The Bottineau courant. (Bottineau, Bottineau County, N.D.) 1895-1929, 1917-05-31
THE NOTORIOUS MOONEY TRIAL.

The current issue of the Womans Journal, n of the most ably edited
and most progressive newspapers of the elite east contains the following
editorial reference to the now nationally notorious Mooney trial at San Fran
cisco. AS a Courant contributor elsewhere in this issue also takes up this
subject, the Journals editorial is quite pertinent:
In San Francisco for some time past the Chamber of Commerce has been
making "a upon the trade unions of that CITY, Any employer who was in
clined to grant the shorter hours asked for by the unions has been intimd-
aMd and coerced into refusing, by the threat of financial ruin if he complied.
The same threat a held owe the head of every. daily paper IN mat, CITY,
and not n dared to print any news of the struggle except from the Cham
Der of Commences point of view. Then the opponents OF organized abor
went a step farther. Last summer during a preparedness parade in San
Francisco, some criminal crank threw a bomb from a house roof, killing
several spectators. Thereupon four OF five labor leaders were arrested and
charged with the crime. There a no reason to suppose that they had any
thing to do with it; but they were the men whom the Chamber of Commerce
most desired to get out of the way.
On San Francisco the bad custom exists of choosing a Jury from men
who volunteer their services Is jurors, n who mostly make their living
by it. AS they are dependent mainly upon the District Attorney tr te
naturally wish to please him. District Attorney Fickert was holly eager to
convict the labor men, and the jury convicted the first two, Billings and
the evidence. A few witnesses Of dsreputable character swore to having
en them arrive on the scene with a uitcase just before tn explosion,
of the crime, the accused men were with them in a wholly different part
of the city. The albi was o complete and convincing that all unpre 8mee
" "a sentenced to live Imprisonment and Mooney to death.
The Hon. Bourke Cochran had given his eminent legal talent to the de-
try describing to great audiences the conspiracy that evidently existed to
put x thze la Labor cI Leaders der he out s of tf i Nay eS by u daH aE1d eapers, it has been
followed with intense interest by the working people all over me world.
When Mooney was sentenced to death, a huge crowd gathered before tn
American Embassy at Petrograd to voice their indignation, while most peo-
pie here n the United States knew nothing about the case.
Then came a sensational development, Frank c: Oxman, the chief witness
against Mooney, had offered money to F. E. Rigan to come to San Francisco
and swear that he saw Mooney on the spot. Rigan had ben announces y
go through with it. He did not testify; and after Mooney was ondemn NJ n e
commit perjury, and the whole "frame-up" became clear.
It made an immense mems s.s sensation Jon rne At first it, Pi hts n Att S . F Flick whose eae
tool he was, straightway stfened him up, and a great effort is TO- beng beng
made by the Chamber of Commerce to whitewash Oxman, and to carry thu
sentenced Mooney to death, is indignant over the perjury commltted, n
is moving vigorously to get him a new trial.