Talk:Pullman Strike
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Hi,
I removed this whole chunk, because it is totally out of chronology and in this state the article is just embarrassing for wikipedia Someone who knows a little bit more about the strike should put the following paragraphs back into the article, but in a logical order.
[[[User:71.14.74.110|71.14.74.110]] 19:42, 30 April 2006 (UTC)--]
1)George Pullman’s idea for a sleeping car on a train was not original. 2)Two other companies were in the business when he formed a company with Norman and Benjamin Field in 1856. 3)The Civil War broke out and the company was forced to break up because of government seizure of railroads. 4)Pullman’s ideas would mature in Central City, Colorado where he opened a trading post.
Pullman returned to Chicago in 1864 and created the Pullman Pioneer Railroad Car. Features Included: a) 16 wheels rather than the standard 8 for a smoother ride b) Fine carpets and drapes c) Mirrors and rich woodwork d) Coiled spring suspension for the longer and wider car e) …and coal-oil lamps
Following the assassination of Abraham Lincoln on April 15th, 1865, his body needed transport from Washington, D.C. to his desired burial site in Illinois. Pullman’s Pioneer was selected to carry Lincoln home. Because of the dimensions of Pullman’s car, it was necessary for the railroads to make modifications. This caused the railroads to standardize their lines.
Pullman had a dream to build a company town where he would house all his factory workers in better conditions than anywhere else in the Chicago area. Pullman decided against using a credit system in his model town because it had been proven to plunge workers into debt. He would pay his workers in money. Pullman City had parks, two shopping centers, a library, schools for factory workers’ children, available health care and a man-made lake. Alcoholic beverages were not allowed in Pullman.
The factory in Pullman employed 14,000 workers in 1883, and 6,000 of them lived in Pullman. That year, an average annual worker’s salary was $613, which was a good wage at that time.Due to the rapid growth of Chicago, it was chosen to host the World’s Fair of 1893, and railroad companies expanded to support the 35 million tourists.
After the World’s Fair, the demand for new railroad cars went down, and therefore Pullman could not afford to keep as many factory workers. Pullman had to close his factory in Detroit and concentrate the work at Pullman. Due to the setting depression, it was necessary for Pullman to lay off yet more workers, and reduce the wages of the rest. The company also had to stop paying workers on an hourly basis and started paying based on pieces of materials completed. This angered many workers because the pay-by-piece method did not suit the intricate work done at Pullman’s factory. Pullman then assigned certain craftsmen to foremen who were paid and distributed the money after completion of each section of car."
An event mentioned in this article is a May 11 selected anniversary. (may be in HTML comment)
Firstly, I would like to adress the pulling of the mail cars. From the strike's inception the General Managers Association planned to rally public support for federal intervention. Upon the announcement of the strike the association itself disrupted traffic by stopping some trains already in transit and cancelling others. Also, the strikers, as instructed by Eugene Debs, stated that they would not operate trains only if pullman cars were attached. During the strike of the Great Northern Railroad and James Hill in 1894 (the ARU's first and only victory) they had the same policy and the strike was very sucessful. Rail owners probably learned from this and so refused to detach Pullman cars while petitioning for federal troops, claiming that the workers were obstructing de livery of the mail.
Secondly, I think that "debt slavery" would be accurate. Pullman cut wages severely in 1894 while the cost of living remained the same. Workers were extended credit by the Pullman company in order to purchase their food and pay rent. Any excess wages (which there were none of anyway) would go to pay off debt, ensuring that no worker could acquire any type of savings.
—The preceding unsigned comment was added by 24.185.205.98 (talk • contribs) .
I don't think the term "debt slavery" is strictly accurate here, because the main means of exploitation was not debt per se, but the control of workers' consumption of goods/services (i.e. the company store, rent etc.). In broader historical terms, this is a "truck system", a subject on which I'll be writing a page in the near future.Grant65 (Talk) 02:19, Mar 24, 2004 (UTC)
[edit] something that wasn't included...
"The railroad operators appealed to the Illinois state governer, John Peter Altgeld, but he refused to call out the militia due to his sympathies for workers. Regardless, railroad operators appealed to the federal government on the premise that the strike was interferring with the federal mail. President Grover Cleveland responded by sending federal troops." It also might be important to add that factory and industry owners would ask state governers for help to combat strikes and they would usually help by sending out the state militia. In the current article it just abruptly goes to, "The strike was eventually broken up by 12,000 U.S Army troops...", however, it is important to ask: Why did the federal government send troops instead of the state militia? Was it normal for federal troops to be sent first?
- Another thing about this, I just learned from my history class that apparently the Pullman strikers were actually letting mail cars go through, so there was something more behind all that than just "Cleveland sent in the troops for mail cars". Homestarmy 19:39, 15 February 2006 (UTC)
[edit] Excised paragraph
- 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.
I took this paragraph out because of its mind-numbingly inaccurate phrase "As evidenced by the success of the Pullman strike . . ." The strike was lost, the ARU was destroyed and Debs ended up in prison. The rest of the paragraph is a collection of generalities that are out of place in this article (Debs was not, let us remember, a socialist at the time of the strike; nor were most of the members of the ARU or the Pullman strikers themselves as far as I am aware.)
As I've said elsewhere, this article needs work; rating it as B-class is generous.Italo Svevo 03:02, 6 July 2006 (UTC)
- You can change the rating to start if you feel it is more appropriate. I was going by the apparent completeness of the prose and following the rating scheme set forth by WP:1.0 as part of the Wikipedia:WikiProject Trains/Assessment efforts. I am, admittedly, not an expert on labor relations. Slambo (Speak) 03:10, 6 July 2006 (UTC)
