The Everett Massacre: A history of the class struggle in the lumber industrySmith, Walker C.
History
The Everett Massacre: A history of the class struggle in the lumber industry
Smith, Walker C.
Industrial Workers of the World; Lumbering -- Washington (State); Lumbermen -- Washington (State)
Two trials were going on in the court room at the same time; that of
Thomas H. Tracy and the I. W. W. before a property-qualified jury, and
that of the existing system of law enforcement before the great jury of
the working class. And just as surely as was the verdict that of
acquittal for Tracy and his union, was there a most decided judgment of
Guilty upon "law and order." For Tracy was not freed by the law but by
the common sense of the jury who refused to consider him guilty and
viewed him as a class rather than as an individual. Under the existing
conspiracy laws he might well have been considered technically guilty.
But "law and order" technically and otherwise was proven guilty, and the
charge that Capitalism is guilty of first degree murder, and a host of
other crimes, was clearly proven.
Why? Why all the brutality depicted herein? Why?
The answer is that we are living in an insane social system in which
money ranks higher than manhood.
To be more specific the outrages at Everett had their roots in the
belief that the men who labor, and especially the migratory and the
unskilled element, form an inferior caste or class to those who exploit
them. The dominant class viewed any attempt to claim even the same civil
rights as an assault upon their supremacy and integrity,--this to them
being synonymous with social order and civilization. This is always more
evident where a single industry dominates, as evidenced by the
occurrences at Ludlow, in the coal district, Mesaba in the iron ore
section, and Bisbee where copper is the main product. Everett
controlled by the lumber interests clinches the argument.
A community dominated by an industry, impelled by a desire for high
profits; or under the spell of fear or passion, whether justified or
not, cannot be restrained by law from a summary satisfaction of its
desires or a quieting of its apprehensions. Before such a condition the
fabric of local government crumbles and lynch law is substituted for the
more orderly processes designed to attain the same end. The Everett
outrages were no example of the rough and ready justice of primitive
communities. The outlaws were in full possession of local government,
legislative, judicial, and executive, yet they fell back upon brute
force and personal violence and attempted to protect the lumber trust
profits by tactics of terrorism.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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