Robber Barons Quotes

“I steal from the rich to give to myself.”
― Robert Thier, The Robber Knight

“Democracy is supposed to be ‘of the people, by the people and for the people’. Capitalism is ‘of the capitalist, for the capitalist’. Period.”
― Jerry Ash, Hellraiser—Mother Jones: An Historical Novel

“If your party serves the powerful and well-funded interests, and there's no limit to what you can spend, you have a permanent, structural advantage. We're averaging fifty-dollar checks in our campaign, and trying to ward off these seven- or eight-figure checks on the other side. That disparity is pretty striking, and so are the implications. In many ways, we're back in the Gilded Age. We have robber barons buying the government.”
― David Axelrod

“Honey, it isn’t democracy that runs this country. Capitalism rules. It does no good to reason with the capitalists or their politicians. This is a class war. We have to stir up the American people, the lower class. Some of the better-off lower class do show some sympathy for us when they’re smacked with the facts. And when they voice themselves collectively, good things happen.” — Mother Jones”
― Jerry Ash

“I am a citizen of this country,” I declare, “and Mr. Mayor, tonight I will be a citizen of this city when I put my shoes under my bed. The courageous men, women and children who are with me (blocked from crossing the bridge into NYC) are also citizens of this country and will be sleeping near their shoes too. I want them with me tonight, here, in the city of New York. We are all American citizens.” — Mother Jones”
― Jerry Ash

“That’s got to stop,” says I. “The idea of any blood-thirsty pirate (Mexican President Diaz) sitting on a throne and reaching across the border to tromp on our Constitution makes my blood boil.” — Mother Jones”
― Jerry Ash, Hellraiser—Mother Jones: An Historical Novel

“Turning back to the crowd I say, “I am duty bound to make this plea, but I want to say, with all due respect to the governor here, that I doubt seriously that he will do — cannot do — anything. And for the reason that he is owned, lock, stock and barrel, by the capitalists who placed him here in this building.” — Mother Jones”
― Jerry Ash, Hellraiser—Mother Jones: An Historical Novel

“To the RKO motion picture camera at her 100th birthday party: “I pray for the day when working men and women are able to earn a fair share of the wealth they produce in a capitalist system, a day when all Americans are able to enjoy the freedom, rights and opportunities guaranteed them by the Constitution of the United States of America.” — Mother Jones”
― Jerry Ash, Hellraiser—Mother Jones: An Historical Novel

“This first generation of corporate barons left a lasting, if dubious, legacy: they made America more hierarchical, with new divisions between management and labor, between a professional class and everyday workers. They made the economy more centralized, consolidating power into a few mega-companies and their owners; they made it more globalized, keyed to international capital and trade. They diminished the voice of the ordinary citizen in society and politics in favor of educated, professionalized elites. In short, they gave America an entirely new political economy, what some historians have called corporate liberalism.”
― Josh Hawley

“Go home now,” says I. “Keep away from the saloons. Save your money. You are going to need it.”
“What are we going to need it for?” asks a voice from the crowd.
“For guns and ammunition,” says I.”
― Jerry Ash, Hellraiser—Mother Jones: An Historical Novel

“What do you see out there?” I ask.
“Pittsburgh,” he replies. Now I laugh. “No, young man. What you see is hell with the lid taken off.” — Mother Jones”
― Jerry Ash, Hellraiser—Mother Jones: An Historical Novel

“What the hell’s the matter with you men? Are you cowards as well as stupid? You boys make me sick. I’m done with you. You hear me? I want you to go back to your places now and stay with your children until I say you’re needed.
“Tell your wives and your older children to bring with them dish pans and cooking pots. Tell them to bring their stirring spoons and ladles. Tell them to carry a mop over their shoulders. We’re goin’ to march on that mine and we’re going to stand guard to see that no scabs are allowed in. Do you hear me?” — Mother Jones”
― Jerry Ash, Hellraiser—Mother Jones: An Historical Novel

“I go back to the union man and say, “Sir, this is a house of God, not a proper place for a union meeting. I have some things to say today that God would not want to hear in His own house. Boys, I want you to get up, every one of you, and go across the road. I want you to sit down on the hillside over there and wait for me to speak to you.”
― Jerry Ash, Hellraiser—Mother Jones: An Historical Novel

“Well, honey, it’s capitalism that brings out the meanness and greed,” says I. “Our founding fathers did a decent job of framing our democracy. They wrote the Constitution and added a Bill of Rights that intended for people of all classes to enjoy the freedoms the Constitution offers. But capitalism came along without a constitution or a bill of rights and the industrialists grabbed unrestricted power. The capitalists wrote their own ‘Declaration of Capitalism’.” — Mother Jones”
― Jerry Ash, Hellraiser—Mother Jones: An Historical Novel

“Good God, is the man a heathen?’

‘Worse, a capitalist with pretensions of culture.”
― Melanie Jackson, Impression of Bones

“This is why tigers have ranges of hundreds of square kilometers," Vlad said. "Robber barons are not really very efficient.”
― Kim Stanley Robinson, Red Mars

“MAGA dumbfucks are trailer park yokels with 6 teeth who support robber barons with 6 yachts.”
― Oliver Markus Malloy, American Fascism: A German Writer's Urgent Warning To America

“Fun Fact: Albert Einstein, considered by many to be the smartest man ever, was a Democratic socialist like Bernie and Zohran Mamdani.

Einstein agreed with Karl Marx, that capitalism is a corrupt system that brings out the worst in people and allows greedy robber barons to exploit the working class.”
― Oliver Markus Malloy, American Fascism: A German Writer's Urgent Warning To America