When May came, the distressed workmen declared it impossible for them and their families to live on their meagre pay. They demanded a restoration of the old rates; but the company refused, affirming that they were running the business at a loss and solely with a view of keeping the men at work. On the 11th of May, 3,000 workmen, a majority of the whole number, quit labor and the company closed their works.
The American Railway Union assumed charge of the strike and ordered a boycott of all Pullman cars. Eugene V. Debs was the president of the Union, and his sweeping order forbade all engineers, brakemen, and switchmen to handle the Pullman cars on every road that used them. This was far-reaching, since the Pullman cars are used on almost every line in the country.
A demand was made upon the Pullman Company to submit the question to arbitration, but the directors refused on the ground that there was nothing to arbitrate, the question being whether or not they were to be permitted to operate their own works for themselves. A boycott was declared on all roads running out of Chicago, beginning on the Illinois Central. Warning was given to every road handling the Pullman cars that its employes would be called out, and, if that did not prove effective, every trade in the country would be ordered to strike.
ON THE BALTIMORE AND OHIO RAILWAY.
The railroad companies were under heavy bonds to draw the Pullman cars, and it would have cost large sums of money to break their contracts. They refused to boycott, and, on June 26th, President Debs declared a boycott on twenty-two roads running out of Chicago, and ordered the committees representing the employes to call out the workmen without an hour's unnecessary delay.
The strike rapidly spread. Debs urged the employes to refrain from injuring the property of their employers, but such advice is always thrown away. Very soon rioting broke out, trains were derailed, and men who attempted to take the strikers' places were savagely maltreated. There was such a general block of freight that prices of the necessaries of life rose in Chicago and actual suffering impended. So much property was destroyed that the companies called on the city and county authorities for protection. The men sent to cope with the strikers were too few, and when Governor Altgeld forwarded troops to the scenes of the outbreaks, they also were too weak, and many of the militia openly showed their sympathy with the mob.
Growing bolder, the strikers checked the mails and postal service and resisted deputy marshals. This brought the national government into the quarrel, since it is bound to provide for the safe transmission of the mails. On July 2d a Federal writ was issued covering the judicial district of northern Illinois, forbidding all interference with the United States mails and with interstate railway commerce. Several leaders of the strike were arrested, whereat the mob became more threatening than ever. The government having been notified that Federal troops were necessary to enforce the orders of the courts in Chicago, a strong force of cavalry, artillery, and infantry was sent thither. Governor Altgeld protested, and President Cleveland told him in effect to attend to his own business and sent more troops to the Lake City.
There were several collisions between the mob and military, in which a number of the former were killed. Buildings were fired, trains ditched, and the violence increased, whereupon the President dispatched more troops thither, with the warning that if necessary he would call out the whole United States army to put down the law-breakers.