Well known militant and socialist as well as suspected dynamitist , Thomas Mooney , was tried and convicted in 1916 for the Preparedness Day Bombing in San Francisco , which led to the death of ten and injury of forty more . His trial , it seemed , was nothing more than a show with coached witnesses and the air of a lynch mob . While the American Socialist Party was at first ready to dispel him , his local branch stood by him and he began to gain the support of an increasingly agitated domestic and international left wing community , which only further radicalized with the introduction of the draft . So much so that Woodrow Wilson felt compelled to start a letter writing campaign to the Governor of California William Stephens to commute Mooney 's death sentence . Stephens seemed to have missed his chance when in November 1917 , the San Francisco Call ran an exposé suggesting Mooney was framed by prosecutors , basing its findings on a federal investigation conducted under Wilson 's orders . ( The allegations later gained even more veracity : the prosecution ’s case was riddled with perjury , corruption , suppression of evidence , conflict of interest , and other irregularities ignored by prosecutors . ) In the meantime , efforts to recall local District Attorney Charles Fickert , who spearheaded the effort to prosecute Mooney , grew more and more promising with each passing day
Preparedness Day Bombing
Preparedness Day Bombing
1917 Sacramento Governor's Mansion bombing