I.W.W. IN AMERICA.

Colonist, Volume LX, Issue 14893, 16 October 1918, Page 2

I.W.W. IN AMERICA.

A STINGING BLOW

"The Mining and Scientific Press" of San Francisco of September 7, in the course of a leading article on the conviction of a- gang of I.W.W 7. leaders, made the following comment: — Bolshevism in America received a stinging blow when Haywood arid 14 other leaders of the I.W.W. organisation were sentenced to 20 years in the Federal penitentiary by Judge La mils at Chicago after a" trial' by jury that ended on' August 30. Besides these, 80 others were sentenced to shorter terms of imprisonment, together with the'imposition of fines ranging from 20,000 dollars on Haywood and tho other" ringleaders, to 5,000 dollars on the lesser agitators. The combined* concurrent sentences of tho 95 I.W.W.'fi make -a total of 807 years and their fines total 3,130,000 dollars ,(£626,000). It remains to be seen, however, "whether the judgment of the Court will :be reversed in a new trial. The trial lasted 128 days. The four counts of indictment included charges of conspiracy to thwart, the national prosecution of the.war, to interfere with tho production of material needed for tlie war, to obstruct the enforcement of. the draft/ arid to violate the espionage law. The Judge laid stress on the LAV.W 7. preamble,declaring eternal hostility to the employing class, on the action of the executive board in expelling members who had entered military service, and on the concerted plan to .incite) strikes, and sabotage with a view to impeding the Government in waging war. Among [those .sentenced are several identified with the worst outrages that have marked labour disorders in the mining districts of the West, notably W. D. Hay wood and Vincent St. John, whose: names recall the strikes at Cripple Creek, Telluride, Butte, and Wardner in years gone by, and, ineradicably", the nssassinations of Arthur L. Collins in 1904 and of Governor Steuncnberg, ol ■Idahi., in 1908.

The trial proved the I.W.W. organisation to be not only anti-social in time of pence, but traitorous in time of war. . . . The evidence showed how largo a part sabotage plays in "the methods of terrorism used by the I.W.W. They tried it against the Government in time of war and thereby invited the merciful punishment of an outraged democracy —in any non-democratic country-they would have seen their last sunrise long ago. We note that the Socialist party have been impelled to wash their hands of them ; it was high time to do so, for. tho I.W.W. is not socialistic in any sense, it is anti-social; i- is as much opposed to a socialistic organisation of society a« to any other; it is purely nn«! maliciously destructive, like the '■•viminal idiots that liavo I>rouu;ht tho Russian revolution fv.mi n hopeful -v *- cess to a miserable fiasco, from intelligent; reformation to political chaos and industrial coll?,r>se. "There is no more room for the P-olshovipt idea in tin? United States than -there is for ilvPrussian.