Here are the notes and lyrics for the Almanac Singers recording of this song on If You Ain't Got the Do-Re-Mi, a Smithsonian-Folkways compilation CD.

Jim Garland (1905–1978), a coal miner, labor organizer, and composer from eastern Kentucky, composed this song in the 1930s after living through the coal strikes near Harlan, Kentucky, and used the melody of "East Virginia Blues/Dark Holler/Greenback Dollar" (see track 19). Garland came from a family of talented folk song composers, including his sisters Aunt Molly Jackson and Sarah Ogan Gunning. After having been blacklisted from the mines, Garland moved to the Pacific Northwest in the late 1940s. He appeared at the Newport Folk Festival and the Smithsonian Festival of American Folklife during the 1960s and 1970s.

I DON'T WANT YOUR MILLIONS, MISTER
(Jim Garland)

I don't want your millions, Mister,
I don't want your diamond ring.
All I want is the right to live, Mister.
Give me back my job again.

Now, I don't want your Rolls-Royce, Mister,
I don't want your pleasure yacht.
All I want's just food for my babies.
Give to me my old job back.

We worked to build this country, Mister,
While you enjoyed a life of ease.
You've stolen all that we built, Mister.
Now our children starve and freeze.

So, I don't want your millions, Mister,
I don't want your diamond ring.
All I want is the right to live, Mister.
Give me back my job again.

Think me dumb if you wish, Mister,
Call me green, or blue, or red.
This one thing I sure know, Mister,
My hungry babies must be fed.

Take the two old parties, Mister,
No difference in them I can see.
But with a Farmer-Labor Party
We could set the people free.

So, I don't want your millions, Mister,
I don't want your diamond ring.
All I want is the right to live, Mister.
Give me back my job again.


26. I Don't Want Your Millions
The Almanac Singers, vocals with instrumental accompaniment
(from Talking Union and Other Union Songs Folkways 5285, 1955)