Challenges to Government & Challenges to Government & Corporate PowerCorporate Power

The Labor MovementThe Labor Movement

Revolt in the WorkplaceRevolt in the Workplace

• Late 19th century, challenges to the new industrial ordered developed.– Objections to long hours– Objections to low pay– Resentment of dependence on bankers &

railroads– Protest against unsafe working conditions

Types of Protest LaunchedTypes of Protest Launched

• Workers responded to these challenges in several ways– Workers joined together in unions & literally

fought with security forces– Workers destroyed machinery that threatened

their jobs– Formed political parties (namely the People’s

Party aka, the Populist Party)

Origins of Populist PartyOrigins of Populist Party

• Coalition of several regional farmers alliances– Northern Alliance (wanted 3rd Party)– Southern Alliance (Tended to ally w/Dems)– Colored Farmers Alliance (Joined in 1889)

• An 1880s recession mobilized these groups into a new political party in 1890.

Populist PlatformPopulist Platform

• Increase the money supply

• Institute a graduated income tax

• Institute a federal loan program

• Popular vote of senators

• 8 hour work day

• Single presidential terms

• Restrictions on immigration

Problems of the PopulistProblems of the Populist

• Interracial conflict– White vs. black, white v. Chinese etc.

• Embraced consumer culture that they were fighting against.– i.e. fought for shorter work days and higher

wages, but wanted to partake in department store shopping, movies, and amusement parks

Militancy in Factors & MinesMilitancy in Factors & Mines

• Urban laborers faced challenges as well:– Layoffs– Wage cuts– Long hours due to no private industry

regulation– Industrial accidents were common– Possibility of being blacklisted– Difficulty in organizing (whites v. immigrants,

men v. women, etc.)

The PinkertonsThe Pinkertons

• The Pinkerton National Detective Agency was founded in 1850 mainly to help the RRs prevent and end strikes.

• Busting of strikes was often fatal for many:– 1875 Mollies Strike -20 hanged for conspiracy– 1877 Haymarket Affair (7 policemen killed)– 1892 Homestead Strike

• Left 3 Pinkertons & 9 strikers dead

Labor UnionsLabor Unions

• Knights of Labor (1869)– Came under leadership of Terence Powderly– Launched effort to organize whites, blacks,

Hispanics, & women– Ran economist and author Henry George

(Progress and Poverty) for mayor of NY in 1886, coming in second.

• Movement demoralized by Haymarket bombings – never recovered.

The Haymarket AffairThe Haymarket Affair

• Workers at McCormick reaper works in Chicago staged strike for 8-hour day.– A battle erupted; 4 strikers were killed

• Local anarchist called for a meeting at Haymarket Square

• Police attempted to disperse; someone threw a bomb, killing several policeman.

• W/O evidence the organizers were convicted & executed.

American Federation of Labor American Federation of Labor (AFL)(AFL)

• Emerged to become most powerful labor movement after the demise of Knights of Labor.

• Founded by Samuel Gompers (1886)• Focused mostly on skilled workers, however* -

most of them white men.• Fought for better wages & working conditions• Emphasized walkouts and boycotts as oppose to

strikes.

The Homestead Strike, 1892The Homestead Strike, 1892

• Employers launched fierce counterattacks on the trade-union movement.– At one of Carnegie’s steel mills in Homestead

Pennsylvania, mgt announced that they would no longer deal w/ the union, but only with employees individually.

– The workers refused and a bloody battle ensued between workers & Pinkertons.

– Although the strikers won, the state militia came in and arrested them.

– This marked the end of unions in the steel industry.

The Pullman StrikeThe Pullman Strike

• Pullman, Illinois 1894• Depression of 1893 led Pullman RR’s to cut

wages, but not rents.• Workers belonged to the American Railway

Union, led by Eugene V. Debs, & went on strike – it spread across the country!

• The company convinced the fed gov’t to break the strike. How? Significance of this case?

Significance of Pullman StrikeSignificance of Pullman Strike

• The Pullman strike signaled big trouble for the poor and unemployed.

• Marked the first time the courts had ordered strikers to return to work.

• Highlighted the dangerous alliance between government and big business.

Eugene V. DebsEugene V. Debs

• Head of American Railway Union

• Led protest of its 150k members against conditions at Pullman Car Company (lowered wages; not rents)

• Strike crippled RRs• Prez Cleveland sent

troops to crush strike & issued fed injunction to force strikers back 2 work

Legacy of the PopulistLegacy of the Populist

• Yielded some remarkable interracial coalitions.• Coalition between black Republicans and poor

white Democrats resulted in victories in state legislatures and several governorships.

• However, were unable to sustain a region-wide coalition in the South– White southern democrats campaigned to

disenfranchise black men

• Blacks & poor whites would find no common political ground again until the 1930s*

Barriers to U.S. Workers Political Barriers to U.S. Workers Political MovementMovement

• Although socialism took hold in many parts of Europe during the 1890s, it never did so in America for a number of reasons:– Farmers and industrial workers found difficult in

allying with each other.– Large influx of immigrants created competition

amongst the poor.– Employers manipulated racial, ethnic, and religious

prejudices between workers (i.e. using blacks as scabs).

– Unions themselves remained segregated.– Employers sold pipe dreams to many of the poor who

therefore would not join unions etc.

SuffrageSuffrage

• In 1890 the two largest suffrage associations merged to form the National American Woman Suffrage Association (NAWSA)

• Elizabeth Cady Stanton served as its president for the first two years.

• Unfortunately, the organization had contradictory impulses:

• Brought supporters together from around the country• But did not allow poor, immigrant, or black women to join

Jim Crow SegregationJim Crow Segregation

• New black elite included doctors, lawyers, etc.• Developed a sense of community by

establishing own institutions• Whites responded by attempting to put these

blacks in ‘their place’– De facto becomes De jure after the 1890s– Lynchings increase – Ida B. Wells most outspoken crusader against

lynching – Free Speech in Memphis.

Racial CategoriesRacial Categories

• White supremacy led to rewriting of state constitutions is south– Poll taxes, literacy test, grandfather clauses

• Plessy v. Ferguson (8-1)

• Free Speech – Ida B. Wells

EducationEducation

• Booker T. Washington v. W.E.B. Dubois• Atlanta Compromise, 1895

– Cast down your buckets…– Vocational training & economic viability– Wait for political rights & social equality– Others objected and felt Washington was a

sell-out*

• Dubois cited the triple paradox of Washington’s thesis.

Triple ParadoxTriple Paradox

• 1. He is striving nobly to make Negro artisans business men and property-owners; but it is utterly impossible, under modern competitive methods, for workingmen and property-owners to defend their rights and exist without the right of suffrage .

• 2. He insists on thrift and self-respect, but at the same time counsels a silent submission to civic inferiority such as is bound to sap the manhood of any race in the long run.

• 3. He advocates common-school and industrial training, and depreciates institutions of higher learning; but neither the Negro common-schools, nor Tuskegee itself, could remain open a day were it not for teachers trained in Negro colleges, or trained by their graduates.