The Colorado campaign was a defeat for the miners, and
a defeat for the union, but Mother Jones had become famous. She
continued to campaign on behalf of the miners and also testified
in front of the federal commission on the violence of the mine
guards and the company detectives. In addition, although the strike
in Colorado had failed, Mother Jones continued to campaign on behalf
of the imprisoned workers and union organizers, some of who had
been accused of murder. No guardsmen were accused or detained,
even though they were clearly involved in the shootings and massacres.
In February of 1915, Mother Jones continued her work with
garment workers in Chicago, and in 1917 she rallied on behalf of streetcar
workers in Bloomington, Illinois. Now in her eighties, she waged
a campaign to urge workers to shut down the streetcars. Their efforts
were successful, and management recognized the union and granted
concessions to its workers. From this streetcar struggle, Mother
Jones moved on to another one in Westchester, New York. She was
accused of inciting riots, even though violence and rioting had
occurred before her arrival.
Mother Jones continued to defend activists who had been
incarcerated. One of these, Thomas J. Mooney, had been sentenced
to death after a bomb exploded in San Francisco during a pro-war parade.
Mooney was against the United States's entering World War
I, an unpopular stance that made him unpopular in
the public eye. Although the testimony against Mooney was obviously
perjured, he was sentenced to death. Mother Jones continued to speak
in his defense, and persuaded others to do the same. She even spoke at
a meeting of the Women's Christian Temperance Union, an organization
that advocated the banning of all alcoholic beverages, which she
had previously criticized. Shortly before Mooney's execution, the
governor of California changed his sentence to life imprisonment
in 1918, and in 1939, he was finally freed.
Mother Jones returned to West Virginia in 1917. The war
had increased the price of coal, and the miners used the opportunity
to demand a share of the increased revenues. A no-strike clause
had been imposed because of the war, but Mother Jones and many
of the militants refused to honor the law. The law in question,
the Lever Act, endorsed the right to collective bargaining as long
as a no- strike policy was maintained. However, the living conditions
in West Virginia mine towns were terrible, and Mother Jones likened them
to slave huts. In these towns, there was no care for the sick, and
the people lived in a condition of desolate poverty.
One of the issues that Mother Jones spoke out against
was the right of women to vote, although this movement was rapidly
gaining popular support. Although Mother Jones viewed the participation
of women as integral to the success of the strikes, she spoke out against
the women's suffrage movement, which she felt alienated working
class women. Mother Jones felt that corporations bought off elected
officials, which meant that women's votes would have no impact on
the economic system. She saw women's suffrage as something that
distracted women from the more important class struggle. She also,
to a certain extent, took a very traditional view of family structure,
and felt that women's primary duties were at home. Summing up her
opposition to the suffrage movement, Mother Jones declared "You
don't need a vote to raise hell! You need convictions and a voice!"
