Boston a novel
towards leadership, a theory as to how labor might be aided, now found
his chance; the unorganized mass began to grow organs--a miracle of
mutation while you watched. The socialists had a meeting-place in North
Plymouth, Rispicci Hall, and this was thrown open, and was swarming
with strikers. Impromptu meetings were held, and committees named, and
speeches made. In the evening came the sympathizers and propagandists,
summoned hastily from Boston; Felice Guadagni, a journalist, orator of
the socialists, and Paul Blanshard, a very young assistant clergyman
from a Congregational church. There was a bigger meeting-place,
Humberto Ferrari Hall, and this was packed to the doors, and the eager
audience learned in several languages the meaning of solidarity, and
the details of how to conduct a strike.
First of all they must get up a circular and mail it out to lists of
names, and raise funds for support. The greater number of these workers
lived close to the border-line of want, and their money would soon be
gone. Those who had savings would contribute, and more would come from
the labor movement outside. On the first day a hundred strikers put up
five dollars each; which would pay for rent and telephone calls and
telegrams, stamps and typewriters. The socialists and anarchists and
I. W. W. brought their mailing-lists, and a feeble little machine of
working-class publicity began to function.
Next day there was a parade; eighteen hundred workers marching the
whole length of the main street of Plymouth, passing the cordage
company’s plant, despite all the guards and the “cops.” Three days
later came another parade, twice as big, with women and children
carrying poles from which dangled clams and mussels, with the sign, “We
are tired of living on these all the time!” That amused the newspaper
reporters, and brought good publicity.
Organizers came: one representing the American Federation of Labor,
the conservative union, which was ready to help them get shorter hours
and higher wages; also one from the Industrial Workers of the World,
which would help them to take over the cordage industry. The strikers
listened to both, and were pulled and hauled between them; their minds
being still further confused by the anarchists, who clamored that both
organizations were traps for the workers, contrived by shrewd officials
who wanted to live without working. Let the workers run their own
strike, and let those who sympathized be content to raise funds and
feed the children.
So thought and spoke Bartolomeo Vanzetti. In this crisis he forgot his
timidity and humility, and developed into a full-fledged orator. So did
many another worker, who found himself making a speech before he knew
it. You would get into an argument with some one, and others would
gather to listen, and soon there would be a crowd. When the cops drove
you off the picket-line, you would stop at the next street-corner and
voice your indignation, and when they moved you on, you would stop at
the corner beyond that. There were always plenty willing to listen;
it was the process by which the workers got their education, and
developed their solidarity. You would learn more in one day of idleness
than in a month of labor. In this crisis realities were unveiled, and
you saw them in their nakedness. If there was anything you could not
understand, there were others willing to explain. In the day by day
consulting among the workers, it was surprising how clear everything
became.
II
Not so many years ago, though it now seemed ages to Cornelia Thornwell,
there had been a strike in the Thornwell Mills, and it had been broken
in the usual way. But Cornelia’s husband had sent her away to the
country-place of their daughter Deborah on the North Shore; so she
had not heard the shouts of the mob and the crack of revolvers, nor
seen the guards patrolling the family mansion on the hilltop. All she
knew were newspaper accounts, and the pictures, drawn by Josiah and
his son-in-law James Scatterbridge, of the desperate unreason of the
strikers. One cause of her evolving into a runaway grandmother had been
a lurking suspicion that their way of breaking a strike had not been
entirely ethical.
And now here she was, in position to see with her own eyes; if she
needed theories, here were A. F. of L. and I. W. W., socialists,
anarchists, syndicalists, right and left wingers, even a few
single-taxers and vegetarians. In the strike headquarters she met
the young clergyman, Paul Blanshard; a new kind of clergyman, with a
religion meant to work here and now. He was barely out of his teens,
yet he saw the whole struggle so clearly that Cornelia felt herself his
junior. He had got his training through the Intercollegiate Socialist
Society; and as she watched the effect of his leadership upon the inert
mass, a new vision dawned upon her. The idea of the workers taking over
industry and running it for themselves had seemed a fanatic’s dream;
but now she began to wonder, might it not after all be possible--some
day in the far-off future?
To her friend Vanzetti it was a cause of grief that she was seen to
be talking with this young clergyman. Vanzetti had taken her for his
pupil and favorite, this unusual Yankee lady who was willing to learn
from an Italian; and here she was falling into the snares of the
“riformistas”! Again and again he explained to her what a waste of time
it was to deal with “politeesh.” He struggled with long polysyllables,
half way between Italian and English. “Twenty year, t’irty year,
worker go politica, elect deputati for parliament--get elect’, do
notting, traditor’, sell out! Sama t’ing wit’ union, worka hard, maka
bigga union, grande, potente--never do notting--joosta graft! All
rispettabilità, onorevole--you onderstanda me? Worker, he work joosta
same--all time. Politeesh, he no work, liva good, dressa genteelman!
He is like--I no can say Eengleesh, it is somet’ing in ocean, he get
on ship, on shell of crab--” and Vanzetti resorted to his dictionary
for the word “barnacool,” so that he might apply it to the rosy-cheeked
young Congregational clergyman. Yes, the Reverend Blanshard would find
a place on the backs of the workers, and stay there like the rest! “You
see, Nonna, he joosta sama priest--new kinda talk, but all sama for
worker. Riformista is--what you call it--trait’!”
“Traitor,” said Cornelia.
“Shoore, trait’,” replied Vanzetti.
The State Board of Arbitration and Conciliation took up the grievances
of the cordage workers, proposing to adjust them. And here was the
trap in action--to lure the workers into the hands of “politeesh”
and “offeesh.” The more conservative strike leaders insisted upon
presenting their case before this board, and Vanzetti opposed them
with all his energies. He rushed about from one gathering to another,
arguing, protesting; when he saw that the proposition was going to
carry, he became frantic, and there was another row between him and
Compagno Culla.
The socialist was trying to explain the wishes of the Italians to the
English-speaking workers, when Vanzetti climbed onto the platform and
thrust the speaker away. “Worker, have notting do wit’ commish! It is
trap! It is for breaka strike! It is for maka slave! It is for bringa
you, for bringa wife, bambini, for be slave for cordage companee! Why
musta worker get politeesh for settle strike? Why musta get go-vérnment
for settle strike? Why musta have owtoritee? Always owtoritee for
worker! But let worker settle strika for self. Soocha man lika dis--”
and Vanzetti pointed an enraged finger at Culla--“soocha man is trait’
for worker--he is more bad as capitalista--”
There was a storm of controversy, some shouting on one side, some
on the other. But the majority did not want to listen to anarchist
propaganda just then; they called for Compagno Culla, and he got the
floor again, and shook his fist at his rival and demanded: “Why for he
talk owtoritee? Anarchista no like owtoritee, he tella you; but I tella
you anarchista is heemself owtoritee! He taka da platform, he maka da
speech, he musta have hisa way or he maka da vee-ólence! Is it not so,
comradda?”
III
The great rich company, the biggest cordage company in the world, which
now in the second year of the great war was doing more business and
making more money than ever in its history before, sent its officials
before the state board to argue that wages of six dollars a week for
unskilled women and nine dollars for unskilled men were abundant and
generous. It proved that this meant an average wage of twenty-five
dollars a week per family, by the simple device of having fathers and
mothers and half-grown children all at work--which was the best thing
for them, because it kept them from idleness and dissipation. The
strikers countered by putting on the witness-stand the head of one of
these families, John Corsini, who had a wife and nine children, the
oldest fourteen years of age; John was paid nine dollars a week, and
the interpreter quoted: “He says they sometimes make a meal that would
not be fit for a pig to eat. He is heavily in debt. Goes in debt about
five dollars a week. Friends bring in food and stockings now and then
to help out, otherwise the children couldn’t go out in the street.”
It was shown that in nineteen years past, the company had raised wages
three times, each time only five per cent; while in ten years the
cost of living had gone up more than fifty per cent. This moved the
company, out of the generosity of its corporate heart, to risk another
five per cent increase; more than this would mean inevitable ruin. Its
highly paid lawyers argued, and their eloquence was reproduced in the
newspapers; smooth-tongued agents came among the workers repeating the
arguments, and promising many sorts of favors to leaders who would be
tractable. The most expensive secret-service agency in the world was at
work. Dissension and doubt and fear spread among the pitiful bewildered
masses. The company gave out the announcement that unless its terms
were accepted at once, strike-breakers would be brought in. At the same
time there appeared a number of head-breakers, the state police, who
rode ruthlessly into the crowds.
Also there came autobuses from Boston and other places, with loads
of ordinary policemen; they stood three ranks deep in front of the
gates, and could have joined hands along the three-quarter mile of
steel fence. Any time they saw a crowd gather, they would come at
double-quick. “Move along there now--step lively!” If you tried to
argue as to the rights of people to the use of the streets, they would
not argue back, but jab their clubs into your stomachs or your backs
and run you along. If you failed to run fast enough, you would get a
thump; and next day in the police-court you would be sentenced as a
rioter, and newspapers would tell how the mob was getting out of hand,
and the company was requesting the governor to call out the militia.
But the strikers stood firm; they would not accept five per cent
advance, and, urged on by the radicals, they requested the state
board to withdraw its intervention. The company was worried, because
the agents of other cordage concerns were in Plymouth, hiring away
their best workers. Something must be done; so one or two hundred
“scabs” were got into the plant, around the fence by the seashore,
and an effort was made to start one department. The struggle became
more tense; the picket-lines drew closer, and the rate of Cornelia
Thornwell’s education was speeded up.
A picket-line was no place for an old lady--so her Italian friends
argued and pleaded; but she had come in search of experience, and
insisted upon getting it. The first time she saw an unarmed worker
struck down by a policeman’s club, she gave voice to her indignation: