Events of Pullman Strike |
| June 20, 1893 Workers founded the American Railway Union to
unite railway labor in a single organization. Eugene Debs was the leader. |
|
| Sept. 1893-May 1894 The Pullman Works reduced wages, on the
average by 25 percent, while not lowering rents in company houses. |
George Pullman |
|
March, April 1894 Workers in Pullman’s
Palace Car Company joined the American Railroad Union. |
|
|
May 7, 9 A committee of Pullman workers
waited on management but received no concessions, either in the form of increased wages or
lowered rents. |
|
|
May 10 Three of the committee were laid off,
allegedly for lack of work. That evening Pullman workers voted to strike. |
|
|
May 11 Pullman works closed. |
 |
|
June 9-26 The American Railway Union convened
in Chicago, representing 465 local unions and a claimed membership of 15,000. |
|
|
June 15, 22 The Pullman Company refused to
receive any communication from the American Railway Union or to permit five proposed
arbitrators to determine whether there was anything to arbitrate. |
|
|
June 21 Delegates of ARU voted to stop
handling Pullman cars on June 26th unless the Pullman Company agreed to
arbitration. |
|
|
June 22 The Pullman Company met with General
Managers’ Association and reached an agreement to resist the proposed boycott. |
|
|
June 26 The boycott and accompanying strikes
began and spread rapidly as General Manager’s’ Association members discharged
men who refused to switch passenger trains with Pullman cars. |
|
|
July 2 A Federal injunction was issued
(served on July 3 and July 4). This injunction enjoined ARU leaders from "compelling
or inducing by threats, intimidation, persuasion, force or violence, railway employees to
refuse or fail to perform their duties." |
President Grover Cleveland |
|
July 3 Federal troops entered the dispute. |
 |
| July 5, 6 Governor Altgeld of Illinois protested the use of
Federal troops; President Cleveland responded. |
|
| July 7 Debs and the other principal officers of the ARU were
arrested, indicted, and held under $10,000 bail. |
|
| July 12 An AFL meeting in Chicago refused to authorize
sympathetic action. The ARU unsuccessfully offered to abandon the strike, provided that
the workers were rehired without prejudice, except where convicted of crime. |
 |
| August 2 Pullman works reopened. Strike ended. Local leaders
were not rehired. |
|
| August 15 Hearings of the US Strike Commission began in
Chicago. |
There were important reactions to the
Pullman strike. |
| [We have adapted this timeline from The Pullman Boycott
of 1894: The Problem of Federal Intervention, Coston E. Warne, ed. (Boston: D.C.
Heath, 1955): v-vi} |
|
indicates an external link 
