Pullman Workers Strike: Rail Network Paralyzed Nationwide

Wages cut by a quarter, rents unchanged, and a company town with nowhere to appeal. Workers at George Pullman's Palace Car Company walked off the job on May 11, 1894, launching a strike that would paralyze the nation's rail network within weeks. Pullman had built an entire town south of Chicago for his employees, controlling their housing, stores, and utilities. When the economic depression of 1893 hit, he slashed wages but refused to reduce rents in company housing. The 3,000 Pullman workers who struck found a powerful ally in Eugene V. Debs and his American Railway Union. Debs organized a nationwide boycott: ARU members refused to handle any train carrying Pullman cars. Within days, rail traffic across twenty-seven states ground to a halt. Mail delivery stopped. Perishable goods rotted in freight yards. The economic disruption was staggering. President Grover Cleveland intervened by obtaining a federal injunction against the strike, arguing that it obstructed mail delivery. When strikers defied the injunction, Cleveland deployed 12,000 federal troops to Chicago over the objection of Illinois Governor John Peter Altgeld. Violence erupted, leaving thirteen strikers dead and millions of dollars in property destroyed. Debs was arrested and imprisoned for contempt. The Pullman Strike fundamentally altered American labor law. The Supreme Court upheld the use of injunctions against strikes, a tool employers would wield for decades. Debs, radicalized by his imprisonment, became America's most prominent socialist. Congress, embarrassed by the bloodshed, rushed to make Labor Day a federal holiday just six days after the strike ended.