HAYMARKET: WHOSE NAME THE FEW STILL SAY WITH TEARS
A DRAMATIZATION IN ELEVEN SCENES
MICHAEL E. TIGARt
BACKGROUND lawyer who defends the movement for social change. His attitudes toward his own work The dialogue in this play is taken from are made up of his hopes, a fighting faith the trial record of the Haymarket trial,' that keeps him going, and a more tempered writings of Darrow' and Altgeld,3 poems view based on his experiences. Lucy of Vachel Lindsay,4 speeches of the Parsons' writings show her to have formed defendants,' and an article by Judge Gary.6 the views that she expresses in the play quite I created other dialogue based upon the early. Indeed, there is evidence that she biographies and autobiographies of the greatly contributed to forming her husband's participants.' In some instances, I political and social outlook. combined several characters into one and Albert Parsons was a complex rearranged the order of events. However, character. He saw Civil War service for the the key speeches of each participant are Confederacy. After the war, he met and their actual words. married Lucy, a woman of color. They The bombing, trial, executions, and were driven out of Waco, Texas and settled pardon of the survivors were such a in Chicago in late 1873, where both became complex series of events that a simple leaders in the movement that led to the chronological retelling would lack dramatic Haymarket events. intensity. Therefore, I chose to tell this May 1, 1886 was an important day in story through a series of flashbacks, American labor history. Five hundred centering on a meeting of Clarence Darrow thousand workers went on strike for the and Lucy Parsons. This meeting takes place eight-hour workday. Eighty thousand struck November 29, 1922, the day then-Governor in Chicago alone. As the strike continued, Small pardoned a group of Darrow's clients tension mounted. On May 3, 1886, armed from the celebrated 1920 Communist labor police at the McCormick Harvesting trial. Lucy was the wife of Haymarket Company on Chicago's South Side charged defendant Albert Parsons. She was a a group of strikers. Four workers were formidable figure in the anarchist movement killed. both before and after her husband's death. The trade union groups, which included Darrow both depicts and symbolizes the every political tendency from moderate to
I The author holds the Joseph D. Jamail Centennial Chair in Law at the University of Texas School of Law.
Published by Penn Law: Legal Scholarship Repository, 1994 (12) HYBRID: A JOURNAL OF LAW AND SOCIAL CHANGE
anarchist, called for a protest meeting the motion. I also believe that the relationship next night at Haymarket Square. The events between law and the relations of production depicted in this play begin at that meeting. is not mechanical, rigid, or automatic. That Trade union leaflets called for militant is, in every historical period, popular action. Leaflets distributed by right-wing struggles can have a significant impact on forces called for armed assaults on union the quantum of justice enjoyed by the members. people. I explored these themes at length in The reader will note that most of the a 1977 book, Law and the Rise of Haymarket defendants had German names. Capitalism. Most of them were indeed German-speaking The operation of capitalist relations of immigrants, part of the wave of immigration production can occur in any of several to the United States in the wake of Europe's different ways-with more or less ample political turmoil. However, I have chosen democratic rights, and with more or less to focus upon Albert Parsons, an American- counterweight to the accumulative tendencies born labor organizer. I made this choice in of that system. part to have the benefit of Lucy's insights These are not new insights. People and to be able to present a strong woman of "make their own history, but they do not color whose work has not received the make it just as they please; they do not attention that it deserves. make it under circumstances chosen by I have envisioned that the performance themselves, but under circumstances directly will take place on a stage that suggests encountered, given and transmitted from the rather than precisely recreates the various past. "' There are limits in every legal locales. In retelling such a complex event, system to the claims for justice that will be it is inevitable that the characters are not recognized and honored. fully developed. They are, in a sense, Because I believe these things, I think Brechtian images of themselves, or "signs." that a deep understanding of law, which In the play's first performance, we might better be termed "legal ideology," is accentuated this imagery by using rear helpful to lawyers who want to participate in projection screens as backdrops. In that social change. I also believe that lawyers initial production, slides of pictorial material engaged in the struggle-as lawyers-must from the period were provided by the recognize that they are neither the inventors Chicago Historical Society.8 nor the owners of the claims they are advancing for their clients. In rejecting a rigid determinism about law as "superstructure," I also reject the WHY I WROTE THIS PLAY idea that legal rules are so indeterminate that they "don't matter." It is true that many I believe that only through the study of legal rules, such as "impartial juror" or history can we understand society's laws of "free speech," are remarkably content-free
https://scholarship.law.upenn.edu/jlasc/vol2/iss1/4 HAYAURKET (13)
in the abstract. But abstractions are the with cruelty or indifference, hurts our work of philosophers, not of lawyers clients and ridicules their claims for justice. representing clients. The lawyer knows that I continued to believe that the examples the legal rules are not indeterminate, at least from history illuminate the choices we face. at the moment they are used to justify a And so I tried to capture some of the particular judgment that the State will back conflicting messages of the Haymarket case. up with force.' ° And while the State's agents pretend that the rules are neutral and neutrally- CAST OF CHARACTERS enforced, the falsity of that claim does not entrain the conclusion that the rules Samuel Fielden, an anarchist leader and a themselves are indeterminate - or that they defendant can bear any content whatever. Rather, the Julius Grinnell, Cook County state's content is changeable within certain attorney and lead prosecutor historically determined limits. Thus, the James "Black Jack' Bonfield, a captain in lawyer must be a student of society as well the Chicago police as of law. Clarence Darrov, a lawyer I have spent my entire legal career Lucy Parsons, widow of Albert Parsons and working out and advancing theories of an anarchist leader justice on behalf of people who were - in Albert Parsons, an anarchist leader and a my view - being oppressed by the State. I defendant have done this work as a courtroom lawyer William "Captain" Black, attorney for the and writer. I have done it with friends in defendants South Africa, Chile, and other places. Joseph E. Gary, trial judge I first read the Haymarket story when I William Neil, a prospective juror was a young man. My father was a labor H.T Sandford, a prospective juror union official, and had only eight grades of H.E. Graves, a prospective juror school. When I was about eleven or twelve, M.M. Thompson, a prosecution witness I told my father that I wanted to be a Henry L. Gilmer, a prosecution witness lawyer. He gave me a copy of Irving John P. Altgeld, governor of Illinois, Stone's biography of Darrow, Clarence 1893-97 Darrow for the Defense. He thought Workers and spectators Darrow was the kind of lawyer one should be. In later years, I often debated with SCENES friends the proper role of a lawyer who was privileged to participate in the movement for Scene I: The Haymarket, May 4, 1886. social change. I confronted the doubts that Scene of the protest rally. we all must have when the legal system, Scene II: Office of State's Attorney
Published by Penn Law: Legal Scholarship Repository, 1994 HYBRID: A JOURNAL OF LAW AND SOCIAL CHANGE
Grinnell, May 8, 1886. Grinnell is on the platform. A number of people are talking with Chicago police captain standing and looking up at the speaker. James "Black Jack" Bonfield. Two of them carry placards, one saying Scene III: A Chicago street, November 29, "Avenge McCormick Murders" and the 1922, near the train station. Clarence other "Einheit." Other signs may be added Darrow and Lucy Parsons keep an at director's option, such as "May Day" and appointment. "Strike. ") Scene IV: June 1886, a courtroom in Chicago. The trial opens as Parsons Fielden: The law is only framed for those surrenders in the company of his who are your enslavers. lawyer, Captain Black. Voice: That's true. Scene V: A Chicago street, November 29, Fielden: We are not the ones who have 1922. Clarence Darrow and Lucy brought this storm of violence upon the city Parsons continue their discussion. of Chicago. All we wanted was the right to Scene VI: July 1886, a courtroom in strike, the eight-hour day, and the first of Chicago. The trial continues. May as a workers' holiday. When the Scene VII: A Chicago street, November railroad workers demanded higher wages, to 29, 1922. Clarence Darrow and Lucy buy a little more bread for their families, Parsons continue their discussion. Tom Scott, the president of the Pennsylvania Scene VIII: Office of Governor Altgeld, Railroad, replied, "Give those strikers a rifle sometime early in 1893. diet for a few days and see how they like Scene IX: A Chicago street, November 29, that kind of bread." The IndianapolisNews 1922. Clarence Darrow and Lucy proclaimed, "If the workingmen had no vote Parsons continue their discussion. they might be more amenable to the Scene X: Office of Governor Altgeld, June teachings of the times." And when the 26, 1893. Governor Altgeld reads the workingmen of Chicago threaten to withhold pardon message. their labor, for a dollar more a day, for an Scene XI: A Chicago street, November 29, eight-hour day, the Chicago 7mes thunders 1922. Clarence Darrow and Lucy "Hand grenades should be thrown among Parsons continue their discussion. these union men who are striving to obtain higher wages and less hours. By such treatment they would be taught a valuable THE PLAY lesson, and other strikers could take warning from their fate." These were not just Scene I. The Haymarket, May 4, 1886 words. The ruling class backed them up with police, the Guard and the Pinkertons, (A speaker's stand, representing the wagon and dared to call it the rule of law. actually used, is set up just north of the Yesterday, your fellow workers in their Haymarket on Desplaines Street. Fielden is blind rage attacked McCormick's factory
https://scholarship.law.upenn.edu/jlasc/vol2/iss1/4 HAYMARKET
and were shot down by the law in cold speak nothing but German were overheard blood, in the city of Chicago, in the to talk the thing over - in English, in a protection of property. You have nothing public street, and in his presence. And you more to do with the law except to lay hands have that other fellow whose story comes on it and throttle it until it makes its last too late and too convenient even for my kick. It turns your brothers out on the taste. I'm supposed to prosecute on that? wayside and has degraded them until they Bonfield: Juries have convicted on less. have lost the last vestige of humanity. Can Grinnell: You're missing the point. Do we do anything except by the strong arm of you think your seven dead police are all I resistance? The Socialists are not going to have to think about? The Central Labor declare war; but I tell you that war has been Union shut down the city of Chicago on the declared on us. first of May and called it the first workers' (Bonfield enters and stands in front of festival. A general strike, Bonfield. Higher Fielden. The crowd is restive but does not wages! Eight-hour days! And it's not just move.) Chicago. In every city, these movements Bonfield: I command you in the name of are growing, festering. Workers do not the people of the state of Illinois, have the right to conspire to withhold their immediately and peaceably to disperse. labor. When your officers and the plant Fielden: We are peaceable. Mayor guards see workers doing that, and try to do Harrison himself has been here. (Sound of something about it, they meet armed running feet off.) resistance. I tell you, Bonfield, this has got Bonfield: I command you to disperse. to stop. Fielden: All right. We'll go. Bonfield: My men are working overtime. Voice: The police! A troop of police! Grinnell: If you step on a snake, Bonfield, (There is a loud explosion as the lights go it turns and bites you. I've been ordered to out.) cut off its head. Bonfield: We have identified three perpetrators. Scene II: Office of State's Attorney Grinnell: Two Germans with funny names GHnnell, May 8, 1886 and a fugitive. I'll tell you how we are going to prosecute this case. The patriots in (Grinnell and Bonfield are in earnest this town have given us $250,000 to find discussion.) witnesses . . . and to teach some to remember the truth if need be. You bring Grinnell: This is not just a murder case! in your Germans. Then I %rant Albert All right! Seven policemen are dead. Most Parsons, August Spies, and Samuel Fielden. of them died because your officers fired at I want the leaders of the Central Labor will and killed each other. You have a Union. And I %rant every speech, every witness who swears that two anarchists who paper, every broadsheet where any of them
Published by Penn Law: Legal Scholarship Repository, 1994 HYBRID: A JOURNAL OF LAW AND SOCIAL CHANGE
ever told the workers to take up arms. I the law does with his case is to look to the want Fielden because he was there. I want court's decision, to justify some infamy of Spies because he's the darling of the today with the infamy of yesterday. The reformers. And I want Parsons - a law shows its a posteriori to the people, as renegade Confederate who married a nigger. God to his servant Moses. I want every one of those heathen snake Darrow: All right! When Governor Altgeld charmers at the end of a rope. (Blackout.) pardoned the Haymarket defiendants thirty years ago, it was too late to save those, like your husband Albert Parsons, who had been Scene III: A Chicago street, November hanged. These defendants pardoned today 29, 1922, near the train station never served a day of their sentences. They were tried in 1920, two years ago. The (There is a park bench and other items hysteria was every bit as high as when the representing a street scene. Lucy Parsons, Haymarket case was tried. widow of executed Haymarket defendant Lucy Parsons: Governor Small may have Albert Parsons, is seated on the bench. signed his political death warrant, as There may be a sound of a train stopping. Governor Altgeld did. So lon:g as there is a Darrow enters, out of breath, rubbing Chicago Tribune to watch over Illinois, no himself against the chilly wind. He looks good deed will go unpunished. about for Lucy. Their eyes meet. She Darrow: Oh, Lucy. "Too long a sacrifice stands and they embrace.) can make a stone of the heart. . .. " Lucy Parsons: Save the poetry for the jury, Lucy Parsons: Clarence! Clarence. Time dulls memory and pain, Darrow: Lucy, I'm sorry I'm late. The struggle sharpens perceptions of reality. train from Springfield was delayed. When the bomb went off, and the policemen Governor Small has pardoned the died, we wept for ourselves. The fourth of Communist Labor defendants. May 1886 is as fresh for me now as then. Lucy Parsons: Another victory for civil The Guard and the Pinkertons had shot and liberty, Clarence. Another supplication to killed two McCormick strikers. Haymarket the state. was to be a protest. The mayor himself was Darrow: Another victory for the law. there, and saw no reason to stop the Lucy Parsons: Wrong! A victory, perhaps, speaking. Then police Captain Bonfield for the lawyers. Your lawyers' victories, marched in and somebody tossed a bomb Clarence, are like fireflies. You catch them and seven cops died. When my husband and put them in a jar. By morning, their Albert and the others were indicted for the light has gone out. And your bugs are murder, we had facts and we had faith. The dead. As dead as my husband Albert facts we have always clung to. The faith - Parsons and the others. At least Albert, in your faith, Clarence - was a delusion. death, inspires the people's movement. All The fact then was and now is that none
https://scholarship.law.upenn.edu/jlasc/vol2/iss1/4 HAYMARKET
of the eight men indicted made or threw that Attorney Julius Grinnell is seated. The bomb, and the State never proved otherwise. prospective jurors are seated to one side.) The fact was that the struggle for the eight- hour day, and the right to strike to win it, Gary: The People of the State of Illinois was just. against August Spies and others, on The faith was that a brilliant lawyer, indictment for conspiracy, riot, and Captain Black, who braved the loss of his accessory to murder. downtown practice, could cajole a judge and (William Black and Albert Parsons enter.) convince a jury that the law - your law, Grinnell: Your Honor, I see Albert R. Clarence - required an acquittal. Or at the Parsons, indicted for murder and demand his very least that appeals judges would know instant arrest. that muttering legal incantations over that Black: This man is in my charge and this trial record would not purge it of the stench. demand is not only theatrical clap-trap, but Darrow: Think how Black must have felt. an insult to me. A hero of the Civil War. For heaven's Albert Parsons: I present myself for trial sake, Lucy, he won a Congressional Medal with my comrades, your Honor. of Honor for bravery. He was a leader at Gary: (Flustered.) You will take a seat the Bar. He believed what we as lawyers with the prisoners, Mr. Parsons. The are taught. He knew he was giving up the indictment will then be read to you and you better part of his practice to defend the will be called upon to plead to it. anarchists. His own faith bewildered him. Black: The indictment is in sixty-nine Lucy Parsons: His own faith killed my counts, your Honor, and Mr. Parsons has husband. Albert had fled to safety. Black read it. wrote and said "I can establish your Gary: Do you waive reading, Mr. Parsons. innocence. Your presence at trial will help Albert Parsons: I am charged as accessory the others." to the murder of police officer Degan, your Darrow: And so Albert surrendered. Honor. I am not guilty. I deny that any of Lucy Parsons: As so Albert surrendered. us here made, or threw, or know who made He walked into court on Captain Black's or threw the bomb. arm on the opening day of trial. Gary: Call the first prospective juror. (Blackout.) Grinnell: Have you read about this case, sir? Neil: As who has not? Scene IV June 1886. A courtroom in Grinnell: Can you be fair? Chicago Neil: I think so. Grinnell: The People are satisfied. (A courtroom scene. There is a judge's Black: You are a manufacturer, sir? bench, on which Judge Joseph E. Gary is Neil: Yes. seated. At the prosecution table, State's Black: As a result of what you have read
Published by Penn Law: Legal Scholarship Repository, 1994 HYBRID: A JOURNAL OF LAW AND SOCIAL CHANGE
about this case, do you have an opinion? Black: Are you prejudiced against Neil: It would take pretty strong evidence anarchists, or socialists? to remove the impression that I now have. Sandford: Based on what I have read, a I could not dismiss it from my mind. I decided prejudice. believe that my present opinion would Black: Challenge for cause. influence me in determining and getting at a Gary: Mr. Grinnell? verdict. Grinnell: The statute says he can be a juror Black: Challenge for cause. if he swears, as he has, that he can render a Gary: Now, Mr. Neil, you haven't heard fair verdict, and if your Honor believes him, the evidence, have you? which your Honor should. Neil: No, your Honor. Gary: Challenge overruled. Gary: So you can't know what effect the Grinnell: What is your business or evidence will have on you, can you? occupation, sir? Neil: Well, I am saying that I do not think Graves: I am a superintendent with the I can put aside my views. Chicago and Northwestern Railway Gary: (Angrily.) And why not? What is to Company. prevent your listening to the evidence and Grinnell: Can you give a fair verdict in this acting upon it? Why can't you listen to the case? evidence and make up your mind? Graves: Decidedly so. Black: I object, your Honor. The other Black: Mr. Graves, you know, sir that the prospective jurors are in court. defendants advocate that labor should be Gary: Of course they are in court. Where free to organize? else would they be? (To Neil.) Well, sir? Graves: Oh yes, I know that. Neil: I understand your Honor. I am to put Black: And what do you think of that idea? the newspaper stories out of my mind. Graves: I am against it. Gary: Yes. Black: Are you opposed to labor unions or Neil: Very well, your Honor. prejudiced against members of labor Gary: Challenge overruled. organizations? Grinnell: Mr. Sandford. You are satisfied, Graves: I am. I am opposed to labor sir, that you can render an impartial verdict organizations of any and all descriptions. in accordance with the law as his Honor Gary: (Breaking in.) Now, sir, you believe instructs you and the evidence you will in individualism - that is, everyone, hear? whether a capitalist or a laborer, acting for Sandford: I am. himself, do you - you are opposed to Grinnell: On your oath? combinations? Sandford: On my oath. Graves: Yes, sir. Black: Sir, do you know what prejudice Black: Well, do you believe in the railroads means? forming combinations with one another? Sandford: I believe so. Graves: Why, yes sir.
https://scholarship.law.upenn.edu/jlasc/vol2/iss1/4 HAYAL4IRKET
Gary: Oh, very well. He is excused. Call Darrow: Lucy, I know all that. A the next. prosecutor hopes and expects to be judge; Grinnell: Prospective juror number nine and after that he will aspire to be governor, hundred and twenty-to.... then senator and president, in their regular (Blackout.) turn. To accomplish this noble ambition he must in each position give the people what Scene V- November 29, 1922. A Chicago they want, and more; and there are no better rungs in the ladder of fame upon which street lawyers can plant their feet than the dead bodies of their victims. But in philosophy, (The street scene again. Darrow and Lucy.) history, and science - the noblest expression of human wisdom, justice and Darrow: (Hand up, as though fending off a charity and mercy are always overruling verbal attack he knows is coming.) I know courts of last resort and preserving the finer what you're going to say. The jury was and rarer qualities that, in spite of some rigged. There was not a man among the rules and some judgments and some nine hundred and eighty-one that the bailiff precedents, still inhere in man. Just returned into court who had not made his sometimes it comes too late. mind up. Lucy Parsons: And what is learned, and Lucy Parsons: Rigged! (She takes out a when do the powerful learn it? Don't paper.) Henry L. Ryce was special bailiff. confuse "the people" with the Chicago Governor Altgeld had in hand, when he Tribune, Clarence. The one has nothing to pardoned the survivors, an affidavit from do with the other. Thirty-five years ago this one of the prospective jurors, Otis Favor. month, my husband was strangled at the end Favor said that he had no sympathy for of a noose. Nearly thirty years ago, anarchy or socialism, but had to speak out. Governor Altgeld pardoned the surviving He was a friend of Ryce, and bailiff Ryce defendants and exposed the savagery of told him before the trial, "I am managing capitalist justice. What do you lawyers and this case, and know what I am about. your law have to show for it? Another trial, Those fellows are going to be hanged as another outrage. certain as death. I am calling such men to Darrow: And another pardon. be jurors so the defendants will have to Lucy Parsons: And as sure as the sun rises, waste their peremptory challenges. The in four or five more decades, the next time defense lawyers wind up with the jury the people fill Chicago's streets in protest, there prosecution wants." After the verdict, will be another trial to prove that the law Favor confronted Ryce - in State's has learned nothing. Attorney Grinnell's office. And Grinnell, Darrow: You can't know that. an officer of the court - your court, Lucy Parsons: You can't predict otherwise. Clarence - urged him not to speak out. All that has gone before predicts that
Published by Penn Law: Legal Scholarship Repository, 1994 HYBRiD: A JOURNAL OF LAW AND SOCIAL CHANGE
Chicago's next big political trial will once overthrow of the law. We thought our again feature a judge gone lunatic with precious institutions were above and beyond prejudice, and a prosecutor who blames the all anarchy. The fourth of May defendants for the people's anger. demonstrated that we were wrong. We had (Blackout.) too much confidence, that a certain class of individuals, some of them recently come here, as the testimony will show, believe Scene VI: July 1886. A courtroom in that here in this country our Constitution is Chicago a lie. Insults are offered to the Declaration of Independence, the name of Washington is (Courtroom. Opening of trial. The scene is reviled and traduced. In the light of the as before. At the director's option, other fourth of May we now know that the defendants than Parsons and Spies may be at preachings of Anarchy, the suggestions of counsel table. In this scene, the action cuts these defendants hourly and daily for years, from one part of the trial to another at have been sapping our institutions, and that several points, indicated in the script with where they have cried murder, bloodshed, ***** These transitions may be indicated anarchy, and dynamite, they have meant by dimming lights, by freezing motion on what they said, and proposed to do as they the stage or other means at director's threatened. option.) I will prove to you that Paxsons - be it Grinnell: Gentlemen: For the first time in said to the shame of our country, because I the history of our country are people on trial understand he was born on our soil - that for their lives for endeavoring to make Parsons, in an infamous paper published by anarchy the rule, and in that attempt for him, called the Alarm, has defined the use ruthlessly and awfully destroying life. I of dynamite, told how it should be used, hope that, while the youngest of us lives, how capitalists could be destroyed by it, this in memory will be the last and only how policemen could be absolutely wiped time in our country when such a trial shall from the face of the earth by one bomb; take place. It will or will not take place as and further has published a plan in his paper this case is determined. We have been in of street-warfare by dynamite against militia this city inclined to believe, as we have all and authorities. through the country, that, however We will show to you, I think to your extravagantly men may talk about our laws entire satisfaction, that, although perhaps and our country, however severely they may none of these men personally threw the criticize our Constitution and our bomb, they each and all aided and abetted institutions; that as we are all in favor of and advised the throwing of it, and therefore full liberty, or free speech, the great good are as guilty as the individual who in fact sense of our people would never permit acts threw it. They are accessories. They are based upon sentiments which meant conspirators. They are, on top of it all,
https://scholarship.law.upenn.edu/jlasc/vol2/iss1/4 HAYA PM:(21) (21)
cowards, because they - having set the ball Black: And you did not hear them say in so in motion, now devise alibis and defenses to many words what it was they )&-anted deny their responsibility. "more" of, now did you? Thompson: Well, it was obvious to me. We call Mr. Thompson. Black: Obvious because you were listening (M.M. Thompson enters, takes seat.) to this conversation? Grinnell: Mr. Thompson, have you seen Thompson: Yes. any of these defendants before today. Black: These men you saw were speaking Thompson: Yes, I saw Spies and Schwab on in low tones? May 4th at the Haymarket. Thompson: Yes. Grinnell: Will you tell the jury what you Black: They were speaking in friendly saw them doing? tones? Thompson: I had arrived at the meeting and Thompson: Yes. asked for Parsons. He had left. I then saw Black: Do you speak German? those two go into Crane's alley. I followed Thompson: No, not a word. them. Black: So you are telling this jury that the Grinnell: By "those two," you mean... conversation you heard was in English? Thompson: The men I now know as Spies Thompson: Yes, sir. and Schwab. Black: Now, you prepared for your Grinnell: What were they doing? testimony in Mr. Grinnell's office at some Thompson: They were talking amongst length, did you not? themselves. One said something that Thompson: We discussed the evidence. included "pistols." I heard the word Black: And did Mr. Grinnell not tell you "police." that Spies and Schwab speak only in German Grinnell: After you heard "pistols" and when they converse together? "police," what did you do? Grinnell: Mr. Grinnell did not tell him Thompson: I walked just a little nearer, and because Mr. Grinnell does not know any just then Spies said, "Do you think one is such thing. enough, or hadn't we better go and get Black: Then perhaps Mr. Grinnell would more?" They then walked into the crowd explain at some appropriate time why a and in a few minutes came back. Schwab German-speaking police informer was put to said, "Now if they come, we will give it to share Mr. Spies' cell? them." Spies answered he thought they Gary: The jury will disregard the last. were afraid to bother with them. I waited a while longer and then I left. Grinnell: Call Harry L. Gilmer. (Gilmer, enters and takes witness chair.) Did you see Black: Sir, had you ever seen Spies or any of these defendants at the Haymarket on Schwab before that night? the fourth of May? Thompson: No sir. Gilmer: Yes, sir. Fielden -as speaking,
Published by Penn Law: Legal Scholarship Repository, 1994 HYBRiD: A JOURNAL OF LAW AND SOCIAL CHANGE
standing on the wagon. There was a sort of Station, the following Sunday, isn't that so? rush to see the police come up. There was Gilmer: Yes. a man came down from the wagon. He lit Black. And when you told Mr. Grinnell, a match and touched it to a bomb. The fuse did you give him a name? commenced to fizzle, and this other man he Gilmer: Oh, no. He showed me a picture, tossed the bomb over into the street. They and asked if that wasn't the man, and I said was all talking, but they were speaking it was. German and I didn't understand them. Black: And the picture was of August Grinnell: And who was the man who lit the Spies? fuse? Do you see him here today? Gilmer: Yes, it was. Gilmer: Right there. Gary: The record may reflect he has Grinnell: Call James Bonfield, captain of pointed to the defendant August Spies. police. (Bonfield enters carrying a pile of books and Black: Mr. Gilmer, you are telling this jury papers.) you saw the bomb thrown? Black: We all know, your Honor, how Gilmer: I did see it. Black Jack Bonfield led the police charge Black: How did you get home that day? the fourth of May. What, may we ask, are Gilmer: On the bus. these books to do with the case? Black: Did you tell anyone on the bus you Grinnell: These are books sold by the had seen the bomb being thrown? defendants, such as Johann Most's tract on Gilmer: No, sir. Revolutionary War Science. They are Black: Where do you live? articles and speeches by these defendants on Gilmer: At a rooming house on Madison anarchy, dynamite, bloodshed, and murder. Street. Black: Then I object. These books have Black: Did you tell anyone at the rooming nothing to do with whether these defendants house about what you had seen? caused any specific person to commit a Gilmer: No, sir. murder on the fourth of May. They serve Black: You went to the Central Police only to inflame the jury. Station to tell them you were a witness, Gary: Mr. Black, if men are teaching the didn't you sir? public how to commit murder, it is Gilmer: The next day, yes. admissible to prove it. These papers teach Black: And even then, you did not tell the commission of murder and this is a anyone you had seen the bomb being murder case. I do not know the contents of thrown? these books, but they are admissible. Gilmer: No. Black: I object to your Honor telling the Black: In fact, sir you did not tell anybody jury that these things teach how to commit this story until you met Mr. Grinnell, on murder. your second trip to the Central Police Gary: I simply asked the prosecutor what
https://scholarship.law.upenn.edu/jlasc/vol2/iss1/4 HAYMARKET
they were, and I am only repeating what he identified or not. said. Most of this stuff is not in English, I Albert Parsons: Then we are dead men. suppose. Black: You will put their political Black: Object again, your Honor. Mr. sentiments on trial. Grinnell's two supposed witnesses to this Gary: I will put their intentions on trial, in bombing contradict one another and a case where the fruit of these intentions is common sense, and there is more all too plain. I want the message clear, contradiction to come when the defense puts Captain Black, to the laboring people, to on a case. And the names of the other whom the anarchists claim to be special defendants, other than Spies and Schwab, friends, that that claim is a sham and a have not even been put in issue. Where in pretense, adopted only as a means to bring law is it admissible that on some other topic, manual laborers into their own ranks; and at some other time, these defendants and that the counsel and advice of anarchists, if others not charged, made speeches and followed by the workingmen, will expose wrote articles? them to the danger of becoming, in law; Grinnell: We disclaim any reliance upon murderers. the witnesses Thompson and Gilmer, your Honor. Our case is this: These defendants (Parsons is on the witness stand.) sowed the seed of anarchy in the fertile soil Black: Mr. Parsons, will you tell the jury of discontent. Now, by the law, they are please about your growing up? responsible for the harvest of bloodshed. Albert Parsons: I was born in Montgomery, Gary: Mr. Black, I intend to instruct this Alabama, and raised in deep East Texas, in jury that if these defendants, or any two or Tyler. My ancestors had a hand in drawing more of them, conspired together with or up the Declaration of Independence, and not with any other person or persons to fought in the American Revolutionary War. excite the people of this city to sedition, Black: Did you see service in the late Civil tumult and riot, to use deadly weapons War? against and take the lives of other persons, Albert Parsons: I was a cavalry scout in the as a means to carry their designs and Army of the Confederacy. Only later did I purposes into effect, and in pursuance of come to see that chattel slavery, and wage such conspiracy, and in furtherance of its slavery, are wrong. objects, any of the persons so conspiring Black: How long have you lived in publicly, by print or speech, advised or Chicago, Mr. Parsons. encouraged the commission of murder Albert Parsons: I was editor of a paper in without designating time, place or occasion Waco, Texas, and leader of a group that at which it should be done, and if such spoke throughout the hill country of Texas murder was committed, then all these on the condition of the Negro people. When defendants are guilty, whether the person the tide turned against Reconstruction, my who perpetrated such murder can be wife Lucy and I came North. I took up
Published by Penn Law: Legal Scholarship Repository, 1994 HYBRID: A JOURNAL OF LAW AND SOCIAL CHANGE
work in the printer's trade, and began to Black: Cross-examine. help organize workers' groups. Grinnell: Mr. Parsons, the Mrs. Parsons Black: Were you at the Haymarket on the you speak of is the woman seated just there evening of May 4? (pointing), is that so? Albert Parsons: I was. Albert Parsons: That is so. Black: Were you there when the police Grinnell: You have worked at many came? different jobs since coming to Chicago, isn't Albert Parsons: No, indeed. I arrived late. that so? The weather threatened, and I suggested we Albert Parsons: It is. move the meeting indoors. But Spies told Grinnell: You have been a typesetter, a me that the hall was already occupied by a maker of suits, and even owned a small meeting of the furniture workers. So I got business with your wife, true? up on the wagon and spoke for about three- Albert Parsons: Yes, sir. quarters of an hour. I remember seeing Grinnell: But since October 1884, tell the Mayor Harrison in the crowd, listening and jury what you have done. watching. When I was done, I went down Albert Parsons: I have been editor of the with Mrs. Parsons and some comrades to Alarm. the bar on the corner. Grinnell: The Alarm is the paper in which Black: Could you see or hear anything from the articles appeared that have been read to there of the meeting? the jury, is that not so? Albert Parsons: Only that it was still going Albert Parsons: That is true. on. We were talking and drinking. All at Grinnell: And in those articles, you once I saw an illumination. It lit up the advocated the use of dynamite, isn't that whole street, followed by a deafening roar, right? and almost simultaneously volleys of shots Albert Parsons: As a means of defense. followed, every flash of which, it seemed to Grinnell: As a means of killing officers of me, I could see. The best comparison I can the law, isn't that true? make in my mind is that it was as though a Albert Parsons: I did not speak of dynamite hundred men held in their hands repeating on the fourth of May, 1886. I spoke of revolvers and fired them as rapidly as defense. I told the people that they could possible until they were all gone. That was not expect to change things except by force. the first volley. Then there were occasional I read the editorial in the Chicago Tribune, shots, and one or two bullets whistled near where the editor recommended that people the door and struck the sign. Mrs. Parsons give bread to the hungry laced with did not move. In a moment, two or three strychnine, as a warning to tramps not to men rushed breathlessly in at the door. beg. Black: Was that your entire participation in Grinnell: You do not deny that on the the events of that night? fourth of May you specifically told that Albert Parsons: It was. crowd that they must use force?
https://scholarship.law.upenn.edu/jlasc/vol2/iss1/4 HAYMARKET
Albert Parsons: I told that crowd that the The law looks at the proximate cause, not Chicago Times had said that police should the remote. The law looks at the man throw hand grenades into groups of strikers. immediately in fault, not at some man who I told them that if the monopolists say that may have manufactured the pistol that does we should have a rifle diet, a strychnine diet the shooting, the dynamite that kills, the and a hand grenade diet, have we not got a bomb that explodes. I ask you, on your oath right to say they will not do that? before God, in a full and honest Grinnell: No further questions. consideration of the entire testimony, who Albert Parsons: But it does not follow that made the Haymarket massacre? Who is I had anything to do with that bomb. responsible for that collision? If Bonfield Gary: There is no question pending, Mr. had not marched there, would there have Parsons. been any death? God sent that warning cloud into the heavens; these men were still Black: Among the mockeries is this. Can there, speaking their last words, but a the law hold these men responsible when deadlier cloud was coming up from behind. there is not a shred of proof that whoever In disregard of our constitutional rights as threw that bomb had any common purpose citizens, it was proposed to order the or agreement with these defendants. dispersal of a peaceable meeting. Has it These men used strong language, the come to pass under the Constitution of the language of anger. Yet so far as this record United States and of this state, our meetings goes, they wanted on the fourth of May to for the discussion of grievances are subject have a peaceable meeting to protest the to be scattered to the winds at the breath of murder of their brothers by the police and a petty police officer? Can they take into Pinkertons at the McCormick plant. Mayor their hands the law? If so, that is anarchy; Harrison himself was at the meeting. He nay, the chaos of constitutional right and testified here, called by the defense, and he legally guaranteed liberty. Who is morally repeated what he told Captain Bonfield that at fault for the death harvest of that night? night. It was a quiet meeting. Would it have been but the act of Bonfield? And Bonfield said, "My detectives Bonfield, who once the Mayor left could not make me the same report." Bonfield, in his get there quick enough. Bonfield, who has police office, surrounded by his minions, been searching the files of the Alarm and one hundred and eighty strong, armed to the Arbeiter Zeitung for years, hoping some day teeth, knew that meeting was quietly and to put before a jury the most inflammatory peacefully coming to its close. Yet Mayor article. Harrison had not so much as left the station My last word for these eight lives. before Bonfield ordered his men to fall in They are in your hands, with no power to for that death march. Who is responsible whom you are answerable but God and for it? Who precipitated that conflict? Who history. made that battle in that street that night? Grinnell: This case is greater than us all,
Published by Penn Law: Legal Scholarship Repository, 1994 (26) HYBRlD: A JOURNAL OFLAWAND SOCIAL CHANGE
more important to the country than you can find Oscar W. Neebe guilty of murder and conceive; the case itself and what it involves fix the penalty at imprisonment for fifteen is more important than all the lives of the years. unfortunate officers who bit the dust that (Blackout.) night in defense of our laws. We have not got the bomb thrower Albert Parsons: Your Honor, you ask me here. We have got the conspirators, and if why sentence of death should not be there was not a syllable of proof in this case pronounced upon me. I answer you and say designating the name of a single individual that this verdict is the verdict of passion, who perpetrated this offense, who threw that born of passion, nurtured in passion, and is bomb, still the defendants are guilty. We the sum total of organized passion in the city have been trying this case under the rulings of Chicago. Who can deny this? Certainly of the court on that hypothesis. If that is not this court. not so, then these gentlemen can tell the The Chicago Citizens' Association Supreme Court about it. stands to a man demanding of your honor And it is so for a reason. In the nature our immediate extinction and ignominious of anarchy, each anarchist knows only one death. Now, I stand here as one of the or two other conspirators. They are people, a common man, a workingman, one autonomous, they do not agree amongst of the masses. You stand as a bulwark; you themselves. If the law the defendants are as a brake between them and us. You contend for was put in place, there would are expected to look neither to the right, nor never in this world be a conviction for the left, but to that justice shall be served. murder against an anarchist. If you do not, you expose not only your Gentlemen, you stand between the own failing, but the mockery that calls itself living and the dead. You stand between law justice. At the trial, I denied that I am and violated law. Do your duty guilty. I deny it yet. The mayor himself courageously, even if that duty is an has published a letter in the New York unpleasant one. World, saying "I do not believe there was any intention on the part of those defendants Gary: All spectators, every one, except the to have a bomb thrown at the Haymarket." officers of this court, must be seated, and So why are we here? The hundreds of everyone must preserve absolute. silence. thousands of working men and women who Gentlemen, have you agreed upon your now organize for their rights have struck verdict? terror into the monopolists' hearts. The Juror: We have, your Honor. We find Haymarket bomb was, I believe, instigated August Spies, Michael Schwab, Samuel by eastern monopolists to produce public Fielden, Albert R. Parsons, Adolph Fischer, sentiments against popular movements, George Engel, and Louis Lingg, guilty of especially the eight-hour movement then murder and fix the penalty at death. We pending, and that some of the Pinkertons
https://scholarship.law.upenn.edu/jlasc/vol2/iss1/4 HAIVARKET
were their tools to execute the plan. Just clemency. The great writers, speakers, exactly four days before May Day, 1886, educators, philosophers all arrayed on the the day of a national general strike for eight side of mercy. hours, the New York Times wrote this: "The Lucy Parsons: All arrayed on the side of strike question is, of course, the dominant erasing this blot from their precious law. one, and is disagreeable in a variety of Albert, if he had admitted guilt and begged ways. A short and easy way to settle it is for mercy, might have been spared by urged in some quarters, which is to indict Governor Oglesby. But Albert would not for conspiracy every man who strikes and give them that satisfaction. A pardon or summarily lock him up. This method would nothing. undoubtedly strike a wholesome terror in the Darrow: The pardon came too late for him. hearts of the working class. Another way (Quoting.) "Of what use are sterile regrets, suggested is to pick out the leaders and illusory reparations, that we may accord to make such an example of them as would vain shadows and insensible ashes." scare others into submission." And that, Lucy Parsons: More noble words. your Honor is this trial, the first no doubt of Darrow: Robespierre said them. He forgot many. The same Times now calls for the them, of course, as soon as the guillotine gallows for us. The Chicago Times called became his to control. When I came to for hand grenades to be thrown among the Chicago, I had a book by Altgeld on crime. strikers. The gallows for socialists; hand I went to see him. We became friends. He grenades for the strikers. was a judge then. When he was elected Your honor, I came here for this trial Governor in 1892 1 went to see him, to urge of my own will. I have nothing, not even again that he should pardon the two whose now, to regret. sentences had been commuted, and Neebe (A jailer puts a noose around Parsons' neck who was still in prison. He had promised to and a hood over his head.) act. His friends, and mine, were becoming Will I be allowed to speak? 0 men of restive. I remember what he said. America, let me speak! Will the voice of (Blackout, spot on Altgeld.) the people be heard? (Blackout.) Scene VIII: The Gmernor's Office. Scene VII: Chicago street. November 29, Sometime in earl, 1893 1922 Altgeld: Go tell your friends that when I am (Street scene again.) ready I will act. I don't know how I will act, but I will do what I think is right. We Darrow: I was still living in Ohio then. I have been friends for a long time. You had not come to Chicago. But I read of it. seem impatient; of course I know how you The appeals that failed. The campaign for feel; I don't w,ant to offend you or lose your
Published by Penn Law: Legal Scholarship Repository, 1994 HYBRID: A JOURNAL OF LAW AND SOCIAL CHANGE
friendship, but this responsibility is mine, justice were practically closed to them; that and I shall shoulder it. I have not yet the prosecuting officers vied with each other examined the record. I have no opinion in hunting them down, but were deaf to about it. It is a big job. When I do examine their appeals; that in the spring of 1886 it I will do what I believe to be right, no there were more labor disturbances in the matter what that is. But don't deceive city and particularly at the McCormick yourself: if I conclude to pardon those men factory; that under the leadership of Captain it will not meet with the approval that you Bonfield the brutalities of the previous year expect; let me tell you that from that day I were even exceeded. will be a dead man. It is further shown here that much of (Blackout. Return to street scene.) the evidence given at the trial was a pure fabrication; that some of the prominent police officials in their zeal not only Scene IX: Chicago street. November 29, terrorized ignorant men by throwing them 1922 into prison and threatening them with torture if they refused to swear to anything desired, Lucy Parsons: The Chicago Tribune saw but that they offered money and employment that his prediction came true. to those who would consent to do this. Darrow: In a way, Altgeld saw to that. He Further, that they deliberately planned to sought no allies among the powerful. He have fictitious conspiracies formed in order never went to all those who had clamored that they might have the glory of for mercy before the hangings, to tell them discovering them. what he was going to do and to ask their There is yet another ground. It is support. And he aimed right at Judge Gary. further charged with much bitterness by those who speak for the prisoners that the record of the case shows that the judge Scene X: Governor's Office. June 26, conducted the trial with malicious ferocity; 1893 that page after page of the record contains insinuating remarks of the judge, made in (Altgeld is seated at his desk reading. We the hearing of the jury, and with the evident come upon him after he has been reading intent of bringing the jury to his way of from his message for some time.) thinking; that these speeches, coming from the court, were much more damaging than Altgeld: Again it is shown that various any speeches from the state's attorney could attempts were made to bring to justice the possibly have been; that the state's attorney men who wore the uniform of the law while often took his cue from the judge's remarks; violating it, but all to no avail; that the that the judge's magazine article recently laboring people found the prisons always published, although written nearly six years open to receive them, but the courts of after the trial, is yet full of venom; that,
https://scholarship.law.upenn.edu/jlasc/vol2/iss1/4 HAM=ARKT
pretending simply to review the case, he had later, I spoke. to drag into this article a letter written by an Lucy Parsons: I remember. excited woman to a newspaper after the trial Darrow: (Quoting from memory.) In the was over, and which therefore he put in history of the country where he lived and simply to create a prejudice against the dead died, the life and works of our devoted dead and the living; that, not content with this, he will one day shine in words of everlasting in the same article makes an insinuating light. When the bitter feelings of the hour attack on one of the lawyers for the defense, have passed amay, when the mad and not for anything done at the trial, but poisonous fever of commercialism shall have because more than a year after the trial run its course, when conscience and honor when some of the defendants had been hung, and justice and liberty shall once more he ventured to express a few kind, if ascend the throne from which the shameless, erroneous, sentiments over the graves of his brazen goddess of power have driven her dead clients, *whomhe at least believed to be away; then this man we knew and loved will innocent. It is urged that such ferocity or find his rightful place in the minds and subserviency is without a parallel in all hearts of the cruel, unwilling world he history; that even Jeifries in England served. contented himself with hanging his victims, In the days now past, John P. Altgeld and did not stop to berate them after they in scorn and derision was called John were dead. Pardon Altgeld by those who would destroy These charges are of a personal his power. We who stand today around his character, and while they seem to be bier and mourn the brave and loving friend sustained by the record of the trial and the are glad to adopt this name. papers before me and tend to show that the Though we lay you in the grave and trial was not fair, I do not care to discuss hide you from the sight of man, your brave this feature of the case any farther, because words will speak for the poor, the it is not necessary. I am convinced that it is oppressed, the captive and the weak; and clearly my duty to act in this case for the your devoted life inspire countless souls to reasons already given, and I, therefore, do and dare in the holy cause for which you grant an absolute pardon to Samuel Fielden, lived. Oscar Neebe and Michael Schwab this Lucy Parsons: Clarence. Think again. twenty-sixth day of June, 1893. Were you right? Is he remembered? What John P. Altgeld, Governor of Illinois did the poet say? "Where is Altgeld, brave (Blackout.) as the truth, Whose name the few still say Scene Xf: Chicago street. November 29, with tears? Gone to join the ironies with old John Brown, Whose fame rings loud for 1922 a thousand years." Darrow: And the same poet said again: Darrow: At Altgeld's funeral, nine years "Where are those lovers of yours, on what
Published by Penn Law: Legal Scholarship Repository, 1994 (30) HYBRID: A JOURNAL OF LAWAND SOCIAL CHANGE
name do they call Lucy Parsons: (Kindly.) What an imagel The lost, that in armies wept over your And you, Clarence, are a fierce old dog, set funeral pall? to bark and warn off intruders. Maybe so. They call on the names of a hundred high- I wish it so. We are all on trial in this life valiant ones, we have chosen, Clarence. All we can A hundred white eagles have risen the sons know is that none of us will live to see the of your sons, verdict. The zeal in their wings is a zeal that your CURTAIN dreaming began." And again: "To live in mankind is more than to live in a name." Lucy Parsons: But that is the point, Clarence. If some message lives beyond all this brave lawyer speech, what is it? That I should salute the law because although it hanged my husband, some other law begged my pardon? I take nothing away from you, Clarence, nor Altgeld, nor Captain Black. It is history's judgment that John Brown's name - and Albert Parsons' - lives longer than Altgeld's. Your lawyer's ego wants you to think you stand at the center of every event by which the world is changed. Your right to stand there is only because some brave soul has risked death or prison in the people's cause and you are called to defend him - or her. When you put law and lawyers at the center of things, you are only getting in the people's way, and doing proxy for the image of the law the State wants us to have. The law is a mask that the State puts on when it wants to commit some indecency upon the oppressed. Darrow: (Angry.) If I believed that, I would still be lawyer for the railroad, and not making do with the fees the union can pay. Lucy, the law is a fence built around the people and their rights.
https://scholarship.law.upenn.edu/jlasc/vol2/iss1/4 HAYALRKT (31)
ENDNOTES
1. See Spies v. Illinois, 12 N.E. 865 (Ill. 1887), error dismissed, 123 U.S. 131 (1887). See also 12 AM. ST. TRIALS 1 (1919); FREDERICK T. HILL, DECISIVE BATTLES OF THE LAW 240-68 (1907). An excellent reference on the Haymarket case and its primary participants is PAUL AVRICH, THE HMARK T TRiAwEI" (1984).
2. See generally CLARENCE DARROW, THE STORY OF MY LIFE (1932); ATTORNEY FOR THE DAMNED (Arthur Weinberg ed., 1957).
3. See generally JOHN P. ALTGELD, REASONS FOR PARDONING THE HAYmARKET ANARCHISTS (1986); see also AVRiCH, supra note 1, at 417-25.
4. See VACHEL LINDSAY, COLLECTED POEMS 95, 96 (1923) (The Eagle That Is Forgotten & Byan, Bryan, Bryan, Bryan).
5. See generally LUCY PARSONS, MASS VIOLENCE IN AMERICA: FAMOUS SPEECHES OF THE EIGHT CHICAGO ANARCHIMSS (1969). This collection was originally published by Lucy Parsons in the late 19th century and has been reprinted.
6. See generally Judge Gary, The Cldcago Anarchists of 1886: The Crime, The Trial, and The Punishment, 65 CENTURY MAGAZINE 803 (1893). This article is referred to by Governor Altgeld in Scene X.
7. See generally CAROLYN ASHBAUGH, LUCY PARSONS: AMERICAN REVOLUTIONARY (1976); AVRICH, supra note 1, at 3-52; DARROW, supra note 2; ATrIORNEY FOR THE DAMNED, supra note 2.
8. In that performance, by Chicago's Remains Theatre, introductory and scene-bridging songs wre performed from from PETE SEEGER & BOB REISER, CARRY IT ON!: A HISTORY IN SONG AND PICURE OF THE WORKNG MEN AND WOMEN OF AMERICA (1985).
9. KARL MARX, THE EIGHTEENTH BRUMAIRE OF LOUIS BONAAMRTE, quoted in J. B. Foster, Introduction to J. FERRARO, FREEDOM & DETERMINATION IN HISTORY ACCORDING TO MARX & ENGELS 7 (1992).
10. See generally Michael E. Tigar, Crime Talk, Rights Talk & Double-Talk: Thoughts on Reading Encyclopedia of Crime and Justice, 65 TEX. L. REv. 101 (1986).
Published by Penn Law: Legal Scholarship Repository, 1994