It was long after her release that “Mother” Jones found that she had been sentenced to the penitentiary for five years and that several of the men had been sentenced to twenty years. She went back to her prison. VII Senator Kern introduced his famous Paint Creek resolution in the senate, on the request of representatives of the United Mine Workers, on April 12, 1913. He did not at that time have the slightest idea of the tremendous importance of his act. The disclosures made to him were so unusual as to convince him that light could do no harm, and his confidence in the judgment of William B. Wilson, then secretary of labor in the cabinet of the president, who had introduced a similar resolution in the House, and of Senator Borah, who had presented such a resolution in the Senate in the preceding session, was such that he did not hesitate in acceding to the request. But he was not to be left long in the dark as to the significance attached to his resolution by many of the most powerful financial elements in the country. The original resolutions directed that an investigation should be instituted to ascertain whether or not a system of peonage was maintained in the coal fields of West Virginia; whether or not access to the post-offices in these coal fields was ever denied miners, and if so, by whom; whether or not the immigration laws of the country were being violated; in the event that any such conditions existed, what could be done to remedy them, whether the commissioner of labor or any other government official could be of service in adjusting the strike, and whether or not parties were being convicted and punished in violation of the laws of the United States. This resolution was offered on April 12. The following six weeks were to astonish the senator in the disclosures of the resources and ramifications of the representatives of feudalism in West Virginia.