Background
William D. Haywood was born on February 4, 1869 in Salt Lake City, Utah Territory.
William D. Haywood was born on February 4, 1869 in Salt Lake City, Utah Territory.
At the age of nine he lost an eye in an accident, quit school, and went to work in a mine.
After 1896 he became active in the Western Federation of Miners and in 1900 became the union's secretarytreasurer. A strong advocate of revolutionary unionism, he presided at the founding convention of the Industrial Workers of the World (known as "Wobblies") in 1905.
In early 1906 he was arrested for complicity in the assassination of ex-Governor Frank R. Steunenberg of Idaho. In a case that attracted national attention and in which the famous trial lawyer Clarence Darrow served as his counsel and William Borah, later Progressive Republican senator from Idaho, as special prosecuting attorney, Haywood won acquittal in July 1907. He was an unsuccessful candidate for governor of Colorado on the Socialist ticket while under indictment.
In 1908 the Western Federation of Miners repudiated him, and he turned his attentions to the I. W. W. , which he soon controlled. The Socialist Party, at its 1912 convention, amended its constitution to bar advocates of industrial violence from membership, a change aimed at Haywood, then a member of the party's national executive committee. He was expelled in early 1913. Haywood was arrested in September 1917 under the wartime Espionage Act and along with 94 other I. W. W. members was convicted in August 1918. Sentenced to 20 years' imprisonment and a $10, 000 fine, Haywood was released on bail pending decision upon application for a new trial. While still on bail, he left the United States on March 31, 1921, and went to the Soviet Union. At first hailed by Russian Communist leaders, Haywood fell out with them in June 1921 at the Third Congress of the Communist International. There is evidence he was disillusioned with the Communists before his death.
Haywood was a founding member and leader of the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW) and a member of the executive committee of the Socialist Party of America.
During the first two decades of the 20th century, he was involved in several important labor battles, including the Colorado Labor Wars, the Lawrence Textile Strike, and other textile strikes in Massachusetts and New Jersey.
Industrial Workers of the World
