November 22, 1909 — The Great Hall, Cooper Union, New York City

I have listened to all the speakers, and I have no further patience for talk. I am a working girl, one of those striking against intolerable conditions. I am tired of listening to speakers who talk in generalities. What we are here for is to decide whether or not to strike.

I am one of those who suffers from the abuses described here, and I move that we go out on a general strike — now.

And will you keep the faith? Will you swear by the old Jewish oath of our fathers?”

[Other workers got up and said “We are starving while we work, we may as well starve while we strike.” Two thousand Jewish hands were thrust in air, and two thousand Jewish throats uttered the oath: “If I turn traitor to the cause I now pledge, may this hand wither and drop off from this arm I now raise.]

Source: Global Americans: A History of The United States, eds. Maria Montoya, Laura A. Belmonte, Carl J. Guarneri, Steven Hackel and Ellen Hartigan-O’connor (Cengage Learning, 2016), p. 487.

Also: What Eight Million Women Want, by Rheta Childe Dorr (Boston: Small, Maynard & Company, 1910), pp. 170-171.