Page:Autobiography of Mother Jones (1925).djvu/122

Rh controlled its legislature, its farmers, its preachers, its workers.

Then I went to Alabama. In 1904 and '05 there were great strikes in and around Birmingham. The workers of the Louisville and Nashville Railroad were on strike. Jay Gould owned the railroad and thought he owned the workers along with the ties and locomotives and rolling stock. The miners struck in sympathy. These widespread strikes were part of the American Railway Union strike, led by Eugene Debs, a railway worker.

One day the governor called Douglas Wilson, the chairman of the strike committee, to his office. He said, "You call this strike off immediately. If you don't do it, I shall."

"Governor," said Douglas, "I can't call off the strike until the men get the concessions that they struck for."

"Then I will call out the militia," said he.

"Then what in hell do you think we will be doing while you are getting the militia ready!"

The governor knew then he had a fight on, for Douglas was a heroic fighter; a fine, open character whom the governor himself respected.

The militia were called out. There was a long drawn out fight. I was forbidden to leave town without permit, forbidden to hold meetings. Nevertheless I slipped through the ranks of the soldiers without their knowing who I was—just