1. George Perkins to SG, Oct. 12, 1917, Files of the Office of the President, General Correspondence, reel 89, frames 129-30, AFL Records.

2. George William Perkins served as president of the Cigar Makers' International Union of America from 1891 to 1926.

3. On Sept. 5, 1917, the Department of Justice made simultaneous raids on the IWW headquarters in Chicago and on local IWW offices and the homes of IWW members in over thirty other cities around the country. Subsequent raids and arrests continued throughout the fall. In Chicago one hundred sixty-six IWW members were indicted on charges of conspiracy to interfere with the war effort, and over one hundred were brought to trial on Apr. 1, 1918. One hundred of them were found guilty; most received sentences ranging from five to twenty years in prison and together they were fined over $2 million. Secondary trials in Sacramento and Wichita began in December 1918 and resulted in additional convictions. The Supreme Court declined to review the Chicago cases (William.D.Haywood et al. v. United States, 256 U.S. 689 [1921] ) but President Warren Harding freed several of the IWW prisoners in 1922, and President Calvin Coolidge commuted the sentences of all remaining wartime prisoners in 1923.

4. Hinton Clabaugh was a division superintendent for the Department of Justice bureau of investigation in Chicago.

5. John Fitzpatrick to SG, Oct. 10, 1917, Files of the Office of the President, General Correspondence, reel 89, frame 56, AFL Records.

6. John J. Fitzpatrick served as president of the Chicago Federation of Labor (FOL; 1900-1901, 1906-46) and as an AFL salaried organizer (1903-23).

7. Oscar Nelson to Fitzpatrick, Oct. 6, 1917, Files of the Office of the President, General Correspondence, reel 89, frames 58-59, AFL Records.

8.  Oscar Fred Nelson, a vice-president of the Chicago FOL from 1910 to 1935, served as a commissioner of conciliation for the U.S. Department of Labor from 1917 to 1922.

9. The Illinois State FOL was organized in 1888 and chartered by the AFL the same year.

10. SG discussed the matter with Attorney General Thomas Gregory on Oct. 17, 1917.

11. Rosa Lee Guard, SG's private secretary.

WEB Accessibility