nevertheless, by a hearty vote, and a collection was taken up for the speaker with the explanation that her sole recompense was the voluntary contributions of her friends.
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[photograph added]
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SOURCES
The Jacksonville Daily Journal
(Jacksonville, Illinois)
-Feb 9, 1905
http://www.newspapers.com/...
Mother Jones Speaks
-ed by Philip S Foner
NY, 1983
IMAGES
Mother Jones
http://www.greatthoughtstreasury.com/...
Mother Jones, March of Mill Children
(search with Mother Jones, choose p.253)
http://books.google.com/...
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More on the Employment of Mother Jones in 1905:
Letter from William Mailly to Mother Jones
In 1903,
William Mailly had offered Mother Jones employment as a speaker for the Socialist Party of America. Nevertheless, the above article indicates that she is not, at that time, being paid by the SPA. The article explains:
a collection was taken up for the speaker with the explanation that her sole recompense was the voluntary contributions of her friends.
April 15, 1903
From William Mailly, Omaha, Nebraska
To Mother Jones, Clarksburg, West Virginia:
I have your favor of the 12th written from Montgomery [WV] and I am going to answer it right away and make you an official offer to become a lecturer for the Socialist party. I can see by your letter that you are tired of your present work [as an organizer for the United Mine Workers of America] and I should like to free you from it and put you out for the Socialist party. I know of nothing that would arouse more genuine enthusiasm among our members than for the announcement to go out from this office that you had become a National lecturer for the Socialist party, and that your entire arrangements for meetings would be in the hands of the National Secretary.
If you will decide to come with us I shall arrange a tour for you through the states where I think you are most needed and can do the best work, and I shall pay you from the time you start, $3.00 a day and your hotel and traveling expenses. This would mean everyday in the week although I would not ask you to speak every day. You would be simply a lecturer and I would arrange interstate tours for you through the state secretaries with the locals and charge them a certain amount for your tours. We would not wish to make any money off of you, but we would only try to clear your expenses. We might charge $15.00 or $20.00 a lecture and give you four or five dates a week so that the income would cover your entire expense. If you would wish any more than this,please let me know...
[paragraph break added]
Letter from Mother Jones to John Walker
`
John Walker
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In a letter to
John Walker, Mother Jones discusses her employment situation. She has not yet taken the harsh view of John Mitchell which would later be displayed in her
Autobiography.
January 4, 1905
Letter from Mother Jones to John H. Walker:
Canton, Ill., 1-4-04 [05]
My dear John-for such you are to me:
Your very kind letter reached me this morning. No one could write that letter but a true comrade and no one could appreciate it as I do but a true and tried comrade.
John, I opposed a ring of fools that had charge of that strike in Colorado. I felt it my duty to do so. I know that Mitchell would have to bear the brunt; they could retire and not be heard of again, but he would have to suffer the result. I want to say right here, I may never see him again, but one thing one thing certain, I will fight to death for him against any false assertion. I know the labor movement; I know the philosophy of the monster capitalism. Sometimes a man or women are to be carried away by the glitter of the tinsel. I for one shall be his defender.
I resigned [as an organizer for the United Mine Workers of America] because I fought; some of the dirty ignoramuses that represented the national office were against me. I do not want to put John in a position where he would have to oppose them; his fight is hard enough. John Mitchell does not know everything those fellows did out there [in Colorado]. I will fight the cause of the miners anyway, whether I am directly in their service or not. John Mitchell can always depend on me. I know whatever mistakes he has made, he is right at heart.
So far as Debs is concerned, I think he will take my word as quickly as anyone else in the United States. We have been close comrades on the battle ground for 14 long years. We can trust our lives in the hands of each other. I went up from Paris to see him; he had got up from a sick bed; I did not approach him upon anything but his health and the future of the workers' cause. Some of these curs were telling him what they were going to do at that convention. The D---- traitors did not chirp. It is impossible for me to break away from my engagements. You know the Socialist party has never in its history given me five cents. I am going out for the cause to wake the people up, and I can be more independent as I am. There is no man in the world that I will I will approach for a job. If John wants me he can send for me. I expect to go to N. Y. in April. I will call on him then, making only a friendly visit. I am not afraid of suffering. The boys of the W. F. of Miners will see that I am not hungry, if the time ever comes; and what if it does?
John, I have been offered many good positions; indeed, I could be in Europe now if I wanted to. Let me tell you, John, you will always find me on the firing line with you.
I will write Debs to keep quiet until I have a chance to see him, and talk things over with him. We cannot afford to serve that dam Pittsburg gang so well.
Yes, John, I know that poor Sam [Gompers?] would would give me the last cent he had. He is a man with a soul; every inch a man.
Tell Tom that I love him just as I always did; that I often wish that I could be with him over there. Poor Tom and [I?] were in many battles together. Regard to poor Noon and that clean, honest soul, Flaherty; get him elected than I will have another friend on the Board. If I could see John and tell him about that old coward Ream and Bousfield, the only fellow the national had was Fairley. He came too late.
Good bye, John, I am always
Loyally,
Mother
Write me at 43 Walton Place, Chicago, Ill.
Tomorrow's Hellraisers will further explore the whereabouts and doings of Mother Jones from the fall of 1903 to February 1905.
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SOURCE
The Correspondence of Mother Jones
-ed by Edward M Steel
U of Pittsburgh Press, 1983
IMAGES
William Mailly
http://en.wikipedia.org/...
John Walker
http://www.illinoislaborhistory.org/...
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Solidarity Forever-UAW Members
Is there aught we hold in common with the greedy parasite
Who would lash us into serfdom and would crush us with his might?
Is there anything left to us but to organize and fight?
For the union makes us strong
Chorus
Solidarity forever, solidarity forever
Solidarity forever
For the Union makes us strong
-Ralph Chaplin, 1915
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