{"id":141,"date":"2015-08-21T18:07:01","date_gmt":"2015-08-21T18:07:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/courses.candelalearning.com\/ushistory2os2xmaster\/?post_type=chapter&#038;p=141"},"modified":"2022-09-02T05:09:45","modified_gmt":"2022-09-02T05:09:45","slug":"social-and-labor-unrest-in-the-1890s","status":"publish","type":"chapter","link":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/wm-ushistory2\/chapter\/social-and-labor-unrest-in-the-1890s\/","title":{"raw":"Social and Labor Unrest in the 1890s","rendered":"Social and Labor Unrest in the 1890s"},"content":{"raw":"<div class=\"bcc-box bcc-highlight\">\r\n<h3>Learning Objectives<\/h3>\r\n<ul class=\"im_orderedlist\">\r\n \t<li>Explain how the Depression of 1893 impacted industrial America<\/li>\r\n<\/ul>\r\n<\/div>\r\n<h2 data-type=\"title\">From Farmer's Hardships to a National Depression<\/h2>\r\n<p id=\"fs-idp25377936\">Insofar as farmers wanted the rest of the country to\u00a0comprehend\u00a0their\u00a0desperation, they got their wish. Soon after President Cleveland\u2019s election, the nation catapulted into the worst economic depression in its history to date. As the government\u00a0floundered\u00a0in its efforts to address the growing problems, more and more Americans sought relief outside of the traditional two-party system. For many industrial workers, the Populist Party began to seem like a viable solution.<\/p>\r\n\r\n<section id=\"fs-idp27735408\" data-depth=\"1\">\r\n<h3 data-type=\"title\">The Panic of 1893<\/h3>\r\n<p id=\"fs-idp25317568\">The late 1880s and early 1890s saw the American economy slide precipitously. <span style=\"color: #008000;\">F<\/span>armers were already struggling with economic woes, and the rest of the country followed quickly.<\/p>\r\n<p id=\"fs-idp10210064\">The causes of the <span class=\"no-emphasis\" data-type=\"term\">Depression of 1893<\/span> were manifold, but one major element was the speculation in railroads over the previous decades. The rapid proliferation of railroad lines created a false impression of growth for the economy as a whole. Banks and investors fed the growth of the railroads with fast-paced investment in industry and related businesses, not realizing that the growth they were following was built on a bubble. When the railroads began to fail due to expenses outpacing returns on their construction, the supporting businesses, from banks to steel mills, failed also.<\/p>\r\n<p id=\"fs-idp1736528\">Beginning with the closure of the Philadelphia &amp; Reading Railroad Company in 1893, several railroads ceased their operations as a result of investors cashing in their bonds, thus creating a ripple effect throughout the economy. In a single year, from 1893 to 1894, unemployment estimates increased from 3 percent to nearly 19 percent of all working-class Americans. In some states, the unemployment rate soared even higher: over 35 percent in New York State and 43 percent in Michigan. At the height of this depression, over three million American workers were unemployed. By 1895, Americans living in cities grew accustomed to seeing the homeless on the streets or lining up at soup kitchens.<\/p>\r\n<p id=\"fs-idp31784064\">Immediately following the economic downturn, people sought relief through their elected federal government. Just as quickly, they learned what farmers had been taught in the preceding decades: An unresponsive\u00a0government interested\u00a0largely\u00a0in patronage and the spoils system in order to maintain its power was in no position to help the American people face this challenge. The federal government had little in place to support those looking for work or to provide direct aid to those in need. Of course, to be fair, the government had seldom faced these questions before. Americans had to look elsewhere.<\/p>\r\n\r\n<h3>Coxey's Army<\/h3>\r\n<p id=\"fs-idp7206976\">A notable example of the government\u2019s failure to act was the story of <strong>Coxey\u2019s Army<\/strong>. In the spring of 1894, businessman Jacob Coxey led a march of unemployed Ohioans from Cincinnati to Washington, DC, where leaders of the group urged Congress to pass public works legislation for the federal government to hire unemployed workers to build roads and other public projects. From the original one hundred protesters, the march grew five hundred strong as others joined along the route to the nation\u2019s capital. Upon their arrival, not only were their cries for federal relief ignored, but Coxey and several other marchers were arrested for trespassing on the grass outside the U.S. Capitol.<\/p>\r\n\r\n<div class=\"textbox key-takeaways\">\r\n<h3>L. Frank Baum: Did Coxey\u2019s Army inspire Dorothy and the Wizard of Oz?<\/h3>\r\n<p id=\"fs-idm61070448\">Scholars, historians, and economists have long argued inconclusively that L. Frank Baum intended the story of <em data-effect=\"italics\">The Wizard of Oz<\/em> as an allegory for the politics of the day. Whether that actually was Baum\u2019s intention is up for debate, but certainly the story could be read as support for the Populist Party\u2019s crusade on behalf of American farmers. In 1894, Baum witnessed Coxey\u2019s Army\u2019s march firsthand, and some feel it may have influenced the story.<\/p>\r\n\r\n<figure id=\"Figure_20_04_CoxeyArmy\">\r\n\r\n[caption id=\"\" align=\"aligncenter\" width=\"520\"]<img src=\"https:\/\/s3-us-west-2.amazonaws.com\/courses-images-archive-read-only\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/884\/2015\/08\/23202923\/CNX_History_20_04_CoxeyArmy.jpg\" alt=\"A photograph shows Coxey\u2019s Army on the march, with protestors walking, mounted on horseback, and riding on bicycles and in horse-drawn buggies.\" width=\"520\" height=\"442\" data-media-type=\"image\/jpeg\" \/> <strong>Figure 1<\/strong>. This image of Coxey\u2019s Army marching on Washington to ask for jobs may have helped inspire L. Frank Baum\u2019s story of Dorothy and her friends seeking help from the Wizard of Oz.[\/caption]<\/figure>\r\n<p id=\"fs-idp7627488\">According to this theory, the Scarecrow represents the American farmer, the Tin Woodman is the industrial worker, and the Cowardly Lion is William Jennings Bryan, a prominent \u201cSilverite\u201d (strong supporters of the Populist Party who advocated for the free coinage of silver) who, in 1900 when the book was published, was largely criticized by the Republicans as being cowardly and indecisive. In the story, the characters march towards Oz, much as Coxey\u2019s Army marched to Washington. Like Dorothy and her companions, Coxey\u2019s Army gets in trouble, before being turned away with no help.<\/p>\r\n<p id=\"fs-idp7559904\">Following this reading, the seemingly powerful but ultimately impotent Wizard of Oz is a representation of the president, and Dorothy only finds happiness by wearing the silver slippers\u2014they only became ruby slippers in the later movie version\u2014along the Yellow Brick Road, a reference to the need for the country to move from the gold standard to a two-metal silver and gold plan.\u00a0While this connection is difficult to prove decisively, it is possible that Coxey\u2019s Army inspired Baum to create Dorothy\u2019s journey on the yellow brick road.<\/p>\r\n\r\n<\/div>\r\n<h2 data-type=\"title\">The Decline of Labor: The Homestead and Pullman Strikes<\/h2>\r\n<\/section>\r\n<figure id=\"CNX_History_18_03_Pullman\">\r\n\r\n[caption id=\"\" align=\"alignright\" width=\"390\"]<img src=\"https:\/\/s3-us-west-2.amazonaws.com\/courses-images-archive-read-only\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/884\/2015\/08\/23202834\/CNX_History_18_03_Pullman.jpg\" alt=\"A photograph shows a long line of strikers facing a long line of Illinois National Guardsmen in front of a railroad building.\" width=\"390\" height=\"292\" data-media-type=\"image\/jpeg\" \/> <strong>Figure 2.\u00a0<\/strong>In this photo of the Pullman Strike of 1894, the Illinois National Guard and striking workers face off in front of a railroad building.[\/caption]<\/figure>\r\n<section id=\"fs-idp27735408\" data-depth=\"1\">\r\n<p id=\"fs-idp22751552\">Several strikes also punctuated the growing depression, including a number of violent uprisings in the coal regions of Ohio and Pennsylvania. Recall that workers had been increasingly unionizing to protect their interests.<\/p>\r\n<p id=\"fs-idp17572880\">While workers struggled to find the right organizational structure to support a union movement in a society that was highly critical of such worker organization, there came two final violent events at the close of the nineteenth century that all but crushed the labor movement for the next forty years. These events, the <strong>Homestead Steel Strike of 1892<\/strong> and the <strong>Pullman Strike of 1894.<\/strong><\/p>\r\n\r\n<h3>The Homestead Steel Strike<\/h3>\r\n<p id=\"fs-idp11106272\">At the Homestead factory of the Carnegie Steel Company, workers represented by the Amalgamated Association of Iron and Steel Workers enjoyed relatively good relations with management until Henry C. Frick became the factory manager in 1889. When the union contract was up for renewal in 1892, Carnegie\u2014long a champion of living wages for his employees\u2014had left for Scotland and trusted Frick\u2014noted for his strong anti-union stance\u2014to manage the negotiations. When no settlement was reached by June 29, Frick ordered a lockout of the workers and hired three hundred Pinkerton detectives to protect company property. On July 6, as the Pinkertons arrived on barges on the river, union workers along the shore engaged them in a gunfight that resulted in the deaths of three Pinkertons and six workers. One week later, the Pennsylvania militia arrived to escort strike-breakers into the factory to resume production. Although the lockout continued until November, it ended with the union defeated and individual workers asking for their jobs back. A subsequent failed assassination attempt on Frick further strengthened public animosity towards the union.<\/p>\r\n\r\n<h3>The Pullman Strike<\/h3>\r\nBut the infamous Pullman Strike of 1894 was most notable for its nationwide impact, as it all but shut down the nation\u2019s railroad system in the middle of the depression. The strike began immediately on the heels of the Coxey\u2019s Army march when, in the summer of 1894, company owner George Pullman fired over two thousand employees at Pullman Co.\u2014which made railroad cars, such as Pullman sleeper cars\u2014and reduced the wages of the remaining three thousand workers. Since the factory operated in the company town of Pullman, Illinois, where workers rented homes from George Pullman and shopped at the company store owned by him as well, unemployment also meant eviction. Facing such harsh treatment, all of the Pullman workers went on strike to protest the decisions. Eugene V. Debs, head of the American Railway Union, led the strike.\r\n<p id=\"fs-idp44887424\">In order to bring the plight of Pullman\u00a0employees\u00a0to Americans all around the country, Debs adopted the strike strategy of ordering all American Railroad Union members to refuse to handle any train that had Pullman cars on it. Since virtually every train in the United States operated with Pullman cars, the strike\u00a0virtually\u00a0brought the transportation industry to its knees.<\/p>\r\nFearful of his ability to end the economic depression with such a vital piece of the economy at a standstill, President Cleveland turned to his attorney general for the answer. The attorney general proposed a solution: use federal troops to operate the trains under the pretense of protecting the delivery of the U.S. mail that was typically found on all trains. When Debs and the American Railway Union refused to obey the court injunction prohibiting interference with the mail, the troops began operating the trains, and the strike quickly ended. Debs himself was arrested, tried, convicted, and sentenced to six months in prison for disobeying the court injunction.\r\n\r\nThe American Railway Union was\u00a0in shambles, leaving workers even less empowered than before, and Debs was in prison, contemplating alternatives to a capitalist-based national economy. The Depression of 1893 left the country limping towards the next presidential election with few solutions in sight. These events, the Homestead Steel Strike of 1892 and the Pullman Strike of 1894, all but crushed the labor movement for the next forty years, leaving public opinion of labor strikes lower than ever and workers unprotected.\r\n<div class=\"textbox exercises\">\r\n<h3>Link to Learning<\/h3>\r\nOur holidays in the United States have connections to the Gilded Age that many might not be aware of. Labor Day came out of the struggles of workers to achieve better conditions and pay during this era. The holiday was proposed by unions such as the Knights of Labor to commemorate the tumultuous Haymarket affair. Initially, lawmakers were reluctant to tie any holiday too closely to the violence of the Haymarket riots, lest the incident be repeated. Labor leader Peter McGuire therefore proposed an alternative date: the first Monday of September. It would avoid any implicit connection to Haymarket, while being ideal for parades, picnics, and other forms of workers' organization and fellowship.\r\n\r\nIn Paris, Marxists and other radical organizations held gatherings on May 1, 1889 to coincide with the Haymarket anniversary. These gatherings resulted in the Second International, a key organization of socialist workers' advocates. Subsequently, May 1 became the day many European countries celebrate workers. Ironically, the anniversary of the Haymarket riots in Chicago is celebrated abroad far more often than in the United States.\r\n\r\n<span style=\"color: #008000;\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=xPhLKARAve4\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">You can watch this video to learn more about the origins of Labor Day<\/a>.<\/span>\r\n\r\n<\/div>\r\n<div class=\"textbox tryit\">\r\n<h3>Try It<\/h3>\r\nhttps:\/\/assess.lumenlearning.com\/practice\/dab71c3e-28c0-459c-9512-31e7322a0c64\r\n\r\n<\/div>\r\n<\/section><section id=\"fs-idm67207568\" data-depth=\"1\"><\/section>\r\n<div class=\"textbox learning-objectives\">\r\n<h3>Glossary<\/h3>\r\n<strong>Coxey\u2019s Army:\u00a0<\/strong>an 1894 protest, led by businessman Jacob Coxey, to advocate for public works jobs for the unemployed by marching on Washington, DC\r\n\r\n<strong>Homestead Steel Strike (1892):\u00a0<\/strong>a steel workers' strike in a Carnegie Steel Company factory, which resulted in a lock-out of the striking employees and the use of strikebreakers by the factory manager, Henry C. Frick\r\n\r\n<strong>Pullman Strike (1894):\u00a0<\/strong>a strike of railroad workers who refused to work on trains that contained Pullman Sleeper Cars after the factory owner fired half his workers and cut wages for the others; the strike was eventually broken by federal troops\r\n\r\n<\/div>","rendered":"<div class=\"bcc-box bcc-highlight\">\n<h3>Learning Objectives<\/h3>\n<ul class=\"im_orderedlist\">\n<li>Explain how the Depression of 1893 impacted industrial America<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/div>\n<h2 data-type=\"title\">From Farmer&#8217;s Hardships to a National Depression<\/h2>\n<p id=\"fs-idp25377936\">Insofar as farmers wanted the rest of the country to\u00a0comprehend\u00a0their\u00a0desperation, they got their wish. Soon after President Cleveland\u2019s election, the nation catapulted into the worst economic depression in its history to date. As the government\u00a0floundered\u00a0in its efforts to address the growing problems, more and more Americans sought relief outside of the traditional two-party system. For many industrial workers, the Populist Party began to seem like a viable solution.<\/p>\n<section id=\"fs-idp27735408\" data-depth=\"1\">\n<h3 data-type=\"title\">The Panic of 1893<\/h3>\n<p id=\"fs-idp25317568\">The late 1880s and early 1890s saw the American economy slide precipitously. <span style=\"color: #008000;\">F<\/span>armers were already struggling with economic woes, and the rest of the country followed quickly.<\/p>\n<p id=\"fs-idp10210064\">The causes of the <span class=\"no-emphasis\" data-type=\"term\">Depression of 1893<\/span> were manifold, but one major element was the speculation in railroads over the previous decades. The rapid proliferation of railroad lines created a false impression of growth for the economy as a whole. Banks and investors fed the growth of the railroads with fast-paced investment in industry and related businesses, not realizing that the growth they were following was built on a bubble. When the railroads began to fail due to expenses outpacing returns on their construction, the supporting businesses, from banks to steel mills, failed also.<\/p>\n<p id=\"fs-idp1736528\">Beginning with the closure of the Philadelphia &amp; Reading Railroad Company in 1893, several railroads ceased their operations as a result of investors cashing in their bonds, thus creating a ripple effect throughout the economy. In a single year, from 1893 to 1894, unemployment estimates increased from 3 percent to nearly 19 percent of all working-class Americans. In some states, the unemployment rate soared even higher: over 35 percent in New York State and 43 percent in Michigan. At the height of this depression, over three million American workers were unemployed. By 1895, Americans living in cities grew accustomed to seeing the homeless on the streets or lining up at soup kitchens.<\/p>\n<p id=\"fs-idp31784064\">Immediately following the economic downturn, people sought relief through their elected federal government. Just as quickly, they learned what farmers had been taught in the preceding decades: An unresponsive\u00a0government interested\u00a0largely\u00a0in patronage and the spoils system in order to maintain its power was in no position to help the American people face this challenge. The federal government had little in place to support those looking for work or to provide direct aid to those in need. Of course, to be fair, the government had seldom faced these questions before. Americans had to look elsewhere.<\/p>\n<h3>Coxey&#8217;s Army<\/h3>\n<p id=\"fs-idp7206976\">A notable example of the government\u2019s failure to act was the story of <strong>Coxey\u2019s Army<\/strong>. In the spring of 1894, businessman Jacob Coxey led a march of unemployed Ohioans from Cincinnati to Washington, DC, where leaders of the group urged Congress to pass public works legislation for the federal government to hire unemployed workers to build roads and other public projects. From the original one hundred protesters, the march grew five hundred strong as others joined along the route to the nation\u2019s capital. Upon their arrival, not only were their cries for federal relief ignored, but Coxey and several other marchers were arrested for trespassing on the grass outside the U.S. Capitol.<\/p>\n<div class=\"textbox key-takeaways\">\n<h3>L. Frank Baum: Did Coxey\u2019s Army inspire Dorothy and the Wizard of Oz?<\/h3>\n<p id=\"fs-idm61070448\">Scholars, historians, and economists have long argued inconclusively that L. Frank Baum intended the story of <em data-effect=\"italics\">The Wizard of Oz<\/em> as an allegory for the politics of the day. Whether that actually was Baum\u2019s intention is up for debate, but certainly the story could be read as support for the Populist Party\u2019s crusade on behalf of American farmers. In 1894, Baum witnessed Coxey\u2019s Army\u2019s march firsthand, and some feel it may have influenced the story.<\/p>\n<figure id=\"Figure_20_04_CoxeyArmy\">\n<div style=\"width: 530px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/s3-us-west-2.amazonaws.com\/courses-images-archive-read-only\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/884\/2015\/08\/23202923\/CNX_History_20_04_CoxeyArmy.jpg\" alt=\"A photograph shows Coxey\u2019s Army on the march, with protestors walking, mounted on horseback, and riding on bicycles and in horse-drawn buggies.\" width=\"520\" height=\"442\" data-media-type=\"image\/jpeg\" \/><\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-caption-text\"><strong>Figure 1<\/strong>. This image of Coxey\u2019s Army marching on Washington to ask for jobs may have helped inspire L. Frank Baum\u2019s story of Dorothy and her friends seeking help from the Wizard of Oz.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/figure>\n<p id=\"fs-idp7627488\">According to this theory, the Scarecrow represents the American farmer, the Tin Woodman is the industrial worker, and the Cowardly Lion is William Jennings Bryan, a prominent \u201cSilverite\u201d (strong supporters of the Populist Party who advocated for the free coinage of silver) who, in 1900 when the book was published, was largely criticized by the Republicans as being cowardly and indecisive. In the story, the characters march towards Oz, much as Coxey\u2019s Army marched to Washington. Like Dorothy and her companions, Coxey\u2019s Army gets in trouble, before being turned away with no help.<\/p>\n<p id=\"fs-idp7559904\">Following this reading, the seemingly powerful but ultimately impotent Wizard of Oz is a representation of the president, and Dorothy only finds happiness by wearing the silver slippers\u2014they only became ruby slippers in the later movie version\u2014along the Yellow Brick Road, a reference to the need for the country to move from the gold standard to a two-metal silver and gold plan.\u00a0While this connection is difficult to prove decisively, it is possible that Coxey\u2019s Army inspired Baum to create Dorothy\u2019s journey on the yellow brick road.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<h2 data-type=\"title\">The Decline of Labor: The Homestead and Pullman Strikes<\/h2>\n<\/section>\n<figure id=\"CNX_History_18_03_Pullman\">\n<div style=\"width: 400px\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/s3-us-west-2.amazonaws.com\/courses-images-archive-read-only\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/884\/2015\/08\/23202834\/CNX_History_18_03_Pullman.jpg\" alt=\"A photograph shows a long line of strikers facing a long line of Illinois National Guardsmen in front of a railroad building.\" width=\"390\" height=\"292\" data-media-type=\"image\/jpeg\" \/><\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-caption-text\"><strong>Figure 2.\u00a0<\/strong>In this photo of the Pullman Strike of 1894, the Illinois National Guard and striking workers face off in front of a railroad building.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/figure>\n<section id=\"fs-idp27735408\" data-depth=\"1\">\n<p id=\"fs-idp22751552\">Several strikes also punctuated the growing depression, including a number of violent uprisings in the coal regions of Ohio and Pennsylvania. Recall that workers had been increasingly unionizing to protect their interests.<\/p>\n<p id=\"fs-idp17572880\">While workers struggled to find the right organizational structure to support a union movement in a society that was highly critical of such worker organization, there came two final violent events at the close of the nineteenth century that all but crushed the labor movement for the next forty years. These events, the <strong>Homestead Steel Strike of 1892<\/strong> and the <strong>Pullman Strike of 1894.<\/strong><\/p>\n<h3>The Homestead Steel Strike<\/h3>\n<p id=\"fs-idp11106272\">At the Homestead factory of the Carnegie Steel Company, workers represented by the Amalgamated Association of Iron and Steel Workers enjoyed relatively good relations with management until Henry C. Frick became the factory manager in 1889. When the union contract was up for renewal in 1892, Carnegie\u2014long a champion of living wages for his employees\u2014had left for Scotland and trusted Frick\u2014noted for his strong anti-union stance\u2014to manage the negotiations. When no settlement was reached by June 29, Frick ordered a lockout of the workers and hired three hundred Pinkerton detectives to protect company property. On July 6, as the Pinkertons arrived on barges on the river, union workers along the shore engaged them in a gunfight that resulted in the deaths of three Pinkertons and six workers. One week later, the Pennsylvania militia arrived to escort strike-breakers into the factory to resume production. Although the lockout continued until November, it ended with the union defeated and individual workers asking for their jobs back. A subsequent failed assassination attempt on Frick further strengthened public animosity towards the union.<\/p>\n<h3>The Pullman Strike<\/h3>\n<p>But the infamous Pullman Strike of 1894 was most notable for its nationwide impact, as it all but shut down the nation\u2019s railroad system in the middle of the depression. The strike began immediately on the heels of the Coxey\u2019s Army march when, in the summer of 1894, company owner George Pullman fired over two thousand employees at Pullman Co.\u2014which made railroad cars, such as Pullman sleeper cars\u2014and reduced the wages of the remaining three thousand workers. Since the factory operated in the company town of Pullman, Illinois, where workers rented homes from George Pullman and shopped at the company store owned by him as well, unemployment also meant eviction. Facing such harsh treatment, all of the Pullman workers went on strike to protest the decisions. Eugene V. Debs, head of the American Railway Union, led the strike.<\/p>\n<p id=\"fs-idp44887424\">In order to bring the plight of Pullman\u00a0employees\u00a0to Americans all around the country, Debs adopted the strike strategy of ordering all American Railroad Union members to refuse to handle any train that had Pullman cars on it. Since virtually every train in the United States operated with Pullman cars, the strike\u00a0virtually\u00a0brought the transportation industry to its knees.<\/p>\n<p>Fearful of his ability to end the economic depression with such a vital piece of the economy at a standstill, President Cleveland turned to his attorney general for the answer. The attorney general proposed a solution: use federal troops to operate the trains under the pretense of protecting the delivery of the U.S. mail that was typically found on all trains. When Debs and the American Railway Union refused to obey the court injunction prohibiting interference with the mail, the troops began operating the trains, and the strike quickly ended. Debs himself was arrested, tried, convicted, and sentenced to six months in prison for disobeying the court injunction.<\/p>\n<p>The American Railway Union was\u00a0in shambles, leaving workers even less empowered than before, and Debs was in prison, contemplating alternatives to a capitalist-based national economy. The Depression of 1893 left the country limping towards the next presidential election with few solutions in sight. These events, the Homestead Steel Strike of 1892 and the Pullman Strike of 1894, all but crushed the labor movement for the next forty years, leaving public opinion of labor strikes lower than ever and workers unprotected.<\/p>\n<div class=\"textbox exercises\">\n<h3>Link to Learning<\/h3>\n<p>Our holidays in the United States have connections to the Gilded Age that many might not be aware of. Labor Day came out of the struggles of workers to achieve better conditions and pay during this era. The holiday was proposed by unions such as the Knights of Labor to commemorate the tumultuous Haymarket affair. Initially, lawmakers were reluctant to tie any holiday too closely to the violence of the Haymarket riots, lest the incident be repeated. Labor leader Peter McGuire therefore proposed an alternative date: the first Monday of September. It would avoid any implicit connection to Haymarket, while being ideal for parades, picnics, and other forms of workers&#8217; organization and fellowship.<\/p>\n<p>In Paris, Marxists and other radical organizations held gatherings on May 1, 1889 to coincide with the Haymarket anniversary. These gatherings resulted in the Second International, a key organization of socialist workers&#8217; advocates. Subsequently, May 1 became the day many European countries celebrate workers. Ironically, the anniversary of the Haymarket riots in Chicago is celebrated abroad far more often than in the United States.<\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #008000;\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=xPhLKARAve4\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">You can watch this video to learn more about the origins of Labor Day<\/a>.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"textbox tryit\">\n<h3>Try It<\/h3>\n<p>\t<iframe id=\"assessment_practice_dab71c3e-28c0-459c-9512-31e7322a0c64\" class=\"resizable\" src=\"https:\/\/assess.lumenlearning.com\/practice\/dab71c3e-28c0-459c-9512-31e7322a0c64?iframe_resize_id=assessment_practice_id_dab71c3e-28c0-459c-9512-31e7322a0c64\" frameborder=\"0\" style=\"border:none;width:100%;height:100%;min-height:300px;\"><br \/>\n\t<\/iframe><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/section>\n<section id=\"fs-idm67207568\" data-depth=\"1\"><\/section>\n<div class=\"textbox learning-objectives\">\n<h3>Glossary<\/h3>\n<p><strong>Coxey\u2019s Army:\u00a0<\/strong>an 1894 protest, led by businessman Jacob Coxey, to advocate for public works jobs for the unemployed by marching on Washington, DC<\/p>\n<p><strong>Homestead Steel Strike (1892):\u00a0<\/strong>a steel workers&#8217; strike in a Carnegie Steel Company factory, which resulted in a lock-out of the striking employees and the use of strikebreakers by the factory manager, Henry C. Frick<\/p>\n<p><strong>Pullman Strike (1894):\u00a0<\/strong>a strike of railroad workers who refused to work on trains that contained Pullman Sleeper Cars after the factory owner fired half his workers and cut wages for the others; the strike was eventually broken by federal troops<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n\t\t\t <section class=\"citations-section\" role=\"contentinfo\">\n\t\t\t <h3>Candela Citations<\/h3>\n\t\t\t\t\t <div>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t <div id=\"citation-list-141\">\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t <div class=\"licensing\"><div class=\"license-attribution-dropdown-subheading\">CC licensed content, Shared previously<\/div><ul class=\"citation-list\"><li>US History. <strong>Provided by<\/strong>: OpenStax. <strong>Located at<\/strong>: <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"http:\/\/openstaxcollege.org\/textbooks\/us-history\">http:\/\/openstaxcollege.org\/textbooks\/us-history<\/a>. <strong>License<\/strong>: <em><a target=\"_blank\" rel=\"license\" href=\"https:\/\/creativecommons.org\/licenses\/by\/4.0\/\">CC BY: Attribution<\/a><\/em>. <strong>License Terms<\/strong>: Access for free at https:\/\/openstax.org\/books\/us-history\/pages\/1-introduction<\/li><li>US History. <strong>Provided by<\/strong>: OpenStax. <strong>Located at<\/strong>: <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"http:\/\/openstaxcollege.org\/textbooks\/us-history\">http:\/\/openstaxcollege.org\/textbooks\/us-history<\/a>. <strong>License<\/strong>: <em><a target=\"_blank\" rel=\"license\" href=\"https:\/\/creativecommons.org\/licenses\/by\/4.0\/\">CC BY: Attribution<\/a><\/em>. <strong>License Terms<\/strong>: Access for free at https:\/\/openstax.org\/books\/us-history\/pages\/1-introduction<\/li><\/ul><\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t <\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t <\/div>\n\t\t\t <\/section>","protected":false},"author":19,"menu_order":9,"template":"","meta":{"_candela_citation":"[{\"type\":\"cc\",\"description\":\"US History\",\"author\":\"\",\"organization\":\"OpenStax\",\"url\":\"http:\/\/openstaxcollege.org\/textbooks\/us-history\",\"project\":\"\",\"license\":\"cc-by\",\"license_terms\":\"Access for free at https:\/\/openstax.org\/books\/us-history\/pages\/1-introduction\"},{\"type\":\"cc\",\"description\":\"US History\",\"author\":\"\",\"organization\":\"OpenStax\",\"url\":\"http:\/\/openstaxcollege.org\/textbooks\/us-history\",\"project\":\"\",\"license\":\"cc-by\",\"license_terms\":\"Access for free at https:\/\/openstax.org\/books\/us-history\/pages\/1-introduction\"}]","CANDELA_OUTCOMES_GUID":"9f4c7b17-3ee0-4e86-bcae-21e9e8181c40,1d6a202a-bbb9-4dd7-8e5a-c604989429f0","pb_show_title":"on","pb_short_title":"","pb_subtitle":"","pb_authors":[],"pb_section_license":""},"chapter-type":[],"contributor":[],"license":[],"class_list":["post-141","chapter","type-chapter","status-publish","hentry"],"part":118,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/wm-ushistory2\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters\/141","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/wm-ushistory2\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/wm-ushistory2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/chapter"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/wm-ushistory2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/19"}],"version-history":[{"count":32,"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/wm-ushistory2\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters\/141\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9365,"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/wm-ushistory2\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters\/141\/revisions\/9365"}],"part":[{"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/wm-ushistory2\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/parts\/118"}],"metadata":[{"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/wm-ushistory2\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters\/141\/metadata\/"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/wm-ushistory2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=141"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"chapter-type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/wm-ushistory2\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapter-type?post=141"},{"taxonomy":"contributor","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/wm-ushistory2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/contributor?post=141"},{"taxonomy":"license","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/wm-ushistory2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/license?post=141"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}