Free speech fights

Over 500 men and women went to jail during the free speech fight.

two hundred went on a hunger strike that lasted from eleven to thirteen days and then went from thirty to forty-five days on bread and water two ounces of bread per day four members lost their lives as a result of the treatment accorded them in this fight Many more free speech fights have occurred since the one in Spokane, the most notable being at Fresno, California.

Here, the authorities in cahoots with employers attempted to stop IWW agitation, which was directly toward the organization of the thousands of unskilled workers in the San Joaquin Valley, the fruit belt of California.

Street meetings were forbidden in Fresno.

failing to destroy the i w w by terroristic methods the employers next proceeded to use a compliant government in an attempt to destroy the organization nation-wide raids upon the offices of local and industrial unions and the general offices were staged books papers literature and supplies of the organizers were illegally seized and in some cases destroyed by government agents this was followed by a grand jury in the city of chicago returning an indictment against one hundred and sixty six officials and members charging them with conspiracy and sedition in a mock trial that followed, before a corporation-owned judge, who cloaked his fealty to the profiteers with a veneer of patriotism, a jury, hand-picked by the APL, American Profiteers Legionnaires, returned a verdict of guilty against 98 of the defendants, 93 of whom were sentenced to terms in the penitentiary, ranging from 1 to 20 years.

But in spite of all, the IWW still lives, and is slowly but surely building up the organization that will strike the shackles of wage slavery from the limbs of the world's workers, and make this earth a fit place for free men and women to inhabit.

Free Speech Fights San Diego, California was the scene of a bitter and brutal fight for free speech, participated in by the IWW and Socialist Party local.

The fight cost two members of the IWW their lives as a result of police brutality.