Rowan v. United States

• Decision Date: 28 March 1927
• Docket Number: No. 4969.,4969.
• Citation: 18 F.2d 246
• Parties: ROWAN v. UNITED STATES.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Ninth Circuit

18 F.2d 246 (1927)

ROWAN v. UNITED STATES.

No. 4969.

Circuit Court of Appeals, Ninth Circuit.

March 28, 1927.

Austin Lewis, of San Francisco, Cal. (Susan Brandeis, of New York City, and Jackson H. Ralston, of Palo Alto, Cal., of counsel), for appellant.

Roy C. Fox, U. S. Atty., and E. J. Farley, Asst. U. S. Atty., both of Spokane, Wash.

Before HUNT, RUDKIN, and DIETRICH, Circuit Judges.

HUNT, Circuit Judge.

James Rowan, formerly a subject of Great Britain, appeals from a decree canceling a certificate of naturalization issued in Massachusetts July 1, 1907. The complaint alleges that the certificate was fraudulently procured, in that Rowan falsely represented that he was attached to the principles of the Constitution and well disposed to the good order and happiness of the same, and that he was not opposed to organized government.

It is alleged that, subsequent to being naturalized, Rowan viciously attacked the government of the United States; that in 1917 he instigated strikes, which crippled the wooden shipbuilding program and the production of spruce lumber for airplanes to be used in carrying on the World War; that during 1917 he was one of the most active members of the Industrial Workers of the World; that he was opposed to conscription and set out to defeat it; that he advocated sabotage; that in 1917 he received and distributed large quantities of propaganda issued by the I. W. W., including pamphlets advocating sabotage; that he was convicted in the federal court in the Northern district of Illinois of violation of sections 6, 19, and 37 of the Penal Code (Comp. St. §§ 10170, 10183, 10201), and of violations of section 4 of the Espionage Act of June 15, 1917 (40 Stat. 217 Comp. St. § 10212d) and was sentenced to imprisonment.

Prior to 1912 Rowan was a member of the Socialist party, and in February, 1912, he joined the labor organization, Industrial Workers of the World, and in 1917, while an official of one of the locals of such organization, took an active part in strikes in the Northwest by which the United States was seriously interfered with in obtaining lumber for use in building ships and airplanes for carrying on the war. At that time his advice to the lumber workers was to abandon former methods of "fighting the boss and put into practice the methods and tactics long advocated by the I. W. W.; that is, to use the job strike," by remaining on the job, but doing all possible to hinder production and reduce profits. Among his many activities in 1917 were telegrams to the Governors of certain states and to other people, advising them that he had been instructed to inform them that, if certain men who had been arrested in several of the Northwestern states were not liberated, there would be a general strike of all agricultural and construction workers in the Northwest.

Upon his trial in Chicago in 1918 for violation of the Espionage Act, he explained that in 1917 the I. W. W. was opposed to war; that it was the belief of that organization that by the "socialization" of industry certain tremendous aggregations of capital would be impossible, and that wars would be impossible. He opposed registration for the draft, advising individual members of the I. W. W. to refuse to register. As an example of his attitude of mind in 1917, we quote from one of his letters: "* * * I meant, if they got too many I. W. W.'s, revolutionists, they might have a bolshevik problem in this country, such as the copper trust, the lumber trust, and other trusts. It would be all right for the common people, the working people. I meant trouble if the wobblies were compelled to serve their country in a military capacity; they might serve their country in a different way from what the big interests wanted them to...