﻿T-Bone Slim Says Tears And Night-Riding Get No Saurkraut

A few years ago when I saw workers were disinclined to accept the message of industrial unionism I said they would be joining the Black Knights or other outfits of equally sombre hue. And I thought then I would hear them saying: “Oh, what a donkey I was!” All that has come to pass, but I am not gloating. I am sorry for them. The supercillious billious saviour from Russia did not come to save, us. A flyer into the realm of Ku Ku Klandom did not spike the farmer’s mortgage, and his twelve bucks is shot to hell. A farmer can be busted without a mortgage, but the mortgage does it quicker, and night riding barbers, bakers and pool sharks aren’t going to make a “going concern” of the farmer—neither will politics.
No wages has been in the harvest fields since the workers took to being rugged individualists—kind of pale around the gizzards, but rugged individuals just the same. And, as much as the I.W.W. would like to raise the wages for the unorganized, it can not do it because the scissorbills have a terrific inferiority complex—you know what I mean, no backbone. They just sit down alongside the farmers at the wailing wall and weep bitter tears by the bucketful— but tears never did anything but kill the grass and leave that much less for the real donkey to eat.
If the I.W.W. ever starts crying, I’m going to hang myself, so I will, and I won’t even waste good rope—I’ll use haywire.
Time is passing, and although it’s not too late yet to shed the burden placed on our shoulders, I’m afraid the saurkraut will go stale if we fight for it politically and leave the matter entirely to professional tax-gatherers and their cohorts.
There is no sense in bearing this triple burden. Let’s be done with it and slap a mortgage on the industrial chiselers in the form of direct action. Don’t worry about the president. You’ll get one. You always did before. Just keep your eye on the saurkraut barrel—and don’t blink.
Join the Union of your kraal—let no one for you think,
Keep your eye on the saurkraut barrel, and don’t you dare to blink.
Oh Susana Jane, don’t you cry for me,
For the One Big Union movement is One Big Jamboree.