The Everett Massacre: A history of the class struggle in the lumber industry

by Walker C. Smith

It is no part of this work to attack The Law. The Law is august, majestic in its impartial findings and the equality of its judgements, always however with due allowance for those subtle distinctions so incomprehensible to the masses which exist between high finance, kleptomania and theft. The Law strips no one of his possessions; under its beneficent reign the rich retain their wealth and the poor keep their poverty. Founded on dogma and moulded by tradition, The Law stands as a mighty monument to Justice. It is ever in this way that we show our respect and reverence for the dead. Being an outgrowth of precedent it gains added sanctity with each fresh proof of antiquity, differing in this regard from automobiles, eggs, women, hats, the six best sellers, and the commoner things of life. Surrounded by mysticism, surcharged with the language of the dead, and sustained by force, who is there would have the temerity to question the sanctity of The Law?

It remained for Attorneys Black and Cooley—and not for the outcast industrial unionists, socialists or anarchists—to charge that The Law is a bankrupt institution, and it was for the citizen-deputies—and not for the despised workers—to prove the truth of the indictment. Truly Society moves in a mysterious way its blunders to reform!

With the true logic of the counting-house Cooley admitted that the mill owners had formed a mob to protect themselves from the rabble, they had pursued illegal methods to prevent the breaking of The Law, they had jailed men in order to preserve Liberty, they had even blacklisted union men in order to give to every man the right to work where, when and for whom he pleased. There is no escaping such logic if one owns property. Of course those who possess no property are the natural enemies of property, and law being based upon property, they are defiers of The Law, and Society being upheld only by observance of The Law, they are the foes of Society. It is not best to kill them in too large numbers for they are useful in doing the work of the world, but they must be kept in fear and trembling of The Law and made to respect it as sacred and inviolable, even if we do not. So argued Black and Cooley.

But the whine of Black, the snarl of Cooley, the moody silence of Veitch, alike served as a confession that "law and order" was a failure. The plea of the State was that all law is the creature of property and when the power of the law proves inadequate in its function of protecting the accumulations of wealth the possessors of property are justified in supplementing The Law with such additional physical or brute force as they can muster, or in casting aside The Law altogether, as it suits their convenience. To the workers The Law must remain sacred while to the leisure class Property is the thing to worship, for however much robbery is to be condemned, the proceeds of robbery are always to be respected.

Their further contention was that the streets are for traffic, for maintaining commerce, in other words to aid in the gathering of property and to enhance the property values already cleared. Out of the graciousness of their hearts the business men and employers allow the pedestrians to use the streets incidental to the purchase of goods or to journey to and from their tasks in the factories, mines, mills and workshops. That the streets might be used for social, religious, political or educational purposes does not enter their calculations, their ledgers carry no place for such entries on the profit side. Free speech is tolerated at times provided nothing of importance is said.

Two trials were going on in the court room at the same time; that of Thomas H. Tracy and the I. W. W. before a property-qualified jury, and that of the existing system of law enforcement before the great jury of the working class. And just as surely as was the verdict that of acquittal for Tracy and his union, was there a most decided judgment of Guilty upon "law and order." For Tracy was not freed by the law but by the common sense of the jury who refused to consider him guilty and viewed him as a class rather than as an individual. Under the existing conspiracy laws he might well have been considered technically guilty. But "law and order" technically and otherwise was proven guilty, and the charge that Capitalism is guilty of first degree murder, and a host of other crimes, was clearly proven.

Why? Why all the brutality depicted herein? Why?

The answer is that we are living in an insane social system in which money ranks higher than manhood.

To be more specific the outrages at Everett had their roots in the belief that the men who labor, and especially the migratory and the unskilled element, form an inferior caste or class to those who exploit them. The dominant class viewed any attempt to claim even the same civil rights as an assault upon their supremacy and integrity,—this to them being synonymous with social order and civilization. This is always more evident where a single industry dominates, as evidenced by the occurrences at Ludlow, in the coal district, Mesaba in the iron ore section, and Bisbee where copper is the main product. Everett controlled by the lumber interests clinches the argument.

A community dominated by an industry, impelled by a desire for high profits; or under the spell of fear or passion, whether justified or not, cannot be restrained by law from a summary satisfaction of its desires or a quieting of its apprehensions. Before such a condition the fabric of local government crumbles and lynch law is substituted for the more orderly processes designed to attain the same end. The Everett outrages were no example of the rough and ready justice of primitive communities. The outlaws were in full possession of local government, legislative, judicial, and executive, yet they fell back upon brute force and personal violence and attempted to protect the lumber trust profits by tactics of terrorism.