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“Citizens of this Great Republic”: Politics and the West Virginia Miners, 1900–19221

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 February 2009

Roger Fagge
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The West Virginia Miners engaged in remarkable inter-ethnic rebellions in the early twentieth century, against the “feudal” conditions in the Mountain State's coalfields. This paper challenges the view that these actions were backed by an equally radical and class-conscious language based on Americanism. It shows how due to various barriers, ranging from ethnic differences to electoral interference, political involvement on the part of the miners was sporadic and unsuccessful, and they were unable to form a common, coherent political identity. Instead they articulated a broad and ultimately ambiguous appeal to “American” rights and values, which focused on the exceptionalism of West Virginia, and took the interpretation of Americanism to be self-evident.

Type
Research Article
Information
International Review of Social History , Volume 40 , Issue 1 , April 1995 , pp. 31 - 50
Copyright
Copyright © Internationaal Instituut voor Sociale Geschiedenis 1995

References

2 Matewan (Dir. John Sayles, US, 1987) Cinecom Int./MGM.

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4 For details of march on Blair, see Lewis, Black Coal Miners in America, pp. 161–164; Jordan, D.P., ”The Mingo War: Labor Violence in the Southern West Virginia Coal Fields, 1919–1922”, in Fink, G.M. and Reed, M.E. (eds), Essays in Southern Labor History: Selected Papers, Southern Labor History Conference, 1976 (Westport, 1977), pp. 101–143Google Scholar; and Fagge, R.J., “Power, Culture and Conflict in the Coalfields of West Virginia and South Wales, 1900–1922” (Ph.D. dissertation, University of Cambridge, 1991Google Scholar; to be published by Manchester University Press, 1996), pp. 282–294.

5 Corbin, Life, Work and Rebellion in the Coal Fields, pp. 246, 244.

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20 The bill, passed in early 1919, was supposed to “foster the ideals, institutions and government of West Virginia and the United States, and to prohibit the teaching of doctrines and display of flags antagonistic to the form and spirit of their constitution or laws”, Journal of the House of Delegates of the State of West Virginia for the 34th Regular Session, Commencing January 14 1919, and the Extraordinary Session Commencing March 11 1919 (Charleston, 1919), p. 52. On the deportation of “aliens”, see Cornwell to Walker, 14 November 1919, WVU, John J. Cornwell Papers (A+M 952), Series 35, Box 137; Walker to Att. General, 17 November 1919, Washington DC, National Archive (NA), Dept. of Justice (RG 60), File 16-130-83, Part 1.

21 Fagge, “Power, Culture and Conflict”, pp. 226–227.

22 US Attorney Northcott to Attorney-General, 18 December 1922, NA, Department of Justice (RG 60), File 16-130-83, Folder 4; Walker Report, pp. 2–4, Daily Reports of Field Investigators, March–August 1923, Suitland, Washington National Records Center (WNRC), Records of US Coal Commission (RG 68), Division of Investigation of Labor Facts, Labour Relations Section, 161, Box 70.

23 W.H. Cline t o Wilson, Secretary o f Labor, 12 October 1920, WNRC, Records o f Federal Mediation and Conciliation Service (FMCS) (RG 280), File 170/1185, Part One.

24 Wolfe to Collins, 7 June 1916, Collins papers, Box 14, File 96.

25 Labor Argus, 23 April 1908, p. 1; 30 April 1908, p. 1.

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34 Ibid., p. 82; Williams, West Virginia, p. 146.

35 Mooney, Struggle in the Coal Fields, pp. 129–130.

36 Trotter, Coal, Class and Color, pp. 47–49, 226–227, 251–252.

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40 Salvatore, Eugene V. Debs, pp. 220–302; Ginger, R., Eugene V. Debs: A Biography (originally published as The Bending Cross, New Brunswick, 1949. This edition, New York, 1962), pp. 220–332Google Scholar; Howe, Socialism and America, pp. 3–35.

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42 Laslett, Labor and the Left, pp. 218–231; “End of an Alliance: Selected Correspondence between Socialist Party Secretary Adolph Germer, and UMW of A Leaders in World War One”, Labor History, 12, 4 (1977), pp. 570–595; Howe, Socialism and America, pp. 36–48; Salvatore, Eugene V. Debs, pp. 262–345; Ginger, Eugene V. Debs, pp. 335–482; Weinstein, J., The Decline of Socialism in America, 1912–1925 (New York, 1967)Google Scholar.

43 The most obvious examples of this is Corbin, D.A., “Betrayal in the West Virginia Coal Fields: Eugene V. Debs and the Socialist Party of America, 1912–1914”, Journal of American History 64 (1978), pp. 987–1009CrossRefGoogle Scholar. The quote is on p. 988. It must be noted, however, that Corbin himself downplays the influence of the SPA in the full length study, Life, Work and Rebellion in the Coal Fields, pp. 240–247. Barkey's “Socialist Party in West Virginia”, although less polemical than the Corbin article, also tends to overestimate the SPA strength, see in particular, chapter IV, “We had the Revolution”. See also Nash, M., Conflict and Accommodation: Coal Miners, Steel Workers, and Socialism, 1890–1920 (Westport, Conn., 1982), pp. 139–148Google Scholar, which falls into a similar trap to the Corbin article. Part of the problem with the Corbin and Nash argument is their over-reliance on the accounts of contemporary socialists who due to the circumstances of struggle, and for reasons of propaganda, exaggerated socialist influence. See, for example, Kintzer, E.H., “Reconstruction in West Virginia”, International Socialist Review, 14 (1913), pp. 23–24Google Scholar.

44 Corbin, “Betrayal in the West Virginia Coal Fields”. For a detailed critique of this view, see Fagge, R.J., “Eugene V. Debs in West Virginia, 1913: A Re-appraisal”, West Virginia History 52 (1993), pp. 1–18Google Scholar.

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47 Ibid., pp. 99–107; Jones, Limits of Liberty, p. 650.

48 Wheeling Majority, 5 December 1912, p. 1.

49 In West Virginia, as elsewhere, Debs' popularity was wider than those who defined themselves as socialists. See, for example, the warm reception he received during his visit to the state in 1913 – even from the local press: Charleston Gazette, 20 May 1913, p. 1; Wheeling Register, 20 May 1913, p. 1. See also Spivak, A Man and His Time, p. 62.

50 Wheeling Majority 5 December 1912, p. 1.

51 Ibid.

52 Wheeling Majority, 14 November 1912, p. 1.

53 Labor Argus, 17 November 1910, p. 1.

54 Williams, West Virginia and the Captains of Industry, pp. 123–124.

55 Barkey, “The Socialist Party in West Virginia from 1898–1920”, p. 164.

56 Socialist and Labor Star, 11 December 1914, p. 2.

57 Ibid., 13 November 1914, p. 3.

58 Barkey, “The Socialist Party in West Virginia from 1898–1920”, pp. 193–195, 251.

59 Nash, Conflict and Accommodation, p. 146.

60 Fagge, “Power, Culture and Conflict”, pp. 226, 230–231.

61 Corbin, Life, Work and Rebellion in the Coal Fields, p. 240; Interview with Bert Castle, WVU, Oral History Collection.

62 Edmunds, however, also later left the party. Lewis, R.L., “The Black Presence in the Paint-Cabin Creek Strike 1912–1913”, West Virginia History, 44 (1985–1986), p. 66Google Scholar.

63 Wheeling Register, 6 October 1912, p. 20.

64 Barkey, “The Socialist Party in West Virginia from 1898–1920”, p. 152.

65 UMWA, Proceedings of 24th Convention, 1914, p. 408.

66 Debs made his accusations at the height of the controversy over his 1913 visit: see Debs, E.V., “Debs Denounces Critics”, International Socialist Review, 14 (1913), pp. 105–106Google Scholar. Salvatore not only agrees, but believes that the Paint Creek strike “confirmed all his (Debs') worst fears concerning the nature of IWW organising drives”, Eugene V, Debs, p. 257. Other historians suggesting a strong IWW presence are Nash, Conflict and Accommodation, p. 143; Bird, S., Georgakas, D. and Shaffer, D. (eds), Solidarity Forever, The IWW: An Oral History of the Wobblies (London, 1987), p. 126Google Scholar.

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77 M. Jones to Borah, n.d., General Records of the Department of Labor, File 16–13 E, Box 24.

78 UMWJ, 15 November 1900, p. 4.

79 Gompers, “Russianized West Virginia”, p. 825.

80 UMWJ, 11 October 1900, p. 4.

81 Labor Argus, 8 July 1909, p 1.

83 Wheeling Register, 3 September 1921, p. 6.

83 For example, at the start of this period miners paraded at Loup Creek on Independence Day “wearing the miners badge”, UMWJ, 19 July 1900, p. 4.

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86 Ibid., p. 1.

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88 Ibid.

89 L.U. 404 to Secretary of Labor, 12 September 1921, FMCS, File 170/1185 A.

90 Resolutions Committee, Rosebud to President Harding, 2 September 1920, ibid., File 170/1185, Part One.

91 Conditions in the Paint Creek District, Pt. 3, p. 2263.

92 Letter from various locals at mass meeting to Keeney, 10 July 1921, Morgan Papers, Box 8, File 1.

93 Local 4384, Monclo to Morgan, 14 July 1921, ibid., Box 8, File 2.

94 Mountclare Committee to Morgan, 15 July 1921, ibid., Box 8, File 2.

95 UMWJ, 15 November 1900, p. 4.

96 Fowles to Harding, 6 January 1922, FMCS, File 170/1185 A.

97 West Virginia Federationist, 26 February 1920, p. 1.

98 Conditions in the Paint Creek District, Pt. 3, p. 2264.

99 Statement enclosed with letter from A.R. Montgomery to Cornwell, Cornwell Papers, Series 35, Box 136.

100 See leaflet “The Work of the American Constitutional Association”, ibid., Box 135.

101 Morgan to A.M. Wimer, Bower Local, 16 July 1921, Morgan Papers, Box 8, File 2.

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