The conflict between the I.W.W. and Western Federation of Miners in Butte was a long and intractable one. In the summer of 1914 it descended into violence. A very early article from future long-time Daily Worker writer and editor of the People’s Daily World.
‘Why is There Martial Law in Butte?’ by Harrison George from Solidarity. Vol. 5 No. 247. October 3, 1914.
The Answer Is Because There Is a Real Union In Butte, and It Must Be Crushed By the Masters.
Reader, have you ever been in Butte? Have you ever seen the Miners streaming up the hill, their long enameled-ware dinner pails in hand; or watched them streaming down again, thronging Park, Main and the other streets, that comprise the retail section of the copper city?
Further up the hill and far-flung around its crest tower, the shaft-heads, buttressed by walled-in grimy mine buildings and flanked by huge piles of waste. Night and day this mountain alternately swallows and vomits forth the toilers which throng the modern city below and make possible its paved streets, its tall structures and wide show-windows filled with commodities from the world markets.
Today one still sees the same sight, the busy streets, the men, the mines and smoke cloud floating over them. But, something standing on the corner there, catches the eye and fills the soul of one with a feeling of half loathing, half hate. The “something” is “yellow-leg,” a militia man, guardian of law and order, upholder of the flag, defender of the faith in private property, a sort of a cross between a god and a rattlesnake, with apologies to the snake.
Behold the “Ruler of Butte”! And up there in the enclosures and secreted about the city, hundreds of gunmen, imported by the Amalgamated Copper Co. to help these human hyenas teach patriotism to the toilers.
WHY? Why were the Paris Communists in thousands shot to death before the stone wall in ’71? Why but to teach the proletaire a lesson and break the back of revolt before it spread to other industrial centers and carry Capitalism to destruction? This is why there is martial law in Butte.
When the W.F.M. committed suicide in Butte, and the funeral sermon preached by Moyer was followed by the salutes fired over the grave by the miners June 23rd: the people of Butte settled down to hum-drum life again and all was as before, except that a new union was born among the Butte miners that was no fake union, pie-card institution or compromiser.
For two months it grew in power and numbers, it formulated methods for protection of miners and grievance adjustments, something the W.F.M. never tried to do. It rose in its collective might and told operators what they could and couldn’t do. It manifested a tendency to put up a real fight for the men. It meant business and its success spelled failure to the W.F.M. and the operators who controlled the miners heretofore through traitorous W.F.M. officials.
For two months the copper company whimpered. For two months I wondered what would be the move of W.F.M. to regain control. For two months Butte was living along as usual. Then when the labor-fakirs and capitalists completed their plans, evidently working together, the trap was sprung.
One Sunday morning at the end of August there was a small explosion on the hill. The plats press said “an enormous explosion.” A hole was blown in the roof and in the floor of a little shack, owned by a mine. Who did it? I don’t know but here is the evidence. About a thousand gunmen were in the city before the echoes had died away, a committee of business men were on the way to the governor to beg for troops and the press howled for law and order and the blood of the new union.
So there is martial law in Butte and MOYER AT LAST HAS THE TROOPS HE ASKED AND THE PROTECTION HE BEGGED FOR TWO MONTHS AGO. A press censor and militancy judge is appointed. You must get a permit before you can invite your friends to your premises to talk anything but religion. A barber whose manhood excelled his patriotism got sixty days for insulting the flag. He had refused to shave one of these “things” that patrol the street corners.
Several Fellow-workers of I.W.W. were given eleven months in jail and $500.00 fine. What had they done? Oh. nothing, but JUST LOOK WHO THEY ARE!
Officers of the Butte Mine Workers Union denied habeas corpus on an excuse of “military necessity,” and most significant of all, the Amalga mated Copper Co. has declared open shop and the W.F.M. is planning a come-back. Its officials are quoted as being “highly pleased” at the way the militia is crashing the new union. At the usual expense of truth, all the trouble is laid to the I.W.W. by the plute press, craft union apologists and un-informed “yellows.” No one can tell how it will all parse out. The militia and gunmen are trying to provoke violence. The labor-fakirs are in high glee and the Amalgamated Copper Co. is swinging the lash over its slaves.
Will the “Richest Hill in the World” flow with blood of men driven to rebellion? Will the rank and file be able to resist this damnable conspiracy of labor-fakirs and capitalists to betray and enslave them? And reader, WILL YOU CONDEMN THESE MEN, if. their patience over-taxed, they should rise en masse and strike, blindly perhaps, but desperately and to kill: strike at these “yellow-legs” and gunmen, at that cursed monster named LAWANDORDER? WILL YOU?
The most widely read of I.W.W. newspapers, Solidarity was published by the Industrial Workers of the World from 1909 until 1917. First produced in New Castle, Pennsylvania, and born during the McKees Rocks strike, Solidarity later moved to Cleveland, Ohio until 1917 then spent its last months in Chicago. With a circulation of around 12,000 and a readership many times that, Solidarity was instrumental in defining the Wobbly world-view at the height of their influence in the working class. It was edited over its life by A.M. Stirton, H.A. Goff, Ben H. Williams, Ralph Chaplin who also provided much of the paper’s color, and others. Like nearly all the left press it fell victim to federal repression in 1917.
PDF of full issue: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/solidarity-iww/1914/v05-w247-oct-03-1914-solidarity.pdf
