Industrial Workers of the World

(tune: John Brown's Body)

When the union's inspiration through the workers blood shall run There can be no power greater anywhere beneath the sun Yet what force on earth is weaker than the feeble strength of one? But the union makes us strong

Solidarity forever! Solidarity forever! Solidarity forever! For the union makes us strong.

Is there aught we hold in common with the greedy parasite Who would lash us into serfdom and would crush us with his might Is there anything left to us but to organise and fight? For the union makes us strong.

CHORUS

It is we who plowed the prairies; built the cities where they trade; Dug the mines and built the workshops; endless miles of railroad laid; Now we stand outcast and starving, 'midst the wonders we have made; But the union makes us strong.

CHORUS

All the world that's owned by idle drones is ours and ours alone. We have laid the wide foundations, built it skyward stone by stone It is ours, not to slave in, but to master and to own While the union makes us strong.

CHORUS

They have taken untold billions that they never toiled to earn But without our brain and muscle not a single wheel can turn We can break their haughtly power, gain our freedom when we learn That the union makes us strong.

CHORUS

In our hands is placed a power greater than their hoarded gold Greater than the might of armies magnified a thousand-fold We can bring to birth a new world in the ashes of the old For the union makes us strong.

CHORUS

By Ralph Chaplin, January 1915.