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The Pullman Strike occurred on May 11, 1894, when 50,000 Pullman Palace Car Company workers went on strike. The strike ended when U.S. Army troops broke the strike.
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[edit] Roots of the strike
The Panic of 1893 created widespread economic dislocation in the United States, with some estimates of unemployment during the subsequent six-year depression ranging as high as 18.4 percent in 1894.
The American Federation of Labor (AFL) sponsored mass meetings in Albany, Buffalo, Chicago, Cincinnati, Detroit, Indianapolis and Toledo to demand relief. The Chicago meeting in late August 1893 drew 10,000 people. Municipal governments set up soup kitchens and established limited public works projects to provide work to the unemployed. But business leaders denounced the actions as 'communism', and Congress took no action.[1]
On May 1, 1894, Coxey's Army—10,000 unemployed men, led by wealthy manufacturer Jacob Coxey of Massillon, Ohio—descended on Washington, D.C., demanding legislation to employ the nation's jobless building public works. Despite warnings from local police, the marchers entered the grounds of the U.S. Capitol. Coxey and other march leaders were arrested and imprisoned for 20 days, as well as fined. Coxey's Army camped in the nation's capital until August 15, when it disbanded.[2]
Labor unions pressed for the eight-hour day to increase employment. Employers resisted, often lengthening the work-day and attempting to break what few unions existed.
The owner of the company, George Pullman was a "welfare capitalist." He hoped to prevent labor discontent, but was not willing to increase the workers' wages. Pullman housed his workers in a company town by Lake Calumet (Pullman, Chicago) in what is now the southern part of the city. Instead of living in utilitarian tenements as did many other industrial workers of the day, Pullman workers lived in attractive company-owned houses, complete with indoor plumbing, gas, and sewer systems.
The luxuries of this supposed utopia came at a cost: in this "company town," everything was owned by the corporation, including both the houses and local stores. The Pullman Company controlled almost every aspect of their lives, and practiced "debt slavery" (one form of truck system), which kept workers under de facto contract by maintaining large debts to the company store and to their "landlord," the Pullman Company itself. Money owed was automatically deducted from workers' paychecks and workers would often never see their earnings at all.
During the major economic downturn of the early 1890s, George Pullman cut wages without an equivalent decrease in rent and other expenses. Discontented workers joined the American Railway Union (ARU), led by Eugene V. Debs, which helped them to stage a massive strike.
The strike effectively shut down production in the Pullman factories and led to a lockout. Many supply routes were cut off for everyone when railroad workers across the nation blocked Pullman cars (and subsequently Wagner Palace cars) from moving in a sympathy strike.
On July 5th, the buildings of the World's Columbian Exposition around the Court of Honor were torched. Buildings caught in the blaze included the administration’s hall, the manufacturer's hall, the electricity hall, the machinery hall, the mining hall, the agricultural hall, and the fair's train station.
[edit] Suprression by the U.S. Army
The strike was broken up by United States Marshals and some 2,000 United States Army troops, commanded by Nelson Miles, sent in by President Grover Cleveland on the basis that the strike interfered with the delivery of U.S. Mail. During the course of the strike, 13 strikers were killed and 57 were wounded. An estimated $80,000 worth of property was damaged, and Debs was tried for, and found guilty of, interfering with the mail. He was sent to prison for six months.
At the time of his arrest, Debs was not a Socialist. However, during his time in prison, he read the works of Karl Marx. After his release in 1895, he became the leading Socialist figure in America. He ran for President for the first of five times in 1900.
Near the turn of the 19th century, the labor class of the United States began to stand up against the negative effects of capitalism. They fought for better wages, better working conditions, and a less taxing work schedule. Socialist agendas were put forth that cited labor as the most important means of production, and that exposed the capitalists’ exploitation of it. As evidenced by the sucess of the Pullman strike, the most effective weapon of labor unions has historically been, and remains today, the strike.
[edit] Notes
[edit] References
- Foner, Philip S. History of the Labor Movement in the United States: From the Founding of the A.F. of L. to the Emergence of American Imperialism. 2nd ed. New York: International Publishers, Co., 1975. ISBN 0717803880
[edit] External links
[[Category:1894 [[Category:Labor disputes [[Category:Rail transport in the United States [[Category:History of labor relations in the United States
[[de:Pullman-Streik
