ABSTRACT
The hanging of several anarchists in 1887 as a consequence of the Haymarket bombing in Chicago caused many Americans to sympathize with the gibbeted radicals. Youths swathed in bright idealism, men and women rooted in equalitarian democracy, workers trusting in the rectitude of their government—all doubted the guilt of the condemned prisoners and were deeply perturbed by the egregious miscarriage of justice. Many of them for the first time became aware of the state’s ruthless arrogation of power, and scores upon scores remained to the end of their lives inimical to government and apprehensive of all forms of authority. Emma Goldman was one of these converts. Like other penniless immigrants, the seventeen-year-old Emma had no alternative but to follow the common groove to the sweatshop. She was quick to conclude that the accused anarchists were innocent of the charge against them.
