Analysis of the Historic Pullman Strike
Analysis of the Historic Pullman Strike
Everything seemed so perfect. Pullman, Illinois was a company town on the outskirts of Chicago, founded in 1880 by George Pullman, president of the railroad sleeping car company. Pullman advertised his town as a model community that included everything from parks to libraries and was filled with satisfied, well paid workers. Each resident worked for the Pullman company, which manufactured railroad cars, and by 1894 it operated "first class" sleeping cars on almost every one of the nation's major railroads. “The name Pullman was a household word.”(Pennock, P1)Their paychecks were drawn from Pullman bank, and their rent, set by Pullman, was deducted automatically from their weekly paychecks. The town and the company operated smoothly and successfully for more than a decade. (Lehrer, P2)
However, in 1893, the residents got angry, and with very good reason. Orders for railroad sleeping cars declined, and Pullman was forced to lay off hundreds of employers. Pullman cut wages an average 25 percent for the workers who continued to work, and refused to lower rent. So the employees walked out, demanding lower rents and higher pay. At the same time, the American Railway Union (ARU), led by Eugene Debs was trying to organize rail workers all across the United States. The former Pullman workers needed people who cared, and joined the union. Now Debs became the leader of the Pullman strike.
The ARU had great influence among the workers who operated trains. To put pressure on Pullman, the union got trainmen to refuse to run trains on which Pullman sleeping cars were attached. This seriously disrupted the American railroad service, and railroad executives got nervous. Mail trains got interrupted, which caused the strike to become a national issue. It was time for the government to get involved. An Omnibus injunction was issued against the leaders of the ARU, which denied them the right to convince railway employees to follow their disruptive requests, such as not operating any trains with Pullman cars. When the Pullman management still had not changed its position, violence broke out. There was rioting, pillaging, and burning of railroad cars. This wasn’t only being done by those who were part of the union; mobs of non-union workers joined in too. The strike and boycott rapidly expanded. Attorney General Richard Olney, who disliked...