Colorado Labor Wars - The Aftermath

The Aftermath

After decades of struggle in the mines of the West, the miners who made up the Western Federation of Miners had come to a class analysis of their circumstances. Haywood said that miners were exploited by "barbarous gold barons" who "did not find the gold, they did not mine the gold, they did not mill the gold, but by some weird alchemy all the gold belonged to them."

The language of the Cripple Creek District Citizens' Alliance suggests that they also viewed the struggle as a class conflict. Their resolutions to Governor Peabody spoke not of prosecuting the lawless strikers, but rather of "controlling the lawless classes." This view echoed that expressed by the governor when he declared martial law, declaring that such actions were taken to counter "a certain class of individuals who are acting together..."

The governor publicly allied himself with the employers' alliances, and he thanked Craig of the Denver Citizens' Alliance for the honor of receiving "membership card No. 1." The governor meanwhile spoke of his supporters — in particular, donors to a "Law and Order Banquet" — as the "best element of the State." The railroads offered half-priced fare for those attending the banquet, and "business and industrial leaders flocked into Denver from all over the state" to honor Governor Peabody for "his stand on law and order."