Page:The Brass Check (Sinclair 1919).djvu/348

 Mr. Maurer came to New York to tell the people about the state constabulary, a public strike-breaking agency organized by the big capitalists of his state. The big capitalists of New York wanted the same thing, and the big newspapers of New York were boosting for it, and of course ridiculing and slandering all who opposed it. At the Washington Irving High School, on April 19, 1916, Mr. Maurer addressed a public meeting and read a passage from his book, "The American Cossack." The incident he read was a funeral; a Spanish war-veteran had died during the miners' strike in Westmoreland County, and was being buried by the striking miners with military honors. Members of the state constabulary came riding up. They objected to these lousy strikers using the American flag, and ordered that the flag be lowered. The strikers refused, whereupon the Cossacks threatened to shoot unless the flag was lowered and furled. Maurer quoted them: "Down with the Stars and Stripes!" So next day the newspapers reported Maurer as saying, "Down with the Stars and Stripes!" The "New York Times" went farther yet, and reported him as saying, "To hell with the Stars and Stripes!" I quote Maurer's letter:

Mayor Mitchel of New York ordered the school-board to investigate these charges at once and they did so. At the hearing twelve witnesses were heard. Eleven swore that I said nothing of the kind and repeated what I did say. One, a "New York Sun" reporter by the name of Lester S. Walbridge, contended that I had said, "Down with the Stars and Stripes!" but admitted that there had been much cheering at the time and that he did not catch all that I said. Three others wrote and telegraphed their testimony, all saying that I said nothing of the kind. Some of the witnesses were people favorable to the State Police. The verdict of the School-board was to the effect that I said nothing of the kind, but had simply told my audience what the State Police had said; that it was the State Police who said, "Down with the Stars and Stripes," and not Mr. Maurer. A clear vindication.

The day the story first appeared in the New York papers, charging me with the flag slander, the story was used to stampede the New York senators into voting for the State Police Bill then pending, and it worked. Although I was vindicated, the story is still used; every now and then someone editorializes about it.

In my effort to verify this story, I write to a reporter who was on the job at this time. He answers:

As a matter of fact all the reporters were out getting a drink when Maurer spoke, and they took their version of what he said from the Real Estate Association's provocateurs at the meeting.