Page:The Agitator Volume 2 Issue 01.djvu/1

 THE AGITATOR A SEMI-MONTHLY ADVOCATE OF THE MODERN SCHOOL, INDUSTRIAL UNIONISM, INDIVIDUAL FREEDOM VOI*. 2 r HOME, [LAKEBAY P. O.] WASH., NOV. 15, 3911. NO. 1 PIONEERS OF PROGRESS Every cause has its martyrs. The cause of labor is most prolific with them. On Friday morning, Nov. 11th, 1837, the black flag was raised over Cook county jail, in Chicago, signalizing the dark and venomous deed that was about to be committed there. The black flag of capitalism, the meaningful emblem of tyranny, of the heartless greed of mammon. For four men were to be hanged that day as a warning to all wage slaves of the fate that awaited them when they became rebel- lious. Four men were to be hanged for the heinous crime of loving their fellow men. The cruel vengeance of the ruling class was to be appeased that day with the red blood of labor. Four men were hanged that day, and the gentle, silk-robed, jeweled ladies heaved a sigh of relief when the venal press heralded the glad tidings; and the captains of industry, the pillars of society, assembled in their clubs and passed 'round the flowing bowl, for anarehy w r as now dead ,the slaves were cowed, society saved and capitalism once more secure in its God-given possessions. Parsons, Spies, Fischer and En gel were hanged. Lingg had cheated the hangman. With the puff of a loaded cigar he had ended his life — with his own breath he blew out the noble life that was in him. That these men had no part in the throw- ing of the bomb was perfectly plain to every- body. But that did not matter. It did not disturb in the least the ready flow of capitalist justice. For justice was blind and had to be lead around by a venal judge and a villianous prosecuting attorney. Gary and Grinnell will be remembered as the Torquemadas of the Modern Inquision. We have been hynotized into the belief that justice is justice, that the legal lie that "all men are equal before the law" is a truth. One might as believe that the forts at the entrance to New York harbor are there for the protec- tion of a foreign invader as to thing the courts are here for the protection of the working class. The courts are truly a part of the fortifica- tions of capitalism. The doubter can be eas- ily convinced by a glance at the records of the trial of these men. The annals of court history cannot produce a more glaring f rameup. And this is saying a great deal, for justice has a very slimy record. Nor can the annals of his- tory show a nobler, braver set of legal victims. They were true heroes of the Social Revolu- tion. They were clear sighted pioneers in the struggle for Industrial Freedom. They saw then what the wisest of us are only now be- ginning to see. They sighted the quagmires of political action, and predicted exactly where the politicians would lead the masses. They predicted that political socialism would de- generate into bourgeois reform. Their keen sociologial eyes penetrated thirty years into the future and saw the Bergerism of today. Milwaukee was an open book to them. Debs well asked recently, "What's the mat- ter with Chicago 1" For in the old days Chi- cago had a bigger Socialist vote than it has today, despite the daily paper and thirty years of " propaganda,' ' when they elected members THE MONUMENT IN CHICAGO to the city council. The men whose memory we honor today were active in the Solialist political movement of the time. But their study and experience taught them the futility of political action. So they sluffed off the left wing, and stood with both feet on the industrial platform, and advo- cated economic organization and direct action with a force and eloquence that soon aroused the wrath and fear of the capitalist class. It was for this they were hanged under the black flag on that black Friday morning, Nov. 11th, 1887. Any other men might, with the same justice, have been hanged for the bomb throwing. For it has never been learned who threw it. Only one man could have thrown it, anyway. It was the men, not the bomb throwers, the capitalists were after. They got the men, but we have their memory, their ideas, and from their deaths we date the era of the Social Revolu- tion. Man is mortal. He may be strangled by the gory hand of the state; he may be crushed in the mine or in the machine. At most, the life of the individual is but a flash in the great ex- panse of time. But ideas are deathless. Tyranny cannot touch them. Corrupt jus- tice cannot hang them. Time alone determines their worth. The ideas propagated by the Chicago mar- tyrs have now become the ground work of the world's great labor movement. Anti-politics, economic organization and direct action are the watchwords of the I. W. W. in this coun- try and of syndicalism in Europe. These or- ganizations have already caused the ruling class to sit up and take notice. Their revolu- tionary tactics will break down the pillars of society within the next generation. The beauty of direct action is that it can and will be applied by the minority. Its ac- tivities cannot be diverted from the straight road that leads to liberty. For that road has been built by ages of working class experience, and is illuminated by the lives of its martyrs. Do not mourn over the death of our com- rades. Let us rejoice that such heroes have lived. ^ # j? DAY OF MARTYRDOM November Eleventh has introduced a new era. On this day were born immortal souls marching on in the hearts of the down-trodden to animate, inspire,, and encourage in the path of duty. Early in the morning our comrades were awake. Parsons ate fried oysters, and seemed to enjoy them. While breakfasting he recited Marc Cook's beautiful poem, entitled "Wait- ing," with smiling features. "Tell me, O sounding sea, I pray, Eternally undulating, Where is the good ship that sailed away Once on a long-gone summer's day — Sailed and left me waiting?" After a while spent in conversation, the ques- tion of his funeral arising, he again drew upon his retentive memory and expressed his inmost thoughts in these beautiful lines: "Come not to my grave with your mourning, With your lamentations and tears, With your sad forbodings and fears . When my lips are dumb ' Do not come! "Bring no long train of carriages, No hearse crowned with waving plumes, Which the gaunt glory of death ilium**; But with hands on my breast Let me rest. "Insult not my dust with your pity, Ye who're left on this desolate shore, Still to suffer and lose and deplore— Tis I should, as I do, Pity you. "For mo no more are the hardships, The bitterness, heartaches and strife, The sadness and sorrow of life; But the glory divine — This is mine! "Poor creatures ! Afraid of the darkness. Who groan at the anguish to come, How silent I go to my home! Cease your sorrowful bell; I am well!" En gel rose at 6 o'clock, having had a good, sound night's rest. "I hope we have a nice day and have a good time," he said, jokingly. "If another minister comes let me see him. I hope I will do him more good than he does me." George Engel, kind, tender-hearted, reserved only to strangers ; a cool, philosophical thinker, needed no "consideration." The last words written on the morning of his martyrdom were : Fuer Freiheit und Recht Wir kaempften nicht schlecht. For freedom and right We made a good fight. The Jenkins of the press report: "Beneath the outer surface of the man there was more than even the closest observers dreamt of. When his hand touched the pen for the last time it did not tremble. Engel was a painter, and had given the angular letters of the Teu- tonic script quite an artistic flourish, signing beneath them his name in a firm hand." "Fischer," said one of the deputies, "is the jolliest fellow of the lot. When I asked him last night what was his last wish, he replied, sarcastically: 'A bottle of champagne,' with the coolness and sangfroid of a veteran. Fischer, the youngest of the four, talked calm- ly of the situation, spoke tenderly and feeling- ly of his wife and family, and with a shrug of his shoulders said: 'It is far easier for me to, die than for my enemies to bear the burden of it. 7 " Upon turning away from his morning ablu-. tion Spies was asked how he felt; he simply