EP 7 Lucy Parsons - More Dangerous Than a Thousand Rioters | Women and Resistance 🌍

In this conversation, Aya Fubara Eneli Esq. and Adesoji Iginla delve into the life and legacy of Lucy Parsons, a radical activist known for her anarchist beliefs and her role in the labour movement. The discussion covers her early life, the Haymarket Affair, her struggles against capitalism and imperialism, and her enduring influence on workers' rights and social justice. 

Parsons' fiery speeches and unwavering commitment to activism are highlighted, along with her reflections on the challenges faced by the working class and the importance of collective action.

Takeaways

*Lucy Parsons was a radical activist and anarchist.
*The Haymarket Affair was a pivotal moment in labour history.
*Parsons faced significant personal struggles and societal challenges.
*Her activism was rooted in a desire for justice for all workers.
*Parsons believed in the power of collective action against capitalism.
*She emphasised the importance of understanding history to avoid repeating mistakes.
*Parsons' legacy continues to inspire modern labour movements.
*She advocated for the rights of the disinherited and marginalised.
*Parsons faced criticism and erasure in historical narratives.
*Her life exemplified the intersection of race, class, and gender in activism.

Chapters

00:00 Introduction to Lucy Parsons
01:35 Defining Anarchism and Activism
12:07 The Impact of the Haymarket Meeting
20:36 Personal History and Identity
25:04 Legacy and Continued Activism
31:51 The Legacy of the IWW and Labor Rights
35:56 Personal Struggles and Misconceptions
40:40 The Fight Against Capitalism and Imperialism
44:27 Lessons from History and the Call to Action

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Transcript

Adesoji Iginla (00:02.146)
Yes, greetings, greetings and welcome to another episode of Women and Resistance. And tonight we are looking at the lives and times of Lucy Parsons. But before then, I am your host as usual, Adesuji Iginla. With me is Lucy Parsons. Good evening. So, Miss Parsons.

Aya Fubara Eneli (00:24.606)
Good evening.

Adesoji Iginla (00:32.536)
You're known as Mrs. Parsons, I beg your pardon. You're known as an activist or described as a radical activist. Would you say that is a clear indication of who you are or there is more to it than meets the eye?

Aya Fubara Eneli (00:34.256)
Mrs. Parsons.

Aya Fubara Eneli (00:55.7)
Well, you know, there are different things that we do with words and at different times different words mean different things. So I would say that for the purposes of this conversation, I will not read my entire speech because your listeners and your viewers are well able to go and find these speeches and I hope that they will read them for themselves and listen to them.

Adesoji Iginla (01:03.982)
Mm.

Aya Fubara Eneli (01:24.92)
But what I will do is share a little bit from one of my speeches and let the people make up their minds as to what I am. So I want to read from a speech that I gave in 1886. It was on December 21st. This speech appeared in the Kansas City Journal and this was

Adesoji Iginla (01:36.312)
Okay.

Aya Fubara Eneli (01:54.83)
after my dear husband Albert Sr. had been sentenced to die with some of his fellow workers, is what I would call them, in a farce, a sham of a trial. But let me share my words with you. I am an anarchist.

I suppose you came here, the most of you, to see what a real live arachist looked like. Well, take a good look. I suppose that some of you expected to see me with a bomb in one hand and a flaming torch in the other, but are disappointed in seeing neither. If such has been your ideas,

Regarding an anarchist, you deserved to be disappointed. Anarchists are peaceable, law-abiding people. What do anarchists mean when they speak of anarchy?

Webster gives the term two definitions, chaos and the state of being without political rule. We cling to the latter definition. Our enemies hold us.

and they believe only in the former. Do you wonder why there are anarchists in this country? In this great land of liberty, as you love to call it, go to New York, go through the byways and alleys of that great city, count the myriad starving, count the multiplied

Aya Fubara Eneli (04:03.732)
thousands who are homeless. Number those who work harder than slaves and live on less and have fewer comforts than the meanest slaves. You will be dumbfounded by your discoveries. You who have paid no attention to these poor, save as objects of charity and commiseration.

They are not objects of charity. They are the victims of the rank, injustice that permeates the system of government and a political economy that holds sway from the Atlantic to the Pacific. Its oppression, the misery it causes, the wretchedness it gives birth to are found to a greater extent in New York than elsewhere. In New York!

where not many days ago two governments united in unveiling a statue of liberty, where a hundred bands played that hymn of liberty. The Marseille, but almost its equal is found among the miners of the West who dwell in squalor and wear rags.

that the capitalists who control the earth should be free to all may add still further to their millions. there are plenty of reasons for the existence of anarchists. But in Chicago, they do not think anarchists have any right to exist at all. They want to hang them there.

Lawfully or unlawfully, you have heard of a certain hay market meeting. You have heard of a bomb. You have heard of arrests and of succeeding arrests effected by detectives. Those detectives! There is a set of men, nay, beasts for you. Pinkerton detectives. They would do anything.

Aya Fubara Eneli (06:26.152)
feel sure capitalists wanted a man to throw that bomb at the Haymarket meeting and have the anarchists blamed for it. Pinkerton could have accomplished it for him. You have heard a great deal about bombs. You've heard that the anarchists said lots about dynamite. You have been told that Ling made bombs. He violated no laws. Dynamite bombs can kill, can murder.

So can gatling guns!

Suppose that bomb had been thrown by an anarchist. The constitution says there are certain inalienable rights among which are a free press, free speech, and free assemblage. The citizens of this great land are given by the constitution the right to repel the unlawful invasion of those rights.

Aya Fubara Eneli (07:31.974)
meeting at Haymarket Square was a peaceable meeting.

Suppose when an arnacus saw the police arrive on the scene with murder in their eyes, determined to break up that meeting, suppose he had thrown that bomb.

he would have violated no law. That will be the verdict of your children. Had I been there, had I seen those murderous police approach, had I heard that insolent command to disperse, had I heard Fielden say, Captain, this is a peaceable meeting, had I seen the liberties of my countrymen trodden underfoot, I, I would have flung the bomb myself.

I would have violated no law, but would have upheld the constitution. I'm going to skip ahead because you can go and read the rest of the speech, but let me share this. In the heat of patriotism.

the American citizen sometimes drops a tear for the nihilist of Russia.

Aya Fubara Eneli (08:53.992)
They say the nihilist can't get justice and he is condemned without trial.

How much more should he weep for his next door neighbor, the anarchist who is given the form of trial under such a ruling?

Aya Fubara Eneli (09:19.102)
There were squealers introduced as witnesses for the prosecution. There were three of them. Each and every one was compelled to admit they had been purchased and intimidated by the prosecution. Yet, hangman Gary held their evidence as competent. It came out in the trial that the Haymarket meeting was the result of no plot.

but was caused in this wise. The day before the wage slaves in the McCormick's factory. Some of you know McCormick, you still use their seasoning. The day before the wage slaves in the McCormick's factory had struck for eight hours labor. McCormick from his luxurious office with one stroke of his pen by his

Idol be ringed fingers turned 4,000 men out of employment.

Some gathered and stoned the factory. Therefore, they were anarchists, said the press. But anarchists are not fools. Only fools stone buildings. The police was sent out and they killed six wage slaves. Mm-hmm, that's what you are, wage slaves.

You didn't know that. The capitalistic press kept it quiet. But it made a great fuss over the killing of some policemen. Then these crazy anarchists, as they are called, thought a meeting ought to be held to consider the killing of six brethren and to discuss the eight-hour movement. The meeting was held. It was peaceable.

Aya Fubara Eneli (11:29.682)
When Bonfield ordered the police to charge those peaceable anarchists, he hauled down the American flag and should have been shot on the spot.

Aya Fubara Eneli (11:46.664)
While the judicial farce was going on, the red and black flags were brought into court to prove that the anarchists threw the bomb. They were placed on the walls and hung their awful specters before the jury. What does the black flag mean?

When a cable gram says it was carried through the streets of a European city, it means that the people are suffering, that the men are out of work, that the women are starving, the children barefooted. But you see, that is in Europe. How about America? The Chicago Tribune said there were 30,000 men in that city with nothing to do. Another authority said there were 10

thousand barefooted children in mid winter. The police said hundreds had no place to sleep or warm. Then President Cleveland issued his Thanksgiving proclamation.

and the anarchist formed in procession and carried the black flag to show that these thousands had nothing for which to return thanks.

when the Board of Trade, that gambling den, was dedicated by means of a banquet $30 a plate. Again, the black flag was carried to signify that there were thousands who couldn't enjoy a two cent meal.

Aya Fubara Eneli (13:32.734)
but the red flag, the horrible red flag. What does that mean?

Not that street should run with gore, but that the same red blood courses through the veins of the whole human race. It meant the brotherhood of man. When the red flag floats over the world, the idol shall be called to work. There will be an end of prostitution for women, of slavery for man.

of hunger for children. Liberty has been named anarchy. If this verdict is carried out, it will be the death nail of America's liberty. You, you, you and your children will be slaves. You will have liberty if you can pay for it. If this

Verdict is carried out.

Place the flag of our country at half mast and write on every fold, Shane.

Aya Fubara Eneli (14:56.338)
Let our flag be trailed in the dust. Let the children of working men place laurels to the brow of these modern heroes, for they committed no crime. Break the twofold yoke.

Bread is freedom and freedom is bread.

Adesoji Iginla (15:30.066)
OK. You cited the Haymarket riot as the origins of your angst against the state. Could you tell us a bit about your earlier upbringing before, obviously, how Haymarket came into the picture?

Aya Fubara Eneli (15:54.022)
It was no riot unless you want to call the policemen rioters. They're the ones who were shooting and the policemen who were killed were killed from their own bullets.

Aya Fubara Eneli (16:12.028)
And I came to anarchy even before the Haymarket peaceable meeting that we had. But yes, I will tell you many tales about Lucy.

Luzia Elinda Carter. Elden Carter.

Books have been written about me and there have been many books that have been written about ararchy in this country that have kept me out of the pages because always women should be erased and not seen and not heard. And those who have included me sometimes would only give me a couple of sentences as the wife of Albert Parsons Sr. In fact,

Even my obituary focused more on my husband, my white husband, than it did me, as though I, too, were not human, that I were not capable of my own thoughts.

Aya Fubara Eneli (17:36.304)
Let me tell you some of the stories that supposedly have been unearthed about me. I am an enigma. I may or may not be black. Some folks say I was born a slave. Some folks say that my master was Dr. Talia Farrow, who was a physician and a very mean man.

and that he lived in Virginia. And when the Civil War was about to break out, you know those cowardly white men, those slave-owning beasts of burden themselves. So many of them made their slaves walk hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of miles to Texas.

where they hoped to still maintain that most barbaric institution. Some claim I was born a slave in Virginia and I made my way with this slave owning so-called physician. How are you a healer and a slave owner at the same time? But we made our way the slaves because we had no humanity on foot.

to Waco, Texas. What do you know about Waco, Texas? What do you know about Texas? You need to go and find out what it would have been like. Way back then, I was born in 1851, it is said. And at that time, I went by the name Lucia L. Dinh Carter.

And it is sad that after the Civil War, after we finally got our independence, our own emancipation two years after the Emancipation Proclamation in Texas...

Aya Fubara Eneli (19:43.122)
You had all of these free black people and we gathered wherever the Freedmen Bureau was. We wanted to get educated and some say I was one of them. Some say I possibly only got two or three years of formal education, but no one can talk about my intellectual acumen. When I died, I had over 3000 volumes of books that the police hauled away.

never returned except some of my books suddenly started to show up on the dare I say black market. Books signed to me by the authors. Some say that I lived with a freed black man for a while but that at some point my paths crossed with that of Albert Parsons

senior who was a former Confederate soldier but had now turned a Republican who was actually signing Black people up to vote to his own great peril. His brother ended up becoming a senator and he was the most vile kind of human being. He wanted a return to slavery.

but in the meantime being connected to his brother did afford Albert Parsons some privileges. But then again I said I was of Mexican and Native American ancestry. Can't you tell from my hair?

Aya Fubara Eneli (21:37.478)
Some describe me as having the skin of a mulatto or maybe a quadroon. But I said I was of Hispanic, Mexican at that time we called it, and Native American ancestry. And Albert Persons and I chose to marry. It was against the law, miscegenation they called it. Some say there was a brief window

where the Republicans had taken over in Texas and we were actually able to lawfully get married, others contest that. Either way, I never claimed black ancestry out loud to anybody.

Adesoji Iginla (22:21.344)
Mm.

Is that a way of fighting what was going on in the context of that time or that was a conscious decision to distance yourself?

Aya Fubara Eneli (22:33.31)
Well, that is for people to continue to speculate, but I will tell you that the Ku Klux Klan was running rampant. Waco, Texas was no place to be as a black person. I witnessed an eight-year-old black girl get raped till she died.

I witnessed the castration of a seven-year-old black innocent boy. I witnessed many lynchings. These people would pack picnic baskets and gather to smell the burning flesh of another human being.

And when the Democrats took over again in Texas, and that was not a safe place to be, you know, there was a period called Reconstruction. It was but a blink of an eye. And by 1873, my husband and I decided to leave. But we didn't just leave. My husband was actually an editor of a magazine, of a newspaper at the time.

Adesoji Iginla (23:27.224)
Yep.

Aya Fubara Eneli (23:46.84)
and he was to go on tour to the north. And he got on a train and he departed and we made plans for me to meet up with him. And we ended up in Chicago. Some say Chicago because my husband's had some connection to some Germans and there were quite a number of German immigrants in Chicago.

By the time we arrived in Chicago, Chicago had experienced that great fire that had torn through the city and they had rebuilt. was, a beautiful city, shiny, new buildings everywhere. But because so many workers had flocked there during the time of the rebuilding, now that the rebuilding was done, there were so many families starving.

Homeless, thousands of men without jobs. And let us not talk about the women who often have to sell their bodies just to feed their children.

I never spoke out against slavery. I fought for the white immigrant. I fought for the wage earner. I felt that poverty was more so the issue for black people and that if we could overthrow this capitalist system, then everybody could eat and it wouldn't matter what your race was. Today,

Some people claim me as Mexican American.

Aya Fubara Eneli (25:33.37)
Some people claim me as black American. Some Native Americans claim me.

Aya Fubara Eneli (25:43.154)
What doesn't matter? I am human.

Adesoji Iginla (25:48.16)
Okay, so how did you following the Haymarket again, been using semantics here? How would you categorize the Haymarket meeting that led to the subsequent hanging of your husband? Because it is important to give that context in order to understand how you came into prominence.

Aya Fubara Eneli (26:19.7)
Do you want to be a full human being or do you want to just be a slave wage earner? And here we had these capitalists. Let me tell you a story. Do you know that at the time that that fire swept through Chicago, there were millions of dollars that were poured into the coffers to take care of the everyday work?

And do you know that after the city was rebuilt, there were still millions left in those coffers. And those damn capitalists decided to siphon that money into building their own businesses. They refused to give the money that had been given to them for the use of

The everyday worker. They refuse to pay anything to people to even have any dignity to be able to live.

And people were supposed to work and travail under these conditions that as I said in my speech were quite frankly sometimes worse than what enslaved people had dealt with. And when people came together, I told you about McCormick as fat, slovenly, overstuffed.

Beast. Sitting down and callously putting an additional 4,000 people out of work.

Aya Fubara Eneli (28:08.973)
gorging on the very lives of other people. And yes, when they came and they killed

regular people who were just asserting their right to live with dignity. We, the so-called anarchists, came together, a peaceable assembly to talk about how we would respond. They threw that bomb because we were fighting capitalism.

We were not for any political party. If you read my other speeches, let me tell you, it happened then, it's happening now. These politicians will tell you whatever they need to. To get your vote and once they get into power, they do what they want to do anyway, which is maintain capitalism.

And once they get into power, they make all kinds of laws to ensure that they stay in power. We wear against voting.

We were against religion!

Aya Fubara Eneli (29:30.612)
Who was it that said it's the opium of the masses? They use it to sedate people.

Aya Fubara Eneli (29:41.32)
That's what we stood for. We were against imperialism.

And so we came together in a peaceable meeting and they came, they orchestrated that bomb and then they used that as a ruse to shoot up people, including themselves, because that's how incompetent they are. And then they put nine men on trial.

Adesoji Iginla (30:06.222)
You

Aya Fubara Eneli (30:18.824)
They did not know who threw that bomb. They had no real evidence against them. Their crime was arnaki. Their crime was that they were a threat to the capitalist system.

Aya Fubara Eneli (30:39.622)
My husband, I was a mother of two children, Lulu and Albert Jr. Lulu died as a young girl.

Aya Fubara Eneli (30:53.36)
Albert was but 13 years old. Albert Jr. My husband and the other man.

held their heads up high. And when they were at those gallows, they gave their speeches because they wanted their words to go down in history.

But they denied my husband Albert Senior even that honor. Just as he started to speak.

They hung him. That you can kill the man, you cannot kill the message. And I wrote about him and I traveled the country talking about our work, talking about what we stood for. And did they ever harass me everywhere I went. I thought I had the right to free speech. They would try to silence me.

Adesoji Iginla (31:39.246)
Mmm.

Aya Fubara Eneli (32:01.64)
try to intimidate me. I spent so much time, I know the insides of so many jails.

But I am Lucy Parsons.

and I could not be so easily gotten rid of or silenced.

I tell you a story.

Adesoji Iginla (32:22.392)
Please do, please do.

Aya Fubara Eneli (32:25.83)
My son Albert Jr. was to carry on the legacy of my dear departed husband Albert Sr. He was to be an arnaqus just like we were.

Do you know what my son Albert Junior did?

Aya Fubara Eneli (32:47.176)
He joined.

a religious group coming to my house and speaking all of that nonsense. And then he enlisted in the army to go and fight in the Philippines against people who had done nothing to him on behalf of this imperialistic country. I could not fathom that. Of course it was madness.

To be insane.

Aya Fubara Eneli (33:28.368)
I had him committed.

to a mental institution. Yes, I did. No son of mine was going to betray our cause in that way.

He had some witnesses.

but he was still considered a miner and therefore my property.

Aya Fubara Eneli (34:01.128)
He lived the rest of his life in the mental institution. And some people castigate me because they say, according to them anyway, that although I provided provision for his clothing while he was committed, I never once visited him.

And why should I? Don't judge me if you've never been me.

He died 20 years after he was committed.

Aya Fubara Eneli (34:42.004)
I see someone is asking if it is true that I worked with the coalition for the International Labor Defense, communist party group. Again, feel free to read my speeches. There's so much I can share. I was not a communist, although I was sometimes accused of being one, but there's no proof that I ever joined the communist party. But to the extent that we were fighting for the same ideals, yes.

Adesoji Iginla (34:51.714)
Thank you.

Aya Fubara Eneli (35:10.938)
I had no problems working with other people. I want to share a few more of, you know, just some quotes from other speeches I wrote. What everybody will admit to you is that I was a striking woman. I was an incredible orator. I could hold the attention of crowds for hours. I was very well read and yes, I am self-taught.

Aya Fubara Eneli (35:40.668)
We are the disinherited of this earth. The outlaws, the rebels, the unrepresented, the castaways, the hopeless. And we are not afraid. And that's how I live my life.

I was unapologetically militant and some people would often talk about my words being fiery and incendiary and to that extent they

went gleeful at the manner of my death.

Adesoji Iginla (36:17.879)
Hmm.

Aya Fubara Eneli (36:18.96)
I suppose it was a befitting way to die.

Aya Fubara Eneli (36:31.348)
What else can I say to your people at this time? I did join the Socialist Labor Party, but I grew disillusioned with electoral politics. In fact, my husband had actually run for office a number of times when he was a Republican still in Texas. Alongside Albert Senior, I co-founded The Alarm, an anarchist newspaper.

And I did become a major figure in the movement for the eight hour work day. What is it exactly that you have to say against me when today the very labor laws that protect you were born out of the work that we did? I was relentlessly surveilled. Chicago police raided my home at will, banned me from speaking publicly and a

course, seized my writings. But that didn't stop me. I continued to publish, to organize, and speak at labor events all across this country. I helped found the industrial workers of the world, IWW. And I inspired generations of radicals, whether they want to give me credit for it or not. My advocacy, my direct action,

Even my solidarity with the white people. We didn't call them that, though of course at that time they were immigrants. But my solidarity with the working class for liberation remains relevant today. You have much to learn from me and the work that I did and the life that I lived.

and the sacrifices that were made for you to now sit in your cushy eight-hour jobs where you are guaranteed break times.

Aya Fubara Eneli (38:32.646)
not yet a living wage, because you're still slave wage earners too afraid to speak up to fight. And they're still bejeweled fat gross beasts who with an idle pen can put you and thousands out of work at whim.

This industrial workers of the world, not of America, but of the world, because we understood the issue of capitalism and imperialism and it went beyond the borders of this here United States of America. We promoted industrial unionism, all workers in all industries, regardless of role in one union. We pressured craft unions and laid the groundwork

for the CIOs broader organizing victories. And yet you don't know my name. We were the catalyst for federal labor laws. Violent repression of the IWW strikes demonstrated the need for protections. Contributing to the environment that produced in 1935,

the National Labor Relations Act. And that was the act that legalized collective bargaining. What do you learn in your schools anymore but to be slave wage earners?

And when it comes to free speech, the IWW's arrest and street fights for the right to speak in public influenced First Amendment discourse and the labor's right to protest, something that is being threatened in 2025 because you are still slave wage earners and don't understand the history and haven't continued the fight. You got complacent.

Aya Fubara Eneli (40:40.83)
while you watched us hang and.

Do you know that the IWW organized across race, across gender, and across immigration status, setting a moral and structural precedent that mainstream unions were forced to follow? And you sit back and watch it be dismantled right now.

Adesoji Iginla (40:59.63)
Mmm.

Aya Fubara Eneli (41:15.474)
Yes, though I am marginalized and vilified when I am spoken of or relegated to just Albert Parsons wife, I did a lot more. And my work with the IWW imprinted the foundations of modern labor law and workers rights. But you know what? Though I had plenty detractors, people are just afraid to fight.

Adesoji Iginla (41:25.89)
point.

Aya Fubara Eneli (41:44.53)
So many of you no spines in your backs. I don't know how you walk, quite frankly.

But I did have some supporters. Of course, they included anarchists. They were socialists. They were unionists. Fellow radicals raised money for my bail because I was so frequently imprisoned. Despite ideological differences, even figures like Emma Goldman, and if you don't know her, maybe you should study as well, respected my stature. Although, you know, Emma Goldman had another issue with me.

See.

Aya Fubara Eneli (42:26.192)
was married to Albert Parsons. I was a woman who advocated for women to live a pious life.

But Emma Goldman, she claims that I wasn't so pious. She claims that I had multiple lovers. She claims that I advocated for women to listen to this, access to birth control pills, contraception, so that they had agency over their bodies and they didn't just have to

Adesoji Iginla (43:01.026)
Mmm.

Aya Fubara Eneli (43:07.924)
keep having baby after baby after baby and you all are letting that fall on your watch. But she claimed that because I advocated for these things that I really did not live such a pious life. That I had multiple lovers.

Like my racial background? Who cares? Tell whatever stories you please about me.

Aya Fubara Eneli (43:41.458)
Like I've said earlier, there are many scholars who are still debating about my Black heritage.

Aya Fubara Eneli (43:53.78)
But do we not now have information?

Adesoji Iginla (43:59.328)
Very much so.

Aya Fubara Eneli (44:00.168)
that lends us to believe that all people originated from a black woman. So again, what does it matter? But I did have beautiful, beautiful golden skin.

I was very striking.

There are others, of course, who criticize me because they said I was silent on racial violence. And that doesn't make sense in light of how fiery I was about injustice in every other way. Now let's just suppose that I was indeed a mulatto, a quadrune. Do you suppose that had I claimed

Adesoji Iginla (44:38.648)
silent.

Aya Fubara Eneli (44:48.082)
Black heritage? That I could have spoken in the places I spoke in and achieved what I achieved? Do you suppose? Do you suppose that I may have even made it out of Waco, Texas? Where even in the 1990s they were still lynching human beings, Black people to be specific? Don't judge me.

I have been largely excluded from mainstream feminist and labor histories.

Maybe because I came from poverty. Maybe because I was supposedly previously enslaved and so lacked that respectability.

Aya Fubara Eneli (45:35.624)
Perhaps it was the lovers I supposedly took I defied, being incorporated into these sanitized narratives. But you know what? For those who are serious about their study, you can't write me out of history. I am a woman of fire and fury. I challenge the legitimacy of the state, the sanctity of capital, and the erasure of women.

from the political discourse.

Aya Fubara Eneli (46:11.699)
and

Aya Fubara Eneli (46:18.204)
Hmm. My death.

Aya Fubara Eneli (46:24.468)
I was still speaking and fighting till my very last days. I was an old woman living with a dear friend who happened to be male. It was March 7th, 1942.

and my companion had gone out to the store and I

Aya Fubara Eneli (46:56.156)
I put a pot of water on my wooden stove and stepped away briefly.

Aya Fubara Eneli (47:11.422)
and there was this fire and I came running and I tried to put it out.

Aya Fubara Eneli (47:21.46)
Couldn't quite get the fire out. They say I was burned on over 25 % of my body. It's not clear whether it was the flame or the smoke. But by the time the neighbors called for help and my partner got to the place, he too ran in to try and save me and he too was overcome. So he died as well.

It was 1942.

I was 91 years old.

I never stopped fighting. And there comes their bitch worries in the papers. Well, she lived a fiery life and I guess it only makes sense she died the way she did. They were so dismissive of me.

Aya Fubara Eneli (48:20.871)
Nonetheless.

everything didn't go up in flames. The police came and carted off my writings. I did have two life insurance policies, enough to cover all my burial.

bills and cover any other outstanding bills and I had I should have had a lot more left over which since I had no children I'd earmarked to be donated to an organization to help the poor. Do you know that the funeral director tried to steal from me and my death?

Adesoji Iginla (49:04.228)
You

Aya Fubara Eneli (49:05.46)
They cremated me for $30 and tried to charge my executor over $490.

Aya Fubara Eneli (49:15.442)
My executor did challenge it. We ended up paying about $270. But I'm telling you these capitalists, no souls, no depth to which they will not go.

Aya Fubara Eneli (49:33.074)
Well, there is a nonprofit, a volunteer run Arnaquist bookstore and community space in Boston, Massachusetts. It's called the Lucy Parsons Center and it's dedicated to radical politics and it's named in honor of me.

Chicago, Illinois had the Lucy Gonzalez Parsons apartments. I didn't tell you I was once Lucy Gonzalez? Of course.

Adesoji Iginla (50:06.232)
You did.

Aya Fubara Eneli (50:09.854)
since I was of Mexican ancestry. Some say it's a name that I just happened to take on and that when I came to Chicago, since there were not many Mexicans in that area, I felt like I could hide under that and there would not be too many people there who could really question or try to verify my background. But the Lucy Gonzalez Parsons apartments,

in Chicago was a 100 unit affordable housing building on the city's west side named it my honor to highlight my lifelong fight for housing, for worker justice, and the poor.

At one point there was also the Lucy Parsons Lab, but it no longer is in existence. It was a civil liberties watch group, watchdog group founded in the 1990s that worked on issues related to police surveillance and public records, drawing from my legacy of defiance against state repression. They did not just start today in repressing.

people who they consider a threat to their capitalist and imperialist goals. And then there's also a park that is named after me. It is the Lucy Ella Gonzalez Parsons Park. I was El Dean. Where did they get Ella from? it was an alias I had used at one point as well.

This park is located at 4712 West Balmont Avenue in the Belmont-Cragin neighborhood of Chicago. It was created in 2001 and officially named for, I suppose, the Mexican Lucy Ella Gonzalez Parsons in 2004. There is also Lucy Gonzalez Parsons Way.

Adesoji Iginla (52:20.334)
Mmm.

Aya Fubara Eneli (52:25.33)
So it looks like the Mexicans may be winning over the Black Americans in terms of my heritage. But this is a ceremonial street sign on Kedzie Avenue, and it was commemorated in 2017.

Aya Fubara Eneli (52:46.92)
What else would you like to ask me young man?

Adesoji Iginla (52:49.484)
Yes, thank you for that walkthrough. You mentioned the fact that Mr. Malcolm of the Spice dynasty signed his workers out of existence.

And looking at the year 2025, you have multi-billionaires in the United States that also have the power to do so, largely because they have someone in the White House that acquiesces to the musings of the billionaire class. How does one protect that vast number of people's interest against the overwhelming corporate interests?

that underpins the so-called democracy of the United States.

Aya Fubara Eneli (53:54.004)
We must unite. The reason the billionaires, the millionaires can sit in their cushy wherever they are and without any thoughts, decimate the lives of thousands and thousands of people. The reason they can continue to line their pockets with the blood, sweat and tears of other people. The reason they can build their high rises on the skeletons of the starving.

The reasons why they can throw people into jails and call them vagrants and vagabonds and so on and so forth is not because.

of the felon you have sitting in your White House. It is because the workers have submitted themselves to being wage, slave wage earners. When the workers in the United States of America and across the world

Adesoji Iginla (54:56.343)
Hmm.

Aya Fubara Eneli (55:04.824)
decide that they no longer want slave wages. When they decide that they deserve the dignity, what did Arnaki want? Remember my initial words, for everybody to be able to live.

Aya Fubara Eneli (55:26.354)
When the workers decide that they've had enough, they will overthrow all of the apparatus that are being used against them. The police, the state, the federal government, the courts, whatever it is that is being used to oppress them must be destroyed.

I said that in 1866, I said it until I died in 1942. I say it from the grave and I challenge any of you to show me anything different that will work because are you not today still dealing with the issues?

Adesoji Iginla (56:15.662)
Hmm.

Aya Fubara Eneli (56:16.968)
that generations before dealt with, but you have not addressed the issue of capitalism and imperialists, and until workers unite across race, across gender, across social class.

Aya Fubara Eneli (56:36.284)
and come to and across the world. Because these corporations are no longer just based in Chicago or in New York, they are multinational corporations. And they don't have to deal with the workers here, they can take that work to another country and have those workers work for even less.

Aya Fubara Eneli (57:02.664)
So until peoples of the world, the workers of the world understand that they have one common enemy and come together and fight together as one for one common cause.

Aya Fubara Eneli (57:22.868)
It'll be 3035 and we'll still have the same issues, but maybe just worse.

Adesoji Iginla (57:30.766)
One more question. Still, know, a throwback to Chicago when you said there was money enough to take care of the people that were being put out of work. You also have that now in 2025 where, in order to get the big, beautiful bill passed,

Aya Fubara Eneli (57:43.636)
you

Adesoji Iginla (58:00.6)
people are being medicated and social security is being stolen from people, essentially giving wealthier to multi-billionaires. Again, I pose the question.

what would be the return of the people in, I mean, I'm not saying they're powerless, but in order to...

Aya Fubara Eneli (58:22.376)
I am so excited you asked me this question. And the answer that I'm going to give you comes from my speech that I gave on May 1st, 1930. Young man, I don't believe you were even a thought in your mother's mind at that time. But listen carefully to my words. I'm telling you, all the solutions you're seeking,

Other people have already thought through it and started to work through it and you abandoned, not you specifically, but you abandoned that work. You got lulled to sleep by a few concessions here and there, or by the idea that maybe you could become part of the executive suite.

Adesoji Iginla (58:59.502)
Mm.

Aya Fubara Eneli (59:11.474)
So listen to my speech. It is titled, I'll be damned if I go back to work under those conditions.

Aya Fubara Eneli (59:23.518)
Hmm.

On May 1st, 1930, as global capitalism convulsed and shattered through an unprecedented crisis that appeared to presage its inevitable collapse, 25,000 workers braved police terror and sedition charges and gathered for a May Day rally at Chicago's Union Park. The workers marched to City Hall where a committee of the unemployed presented demands for work or wages to the mayor and city council. They then strolled to the Ashland Boulevard

auditorium for a mass meeting. The meeting opened with a spirited rendition of the International. Not the Star-Spangled Banner, young man, International. The anthem of the International Workers' Movement. Before the audience heard a number of addresses, including one from me, someone stood up and described me as

One of the old pioneers in the fight for the eight hour day. 1930, remember I was born in 1851.

Both the May Day demonstrations, location in Chicago, and inclusion of Parsons, me, on this mass meeting stage were of historical and political significance. They initially did not want me to speak, but I insisted.

Aya Fubara Eneli (01:00:49.818)
labor unions had called for a general strike on May 1st, 1886 to demand an eight-hour day across the United States. Nearly half a million workers joined the strike. Chicago was the epicenter of the movement with perhaps a hundred thousand workers and their supporters and allies taking to the streets. And then of course that was broken up. I've told you a little bit already about the hay market. And these were my remarks.

Adesoji Iginla (01:01:13.868)
Hey, markets.

Aya Fubara Eneli (01:01:19.388)
I wish I had this trend.

I wish I had the wisdom.

I wish I was a fine enough speaker to depict to you Chicago 44 years ago.

In my humble way, I would try to give you just an outline of it. We had been organizing the working class for nearly a year, very quietly.

They were so downtrodden in those days that the capitalists paid little attention to them. But when the first of May came and this slogan went forward, throw down your arms, throw down your tools and come out. Why? I have never seen such a strike. It was a psychological moment. It was a spontaneous strike. And they came out by the thousands until the capitalist class claimed themselves. There were 40,000 who stood in the streets of Chicago. And when they tried to get back,

Aya Fubara Eneli (01:02:15.838)
try to get them back to work.

We replied, I'll be damned if I go back to work under such conditions. That was the spirit of the day. That was the dividing line between the long and the short hour movement in America. From that day on, there are unions in this city today who were organized then, the Baker's Union and other unions, and they have never gone back.

to the old time if it had not been for the organization that came into existence just on the heels of this, our leaders were put to death. And after they were put to death, they came to the front, an organization, a so-called labor organization, the AFL of L, the American Federation of Labor. What have they to produce? What have they to show for their 46 years?

They have gone together and scraped together the mechanics, two million in a population of 38 million. They have two million under their banner, the others can go straight to hell for all they care. They are nothing but the common herd. As I see the movement today, 44 years from now will tell a different story. 40 years from now, I believe such a thing will have disappeared. That's what I said back in 1930, and here we are in 2025.

Aya Fubara Eneli (01:03:41.768)
It will have disappeared from the face of the earth because I see in this movement today, I have seen many movements come and go. I belonged to all of those movements. I was a delegate that organized industrial workers of the world. I carried a card in the old socialist party and I am now today connected with the communists through the international labor defense. So I have seen these movements come and go.

Listen to me. In human affairs, in life, it is just as the ebb and flow of nature. It's like the ebb and flow along the ocean's way, along the shore of a seaside. Those waves come and play their part and go, but they all leave their imprints until the ocean itself is worn away with time.

And so...

No one needs to be discouraged because these waves of human forces to the radical movement come and go. They all leave their imprint, the radical imprint. They all leave something behind and the next great movement like this one that comes

steps into the footsteps of those who have gone and carry it further until the Emancipation comes if you don't forget those footsteps. It is a lesson of history. We do not accomplish all in one day or one generation. It goes on to the other generations and I believe without flattering this organization that they have the right hope. I can't help but believe they will go on

Aya Fubara Eneli (01:05:33.908)
and on and will not pass away like the other organizations because I think they have the substantiality. Now I'm not going to speak for a great while. I want to tell you something about the Haymarket and then probably I am about through. The movement of 1886, the eight-hour movement was a grand success. For a few days they had the capitalist on the run you might say.

They were taken completely by surprise. We had a great movement trial at that time. And I must say, right here and now, I must put in a slight protest for the so-called anarchists in those days.

Aya Fubara Eneli (01:06:20.766)
I am an anarchist. I have no apology to make to a single man, woman, or child because I am an anarchist because anarchism carries the very germ of liberty in its womb.

Aya Fubara Eneli (01:06:37.632)
Now, we anarchists and others of us here, we carried on the strike, we carried on this movement, and on the 3rd of May, I want to tell you now something you carry home that will be substantial. On the 3rd of May, the McCormick Reaper works, people struck and came out to demand the reduction of hours of daily toil from 12 to 10. They did not even ask for eight hours. That was beyond their reckoning. And on that,

day, the great monstrous meeting was being held. The police went down to that meeting and they shot and clubbed those innocent people. And the next day, the Haymarket meeting was called as a protest against the clubbing and shooting of those people on the day before. It was a conspiracy of the capitalist class to break up the great movement.

Listen to me.

Aya Fubara Eneli (01:07:27.316)
Those of you today who enjoy better conditions, we must enjoy better conditions after 44 years. There's no such thing as standing still in the world, nowhere in nature, so there has to be some better. Today, the communists are demanding six hours or seven hours, rather. 44 years from now and a long time before that time, four hours and even less, they will demand. We're not there yet, unfortunately, in 2025.

It was my hope that we would demand this until there isn't one man or woman in the world who wants to work and who cannot get it. This is the kind of movement of the future.

Listen.

Aya Fubara Eneli (01:08:21.78)
I'm going to modify the last part of that speech made in 1930 just for you in 2025.

Aya Fubara Eneli (01:08:32.052)
There has been nothing added of a fundamental nature to the labor movement in 95 years. Actually, I could say 95 years plus 44.

You wonder how those men of that day could have such a grasp of the labor movement. For three days they said to the court, they said, honorable judge, my husband said, honorable judge, we are not delivering these speeches either to you or to your class. When we are dead and gone, to which we believe we are doomed, this

is our message to the world and the working class to know why we were put to death.

and all these years of my life and beyond my life, I have been carrying this message to you, the working class.

Aya Fubara Eneli (01:09:52.466)
You must organize.

You must cut across anything that will keep you divided. You must fight these capitalists and imperialists.

Aya Fubara Eneli (01:10:10.789)
Only then will you prevail.

Adesoji Iginla (01:10:16.526)
Mmm.

And maybe to even add to what you just said there, there's a movement now for a four-day working week.

Aya Fubara Eneli (01:10:30.728)
Didn't they write a book about it? A four hour work day, something of that nature? They act like these are novel ideas.

Adesoji Iginla (01:10:32.766)
Yes, yes, yes.

So, I mean, we're sure from what we've heard so far that Mrs Parsons lived a full life although one shudders at the way she went out but a full life all the same. A life of struggle, a life of putting and I do notice most of your speeches

there was not the I, it was we, the collective we. And again, we live in different times where the limelight is what matters most to our so-called leaders at the moment. So there is not the eternal we, but rather the I to be put on a pedestal where capital,

can pick them off and set back the movement they're supposed to represent. But we thank Mrs. Parsons for coming through, for telling us about what work we still have to do, what has been done and what we still have to do in terms of. It's a shame that 95 years on, nothing has been built on the Haymarket peaceable

meeting. Stop calling it a riot because a riot is the language of excuse for capital in order to break up any movement that stares them in the face. So again, by that token, we've come to the end of this week's episode of Women and Resistance. But next week, we'll be going to the continent of Africa.

Adesoji Iginla (01:12:36.258)
And we'll be talking about Tatu Batu. The name again is Tatu Batu. I would leave you all to ponder why that name is so important. And, but I'm sure next week we'll get the answer to our wondering thoughts. But next week we'll be looking at Tatu Batu, the life and times of Tatu Batu and

But for today, Mrs. Parsons, thank you for.

Aya Fubara Eneli (01:13:10.624)
May I say a word to Peggy? Peggy brought up my work with International Labor Defense and I was so thrilled when I saw that because somebody's paying attention. Thank you, Peggy.

Adesoji Iginla (01:13:27.0)
You

Adesoji Iginla (01:13:31.628)
Yes, thank you to everyone that has managed to tune in and to those that will be listening to the audio version later in the course of week and following weeks thereof. We thank you for coming through again from Mrs. Persons, although she has thanked Peggy. You want to extend the thanks to everybody else.

Aya Fubara Eneli (01:14:00.284)
I am very grateful for this platform you have given me. Those who do not know their history, they said, are bound to repeat it. And whatever judgments people make of me and my character, what I stood for stands the test of time. And it behooves your listeners to go and study what has been done before and to take courage.

Adesoji Iginla (01:14:09.491)
Mm, yes.

Aya Fubara Eneli (01:14:30.996)
to do the work that must be done now. Thank you again for this opportunity.

Adesoji Iginla (01:14:36.44)
No thank you. And just to even further underscore what you've said, it's funny that Capita has a way of understanding what they've done before to crush such movements. But we, the working class, somehow believe we have to reinvent the wheel instead of just continuing what has gone before. So again, study, study, study. And in the words of Kwame Turei, organize.

organize and organize. So until next week.

Aya Fubara Eneli (01:15:09.488)
As a young man, he came way after us, but he may have learned from us too.

Adesoji Iginla (01:15:14.85)
Yes, it did. Yes, it did. And until next week, stay blessed and God bless and good night.