The labor journal. [volume] (Everett, Wash.) 1909-1976, 1917-08-24
FICKERT'SLAST
FRAME-UP TO
HANG MOONEY

NEW YORK, Aug. Is. - Tom
Mooney and the four other victims
of the frame-up in San Francisco
can only be saved from death or
heavy prison sentences if the ma
tion's aroused workers will use their
organized power to defeat the at
tempt of the United Railways ard
the Chamber of Commerce to crush
unionism on the Coast.
AS the first step, the vested in-
terests of California must be baked
in their desperate scheme to becloud
the issue of clear-cut attack on la
Dor by taking Alexander Berkman
West and trying him on the indict-
ment returned just before Rena
Moneys case. came to a close.
These opinions were expressed here
by Edwin V. Mckenzie, one of the
four attorneys handling the case for
Tom Mooney, Rena Mooney, Israel
Weinberg, Warren X. Billings and
Ed Nolan, the five labor leaders on
whom the money barons of San
Francisco are trying to fasten the
crime of having set off the bomb
which exploded during the prepared
ness parade on July %, 1916, killing
ten persons.
Mckenzie has come East to help
awaken workers here to the danger
that threatens all of the five de-
PENDANTS if Berkman once gets into
the clutches of the frame-up ring in
San Francisco Officials on the
Coast want to hang Berkman, for if
they can do that, it will be easy to
convince a professional jury, care
fully selected by the prosecution,
that all the other five defendants
should be hung for the high crime
of having always aided the toilers
to secure better working conditions,
and therefore are a menace to the
society which is holding the workers
in subjection for its own gain.
Mckenzie says that District At
torney Fickert is cock-sure that if
he can dispose of Alexander Berk-
man first, and drag in issues into
the Mooney case absolutely foreign
to it, such as anarchism and the
draft question, it will be easy for
the gang of perjurers and henchmen
that he controls to find the five
union members guilty"
Realizing the perilious situation
in which five innocent workers find
themselves as a result of this latest
trick Of the grab-it-all in San Fran
cisco, the United Hebrew Trades of
this city is making vigorous cam
paign to prevent Berkman from be-
coming an additional victim of one
of the most outrageous conspiracies
directed against workers.
The United Hebrew Trades, which
has nearly a quarter of million
members, at it's regular meeting un
animously voted to raise funds to
fight against having Berkman taken
to the coast Already such power
full unions as the Amalgamated
Clothing Workers, the Joint Board
of the Furriers Union, and the Joint
| Board of the Cloakmakers' Union,
have come forward with generous
contributions. Max Pine, secretary
treasurer of the United Hebrew
Trades, to whom all contributions
should be sent at his headquarters,
IT'S East Broadway, New York City,
has made an urgent appeal for
money to all workers who want to
help save four guiltless men and one
guiltless woman from the gallows.
At the same time, Mckenzie points
out that labor should not be lulled
to inaction by the fact that Rena
Mooney was acquitted. He says
that District Attorney Fickert has
vowed in his rage at having been
foiled in his effort to have her
convicted like Billings and Mooney,
that he would try her on each of the
seven remaining indictments, if that
was necessary to get a conviction.
Mckenzie also says that the trial
of Rena Mooney shows that the
prosecution itself is afraid to use
Frank C. Oxman, cattleman now un-
der charges of subornation of per-
jury for his testimony in the Mooney
case, again.
If Fickert had used him, Nc
Kenzie says, the attorneys for the
defense stood ready to prove that
Oxman had lied when he said he
was in San Francisco at the time
of the explosion. According to
careful investigation made by the
defense, Oxman did not arrive in
San Francisco until about 6:35 d. m.