Mother Jones

WE WANT PRESIDENT ROOSEVELT to hear the wail of the children who never have a chance to go to school but work eleven and twelve hours a day in the textile mills of Pennsylvania; who weave the carpets that he and you walk upon and the lace curtains in your windows, and the clothes of the people. Fifty years ago there was a cry against slavery and men gave up their lives to stop the selling of black children on the block. Today the white child is sold for two dollars a week to the manufacturers. Fifty years ago the black babies were sold C. 0.D. Today the white baby is sold on the installment plan.

In Georgia where children work day and night in the cotton mills they have just passed a bill to protect song birds. What about little children from whom all song is gone? . . .

The trouble is that no one in Washington cares. I saw our legislators in one hour pass three bills for the relief of the railways but when labor cries for aid for the children they will not listen.

I asked a man in prison once how he happened to be there and he said he had stolen a pair of shoes. I told him if he had stolen a railroad he would be a United States Senator.

- Mother Jones, in a speech delivered in 1903 at Coney Island, NY. She had led 300 men, women, and children on a 17-day march to Teddy Roosevelt's home, but the president refused to see them when they arrived a few days later.

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