[Translated by Prof. H. H. Fick.]

“Court of Justice: With the same contempt with which I have tried to live humanely upon this American soil, I am now granted the privilege to speak. If I do take the word I do it because injustice and indignities have been heaped upon me right here. I have been accused of murder. What proofs have been brought in support of it? It has been proved that I assisted some man by the name of Seliger in manufacturing bombs. It has been furthermore stated that with the assistance of somebody else I have taken those bombs to 58 Clybourn avenue, but although one of these assistants has been produced as a State witness it has not been shown that one of these bombs was taken to the Haymarket. * * * What is Anarchy? * * * The points that we are driving at have been carefully withheld by the State. * * * But it has not been said that by their superior force we are driven to our course. Contempt of court has been charged against us. We have been treated as opponents of public order. What is this order? Such order as represented by police and detectives? On the slightest occasion the representatives of this public order have forced themselves into our midst. The same police that aim to give protection to property embraces thieves in its ranks. * * * I have told Capt. Schaack that I was at a meeting of carpenters at Zephf’s hall on May 3. He has stated that I admitted to him that I learned the fabrication of bombs from Most’s book, ‘Science of Warfare.’ That is perjury. * * * It has been proved that Grinnell has used Gilmer for his purpose intentionally. There are points which prove that. * * * I say that these seven persons here, of which I am one, are murdered purposely by Grinnell. * * * Grinnell has the courage to call me a coward, right here in this court of justice, and Grinnell is a person who has connived with miserable subjects to go against me, to get testimony against me, to kill me. * * * Is life worth living? What are their purposes in thus murdering these men? Low egotism, which finds its reward in a higher position, and which yields a return of money. * * * But it has been said that the International association of working men was in itself a conspiracy, and that I was a member of this association. My colleague, Spies, has already stated to you how we were connected. * * * And that is the conspiracy that has been proved against me, and for that I am to end my life upon the gallows—an instrument which you consider a disgrace to me. I declare here openly that I do not ackowledgeacknowledge these laws, and less so the sentence of the Court. * * * I would not say a word if I was really guilty according to this foolish law, but even according to these laws that would not be respected by a schoolboy, not even these laws have been carried out to the full extent when I was found guilty. * * * You smile. You perhaps think I will not use bombs any more, but I tell you I die gladly upon the gallows in the sure hope that hundreds and thousands of people to whom I have spoken will now recognize and make use of dynamite. In this hope I despise you, and I despise your laws. Hang me for it.”

GEORGE ENGEL.

[Translated by Mr. Gauss.]

“When I left Germany in the year 1872 it was by reason of my recognition of the fact that I could not support myself in the future as it was the duty of a man to do. I recognized that I could not make my living in Germany because the machinery and the guilds of old no longer furnished me a guarantee to live. I resolved to emigrate from Germany to the United States, praised by many so highly. When I landed at Philadelphia, on the 8th of January, 1873, my heart and my bosom expanded with the expectation of living hereafter in that free country which had been so often praised to me by so many emigrants, and I resolved to be a good citizen of this country; and I congratulated myself on having broken with Germany, where I could have no longer made my living, and I think that my past will show that, that which I resolved I intended to keep faithfully. For the first time I stand before an American court, and at that to be at once condemned to death. And what are the causes that have preceded it, and have brought me into this court? They are the same things that preceded my leaving Germany, and the same causes that made me leave. I have seen with my own eyes that in this free country, in this richest country of the world, so to say, there are existing proletarians who are pushed out of the order of society.”

After explaining how his dissatisfaction with the existing order of things led him to become a Socialist, Engel continued:

“I resolved to study Socialism with all my power. In the year 1878 I came from Philadelphia to Chicago, and took pains to eke out my existence here in Chicago, and believed that it would be an easier task to live here, than in Philadelphia, where I had previously in vain exerted my powers to live. I found that, that also was in vain. There was no difference for a proletariat, whether he lived in New York, or Philadelphia, or Chicago. * * * To make further investigations I tried to buy, from the money that I and my family earned, scientific books on those questions. I bought the works of Ferdinand LaSalleLassalle, Karl Marx and Henry George. After investigating these works I recognized these reasons why a proletariat could not exist, even in this country, as free as it is. I thought about the means by which that could be corrected. They praised to me this country where every man and every working man had a right to go to the ballot-box and choose his own officers. I scarcely believed that any citizen of the United States could have meant so honestly and well as I, when I turned my attention to politics, and took part in them. But even in this regard of freedom of the ballot-box I found myself mistaken. I learned to see that the working man was not free in his opinion, that he was not free in vote. It was in vain that the Socialistic party took pains in former times, honest pains, to elect honest officers. After a few vain attempts I found that it was impossible for a working man to free himself by means of the ballot-box, and to secure those things which were necessary for his existence. * * * In this city corruption even entered the ranks of the Social Democracy. I also obtained the conviction that through those men who put themselves over us as leaders, and occupied themselves with compromises, this was brought about, and then I left the ranks of the Social Democracy and gave myself over to the International which was then organizing; and what these men wanted, and what these men through their exertions sought to bring about was nothing more or less than the conviction that the freeing of the ruling classes could only be brought about by force, as have all revolutions been throughout history. This conviction, before I went over to those people, was obtained through study of the history of all lands. The history of all lands showed me that all advantages in a political, in a religious, and in a material direction, were always obtained only by the use of force; and if I confine myself to the history of this country where I am convicted, I take into consideration that the first emmigrantsimmigrants into this country and the first colonists, only freed themselves by force from the power of England. I afterward obtained the conviction that the slavery existing in this country, to the shame of the Republic, could only be put aside by force. And what does this history teach us? The man that spoke against existing slavery in this country was hanged, as it is intended that we should be hanged, to-day. In the course of time I became convinced that all those who spoke in favor of the ruling classes must hang. And what are the reasons for it? This Republic does not exist through, and its affairs are not conducted by, those persons who come into office by an honest ballot. * * * Under these conditions it is certainly not a wonder that there were men, noble men, noble scientific men, who have tried to find ways and means to bring back humanity to its original condition. And this is the social science to which I confess myself with joy. The State’s Attorney said here ‘Anarchism is on trial.’ Anarchism and Socialism are, according to my opinion, as like as one egg is to another. Only the tactics are different. Anarchism has abandoned the ways pointed out by Socialism to free man-mankind, and has resolved no longer to bear the yoke of slavery, and, therefore, I say to the working classes, do not believe any longer in the ballot-box and in those ways and means that are left open to you; but rather think about ways and means when the time comes, when the burden of the people becomes intolerable. And that is our crime. Because we have named to the people the ways and means by which they could free themselves in the fight against Capitalism, by reason of that, Anarchism is hated and persecuted in every state. In spite of that and again in spite of it Anarchism will exist, and if not in public it will exist in secret, because the powers force it to act in secret. If the State’s Attorney declares or thinks that after he has hanged these seven men and sent the other one to the penitentiary for fifteen years he has then killed Anarchism, I say, that will not be so. Only the tactics will be changed, and that will be all. No power in the world will tear from the working man his knowledge and his skill or opportunity in making bombs. I am convinced that Anarchism cannot be routed out,—if that was the case it would have been routed out in other countries long ago—in the least by our murdering the Anarchists. That evening when the first bomb in this country was thrown, I was sitting in my room; did not know anything about the conspiracy; did not know anything about that deed; did not know anything about the bomb; did not know anything about the conspiracy which the State’s Attorney had brought about here. * * * Can you have respect for a government that only gives rights to the privileged classes, but to the working men not at all, although there are conspiracies in all classes and connections of the capitalistic class. Although we have only recently experienced that the coal barons came together, put up the price of coal arbitrarily while they paid less wages to their working men, and wherever those coal workers, those miners have come together to consider the bettering their conditions, their demands have always been very modest on the whole, then the militia appears at once upon the scene and helps those people, while they are feeding the miners with powder and lead. For such a government I have no respect, and can have no respect in spite of all their followers, in spite of all their police, in spite of all their spies.

“I am not a man who hates a single capitalist. I am not the man who at all hates the person of the capitalist. I hate the system and all privileges, and my greatest desire is that the working classes will at last recognize who are their friends and who are their enemies. Against the condemnation of myself by the capitalistic influence I have no word to say.”

Sam’l Fielden.

SAM FIELDEN.