Great Railroad Strike Dbq

On May 11th, 1894, one of the most violent labor strikes in American history took place in Pullman, Illinois. This labor strike, initiated by the American Railway Union (ARU) and led by Eugene Debs against the extremely wealthy and powerful George Pullman and his company, the Pullman Palace Car Company. This strike became a turning point in the national battle regarding U.S. labor laws, and was instrumental in the regulation of corporations by the government. The event that would eventually give birth to Labor Day took months of riots, struggles, and ultimately, violence. It showed America how important the lives and wellbeing of American workers was, and helped the nation recognize the rights that employees

On July 16, in Martinsburg, West Virginia, some of the workers decided to ‘quit' and refused to work. This spontaneous strike sparked protests in other cities including St. Louis,

In his book, “Killing for Coal: America’s Deadliest Labor War”, Thomas G. Andrews construes the trajectory of a unique labor movement of the southern Colorado coal workers. The labor movement is unique as it integrates the social, ecological and industrial context of the strike for a captivating narration of the Ludlow massacre. Andrew’s account is valuable as he insists that credible conclusions must be grounded in complete and sophisticated provenance as opposed to oversimplified explanations. The intent of this response paper is to analyze the burdensome nature of obtaining coal, substandard pay and the treacherous working conditions. Secondly, the paper discusses the ways which helped employees to achieve autonomy and solidarity.

Everyone was frustrated with work conditions and this led to the formations of unions around the country. The Knights of Labor was a very popular union that led the first major strike in the United States. The year was 1885 and Jay Gould’s Missouri Pacific Railroad was the target. The owner, Jay Gould, had recently cut wages drastically and fired union members. The Knights led the strike and eventually succeeded to improve wages for the railroad workers. With this great accomplishment the Knights gained

In the late 1800s and the early 1900s, labor was anything but easy. Factory workers faced long hours, low pay, high unemployment fears, and poor working conditions during this time. Life today is much easier in comparison to the late 1800s. Americans have shorter days, bigger pay and easier working conditions. Not comparable to how life is today, many riots sparked, and citizens began to fight for equal treatment. Along with other important events, the Haymarket Riot, the Pullman Strike, and the Homestead strike all play a vital role in illustrating labor’s struggle to gain fair and equitable treatment during the late 1800s and early 1900s.

The Great Railroad strike occurred in 1877 and started in Martinsburg, West Virginia. The original incident was when major railroad companies announced that there would be another wage cut of ten percent, after workers’ wages were already slashed during the financial panic of 1873. This economic downfall caused hundreds of laborers to leave their jobs and go on strike. The word spread to cities across the country that railroad workers were striking causing a domino effect of strikes within other railroad companies as well as other professions. The initial strike led to violence causing the loss of

The Great Strike of 1877 coming after the heels of the Civil war and in the midst of a time of economic upheaval in American society, this is not argued, this is the fact of the time. We now have many primary source documents that we can use to ask questions and make judgements about this period in American history. Perhaps most importantly is the everlasting ability of using the media specifically newspapers during this time period, to sway public opinion. The question a historian finds himself asking is, if and how are the newspapers used to form and give the general public not the strikers or the business owners, a bad opinion of the strikes and a good opinion of the railroad strikers.

The Great Railroad Strike of 1877 manifested into the first of a series of labor strikes in the United States and the first general strike of the nation. Working on the railroads, labor workers already had poor working conditions and low wages. However, the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad (B&O) had made its second wage cut in the past eight months; both cuts by ten percent. In response to this, labor workers refused to allow any freight trains to roll in and out of the station until the restoration of their original wages. The railroad strikers included individuals from railroad workers to other labor sympathizers alike. The Great Strike of 1877 succeeded for the labor economy because of the large number of labor supporters, the overpowering of the militia, and the power of initiative from the people.

Despite being able to cause a small improvement in workers’ pay and hours, labor unions ultimately died out by the 1900s due to their methods. Unable to truly focus on the plight of skilled workers, most labor unions instead focused on that of unskilled workers, pushing aside the skilled workers. (Doc D). The actions of labor unions ended up being counterproductive, forcing companies to wage war against the labor unions. These stricter contracts such as that of Western Union Telegraph Company, forced workers to affiliate themselves against labor unions. (Doc E) One important thing to note is that the workers’ rights advocates were never able to coincide on one factor. As evidenced in an illustration in 1887, labor unions had to compete with other movements such as socialism, anarchism, and other labor unions. (Doc F). Because of this, the media, although recognizing the labor union movement, began viewing the labor unions as dangerous entities. Although the initial strikes such as the Wabash strike were successful, the ones that followed proved detrimental to the movement, and caused the steady decline of the labor unions. Because some of the strikes were dangerous, many strikes resulted in the deaths of those involved, such as the Homestead Crisis, and Pinkerton (Doc G). Combined with events such as the Wildcat strike, Haymarket strike, the Pullman Strike, the public began to associate a negative

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Before the steel industry started its decline in the Chicagoland areas, they saw a major spike in production after WWII, there was also large amounts of labor strikes in the steel industry. These strikes were the beginning of the end for Chicago’s steel industry, “For the most part, strikes at Chicago-area plants between 1900 and 1920 ended in defeat for workers. The largest of these strikes occurred in 1919, when 90,000 Chicago-area workers led an industry wide national protest coordinated by the American Federation of Labor (AFL) that sought union recognition and the 8-hour day. The strike temporarily halted steel production, but, after state and federal troops were called in, workers returned to their plants.” During World War II was when

When the depression of the 1870s struck, pay cuts to the American Railroad system had to be made. This wasn’t the first time though, and the workers became infuriated. Already being paid the bare minimum, the workers began to protest the second pay cut. They began to block the trains and forced them to stay still and not move. The military was sent to put an end to the protests by the government, but they did not want to use force against the protesters. When word got around, other people began to protest as well. When the strike reached Baltimore, battles struck out on the streets, and the soldiers had no choice but to use force. As they were firing into a crowd, they shot and killed ten people. Word continued to spread and eventually, over

The boycott was arranged by the American Railway Union led by Eugene Debs and launched on June 26, 1894. The union decided to become involved a few weeks ago, after nearly four thousand workers began a wildcat strike in Pullman,

cities by thousands of other laborers suffering from repeated wage cuts as well as by

According to journalist, “the Triangle fires lead to widespread labor reforms changes in the United States; however, its commemoration underscore the plight of immigrant workers similarly exploited at that particular time” (Traywick, 2011).