“Look, look!” cried the Mayor. “Grant Adams is standing on that platform–and those women have to hold him up–it’s shameful. Listen!”
“I want to say to my old neighbors and friends here in Harvey,” cried Grant, “that in this strike we shall try with all our might, with all our hearts’ best endeavors, to do unto others as we would have them do unto us. Our property in the mines and mills in this Valley, we shall protect, just as 547sacredly as our partners on Wall Street would protect it. It is our property–we are the legatees of the laborers who have piled it up. You men of Harvey know that these mines represent little new capital. They were dug with the profits from the first few shafts. The smelters rose from the profits of the first smelters in the district. Where capital has builded with fresh investment–we make no specific claim, but where capital has builded here in this district from profits made in the district–profits made by reason of cheating the crippled and the killed, profits made by long deadly hours of labor, profits made by cooking men’s lungs on the slag dump, profits made by choking men to death, unrequited, in cement dust, profits sweated out of the men at the glass furnaces–where capital has appropriated unjustly, we expect to appropriate justly. We shall take nothing that we do not own. This is the beginning of the rise of the Democracy of Labor–the dawn of the new day.” He waved his arm and his steel claw and chanted:
“March on!–March on!–all hearts resolved,”
And in a wave of song the response came
“To victory or death.”
Grant Adams flaunted his black slouch hat; then he sprang from the platform, and hurried to the front of the procession. The band struck up a lively tune and the long trail of white-clad women and white-badged men became animate.
“Well, Ahab–you heard that? That is rebellion,” said old Joe, squinting his mole-like eyes. “What are you going to do about that–as the chief priest of law and order in this community?”
Five minutes later Ahab Wright, greatly impressed with the dignity of his position, and with the fact that he was talking to so superior a person as a governor, was saying:
“Yes, your excellency–yes, I wanted to tell you of our conditions here in the Valley. It’s serious–quite serious.” To the Governor’s question the Mayor replied:
“No–no–not yet, but we want to prevent it. This man Adams–Grant Adams, you’ve heard about him–”