Unrecorded Texas Labor Unrest Broadside

[Texas]: [Labor]: [Rangel-Cline Defense Committee]:

Shall Texas Hang These Workers? [caption title].

Los Angeles: Citizen Print Shop, [ca. 1914]. [4]pp., on a single folded sheet, 5.5 x 7 inches. Even toning, old horizontal fold. Very good. Item #12625

An unrecorded brochure pertaining to the legal fight of a group of labor activists accused of murder in Texas in the early-20th century. The fourteen men, most either labor activists for the International Workers of the World, socialists, or anarchists (or all three) were on their way to Mexico in 1913 to organize Mexican laborers when they were ambushed by a posse.  After one of the group was killed, they took two of the posse as hostages, and shot one who fought them in his effort to escape.  The two most prominent members of the group – Charles Cline and Jesus M. Rangel – were members of Ricardo Flores Magon’s Liberal Party, and were also reportedly traveling to Mexico to take part in the Mexican Revolution.

The present pamphlet presents the defendants as conscientious labor organizers, “trying to teach labor its rights and…organize the Mexican unskilled laborers who as underbidders are a menace to the standard of the American worker.” The defendants “believe in the necessity for economic emancipation and taught that the workers should have what they produce.” The work then includes biographical passages of Cline and Rangel, along with more details on the case.  Cline is characterized as such an effective speaker and organizer that “he is regarded as a very dangerous character by the lumber barons of Louisiana and Texas.” Upon discussing the notion that authorities in Texas are seeking the death penalty for Cline and Rangel, the author asks: “Will the workers of America allow the master class to pick off their most valuable men, one by one? Let a million voices of labor answer no!” The brochure was issued by the Rangel-Cline Defense Committee, which prints a call to action on the final page, along with various endorsements, including that of Eugene V. Debs.  The work ends with an optimistic cry: “Things are coming our way and with YOUR HELP, pulling all together, we will WIN THIS BATTLE!” Cline and Rangel were each given 99 years in prison and most of the other defendants were put in jail for at least ten years, whether or not they had anything to do with the crime. The case is widely regarded as a miscarriage of justice motivated by business interests in Texas with an absolute dependence on cheap, and unorganized, labor.

Price: $500