After precautions had been taken to exclude objectionable persons, the proceedings began. Four speeches were delivered, two in English and two in German. Parsons confined his remarks to the capitalists. All present were poor, he said, and they only had themselves to blame. One-half of all the wealth in the country belonged to the poor people, but the capitalists had robbed them of it. The poor offered no resistance, and yet the capitalist was doing the same thing day after day. He was getting richer, and the poor poorer, because the working people lay down and permitted themselves to be robbed. He recounted some of Most’s experiences, and insisted that capitalists must submit to workingmen. They must be shown that their lives are worth no more than the lives of the working people.
THE OFFICE OF THE ARBEITER-ZEITUNG.
From a Photograph.
He next touched upon the merits of a new invention by which, he said, many hundreds of houses could be set on fire, and exhibited a small tin box or can with a capacity of four ounces. This can, he remarked, could be filled with some chemical stuff to serve as an explosive. A great many of these cans could be carried in a basket, and, traveling around as match peddlers or under some other guise, his hearers could secure entrance to the houses of capitalists. All they would then be obliged to do was to either place or drop one of “those darlings” in a secure place and go about their business. It would do its work, without any one’s presence to attend to it, in less time than an hour. If they would get the boxes ready, he would tell them where to get the “stuff.” This plan of operations would keep the fire and police departments quite busy. If they organized and went to work with a resolute spirit, they could have things all their own way throughout the city and obtain possession of what remained after their work of destruction. He also urged all his comrades to become familiar with dynamite and said that for the necessary instructions they could come to a building on Fifth Avenue (107, the offices of the Arbeiter-Zeitung and Alarm), where he and others could be found to help them. There was no other way now left, he continued, except for the laborers to use the sword, the bullet and dynamite, and, closing sententiously, he said:
I probably will be hung as soon as I get out on the street, but if they do hang me, boys, don’t forget what I have been telling you about the little can and the dear stuff, dynamite, because this is the only way I and you can get our rights.
It goes without saying that Parsons was applauded to the echo. Another speaker emphasized his remarks about dynamite, but refrained from making a speech, because, as he said, Parsons had “covered the ground so well and thoroughly.” One of the German speakers gave his attention to King William and the Pope, scoring them in the strongest language he could command. He held that the “police of Chicago were only kept to protect the property of capitalists and to club poor workingmen.”
Another event memorable in the history of the party was the flaunting of the black flag on the streets of Chicago for the first time. On that occasion—November 25, 1884, Thanksgiving Day—they marched through the fashionable thoroughfares of the South and North Divisions, and, with two women as standard-bearers for the black and the red, they made it a point to halt before the residences of the wealthy, uttering groans and using threatening language. Their route included Dearborn Street to Maple on the North Side. There they massed in front of the residence of Hon. E. B. Washburne, ex-Minister to France. They pulled the door-bell and insulted the family by indulging in all sorts of noises, groans and cat-calls. They rested satisfied with this last exhibition, and retraced their steps, proceeding to Market Square, where they dispersed.
The preliminaries leading up to the procession just described were thus given in the Alarm on the following Saturday:
THE BLACK FLAG.