Your Honor, years ago I recognized my kinship with
all living beings, and I made up my mind that I was not one bit better than the
meanest on earth. I said then, and I say now, that while there is a lower class,
I am in it, and while there is a criminal element I am of it, and while there is
a soul in prison, I am not free.
I listened to all that was said in this court in support and justification of
this prosecution, but my mind remains unchanged. I look upon the Espionage Law
as a despotic enactment in flagrant conflict with democratic principles and with
the spirit of free institutions....
Your Honor, I have stated in this court that I am opposed to the social system
in which we live; that I believe in a fundamental change -- but if possible by
peaceable and orderly means....
Standing here this morning, I recall my boyhood. At fourteen I went to work in a
railroad shop; at sixteen I was firing a freight engine on a railroad. I
remember all the hardships and privations of that earlier day, and from that
time until now my heart has been with the working class. I could have been in
Congress long ago. I have preferred to go to prison....
I am thinking this morning of the men in the mills and the factories; of the men
in the mines and on the railroads. I am thinking of the women who for a paltry
wage are compelled to work out their barren lives; of the little children who in
this system are robbed of their childhood and in their tender years are seized
in the remorseless grasp of Mammon and forced into the industrial dungeons,
there to feed the monster machines while they themselves are being starved and
stunted, body and soul. I see them dwarfed and diseased and their little lives
broken and blasted because in this high noon of Christian civilization money is
still so much more important than the flesh and blood of childhood. In very
truth gold is god today and rules with pitiless sway in the affairs of men.
In this country -- the most favored beneath the bending skies -- we have vast
areas of the richest and most fertile soil, material resources in inexhaustible
abundance, the most marvelous productive machinery on earth, and millions of
eager workers ready to apply their labor to that machinery to produce in
abundance for every man, woman, and child -- and if there are still vast numbers
of our people who are the victims of poverty and whose lives are an unceasing
struggle all the way from youth to old age, until at last death comes to their
rescue and lulls these hapless victims to dreamless sleep, it is not the fault
of the Almighty: it cannot be charged to nature, but it is due entirely to the
outgrown social system in which we live that ought to be abolished not only in
the interest of the toiling masses but in the higher interest of all
humanity....
I believe, Your Honor, in common with all Socialists, that this nation ought to
own and control its own industries. I believe, as all Socialists do, that all
things that are jointly needed and used ought to be jointly owned -- that
industry, the basis of our social life, instead of being the private property of
a few and operated for their enrichment, ought to be the common property of all,
democratically administered in the interest of all....
I am opposing a social order in which it is possible for one man who does
absolutely nothing that is useful to amass a fortune of hundreds of millions of
dollars, while millions of men and women who work all the days of their lives
secure barely enough for a wretched existence.
This order of things cannot always endure. I have registered my protest against
it. I recognize the feebleness of my effort, but, fortunately, I am not alone.
There are multiplied thousands of others who, like myself, have come to realize
that before we may truly enjoy the blessings of civilized life, we must
reorganize society upon a mutual and cooperative basis; and to this end we have
organized a great economic and political movement that spreads over the face of
all the earth.
There are today upwards of sixty millions of Socialists, loyal, devoted
adherents to this cause, regardless of nationality, race, creed, color, or sex.
They are all making common cause. They are spreading with tireless energy the
propaganda of the new social order. They are waiting, watching, and working
hopefully through all the hours of the day and the night. They are still in a
minority. But they have learned how to be patient and to bide their time. They
feel -- they know, indeed -- that the time is coming, in spite of all
opposition, all persecution, when this emancipating gospel will spread among all
the peoples, and when this minority will become the triumphant majority and,
sweeping into power, inaugurate the greatest social and economic change in
history.
In that day we shall have the universal commonwealth -- the harmonious
cooperation of every nation with every other nation on earth....
Your Honor, I ask no mercy and I plead for no immunity. I realize that finally the right must prevail. I never so clearly comprehended as now the great struggle between the powers of greed and exploitation on the one hand and upon the other the rising hosts of industrial freedom and social justice.
I can see the dawn of the better day for humanity. The people are awakening. In due time they will and must come to their own.
When the mariner, sailing over tropic seas, looks for relief from his weary
watch, he turns his eyes toward the southern cross, burning luridly above the
tempest-vexed ocean. As the midnight approaches, the southern cross begins to
bend, the whirling worlds change their places, and with starry fingerpoints the
Almighty marks the passage of time upon the dial of the universe, and though no
bell may beat the glad tidings, the lookout knows that the midnight is passing
and that relief and rest are close at hand. Let the people everywhere take heart
of hope, for the cross is bending, the midnight is passing, and joy cometh with
the morning.
I am now prepared to receive your sentence.
Book/CDs by Michael E. Eidenmuller, Published by
McGraw-Hill (2008)
Page Updated: 12/29/21
U.S. Copyright Status: Text and Image = Public domain.