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Tom Mooney was an active member of the Socialist Party, and an avid campaigner for Eugene Debs for President. He edited a radical newspaper called Revolt and was friends with a number of anarchists, many of whom argued that violent acts could be useful instances of "propaganda by the deed." In short, the establishment viewed Tom Mooney as a radical man, and in 1916 they viewed him as increasingly dangerous.
Mooney in 1916 lived in San Francisco, and was involved in two activities that year which made him an enemy of conservative city leaders. First, he was involved in a unionizing drive for employees of the United Railroads of San Francisco. Second, he was resisting efforts to draw the United States into the war that was then raging in Europe. While most city politicians approved of U.S. "preparedness," Mooney and his comrades argued against American militarism.
At a huge Preparedness Day rally in San Francisco in the summer of 1916 the crowd was shocked by the bright flash and dull roar of an exploding bomb. Ten innocent people died, and the local police came under considerable pressure to make arrests of the bomber or bombers. The police had virtually no evidence as to who was responsible, but arrested Mooney as well as Mooney's wife. They also arrested three other men, including Warren K. Billings, who had a reputation for being committed to violent action for political purposes.
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Although evidence suggested Mooney and his wife had been blocks away from the explosion, Mooney was convicted of first degree murder. Billings was convicted of second degree murder, while the other three defendants were not convicted. The court gave Mooney the death sentence.
Not long after the trial, evidence began to accumulate to the effect that Mooney and Billings had been convicted on perjured testimony. A conservative federal commission that looked into the case found that the aim of the entire criminal proceedings had been simply to convict Mooney and Billings no matter what the facts. Eventually even the jurors and the presiding judge made public statements to the effect that they had erred. Tens of thousands of Americans called on President Wilson to pardon the two men. Eventually Mooney's death sentence was commuted to life in prison, but neither man was released.
For two decades Mooney and Billings were viewed as labor's most important martyrs, the very symbol of government action to stifle labor organization and political dissent. Finally, in 1939 Governor Culbert Olsen ordered the release of the two men. The formerly fiery Billings now involved himself in the centrist politics of his Watchmaker's Union. As for Mooney, the twenty-three years in prison had broken his health, and he died less than three years after winning his freedom.
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For the political collector there are a number of items that support Mooney, or Mooney and Billings both. Of the buttons, the one shown at the top of this page (a cello from the Brunt Company of California) is the most common. It can often be had for around $12.
For the collector who is wise enough to seek paper items as well as buttons and 3-D items, there is a wealth of pamphlet materials, and well as some graphic fliers or posters. The cut shown above, with a Mooney banner, is reproduced from a pamphlet entitled Tom Mooney, written by Theodore Dreiser, one of America's greatest novelists of that era.
Other nice collectibles related to Mooney are several buttons supporting the novelist Upton Sinclair for governor of California. Sinclair was the Socialist gubernatorial nominee in 1926 and 1930, and the Democratic nominee in 1934. The Mooney case was an issue in all three campaigns. The button pictured below was from one of the two Socialist races. A similar button from 1930 says "Vote Socialist. Free Mooney. End Unemployment. Sinclair for Governor."
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While there are hundreds of different buttons demanding the release of various political prisoners, the campaign to free Tom Mooney was one of the strongest, and was undoubtedly the longest-lasting. Over the two decades of Mooney's imprisonment, labor and leftist groups kept up a steady campaign to free the two framed men—Mooney and Billings.
| © 1998 by Stephen Cresswell |