Federal Judge Imprisons 'Wealers' for Labor Protests
Twenty-nine members of the 'Industrial Army' are sentenced to McNeil Island after defying a federal injunction in North Yakima.
The story, cleaned up
A cleaned-up reading of the newspaper page: spelling and layout repaired, one story lifted off a crowded page. It follows the original closely but it is not a transcription. The original page is below; read it if a detail matters.
The trial of the first batch of thirty-five 'Wealers' (members of the Industrial Army), which has occupied the attention of the United States court for one week, was concluded yesterday. Judge Hanford discharged six of the men and sentenced the remaining twenty-nine to McNeil Island for sixty days, finding them all guilty of contempt. The court ruled that the men had willfully defied federal orders regarding the custody of the Northern Pacific Railroad. Judge Hanford’s decision focused on the court's authority to protect railroad property during the financial depression, arguing that the men had no right to seize trains to reach Spokane. He dismissed claims that the men were ignorant of the law, asserting that their organized movement and presence on railroad property made them active participants in obstructing court-mandated receivers.
“Any departure from strictly regular, honest, legal methods, instead of bringing relief, only adds to and increases the burdens that rest upon the poor and the unfortunate.”
This 1894 trial of the 'Industrial Army'—a branch of the broader Coxey’s Army movement—highlights the collision between labor agitation and federal power during the Panic of 1893. Today's Seattle battles over labor rights and the criminalization of unhoused or transient populations echo the same struggle for bodily movement and public space that Judge Hanford adjudicated here.
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