You ought to be out raising hell. This is the fighting age. Put on your fighting clothes.
-Mother Jones
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Friday January 29, 1904
From The Indianapolis News: As U. M. W. Convention Ends, Miners Vote for Relief
MINERS VOTE $5,000 RELIEF.
----------
Will Investigate Causes of the Harwick Mine Explosion.
The United Mine Workers' convention, before adjournment last evening [Wednesday], voted $5,000 for the immediate relief of the families of the 190 miners killed in the Harwick mine explosion at Sedgwick [Cheswick], Pa., this week. The convention also instructed the national executive board to obtain the services of expert mining engineers and to make a thorough investigation and to obtain information that probably will be used in movements for legislation in the various mining States to prevent mine horrors. Delegates, speaking on the floor of the convention, held that mines should be divided into sections and these section should be so ventilated that an explosion occurring in any one part of the mine might not affect the miners in another section. A resolution of respect to the dead and expressing sympathy for the families was passed by unanimous vote....
SOURCE
The Indianapolis News
(Indianapolis, Indiana)
-of Jan 28, 1904
Note: the final number of the dead was fixed at 179
http://www.dailykos.com/...
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Thursday January 29, 1914
From the Miners' Bulletin: Article on Congressional Investigation Continued
Congressman Edward Keating
of Colorado
Part II from the
Miners' Bulletin of January 28th. The article, "To Investigate Industrial Wars," has a dateline of Washington, Jan. 23:
The executive committee, American Federation of Labor, last night voted to appoint a committee to investigate the question of ownership of the land whose mineral resources the Calumet and Hecla corporations are exploiting.
The government is in possession of evidence going to show that the title to these lands has never passed to the present holders and that the government can legally institute a suit for its recovery to the people.
Will Ask U. S. Action
When this investigation is finished, President Wilson and congress will be asked to take the necessary action for the recovery of these lands.
Bills will shortly be introduced into congress for government ownership of copper lands, similar to the proposal made yesterday by Senator Kenyon, Ia., for the government ownership of West Virginia coal mines.
Evidence has developed here for presentation to the mines and mining committee which will show that Michigan state officials have been playing into the hands of corporations from the start.
In its instructions to the rules committee the [House Democratic] caucus prescribed the form of resolution which it shall report to the house. Its principal provisions follow:
The committee on mine and mining shall make a thorough and complete investigation of the conditions existing in the strike afflicted mining regions in Michigan and Colorado, and of the causes of the trouble.
Probe Peonage Charge.
The committee shall report whether a system of peonage is or, has been maintained in those mining regions, whether access to post offices has been prevented, whether the immigration laws have been violated, whether the secretary of labor or other officials of government may be of service in adjusting the differences between the strikers and the operators, and whether or not persons have been persecuted and convicted in violation of the laws of the United States. The last clause of the resolution confers broad powers upon the committee to require the attendance of witnesses and the production of documents, and provides that persons refusing to answer questions propounded by the investigators may be punished by fine and imprisonment.
The resolution embodies the salient features of the measure offered by Representatives MacDonald and Keating and is cast in the form of the Kern resolution under which the Senate investigated the West Virginia strike.
The inquiry was committed to the mining instead of the labor committee, as at first proposed, because of the possible criticism of an investigation by the latter body, the membership of which is composed largely of union labor sympathizers.
The overwhelming sentiment in favor of an investigation became apparent as soon as the caucus convened.
The debate was opened by Representative Keating who, in a speech lasting nearly an hour, described conditions existing in the Colorado strike.
SOURCE
Miners' Bulletin
"Published by authority of
Western Federation of Miners
to tell the truth regarding
the strike of copper miners."
-of Jan 28, 1914
Photo: U. S. Rep Edward Keating
http://en.wikipedia.org/...
U. S. Rep William J MacDonald (no photo available)
http://en.wikipedia.org/...
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Wednesday January 29, 2014
The House Investigations of the Michigan and Colorado Strikes Online:
Conditions in the Copper Mines of Michigan: Hearings Before a Subcommittee of the Committee on Mines and Mining, House of Representatives, Sixty-third Congress, Second Session, Pursuant to H. Res. 387, a Resolution Authorizing and Directing the Committee on Mines and Mining to Make an Investigation of the Conditions in the Copper Mines of Michigan.
-United States. Congress. House. Committee on Mines and Mining
U.S. Government Printing Office, 1914
Part I, p.1-520
http://books.google.com/...
Part II-III, p.521-1327
http://books.google.com/...
Part IV-VII, p. 1329-2357
http://books.google.com/...
Conditions in the coal mines of Colorado: Hearings before a subcommittee of the Committee on mines and mining, Hous of Representatives, Sixty-third Congress, second session, pursuant to H. res. 387, a resolution authorizing and directing the Committee on Mines and Mining to make an investigation of conditions in the coal mines of Colorado
-United States. Congress. House. Committee on Mines and Mining
U.S. Government Printing Office, 1914
Vol. 1, p.1-1477
http://books.google.com/...
Vol. 2, p.1479-2916
http://books.google.com/...
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The Commonwealth of Toil-Pete Seeger
They would keep us cowed and beaten,
Cringing meekly at their feet.
They would stand between each worker and his bread.
Shall we yield our lives up to them
For the bitter crust we eat?
Shall we only hope for heaven when we're dead?
-Ralph Chaplin