Labor on Trial: The Murder of Frank Steunenberg

Frank Steunenberg Murdered.

In 1899 Idaho governor Frank Steunenberg had called for federal troops to suppress a strike by miners in Couer d'Alene. After breaking the strike, Steunenberg and the legislature worked to break the union, passing a law that forbade miners to organize unions. Though Steunenberg retired from politics, he was still a hated figure to miners and to organized labor. On the evening of 30 December 1905, as Steunenberg opened the front gate to his home in Cald-well, Idaho, a bomb exploded, killing him.

Confession of Harry Orchard.

Police arrested Harry Orchard, who had been living in Caldwell under the name of T. S. Hogan. Orchard claimed to have been a bomber for the Western Federation of Miners (WFM), and he confessed to a grisly series of bombings aimed at police officers and strikebreakers. He claimed to have planted a bomb at the Cripple Creek, Colorado, mine during a strike there in 1903,...

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