The Story of Civil Liberty in the United States
The Story of Civil Liberty in the United States - Civil Liberty and Labor (1870-1917) - Page 226
The investigator added that every member of the so-called vigilance committee had laid himself open to criminal charges under the federal law (Sec. 5,508, Revised Statutes). “The question naturally arises—who are the real anarchists,—the real violators of the constitution, these so-called and unfortunate members of ‘the scum of the earth’ or these presumably respectable members of society?”
Outside these organized fights, I. W. W. members have suffered numerous outrages. For example, in Lawrence, Mass. in 1912
Peaceful women went to a meeting, March 1st … returning home about 15 of them were suddenly surrounded by fifty or more metropolitan police officers…. There had been no provocation, nor shouting, even, nor noise…. The clubbing they received was shameful and atrocious…. Not until one of the women, Bertha F. Crouse, 151 Elm Street, had been beaten into insensibility did the thugs in uniform desist…. The beaten woman was carried unconscious to a hospital, and pregnant with new life, this was blown into eternity by the fiendish beating and was born dead, murdered in the mother's womb.24
There was even a movement in Massachusetts at that time to make it a crime for any one to speak in criticism of the military, which had been called out, on the ground that it was an interference with military control. This was intended to silence W. D. Haywood, one of the I. W. W. leaders, but it was scarcely needed.25
By summary action the police have forbidden the I. W. W. to talk in Manchester, N. H. and they are obliged
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