Mother Jones was always doubtful of the good of organized institutions. These require compromises and she could not compromise. To her there was but one side. Right and wrong were forever distinct. The type is common to all great movements. It is essentially the difference between the man of action and the philosopher. Both are useful. No one can decide the relative merits of the two.

This little book is a story of a woman of action fired by a fine zeal. She defied calumny. She was not awed by guns or jails. She kept on her way regardless of friends and foes. She had but one love to which she was always true and that was her cause. People of this type are bound to have conflicts within and without the ranks.

Mother Jones was especially devoted to the miners. The mountainous country, the deep mines, the black pit, the cheap homes, the danger, the everlasting conflict for wages and for life, appealed to her imagination and chivalry. Much of the cause of trades unionism in England and America has been associated with the mines. The stories of the work of women and children in the mines of Great Britain are well known to all trades unionists. The progress of trades unionism in England was largely the progress of the miners’ cause. The fight in America has been almost a replica of the contest in Great Britain. Through suffering, danger and loyalty the condition of the miners has gradually improved. Some of the fiercest combats in America have been fought by the miners. These fights brought thousands of men and their families close to starvation. They brought contests with police, militia, courts and soldiers. They involved prison sentences, massacres and hardships without end. Wherever the fight was the fiercest and danger the greatest, Mother Jones was present to aid and cheer. In both the day and the night, in the poor villages and at the lonely cabin on the mountain side, Mother Jones always appeared in time of need. She had a strong sense of drama. She staged every detail of a contest. Her actors were real men and women and children, and she often reached the hearts of employers where all others failed. She was never awed by jails. Over and over she was sentenced by courts; she never ran away. She stayed in prison until her enemies opened the doors. Her personal non-resistance was far more powerful than any appeal to force.

This little book gives her own story of an active, dramatic life. It is a part of the history of the labor movement of the United States.

Clarence Darrow.

Chicago, June 6th, 1925.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

I. Early Years[11]
II. The Haymarket Tragedy[17]
III. A Strike in Virginia[24]
IV. Wayland’s Appeal to Reason[28]
V. Victory at Arnot, Pennsylvania[30]
VI. War in West Virginia[40]
VII. A Human Judge[49]
VIII. Roosevelt Sent for John Mitchell[56]
IX. Murder in West Virginia[63]
X. The March of the Mill Children[71]
XI. “Those Mules Won’t Scab Today”[84]
XII. How the Women Mopped Up Coaldale[89]
XIII. The Cripple Creek Strike[94]
XIV. Child Labor, North and South[114]
XV. Moyer, Haywood and Pettibone[132]
XVI. The Mexican Revolution[136]
XVII. How the Women Sang Themselves Out of Jail [145]
XVIII. Victory in West Virginia[148]
XIX. Guards and Gunmen[169]
XX. Governor Hunt, Human and Just[172]
XXI. In Rockefeller’s Prisons[178]
XXII. “You Don’t Need a Vote to Raise Hell”[195]
XXIII. A West Virginia Prison Camp[205]
XXIV. The Steel Strike of 1919[209]
XXV. Struggle and Lose: Struggle and Win[227]
XXVI. Medieval West Virginia[232]
XXVII. Progress in Spite of Leaders[236]