"I speak not to defend myself, but to defend my right of free speech, trampled upon by those who have caused the curtailing of my liberty.
I know that the right of free speech was once guaranteed to every man and woman in this land.
What do those who have brought me here understand by the right of free speech? Does it give a right to all to say what appears to the individual good or bad, or has it been granted to permit the expression of only that which to a certain class of the citizens appears right?
Is free speech solely for the purpose and use of the Government and its officers, are individuals prohibited from say[ing] that which is true, even though hardly to the taste of a certain class or portion of the public? Can I only say that in which I do not concur, and must I say it?
I am positive that the men who shed their blood for the independence of this land, and who offered up their lives to secure the liberty and rights of the American people, must have had a very different understanding of the right of free speech than those who to-day represent the Government, and who so interpret the right as to permit the expression only of that which is conducive to their benefit.
According to such an interpretation of the right of free speech I must call them despots, and as such, without the right to commemorate in celebrations the memory of those who fell in the fight for Independence, for the former deliberately trample under foot the principles of those heroes, and when decorating their graves commit blasphemy.
Why don't the representatives of the State drop the so-called mantle of free speech, discard the mask of falsehood and admit that absolutism reigns here?
Under such a condition of things the American citizen has no shadow of right in pointing the finger of contempt at European institutions and in speaking of the downtrodden hungry of the Old World.
The sorrowful condition of the workingmen of the Old as well as the New World increases from day to day, and it reached a high point in its horizon this very year.
Devoid of all means of sustenance, the workingmen assemble to consult, to devise means to remedy their need. Those who throughout the year utilize the people and gather riches at their cost perhaps feel that it would not go well with them should the workingmen become half conscious of their exigencies, and in their terror the latter seek the aid of government. Innumerable policemen and spies are sent into the meetings of the unemployed, to control all their deliberations, to control the speakers.
I belonged to that class of speakers who endeavored to show the workingmen the real reason of their misfortune.
The speeches made by me must have contained much that was unpleasant for the rich of the City of New York, because they set in motion whole bands of spies to cause my apprehension and confinement, for the reason, as the indictment reads, that I had offended against the law and exhorted those present at my speeches to acts of violence.
If what I said at Golden Rule Hall 4 and at Union Square was a violation of the laws, then all those who were present at those meetings, and who by protracted and loud applause evinced their approval of what I said, were equally guilty with me. Why, then, did the city authorities proceed against me alone? Why? Because the authorities know that no danger lies in the workingman's ignorance of the true cause of his privations.
From the moment that I, as an Anarchist, showed them that the workingman could never expect relief from his despoilers, from that moment I made the ruling masses uncomfortable, and had to be put out of the way.
I do not acknowledge laws made to protect the rich and oppress the poor. Who are the law makers? Senators, the great of the land? Capitalists. Capitalists who torture thousands to slow death in their factories they are people who live in affluence, robbing the workingman of his strength to deprive him of the results of his labor; they are men whose fortunes have been built upon a foundation formed by pyramids of children's corpses.
The wealth, the luxury, the pomp and glory of power are bought at the price of murdered and disfigured mankind.
Ever rises the voice of the disinherited people, a voice growing in volume, and to which the overbearing classes will not listen, and to still which they devise new laws intended to silence the masses. Bands of priests are sent out to teach subjection, to propagate superstition and keep the people in ignorance.
The demands of the workingmen are met with the Winchester rifle and the Gatling gun, and I must confess that my brethren and myself will ever oppose such a state of 'order'; an 'order' in which we do not believe, and whose representatives we will never be compelled to meet in the struggle for advancement.
I can fully understand that such people hate the Anarchists, for it is our endeavor to abolish private property, State and Church. In one word, we aim to free men from tyrants and government.
The striving for freedom is not the creature of my brain, nor that of any other being; it lies rooted in the people, and the contentions of the past, the struggles between the people and their oppressors, show but too plainly that the people are desirous of being freed from their burdens.
The burning at the stake and the gallows have been the reward of numberless men of advanced thought, and even to-day thousands feel the icy blasts of Siberia and the torrid breath of New Caledonia, while others yield up their lives in the cause, hidden by the grim walls of dungeons deep. And yet the desire for freedom grew, and grows.
The world is gliding ever nearer the fact that in Anarchy can be found the happiness and content of man.
You will not be able to stifle Anarchy by the erection of gallows and of jails.
You endeavor to make us appear to the public eye veritable murderers, wholly depraved, but when we show the people our true objects they find that we only desire the benefit of mankind.
We seek the establishment of Anarchy, or, in other words, a freedom from government of any kind; a community of interests based upon common production of equal and necessary character; we seek a perfect liberty for each individual to enjoy the grand and glorious products of nature; we seek for each an equal liberty to cultivate the talents and abilities as well the attainments of the highest knowledge.
All wrongs now perpetrated, such as theft, murder, lying and prostitution, are an outcome of the injustice at present obtaining in the social state, and will disappear with its downfall.
I tell you, the day of reckoning is not far--a time when no concessions will be granted to the tyrants and despots.
Such is my belief, spread by me among the workingmen, and this belief will cease only with my life.
You have convicted me, you may pass sentence of imprisonment upon me, but I tell you that I hate your laws; that I hate your 'order,' for I know but one 'order'--it is the highest potency of order--Anarchy."