1916 Preparedness Day Bombing

consummate face of American socialism [the SPA’s (Socialist Party of America) candidate for President five times], was at the meeting and proclaimed that if workers continued to side with the moderate AFL, they could expect to be “puked on in return.”1 The 1916 Preparedness Day Watching the IWW and labor organizers of other stripes Bombing very closely was the Pinkerton National Detective Agency, an important piece of labor relations in the Gilded Age and Pro- Anarchy and Terrorism in Progressive Era America gressive Eras. The Pinkertons, founded by Allan Pinkerton in 1850, emerged as the private detective agency in the country. In fact, they orchestrated the Steunenberg investigation. Jeffrey A. Johnson They had been made famous by the successful thwarting of an assassination attempt on Abraham Lincoln; over time, its agents were more commonly hired and employed by corpo- rations looking to protect their financial interests. Outdated police forces at the time simply could not patrol urban envi- ronments effectively, and they stood ill-equipped to handle the large labor demonstrations of the late nineteenth century. By the Homestead Strike, the Pinkertons were an acceptable and employed means of handling strikes and strikebreakers (though, ironically, the detectives could usually expect a wage of only about $1 a day). To meet the demand of labor unrest and the crime that came with westward expansion, the Pinker- tons opened a new office in Denver in 1886 and had 20 offices by 1907. The business, in other words, warranted this com- pany growth. They hired 58 new detectives in 1899 alone. The Pinkertons had clearly been anti-labor, and Samuel Gompers cited the “unscrupulousness” of the Pinkertons, saying “they have been not only private soldiers, hired by capital to commit violence, and spies in the ranks of labor, they have been and 1 Jeffrey A. Johnson, “They Are All Red Out Here”: Socialist Politics inthe Pacific Northwest, 1895–1925 (Norman: The University of Oklahoma Press, 2018 2008), 71. 68 during the Coeur d’Alene troubles, who spoke of Steunenberg in glowing terms, observing “a truer friend of laboring classes never lived.” Yet, Steunenberg was famous (or infamous) for the handling of that 1899 Mining War. The most radical miners and workers of the Northwest—and elsewhere—never for- got Steunenberg’s actions. While anarchists and those keen on “the deed” would have rejoiced, news of the 1905 Steunenberg murder shocked many others. After all, its gruesome news was coupled with itbe- ing the first time in American history that dynamite was used in an assassination. Blame quickly fell where it increasingly did: on leftist “radical” labor activists. Idaho Governor Frank Gooding issued a $5,000 reward for the culprit(s) and Pinkerton detectives quickly received a confession from Harry Orchard, a labor spy and someone directly involved in the 1899 Coeur d’Alene violence as a labor terrorist. Orchard seemed to represent a growing radical fringe of labor activists that many feared might cause just this kind of violence. After all, only a few months before the murder, radical American labor had in Chicago what one organizer called the “Continental Congress of the Working Class”— the 1905 founding meeting of the IWW, a mix of socialists and disgruntled trade unionists separating themselves from more traditional unions. At the center of the IWW, and messenger of the “Continental Congress” rhetoric, was a hard-drinking, Stetson-wearing, one-eyed labor organizer— standing 5’11” and 236 pounds—the menacing William “Big Bill” Haywood. He and IWW founders envisioned a union that did not discriminate on membership or tactics. Instead, the IWW—or “Wobblies,” as they became more commonly known—advocated for “one big union” and hoped that they could have a membership that did not exclude based on skill, race, or gender. A radical union with socialist leanings, they decided to abandon accommodating approaches of unions like the American Federation of Labor (AFL). Eugene Debs, the 67 During a snowy Southern Idaho night on December 30, 1905, former Governor Frank Steunenberg headed home. He had retired to Caldwell, Idaho, just west of Boise, four years ear- lier, had settled into business ventures with his brothers and was otherwise enjoying a normal winter evening. Because of Contents blizzard-like conditions outside, he stopped into the Saratoga Hotel on his way for some mulled cider and perused the Cald- well Tribune by the barroom fireplace. On the chilly walk from Preface 7 the Saratoga to his home, Steunenberg looked his peculiarly disheveled self. His brown hair matted to his forehead, the Acknowledgments 9 tall, stocky governor looked “like a Roman senator,” according Timeline 11 to one friend. When he arrived at his house on 16th Avenue, like he had done hundreds of times before, he walked up to his Introduction 13 front wrought-iron gate. A hastily built trigger on the gate det- onated a bomb, with the explosion taking both of his legs and CHAPTER 1. “Perpetuated Hatred and Suspicion”: throwing the governor 10 ft. With half of his clothes ripped Labor and Capital at Odds 17 off, he laid there with mangled legs, and the snow an ominous Edward Bellamy .................... 29 shade of pink. His wife thought the noise was a potbelly stove Marx and Engels .................... 34 exploding but would quickly discover that it was something much more sinister. Steunenberg lived only another 20 min- CHAPTER 2. “The Wrath of Man”: Anarchism utes and was pronounced dead in his home at 7:10 pm that Comes to the United States 44 evening. Shusui Kotuku ..................... 54 But the assassination was much more than a random violent act. Near the close of his gubernatorial term in 1899, Steunen- CHAPTER 3. “Assassins, Murderers, Conspira- berg had dealt with a serious crisis: a strike by the Western Fed- tors”: The March of Progressive Era Radicalism eration of Miners in the Coeur d’Alene district in the northern and Violence 65 part of the state, the epicenter of Idaho’s richest gold, lead, and Caldwell, Idaho, in 1905 . 71 silver mines. Responding to the use of violence by strikers (in- CHAPTER 4. “The Road to Universal Slaughter” cluding the sabotage of the Bunker Hill mine), he proclaimed and “This Dastardly Act”: The Preparedness De- martial law and when he asked for federal troops, President bate and Bombing 91 William McKinley obliged. The soldiers were ordered to round Arsenic as a Weapon . 97 up over 1,000 miners and placed them into detention centers— hot and cramped “bullpens,” as they were known by miners. CHAPTER 5. “The Fanatic Demon”: The Manhunt 117 On the one hand, validations came from those like Bartlett Sin- Anarchism and Socialism . 134 clair, Steunenberg’s personal representative in northern Idaho 66 3 CHAPTER 6. “The Act of One Is the Act of All”: The Trials 137 Mysterious Suitcases . 143 The Mooney Case Abroad . 161 CHAPTER 3. “Assassins, CHAPTER 7. “Fighting Anarchists of America”: The Attacks of 1919 and 1920, and the Mooney Murderers, Conspirators”: Defense Onward 175 The Dreyfus Affair . 212 The March of Progressive Era Famous Supporters . 217 Radicalism and Violence Epilogue 218 Documents 224 The events and emerging organizations of the 1890s clearly DOCUMENT 1. The “Pittsburgh Proclamation” . 224 indicated that, at times, the nation began taking a radical DOCUMENT 2. Preparedness Parades . 230 turn, and acts of labor violence and anarchist terrorism grew DOCUMENT 3. “Preparedness, the Road to Univer- increasingly common. More traditional approaches to reform sal Slaughter,” by Emma Goldman . 232 (party politics, the traditional labor movement, and benevolent DOCUMENT 4. Tom Mooney, a Miner’s Son . 241 reform organizations and institutions) sometimes gave way DOCUMENT 5. U.S. Espionage Act, 15 June 1917 and to radical alternatives. Emerging out of labor and the left’s The U.S. Sedition Act, 16 May, 1918 . 250 discontent with Gilded Age and Progressive Era disparities Section 1 . 250 were explicit organizations and approaches on the left that Section 2 . 252 more regularly and openly advocated violence, sabotage, and Section 3 . 253 “direct action.” Certainly, the Socialist Labor Party, Socialist Section 4 . 253 Party of America, and later the Industrial Workers of the Section 5 . 254 World (IWW) formed a complex network of organizations, Section 6 . 254 radicals, organizers, and agitators that rank-and-file Ameri- Section 7 . 254 cans may have feared, and the events during the decade before Section 8 . 255 the San Francisco bombing seemed to only confirm a growing Section 9 . 255 discontent. If the march of labor versus capital and the rise of American anarchism were any indication, a continued Bibliography 257 advance of class tension and antiradical buildup continued ARCHIVAL MATERIALS . 257 toward 1916 in these preceding years. In many ways, the ABBREVIATIONS . 258 nation’s fears focused on, of all places, Idaho. SELECTED PAMPHLETS . 258 4 65 of Mother Earth, with stops in Chicago, Milwaukee, Toledo, LEGAL PROCEEDINGS . 259 and St. Louis. He delivered speeches on a variety of topics, NEWSPAPERS AND PERIODICALS . 260 but among them were speeches typical of his left-leaning BOOKS, ESSAYS, AND JOURNAL ARTICLES . 261 positions, such as “War – At Home and Abroad,” “The War of the Classes,” and “Is Labor Justified in Using Violence?” As the European war loomed, his announcement also made plain his hope to organize antimilitarist leagues in the cities he visited. Berkman, like Goldman, loved San Francisco and he, too, settled there in 1915. “The climate is great, the country beautiful. The bay and the ocean and the mountains –all around you,” he wrote.25 By the eve of the 1916 attack, then, the city had its radical and anarchist elements, many of whom operated openly and unapologetically.

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