The Pullman Strike: Aftermath
This is the fifth installment of a series on the great Pullman Strike of 1894. I thought it was going to be the last, but there’s just so much to tell about Eugene Debs after the strike was over that I’m going to do one more after this.
I take a different approach than most histories: instead of summarizing it as “first this happened, then that happened” and giving a few brief words from the newspapers, I show you the actual newspaper stories from those days, when they didn’t know how it was going to turn out.
Part 1 introduces the players. George Pullman, Grover Cleveland, and Eugene Debs, mainly. In the great depression of 1893, Pullman cut employees’ wages but left their rents in the company town of Pullman the same. The union struck and called for railway workers to refuse to run any trains containing Pullman cars.
Part 2 shows how the U.S. was almost paralyzed by a nationwide shutdown of the railroads. Violence broke out across the country. The railroads could have just stopped attaching Pullman sleeping cars to all their trains, but they considered this a war of Big Business vs. Labor, and they were on the business side. The President and Attorney General were solidly on that side, too, and obtained a blanket injunction against nearly anything the union might try to do.
Part 3 is the climax of the violence. The injunction looks meaningless because the government had no means of enforcing it. President Cleveland does the unthinkable and calls out the Army. Eugene Debs says that the troops would never shoot at American citizens, and doing so would mean civil war. Nonetheless, they do shoot and kill some rioters. Debs escalates even further and calls for a general strike; not just against railroads but against everything.
Part 4 ends in complete and utter defeat for Debs. The general strike fizzles, Pullman refuses to negotiate at all, and the American Federation of Labor, led by Samuel Gompers, declines to back Debs’ efforts. Debs and his managers are arrested on conspiracy charges that threaten to lock them up for life.
We now resume.
“Pullman” is now just a neighborhood of Chicago, and I grew up about two miles away from it. I went to the Pullman Library and had an account at the Pullman Bank. For some reason, they never taught us any of this history in school.
Debs Goes to Jail the First Time
The New York Times for July 18 reports:
CHICAGO. July 17.—Eugene V. Debs. President of the Americans Railway Union, and his "cabinet"—Vice President George W. Howard, General Secretary Sylvester Kellher, and L. W. Rogers, Chairman of the Executive Committee and editor of The Journal of the organization—were taken to the county jail this afternoon as prisoners of the United States for violation of the injunction issued July 2 by Judges Woods and Grosscup, restraining them from combining and conspiring to hinder inter-State commerce traffic or the movement of United States mails.
The imprisonment of the chiefs of the new railway union was not in any sense an arbitrary proceeding. Although predicated upon what the court regarded as an open and defiant violation of orders previously issued from its jurisdiction, an opportunity was afforded to the defendants of presenting bonds for their appearance in court a week hence. This proposition, however, was rejected by President Debs. Bondsmen offered their aid and support to the union leaders, but were declined. Unless in the meantime Debs should tire of incarceration, he will remain in jail until Monday morning of next week.
So Debs was charged with violating the court’s injunction. This was not a criminal proceeding in which he’d have the right to a jury trial. He could have posted bond, but chose to stay in jail until his hearing.
The hearing ended inconclusively when one of the assistant prosecutors fell ill, and was postponed until September. This time Debs allowed himself to be bailed out.
Some Pullman Employees Go Back to Work
The Pullman company offered to take back some employees, provided they were not members of the American Railway Union and promised to never join it. Strike organizers were not welcome.
In 1894 there was no “social safety net.” A family without a breadwinner was on its own and was reduced to begging, or starvation. Whereas at the beginning of the strike, the public was with them and supported the relief funds generously, the arson and violence had taken their toll. Many of the strikers just had to swallow their pride and rejoin. Others moved on to other jobs.
Governor Altgeld Tries to Help the Starving
In desperation the workers wrote to the Governor of Illinois, John Peter Altgeld:
Kensington, Ill.,
August 17, 1894.
To His Excellency, the Governor of the State of Illinois:
We, the people of Pullman, who, by the greed and oppression of George M. Pullman, have been brought to a condition where starvation stares us in the face, do hereby appeal to you for aid in this our hour of need. We have been refused employment and have no means of leaving this vicinity, and our families are starving. Our places have been filled with workmen from all over the United States, brought here by the Pullman Company, and the surplus were turned away to walk the streets and starve also. There are over 1600 families here in destitution and want, and their condition is pitiful. We have exhausted all the means at our command to feed them, and we now make this appeal to you as a last resource. Trusting that God will influence you in our behalf and that you will give this your prompt attention, we remain,
Yours in distress,
THE STARVING CITIZENS OF PULLMAN
F. E. POLLANS,
L. J. NEWELL,
THEO. RODHE,
Committee.
At this point, I have to mention the personal significance of “Altgeld” to me:
Altgeld Gardens is a public housing project south of the Pullman neighborhood. I regularly rode a bus that went up 111th St. and then down Michigan Ave., and its destination was Altgeld Gardens. I don’t recall ever learning who Altgeld was. As that Wikipedia article says, Barack Obama worked there in his first job as a community organizer.
The Governor was moved by this letter and wrote to Mr. Pullman:
August 19, 1894.
To George M. Pullman, President Pullman Palace Car Co., Chicago:
Sir:—I have received numerous reports to the effect that there is great distress at Pullman. To-day I received a formal appeal as Governor from a committee of the Pullman people for aid. They state that sixteen hundred families including women and children, are starving; that they cannot get work and have not the means to go elsewhere; that your company has brought men from all over the United States to fill their places. Now these people live in your town and were your employees. Some of them worked for your company for many years. They must be people of industry and character or you would not have kept them. Many of them have practically given their lives to you. It is claimed they struck because after years of toil their loaves were so reduced that their children went hungry. Assuming that they were wrong and foolish, they had yet served you long and well and you must feel some interest in them. [emphasis added] They do not stand on the same footing with you, so that much must be overlooked. The State of Illinois has not the least desire to meddle in the affairs of your company, but it cannot allow a whole community within its borders to perish of hunger. The local overseer of the poor has been appealed to, but there is a limit to what he can do. I cannot help them very much at present. So unless relief comes from some other source I shall either have to call an extra session of the Legislature to make special appropriations, or else issue an appeal to the humane people of the State to give bread to your recent employees. It seems to me that you would prefer to relieve the situation yourself, especially as it has just cost the State upwards of fifty thousand dollars to protect your property, and both the State and the public have suffered enormous loss and expense on account of disturbances that grew out of trouble between your company and its workmen. I am going to Chicago to-night to make a personal investigation before taking any official action. I will be at my office in the Unity block at 10 a.m. to-morrow, and shall be glad to hear from you if you care to make any reply.
JOHN P. ALTGELD, Governor.
Altgeld did go to the town of Pullman in person, and here’s what he wrote afterwards:
August 21st 1894.
Mr. George M. Pullman, President Pullman Car Company, Chicago, Ill.:
Sir:—I have examined the conditions at Pullman yesterday, visited even the kitchens and bedrooms of many of the people. Two representatives of your company were with me and we found the distress as great as it was represented. The men are hungry and the women and children are actually suffering. They have been living on charity for a number of months and it is exhausted. Men who had worked for your company for more than ten years had to apply to the relief society in two weeks after the work stopped.
I learn from your manager that last spring there were 3,260 people on the pay roll; yesterday there were 2,200 at work, but over 600 of these are new men, so that only about 1,600 of the old employees have been taken back, thus leaving over 1600 of the old employees who have not been taken back, a few hundred have left, the remainder have nearly all applied for work, but were told that they were not needed. These are utterly destitute. The relief committee on last Saturday gave out two pounds of oat meal and two pounds of corn meal to each family. But even the relief committee has exhausted its resources.
Something must be done at once. The case differs from instances of destitution found elsewhere, for generally there is somebody in the neighborhood able to give relief; this is not the case at Pullman. Even those who have gone to work are so exhausted that they cannot help their neighbors if they would. I repeat now that it seems to me your company cannot afford to have me appeal to the charity and humanity of the State to save the lives of your old employes. Four-fifths of those people are women and children. No matter what caused this distress, it must be met.
If you will allow me, I will make this suggestion: If you had shut down your works last fall when you say business was poor, you would not have expected to get any rent for your tenements. Now, while a dollar is a large sum to each of these people, all the rent now due you is a comparatively small matter to you. If you would cancel all rent to October 1st, you would be as well off as if you had shut down. This would enable those who are at work to meet their most pressing wants. Then if you cannot give work to all why work some half-time so that all can at least get something to eat for their families. This will give immediate relief to the whole situation. And then by degrees assist as many to go elsewhere as desire to do so, and all to whom you cannot give work. In this way something like a normal condition could be re-established at Pullman before winter and you would not be out any more than you would have been had you shut down a year ago.
I will be at the Unity block for several hours and will be glad to see you if you care to make any reply.
Yours, respectfully,
JOHN P. ALTGELD.
So when the Governor of your state, which has suffered so much damage and loss of life because of your pigheadedness, appeals to your conscience as a human being, what do you do? I wasn’t able to find Pullman’s official response to Altgeld, but here is Altgeld’s answer to it:
Chicago, August 21st, 1894.
George M. Pullman, Esq., President Pullman Palace Car Company, City.
Sir:—I have your answer to my communication of this morning. I see by it that your company refuses to do anything toward relieving the situation at Pullman. It is true that Mr. Wickes offered to take me to Pullman and show me around. I told him that I had no objections to his going, but that I doubted the wisdom of my going under anybody’s wing. I was, however, met at the depot by two of your representatives, both able men, who accompanied me everywhere. I took pains to have them present in each case. I also called at your office and got what information they could give me there, so that your company was represented and heard, and no man there questioned either the condition of the extent of the suffering. If you will make the round I made, go into the houses of the people, meet them face to face and talk with them, you will be convinced that none of them had $1,300, or any other sum of money only a few weeks ago.
I cannot enter into a discussion with you as to the merits of the controversy between you and your former workmen.
It is not my business to fix the moral responsibility in this case. There are nearly six thousand people suffering for the want of food—they were your employees—four-fifths of them women and children—some of these people have worked for you for more than twelve years. I assumed that even if they were wrong and had been foolish, you would not be willing to see them perish. I also assumed that as the State had just been to a large expense to protect your property you would not want to have the public shoulder the burden of relieving distress in your town.
As you refuse to do anything to relieve suffering in this case, I am compelled to appeal to the humanity of the people of Illinois to do so.
Respectfully yours,
JOHN P. ALTGELD
We’ll see the testimony of Pullman and Wickes below. The federal government established a commission to inquire into the Pullman strike.
The Commission
Here’s the report of the Commission. The summary:
UNITED STATES STRIKE COMMISSION,
Washington, D. C., November 14, 1894.
SIR: We have the honor to hand you herewith our report upon the controversies which arose between the Illinois Central Railroad Company and the Chicago, Rock Island and Pacific Railway Company and certain of their employees in June last. This report is made in accordance with your directions of the 26th of July and under the provisions of section 6 of chapter 1063 of the laws of the United States passed October 1, 1888.
The appropriation applicable to the investigation which we have conducted was $5,000, a sum which has proved amply sufficient for all the expenses of the commission. [emphasis added]
In addition to our report covering our consideration, conclusions, and recommendations, we hand you herewith a copy of the testimony taken at the hearings conducted by the commission, a digest of the suggestions made in writing to the commission, and various other matters which have been submitted to it, all bearing upon the difficulties and controversies considered. These matters are in the form of appendices.
We are, very respectfully, your obedient servants,
CARROLL D. WRIGHT.
JOHN D. KERNAN.
NICHOLAS E. WORTHINGTON.
The PRESIDENT.
$5,000. Probably the coffee would cost more than that nowadays. A commission like this would cost $100 million at least.
Here is its dialog with Thomas Wickes, the executive who acted as front man for Pullman:
The Pullman company is hostile to the idea of conferring with organized labor in the settlement of differences arising between it and its employees. The position of the company in this respect is clearly stated in the testimony of Mr. Wickes, its second vice-president, which is here cited:
Q. 222. Has the company had any policy with reference to labor unions among its help?
Ans. No; we have never objected to unions except in one instance. I presume that there are quite a number of unions in our shops now.
Q. 223. What are they?
Ans. I couldn't tell you, but I have heard of some of them. I suppose the cabinetmakers have a union, and I suppose the car builders have a union, and the carvers, and the painters, and other classes of men. We do not inquire into that at all.
Q. 224. That is, unions among themselves in the works?
Ans. Members of the craft, belonging to other unions; that is, the cabinet union might have its headquarters in Chicago and our men would be members of it; but we did not object to anything of that kind.
Q. 225. The only objection you ever made was to the American Railway Union, wasn't it?
Ans. Yes, sir.
Q. 226. What is the basis of your objection to that union?
Ans. Our objection to that was that we would not treat with our men as members of the American Railway Union, and we would not treat with them as members of any union. We treat with them as individuals and as men.
Q. 227. That is, each man as an individual, do you mean that?
Ans. Yes, sir.
Q. 228. Don't you think, Mr. Wickes, that it would give the corporation a very great advantage over those men if it could take them up one at a time and discuss the question with him? With the ability that you have got, for instance, where do you think the man would stand in such a discussion?
Ans. The man has got probably more ability than I have.
Q. 229. You think that it would be fair to your men for each one of them to come before you and take up the question of his grievances and attempt to maintain his end of the discussion, do you?
Ans. I think so; yes. If he is not able to do that, that is his misfortune.
Q. 230. Don't you think that the fact that you represent a vast concentration of capital, and are selected for that because of your ability to represent it, entitles him, if he pleases, to unite with all of the men of his craft and select the ablest one they have got to represent the cause?
Ans. As a union?
Q. 231. As a union.
Ans. They have the right; yes, sir. We have the right to say whether we will receive them or not.
Q. 232. Do you think you have any right to refuse to recognize that right in treating with the men?
Ans. Yes, sir; if we chose to.
Q. 233. If you chose to. Is it your policy to do that?
Ans. Yes, sir.
Q. 234. Then you think that you have the right to refuse to recognize a union of the men designed for the purpose of presenting, through the ablest of their members, to your company the grievances which all complain of or which any complain of?
Ans. That is the policy of the company; yes, sir. If we were to receive these men as representatives of the unions they could probably force us to pay any wages which they saw fit, and get the Pullman company in the same shape that some of the railroads are by making concessions which ought not to be made.
Q. 235. Don't you think that the opposite policy, to wit, that all your dealings with the men, as individuals, in case you were one who sought to abuse your power, might enable you to pay to the men, on the other hand, just what you saw fit?
Ans. Well, of course a man in an official position, if he is arbitrary and unfair, could work a great deal of injustice to the men; no doubt about that. But then it is a man's privilege to go to work somewhere else.
Q. 236. Don't you recognize as to many men, after they have become settled in a place at work of that kind, that really that privilege does not amount to much?
Ans. We find that the best men usually come to the front; the best of our men don't give us any trouble with unions or anything else. It is only the inferior men — that is, the least competent — that give us the trouble as a general thing.
Since the strike, withdrawal from the American Railway Union is required from those seeking work. The company does not recognize that labor organizations have any place or necessity in Pullman, where the company fixes wages and rents, and refuses to treat with labor organizations. The laborer can work or quit on the terms offered; that is the limit of his rights. To join a labor organization in order to secure the protection of union against wrongs, real or imaginary, is overstepping the limit and arouses hostility. This position secures all the advantage of the concentration of capital, ability, power, and control for the company in its labor dealings, and deprives the employees of any such advantage or protection as a labor union might afford. In this respect the Pullman company is behind the age.
In other words: the Pullman company’s position was that the normal worker has no right to join a union, the company will not negotiate with one, and it will refuse to hire anyone who belongs to one. If he doesn’t care for that policy, he’s free to work somewhere else.
On August 27, Pullman himself sat down before the Commission. Somehow, I can’t get access to the primary sources for that testimony, so I have to cite the book here:
It [paying more wages] would not have been a good business investment, he said, because "the wages had been fixed."
"Who fixed them?"
"They were to work at an agreed scale."
"They were forced to?"
"No, they were not forced."
"They had to take that or quit?"
"Exactly."
A commissioner suggested that a lack of bread and meat might compel a man to work for less money.
"Then," Pullman replied, "I would say it was agreed."
Pullman parried in the same opaque manner questions about "what is known to workmen as the living wage."
Pullman said that his employees' claim that before the strike they were not receiving a living wage was not true "because they are working for it now." Their strike broken, their union membership canceled, the men had taken what they could get. They were living on it, therefore it must be a living wage.
The commissioner naturally tried to delve into the question of why Pullman had so adamantly refused to arbitrate.
"It was the principle involved," Pullman said. "We must be the parties to decide whether we were willing to continue the manufacturing. To arbitrate would have been "a piece of business folly."
He went on to explain that the question of whether the shops would be operated at a loss was "impossible for the company, as a matter of principle, to submit to the opinion of any third party."
"You use the expression, 'Impossible to be submitted.' Why is it impossible?"
"Because it would violate a principle."
"What principle?"
"The principle that a man should have the right to manage his own property."
Despite his carefully cultivated image as someone who was unflappable, he was so upset by this cross-examination that he spent the next four days in bed. He died of a heart attack barely three years later, and the Wikipedia entry details the extraordinary lengths which the family went to, to avoid his body being dug up by enemies:
Fearing that some of his former employees or other labor supporters might try to dig up his body, his family arranged for his remains to be placed in a lead-lined mahogany coffin, which was then sealed inside a block of concrete. At the cemetery, a large pit had been dug at the family plot. At its base and walls were 18 inches of reinforced concrete. The coffin was lowered, and covered with asphalt and tar paper. More concrete was poured on top, followed by a layer of steel rails bolted together at right angles, and another layer of concrete. The entire burial process took two days.
The Mid-Term Election of 1894
Only a few months after this, the US had elections. Cleveland was a Democrat, and the Democrats were already unpopular (tariffs, the Depression, and silver monetization were big issues), but the perception that they were in bed with big business and had used the Army to crush a strike didn’t help. They suffered a wipeout in the House that is still the largest in U.S. history: 105 seats. Republicans controlled both houses of Congress for the last two years of Cleveland’s term.
Debs’ Trials
Debs now had two trials coming up: the first, for violating the injunction; and the second, for conspiracy to hinder interstate commerce, the Mails, and so forth. The former was in front of a judge, while the latter would be a full jury trial.
The young Clarence Darrow was his attorney. We’ll cover those, and his later career as a Presidential candidate, in the next article.