A THOUSAND RIOTERS SELECTED WRITINGS OF LUCY PARSONS A Stroll Through the Streets o! C and Ballot Humbu, ToT About Li AND RIOTERS TED WRITINGS OF LUCY PARSONS A THOU ty The Principles of Anarchism Comrades and Friends: Tthink Teannot open n than by stating my experience address more appropriately 1 my long conneetion with the of 1877 that [first what is known as the “Labor Qi thousands of earnest, sineere people think. in human society, known as It was during the great railroad str stion.” 1 uument in the hands of the oppressed to alleviate their sufferings, But a closer study of the that derstand how organized govern- ments used their concentrated power to retard progress by thi iscontent if raised in n. history and tendency of governments, c is was a mistake: I eame to u ever-ready voice of ns of silencing vigorous protest against the machinations of the scheming, few ays did, always will and abw of nations where majority rule is recognized as the only means of adjusting the affairs of the people. I eame to understand that ntrated power can be always wielded in th who a 's must rule in the councils such co terest of the few and at the pense of the many, Government in its last analysis is this power reduced to a science. Govern lead: they follow progress. When the prison, stake or seaffold can no longer silence the voice of the protesting minority. prog- ents never ress moves on a step, but not until then, I will state this contention in another way: I learned by close study that it made no difference what fair prom litical party, out of power might make to the people i secure their confidence, when once securely established in con- trol of the affairs of society that they were after all but human 5 a po- order to with all the human attr are: First, to remain in power at all hazards: if not individu- ally. th administration must be kept in control. Second, in order to keep in power, it is necessary to build up a powerful mac one strong enough to erush all opposition and silence all vigor- of the politician, Among these ly the same views as th those holding es: ‘ous murmurs of discontent, or the party machine might be smashed and the party thereby lose control When I came to realize the faults, failings, shortcom- ings, aspirations and ambitions of fallible man, [concluded that it would not he the safest nor best policy for society, as anagement of all nifold deviations and ramifications in the hands of aged by the party which happened to nd therefore was the majority party. nor did ne partiele of difference to me what a party, out of power may promise: it does not allay my fears of a party, when entrenched and securely seated power might do to crush opposition, and silence the voice of the minority, and thus retard the onward step of progress. a whole, to entrust thy affairs, with all their m finite m it ten, nor does it now make nd to My control of «dis appalled at the thought of a political party ha II the details that total of our lives, power shall have all a ake up the sum rty in hority to dictate the kind of books that shall be used in our schools and univer ficials editing. printing, and circulating mag ng of the tho ties, government of- literature, histories, ines and press, to say not and and one activities of life that civilized society 4 people engage in, in ‘To my mind, the struggle for liberty is too great and the few steps we have fice, for the s consent to tu ined have been won sat mass of the people of this 20th century t0 ¥y politic 'y the management of affairs. For all who over toa ‘our social and industr at all familiar with history know that men will abuse power when they pos- sess it, for these and other reasons, 1, after careful study, and nest. political al phase of Socialism, Anarchism, be- Socialist to the ne cause in its philosophy I believe I ean fi id the proper conditions for the fullest development of the individual units in society which can never be the case under government restrictions. ‘The philosophy of anarchism is included in the word Liberty”: yet it is comprehensive enough to include all things else that are conducive to progress. No barrie human pro} whatever to to thought, or investigat anarchism: nothing is considered so true or so certain, tha ture discoveries may not prove it false: therefore, it has but one infallible, unchangeable motto, “Freedom.” Freedom to discover any truth, freedom to develop, to live naturally and fully. Other schools of thought are composed of crystallized ideas-principles at are caught and impaled between the planks of lo and considered too plat- fi investigation, In all other “issues” there is always a limit: some aered to be di urbed by a close imaginary boundary line beyond which the searching mind dare not penetrate, lest some pet idea melt into a myth, But ana chi nies to all f the human being and natural development, From the natural resources of all ia tures, and from universal truth, all bars of prejudice and supe stition, that the mind may develop symmetrically. is the usher of science of truth, It would remove all barriers betw the es tificial restrictions, that the body bed iod of education must Anarchists know that a long pe precede not believe in vote begging, nor political eampaigns, but rather dividuals. great fundamental ehange in society, hence they do in the development of self-thinking i We look away from government for relief, because we 6 know that foree (legalized) invades the personal liberty of man. upon the natural elements and intervenes between man and natural laws: from this exercise of force through gov ments flows nearly all the misery, poverty, crime and co ‘sisting in society So, we perceive, there are actual, material harriers blockading the way. These must be re they would melt away, or be voted o1 we would be content to wait and v frowning rocks towering betwe dom, while the dark chasms of a hard-fought past yawn bel nbling they may be with their own weight and the de« aly stand under u pved. IF we could hope ed and pray. But they ar us and a land of fres nto nothingness us. Cr of time, but to in the crash. There is something to be done in a case like this- the rocks must be removed, Passivity while slavery iss over us is a crime, For the moment we must forget that was are anarehists-when the work is accomplished we may forget that we were revolutionists-hence most anarchists believe the coming change can only come through a revolution class will not allow a peaceful change to take place: still we are willing to work for peace at any price, except at the price of liberty ecause the possess- And what of the glowing beyond that is so br 1 the faces of the poor say itis a dre those who gri dream, itis the real, stripped of br folds, mitres and guns. It is istortions materiali into thrones and se on her own interior laws as in all her other associations. It return to first principles: for were not the land, the water, the light, all free before governments took shape and form? In thi free state we will again forget to think of these things as “prop- up to it, The idea st that 1 thought, erty.” It is real, for we, as a of less restriction and more liberty, and a confiding. nature is equal to her work, is permeating all mode From the dark y generally believed that 1 every human impul ad every emot vf as far from nature's remedi seized upon and d thought- has been swift and ste: parent that in e soverned least not so long gone by-when it was ly depraved had: when every action, every the 1 was controlled and rest nd zh an the 's soul was t hu bled, dosed uff s possible: when th ed and kept cl was, d before it had al nm those days to these years the progress of this idea ly. Ie is becoming » we are “governed best where we to evolve Still unsatisfied perhaps, the inqui for ways oon like hun exchanging and de seeks for details, fores. How ill we go ng and sleeping, w ling, without government? So used have we ms, and whys and w ng and los become to “organized ordinarily tions being * Bur ization of a fre athority would be to plac the way of coming generations. The est thought of today may become the useless vagary of tomorrow, and to crystallize it authority” in every department of life that annot conceive of the most common-place avoca ied on without their interference and “protec- archism is not compelled to outline a complete society. ‘To do so with any assumption of ato a creed is to make it unwieldy We mal, and inst xperience that 1 tively affiliates with his kind co-ops in groups, works to better a combined with his fellow to the formation of co- nization, regulations, leaders, ete.: it will institute methods of direct communic its own th every member of tha industrial branch in the we 1, and establish equitable rel with all other branches. There would probably be conventions of industry which delegates would attend, and where they would t ct such business as was necessary, adjourn and from that moment be delegates no longer, but simply members of a group. ‘To remain permanent members of @ continuous congress would he to establish a power that is cert soon or later to be abused, No great, central power, like a con: sof men who know nothi of their constituents’ trades, interests, rights or duties, would be over the various organi iffs, poli ved at while in se of groups might profit by the knowledg interchange of thought afforded by conventions if they choose. but they will not be compelled to do so by any outside force, ations or groups: nor would they employ shi ailers to \en, courts or enforce the conclusions ar sion, The members ned through mutual Vested rights, privileges. charters, title deeds, upheld by all the parapher power-such as prison, seaffold and armies will have no existence. ‘There can be no privileges bought or sold, and the transaetion kept sacred at the point of the bayonet. Every aan equal footing with his brother in the race of life, and neither Iidom nor metal dra shall handicap the one to the advantage of the other 1 of government-the visible symbol of an will stand on Property will lose a certain attribute which sanctifies it now. The absolute ownership of it-"the right 10 use or abuse”~ will be abolished, and possession, use, will be the only title. It will be seen how impossible it would be for one person to “own a million acres of land, without a title deed, backed by a gove ment ready to protect the title at all hazards, even to the loss of thousands of lives. He could not use the million acres himself, nor could he wrest from its depths the possible resources it con- tains, People have become so used to seeing the evidences of 9 hority on every hand that most of them honestly believe t they would s club o the soldier's bayonet. But the anarchist says, “Remove thes inth will respond to these better influences. » utterly to the bad if it were not for the policeman’s evidence of brute force, and let man feel thi ences of self responsibility and self c he belief in a literal place of torment has nearly melted away: and instead of the direful results predieted, we have a higher and tr dlo not eare to go to the bad when they 1 standard of manhood and womanhood. People d they own motives in doing not. Individuals a of the good, While acting out the ings and condit right path by some outside power, some restr them by church or sta right to rebel and secede, sacred to h atures according to their surround us, they still bel eve they are being kept nt thrown arou So the objector believes that with the m, he would forever be rebelling and seceding, thereby creating constant confusion and ely for the reason that turmoil. Is it probable that he would, n he could do so? Men are to a great extent creatures of habit, and grow to love associations: under reasonably good conditions, he would remain where he commences, if he wished to, and, if he did not, who has any natural right to force him into relations ul to him? Under the present order of affairs, persons do interested members for unite with societies and remain good, d life, where the right to retire is always conceded. What we anarchists contend for is a larger opportun to develop the right as a sound being to develop that which is broadest, noblest h pped by any centralized where he shall have to wait for his permits to be signed. sealed. approved and handed down to him before he can engage in the active pun We know th all, as we er lil its in society, that mankind est and best li jority of life with his fellow by after row more enlightened undei ty, we 10 less and less for that exa rial wealth, which, in our gree¢ so impossible to think upon carelessly. The man and woman of think not Ih of the rie irtured senses loftier intellects, in the prese to be gained by their efforts as of the good they ean do for their pring of healthy rushed and n before his birth, that impels him on- fellow creatures. Th ction in every hu ed by 1 being who bi ty and drudgery fr nd use the powers within him when rose to bloom in the sunlight and s in life than that, And so will it be when humanity is once relieved from the press ion, want, and slavery, it will be concerned, le: the ownership mulations of wealth. $ ‘ions would be but dl trouble, Wh a day of easy, of healthful labor will produce all the comforts es one , and the opportunity to labor is never cople will become indifferent as to who owns the wealth ed, Wealth will be below par, and it will be found that men and women will not aecept it for pay, or be br to do what they would not willingly and naturally do without I will, supersede al for spiration born in man to make the most or four hours weal by it, Some higher ince gold, The involunts ’s fellow-b of one’s self, to be loved and appre \e. to “make the world better for hay i.” will urge him on the nobler deeds than ever the sordid and selfish incentive of If, in the present ¢ neful struggle for exis i tence, when organized society offe elty, and deceit, men can be fo 1 the than gold. who suffer want and persecution rather than desert principle, who can bravely walk to the scaffold for the good they ean do a premium on greed, ¢ who stand aloof ation to work for ost alone dete ood rathe anity, what may we expeet from men when freed from the necessity of selling the better part of themselves for cad? The te the awful alte als in the serv ible conditions under which labor is per native if one does not prostitute talent and mot © of mi mon: and the power wealth obtained by ev coneepti« And yer, there are so unjust means, combined to make the of free and vob ary labor almost a amples of this principle even now. In a well bred family each person has certain duties, whieh are performed cheerfully. and are not n il for according to ited members sit mpossible one. some pre-determined st down to the well-filled ble to ble, the stronger do not se get the most, while the weakest do witho around them more food than they ean possibly consume, Each patiently and politely awaits his turn to be served, and leaves or gather greedily what he does not want: he is certain that when again hungry plenty of good food will be provided. This pr ple can be ex- tended to include all society, when people are eivilized enow wish it the exact return for the of labor performed will render absolute communism a y sooner or later. The land and all it contains, without whieh labor cannot be exerted, belong to no one man, but to all alike, The invention are the common inheritance nan takes the tree that nature fu ad discoveries of f the coming generations: ished free, and 0 useful article, or a machine perfected and be~ n by many past generations, who is to determine 1 is his and his alone? Primitive n queathed to h what proporti ave I with hi hour a rude resemblance to modern worker has occupied an al value than the rude toiled the longes week fashion rticle clumsy tools, whe he finished article is of far more wo. and yet the primi le long his hands so restless, that wealth wi ing like magic, ready We will become of the world aarrel over its posse the food spread before us o this,” the objector urges, “is very b when we become angels. [t would not do now to abolish govern- legal 6 loaded table. al in the far off future, traints: people are not prepared for it ding history, that woved the people herty, Once it was considered ne essary 10 compel men to sav 1 of gover eh racks and stakes, Until the foundation I is a question, We have old- have not abused their new wheres fiction has been cir souls, with thi mental scaffolds, el cof the A that gov republic it was considered absolutely esse uments should second the efforts of the church, we: and yet it is found that ed since they ple to attend the means of g if they prefer it uld not work if the over- return to the old removed: they of profit now that ex-slave owners would system if they could So many able writers have shown that the unjust institu- ‘h work so nisery and s ses whole existence to 1 help but believe and every root in governments, and ow: the power derived from govern that were eve y title deed. ev 13 police officer or soldier abolished tomorrow with one sweep. we would be better off than now. The actual, material things that u nd skill would r 1 their force and the -es of life made free to all the people that they would need needs would still exist; his strength and his instinetive social inclinations r no force but that of society and the opinion of fellow beings to Keep them moral and upright Freed from the systems that made him wretched be- fore, he is not likely to make himself more wretched for them. Much more is ¢ ined in the thought that condit make man what he is, and not the laws and penalties made for dance, th his ion, We have 1 is supposed by careless observ zh to make laws, jails, courts, armies, guns and armories Il, if they were the true preven know they do not prevent crime: that wickedness and depray exist in spite of them, nay, inerease as the struggle between class= Ith greater and more powerful and poverty and desperate To the governing class the anarchists say: “Gentle we ask no privilege, we propose no restriction: nor, on the other will we permit it, We have no new shackles to propose, we k emancipation from shackles. We ask no le for co-oper will we per of the social unit ative sanction, ion asks only for a free field and no 1 their interference.(*2) It asserts that in freedox s the freedom of the social state. It asserts L utilize soil lie social happi and progress and the death of rent, It asserts that order ¢ liberty prevails, and th follows order. It asse tha freedom to possess exist w progress leads and never mancipat augurate liberty, equality, fraternity, That the ¢ ess, if it ever had any is I believe finally, that mn will in- sting industrial syster admitted by all who have give serions thought to this phase of | conditions. 4 ‘The manifestations of discontent now looming upon side show that society is conducted on wrong prineiples and that somet e soon or the wa ge class has got to be do: will sink into a slavery worse than was the feudal serf. I say to the wagi clearly and act quickly. or you are lost Strike not for a few cents more an hour, because the price of living will he raised faster still, but strike for all you earn, be content with noth 2 less, Following are definitions which will appear in all of the new standard Dictionaries: Anarchism-The philosophy of a new social order based on liberty unrestricted by man made law, the theory that all forms of government are based on violence-hence wrong and harmful, as well as unnecessary A regard of condition of society regulated by voluntary agree government archy-Absence of government: disbelief im and dis- avasion and authority based on coercion and force: ent instead of Anarchist-No. 1. A bel to all forms of coercive government One who advocates Anarchy, or absence of gover ideal of political lib sm: one opposed ad invasive authority. 2 ment, as the nd social harmony Published as a pamphlet circa 1905-1910 Are Class Interests Identical? is of the Aims and Objects of the ial Workers of the World working cl interests, that country is America. The wage- a this country where every man’ president of these United States, there ean be no elasses wccept this kind of “jollying” without q «ls of them do really believe we have no classes here. Because one man in thirteen or fourteen million men is elected. J of being born to rule, they accept this a indisputable is difficult to drive ly American mind, is that the belon t to wh to the ngs to an entirely different lass Ih the employi class oce ss. he thinks maybe himself to keep quiet, while wro every hand. If he joins his union, itis as a sort of temporary ft, or conver ence, as he expeets to become a business- arn a profession or hi or his da rry arich of the kind will happen: so he goes on from year to year himself: meanwhile his condition and that of his class are and more hopel bribing becom upon wrong pre es, in so far as they terests between capital and labor,” If the interests of capital and labor are identical, why do they not broth belo 16 ation? We need to view from thi t standpoint the elass struggle: hence when an organization is founded fro the express purpose of teaching the working elas correct and fundamental principles underly own relation to the employing class, and when we to be taught in the hail sueh an 0 ng, the wage-system and the stand these lesson ss of the unions, then ion as a real blessing! gani ‘The Industrial Worke July 8th, 1905 with the avowed purpose of de the work ni the employ mon.” That the readers of The Liberator may understand what the Industrial Workers of the World really stand for, we Preamble of the Constitution: of he World was launched in Chieago, ing that IWW Pres le ‘The working class and he employing class have no jon. These ean he no peace so long as hunger and want are found among the millions of working people, and the few, who make up the employ class, have all the good th st go on until her on the political, as well as on the industrial field, and the take andl hold that which they produce by their labo working class without affiliation with wealth and canter ‘of life. Between these two classes a strugel the toilers con hrough an evonomic organization of the ny political party: The rapid gathering of nent of the industries into fewer and fewer ble to cope with the ever-g trades unions foster a state of things which of the mans nds make the trades unions 1 rowing power of ‘employing elass, because the allows one set of workers to be pitted against another set af workers in the lustry, thereby helping to defeat one another unions aid the e ‘lass to mislead the workers into the belief that the ion with their employers. These sad cond d and the interests of the working elass upheld only by an working class have interests in co “organization for hers in any one industry fo in all industries, if necessary; cease work whenever a strike or a lockout is ‘on int any department thereof, thus 1 Chicago, The Liberator, September 3, 1906 A Stroll Through the Streets of Chicago the sudden stoppage of the big whes been played in the industrial ranks generally, The wheels in the factories xd to revolve, the fires have be drawn, and nis of the wage-carning elass have been. upon the highways in the country and the city Reade ize its effects? Mayhe not, so let us take a stroll the reets of this wonderful city It is two pam. The afternoon papers are j a thou- sand or more people are buying them, perhaps paying out their last penny: They read the ly: off they dash pell mel i other in their mad r 1 the boss h mad race, ing to outstrip ¢ i the job. So IY appe This is no overdrawn picture: it actually occ in this eity, and of eo every day n hundreds of inhi other cities, dlreds of pla ‘The free fee wi the polic are filled to suffocation. the robb and itis ns and soup kitchens are in full stations and cheap lodgir parity is the dope being handed out by 1 pre: to the poor people to keep them quiet stu ast for the time being. Coffee wagons, soup kitchen and cheap lodging-houses are being patronized by men only. What has become of the 1S women? About as many women as men were discharged, To the ‘under-world” they soon will sink, some of them never to rise again! And this panie is only two months old! What. in the name of justiee is in store fe In the face of these hellish conditions there are radi- cals who preach to us about peace, intellectual education, and the like, Why should all the ka the working elass? Why should they be quiet while st like peace be on the side of receiving just sufficient for their laborious toil to keep body soul together and to produce more slaves for the bosses? The spirit of resistance seems to have forsaken the working class. [believe in peach at any prie xcept at the price of lib- erty. But this precious gift the wealth-prod ady seem to have lost. Life -mere existence- they have: but what is life worth when it lacks those elements which make for enjoyment? ike Advocating peach i many other t be overworked. a good thi x in its way: but, In this city where are fully 100,000 persons out of em- t, and the number is on the increase, ployn ‘The Wheel af The Demonstrator, January 16, 1908 (excexpts): or 19 Crime and Criminals Our saintly Christians and other goody-goody people throw up their h ‘emplating the prevaler of crime among rimes, or unsociable aets the “lower classes. among the “lower Classes. re only a reflex of crimes or robber- ies of the upper or “be they are born, How many thousands, yea millions, of mothers classes.” We rob our children before e there who see a thousand and on ney whieh their appetite craves re unable to gratify it? They walk among the working el articles while in a state of pr or their heart desires, and yet the streets, gazing at the gorgeous displays, everything to a tract the eye and cause the heart to wish for. yet unable, owing to poverty, to gratify such na igs. What is the conse~ The unborn child pointment that the mother f robbed it before its birth, it fied. its growing years: the desire grows stronger hecause of poverty apressed, it feels the s e disap- Is: it is impressed upon it, We have rs the world with an unsatis- rasping nature. This proclivity grows steadily: upon it with and, finally. the child reaches forth and takes son ses y. This is theft, it is illegally done: the society for the first time takes an interest in this huma p of its own false, unnatural, inhuman system. How wiser and cheaper it would have been to make conditions n ral and social so that the child could have seen the light of Earth under the best conditions possible, instead of -as is often the prope being. It comes forward to sh the child it is now ready to infliet tort re upon the vietim h better case- under the worst conditions, Id be than to have to build at, gloomy prisons, superintended by guardsmen, who harden How much better this we J debase their 1 tures still more. And the case holds good 20 with murders, legal and il |, or Iynchings. The sensation press gives all the gory de slaving headlines, They cate I the eye of thousands of prospec: 1 its detains tive moth pressed by the horror and they is born it reaches 1 path, and the old p ful deed is committed where 's and woman’s estate, some adversity crosses its upon it and an aw ed and wonders tal impressic ne community is sh could have come from, Another candidate starts for the prison or the gallows. Thus the long procession is ever wending throws up her hands in “holy” horror whe her children commits an awful deed, She never recognizes the e reflex of her own mi: s way trough the ages. The hoary-headed old one of social disease When society has grown wise enough to supplant the prison with the schoolhouse, the teacher for the hangman and kind tr al substituting kindness for brut and ¢ eand The Liberator, March 25, 1906 The Ballot Humbug Whatever we hear from all quarters we are very apt to believe, whether it requires some effort to believe, whether it is true or not, especially if it requires some effort to examine it, Of all the modern delusions, the ballot has certainly been the great est. Yet most of the people believe in it In the first place. peiple that the majority shall lead and the minority must Follow (no mat= ter wheth founded on the p it will he any advantage to the minority follow them or not). Let us take a body of le absolutely honest, and see what they can do, A.B and C each a distinet principle to ¢ ry out, and there is no good why each one should ot earry out his principle to a certain e: tent without interfe with the other two. Pol ies steps in and patter by the ballot, for that is fair, What ? A. and C finally reach a comprom » a portion of their ideas. A and C are then the major- ity and B’s principles get no further consideration, but a simply ruled out of existence. This is the majority rule says: let us decide the is the resu ve and unite by Notice the rest Instead of three well-de xl principles that might have been continued, developed and enjoyed. we rupted the other two. This is nevitable result of majority rule in a le have lost one altogether, and e attempts to manufacture laws to enforce upon people of large ities who have all kinds of conlliet Of course it is better to have majority rule if it repre= sents the real wishes of a large number of people than to have minority rule which is only in the interest of the few, as is the he interests of the case today, where all laws are practically capitalistic class, But the prineipal of rulership is in itself wrong: > man has 3 nother man yy right to rule Of course, if one is invading the rights of another, he tulership, but self-preservation F law factories are operated. A jority as follows; He hires a tool called nd t trained. This is no apitol and but nit to them his in the brightest colors and in a way that will it appear to be a great blessing to the country. In this way, together th sually gets the votes of the majority of t Ifthe scheme to be put through is so barefaced that the majority ea done by a con Dill is all right, and B, being opposed to other scheme that A oppo: to vote for the bill on the condition that A will vote for B's bill not be mislead into voting for it, then the job is ded A that the lobbyist has per s-it is only necessary to get B to agree This scheme is ealled honest, or at least “all polities.” The lobbyist who is running A might have put the two jobs up with the lobbyist who is running A might have put the two jobs up with the lobbyist who was run- ning B, when it comes T do our lobbyists use one member of the legisla bodies against another to pry a fat job out of the people for th henefit of the moneybags. It makes no differenee who the mem ber of cong be. or what hi he- the job can be worked on him just the same, Therefore, what does the people's voting amount to in the choice of members? Let us take this stature is com- posed of ninety five will make an ample: Suppose a leg 1 members: on the above sche jority, even if all are present: the twenty-five swap jobs with twenty-five more and thus make fifty votes Phe lobbyist makes it his business to know how e sick or absent, or majority of one. e strives to bet the worst opponents on commissions or investigating committees out of town, But there is much in trading votes, for each member generally feels like keeping his trades to himself, or therefore it is easy to trade Vs vote with B, C.D and E and make each one think that he alone traded with A. In this way ten such Fa majority of ninety-nine, and ten nd when eapital has use for them, he persuaded to do so. as A can easily get fo such men are not hard to But this is not the end, A cannot trade with F, so A ine troduces a bill or an mendment repulsive to F to drop it on condition that F will either vote for the absent when it comes up. These are some of the tricks played in Can you blame an Anarchist who declares tha made laws are not seared? Soc to barbarism if laws were done away with, With thousands of laws bei tricks, what becomes of the vo becomes of his refor ety would not disband or revert acted and hundreds of corruptionists playing their Viewory at the polls? What se of the ballot? So: il it is repealed vanity? ig all things by the long as he is willing to submit to a bad law what better leverage do rogues want on hu he fact is money and not votes is what rules the people. And the capitalists no longer care to buy the voters, they buy the “servants” after they have heen elected to “serve idea that the poor man’s vote amounts to anything is the veriest delusion, ne ballot is only the paper veil that hides the tricks. Can you blame an Anarchist when he sees a politieal b anything sacred about him, or his laws? We know there never mer conniving for a job in a law factory that he fails to see was a law passed that ever prevented one single crime form be- ommitied, We know crime will cease only when men are kes them happier to do right than wrong, We know that if passing laws would have prevented crime or made men better that we would all be angels by now. taught to do good, because it We say: Turn the law factories entists in them to teach the truths of hun raternity, and make th the means of life, and mankind will quickly develop that whieh to schools and place sei- solidarity, love and possible by abolishing monopoly in is best, noblest and purest in his Chieago, The Liberator, September 10, 1905 25 TO TRAMPS, ‘The Unemployed, the Disi herited, and Miserable. A word to the 35,000 now tramping the streets of this great city, with hands in pockets, gazing listlessly about you at the evidence of wealth and pleasure of which you own no part, not sufficient even to purchase yourself a bit of food with wh ich to appease the pangs of hu now knawing at your vitals. It is with you and the hun- ger dreds of thousands of others similarly situated in this great land of plenty, that I wish to have a word. Have you not worked hard all your life, since you e old enough for your bor to be of use in the j duetion of wealth? Haye you not toiled long, hard and laboriously in producing wealth? And in all those years of drudgery do you not know you have produced thou- sand upon thousands of dollars’ worth of wealth, which you did not th 1, do not now, and unless you ACT, never will, own any part in? Do you not know that when you were harnessed to a machine and that machine ha to steam, and thus you toiled your 10, 12 and 16 hours in the 24. that during this time in all these years you rnessed. received only enough of your labor product to furnish yourself the bare, coarse necessaries of life, and that when you wished to pure nything for yourself and family it always had to be of the cheapest quality? If you wanted to go anywhere you had to wait until Sunday, so little did you receive for your unremitting toil that you dare not stop for a moment, as it were? And do you not know that with all your squeezi ching and economizing you never were enabled to keep but a few days ahead of the 26 wolves of wa employer saw fit to create an artific production, that the the iron horse to which you had been harnessed was stilled: ut? And that at last when the eaprice of your famine by limiting es in the furnace were extinguished the factory door locked up, you turned upon the highway a tramp, with hunger in your stomach and rags upon your back? Yet your ¢ ployer told you that it was overproduction which made him close up. Who eared for the bitter tears and he t-pangs of your loving wife and helpless children, when yo bid them a loving “God bless you" and turned upon the tramp- er’s road to seck employment elsewhere? I say, who cared for dl pal np now, to be execrated and denounced as a “worthless tramp and a vagrant those heartach 7 You were only a by that very class who had been engaged all those years in rob- bing you and yours. Then can you not see that the “good boss’ or the “bad boss” euts no figure whatever? that you are the com- mon prey of both, and that their mission is simply robbery? Ci you not see that it is the INDUSTRIAL SYSTEM and not the boss” which must be ch god? Now, when all these bright summer and autumn days are going by and you have no employment, and consequently can save up nothing, and when the winter's blast sweeps down from the north and all the earth is wrapped in a shroud of ice, hearken not to the voice of the hyprocrite who will tell you that it was ordained of God that “the poor ye have always”: or to the arrogant robber who will say to you that you “drank up all your wages last summer when you had work. and that is the reason why you have nothing now, and the workhouse or the workyard is too good for you: that you ought to be shot.” And shoot you they will if you present your petitions in too emphatic a maner. So by not to them, but list! Next winter w ly your feet through the holes in your worn-out shoes the cold blasts nts, when the h the rents in your se frost is bi and w wretcheduess seems to have nd upon you, when mise for her own is he- den and existence come iockery, when you have walked the streets by di slept upon hard boards by night, and at last determine by your own hand to take your life, - for you an existe you determine to rather th 1e which has becon en - so, perehanee. of the lake ther z you can do to insure those whom you are about to orph mockery of your rash act; but stroll you down the rich and look th cent plate windows into voluptuous homes, and here you will discover the very identi- n inst a like fate? The waves will only dash over y avenues of the the cal robbers who hi id yours. Then let your we dlespoiled y tragedy be enacted here! Awaken them from their wanton sport at your expense! Send forth your petition and let them read it by the red glare of destruction, Thus when you long that you have spoken tn they have ever been Wve never yet deigned to notice k behind” you can be assur lingering lo to these robbers in the only k xe wh able to understand, for they ny petition from their slaves that they were not compelled to read by the red glare L ing, from thi was not handed to them upon the point of the sword, You ne no organization when you mind to present this kind of petition, In fact, n would be a detriment to you: b of yo ayail yourselves of those little methods of has placed in the hands of the poor man, and you will b power this or any other land, cof explosives! Dedicated to the tramps by Lucy E, Pars Marm, October 4, 1884. 28 nd 1853 Black. nost likely is believed to have been born xed her speculated to be of Mexican and Native Amer slaves, although not much can be confirmed about her early life wey married Albert Parsons around 1870 and moved to € go. She had two sons, and supported her family through vari san, Her parents we seamstress jobs. In 1879 Lucy joined the Working Women’s Union, Also in the early 1880s she joined the Knights of Labor and helped to orga stresses. In 1883 she helped found the Interna- tional Working People’s Association (WPA) in which she wrote for their newspaper, The Alarm. Mong with her husband Albert and | 1s and workers she joined the struggle for the 8 hour we On May 4th 1886 during arket Square area of Chicago, reds of other Jabor demonstration in the Hayr a bomb was thrown by a known person, Lucy's husband Al- ert was not present during the demonstration, although he was tied and hung alox being no evidence against any of them. Luey believed that it was the police that threw the bomb. with four other Anarchists despite there Lucy spent a short time mourning her husband's death ted on a Haymarket de paign, She went on speaking tour covering seventeen sta story of her husband's death and the Hayn in which she told the rket affair he wrote pieces against Iynchings in a news- «dom. In 1905 she helped co-found the radical ndustrial Workers of the World (IWW) in which svspaper The Liberator. In 1927 she joined the National Com tee of the Inter which was a communist led labor organization, She died in 1941, about the age of 89. in a fire paper c lal she wrote for thei tional Labor Defense. More about Lucey www lueyparso project.org Lucy Parsons: Freedom, Equality and Solidarity 29 unemployment protest at the Hull House in Chicago “Of all the modern delusions, the ballot has certainly been the greatest. The fact is money and not votes is what rules the people.” cy Parsons political life spans over 60 y jovements, Her writin ce, that a Chicago police officer called her an a thousand rioters.” Despite this influ- be Jooked, even nat Goldn dow of her white husband Albi booklet contains six of her texts. ist and Labor + Parsons, Please re-print, re-produce + revolt. Anti-copyright.