Hellraisers Journal: Eugene Victor Debs on the Chicago Pullman/ARU Strike of 1894: “The Grandest Industrial Battle in History.”

Share

Quote EVD Workers n Parasites, SDH Jan 30, 1904—————

Hellraisers Journal – Wednesday August 31, 1904
Eugene Debs Replies to Grover Cleveland’s Critique of the Chicago Strike of 1894

 From the Appeal to Reason of August 27, 1904:

The Federal Government and the Chicago Strike

Eugene V. Debs’ Reply to Grover Cleveland’s Magazine Article.

EVD re ARU Pullman Chicago Strike 1894, McClures p227, July 1904

This article was written for McClure’s Magazine in reply to Cleveland, but the editor of that publication refused to publish it, although permitting Cleveland’s calumny of the railway employes of this country to appear in its columns. McClure boasts of circulating a half million copies of Cleveland’s article. This first edition of the Appeal already reaches the half-million mark-ten days before going to press. It will exceed one million before the first of September. The Socialists of America propose to give plutocracy an example of what can be accomplished in the way of circulating the defense of the working class in spite of the wealth of plutocracy. Every true Socialist will take a hand in this distribution.

IN THE July issue of McClure’s Magazine, ex-President Grover Cleveland has an article on “The Government in the Chicago Strike of 1894.” That there may be no mistake about the meaning of “government” in this connection, it should be understood that Mr. Cleveland has reference to the federal government, of which he was the executive head at the time of the strike in question, and not to the state government of Illinois, or the municipal government of Chicago, both of which were overridden and set at defiance of the executive authority, enforced by the military power of the federal government, under the administration of Mr. Cleveland.

CLEVELAND VINDICATES HIMSELF.

THE ex-president’s article not only triumphantly vindicates his administration, but congratulates its author upon the eminent service he rendered the republic in a critical hour when a labor strike jarred its foundations and threatened its overthrow.

It may be sheer coincidence that Mr. Cleveland’s eulogy upon his patriotic administration, and upon himself as its central and commanding figure, appeared on the eve of a national convention composed largely of his disciples who were urging his fourth nomination for the presidency for the very reasons set forth in the article on the Chicago strike.

HIS KNOWLEDGE SECOND-HAND.

HOWEVER this may be, it is certain that of his own knowledge ex-President Cleveland knows nothing of the strike he discusses; that the evidence upon which he acted officially and upon which he now bases his conclusions was ex parte, obtained wholly from the railroad interests and those who represented or were controlled by these interests, and it is not strange, therefore, that he falls into a series of errors beginning with the cause of the disturbance and running all through his account of it, as may be proved beyond doubt by reference to the “Report on the Chicago Strike” by the “United States Strike Commission,” of his own appointment.

WHAT WAS THE CHICAGO STRIKE?

SIMPLY one of the many battles that have been fought and are yet to be fought in the economic war between capital and labor. Pittsburg, Homestead, Buffalo, Latimer, Pana, Coeur d’Alene, Cripple Creek and Telluride recall a few of the battles fought in this country in the world-wide struggle for industrial emancipation.

When the strike at Chicago occurred, did President Cleveland make a personal investigation? No.

Did he grant both sides a hearing? He did not.

In his fourteen-page magazine article what workingman, or what representative of labor, does he cite in support of his statements or his official acts? Not one.

I aver that he received every particle of his information from the capitalist side, that he was prompted to act by the capitalist side, that his official course was determined wholly, absolutely by and in the interest of the capitalist side, and that no more thought or consideration was given to the other side, the hundreds of thousands of workingmen, whose lives and whose wives and babes were at stake, than if they had been so many swine or sheep that had balked on their way to the shambles.

* * *

THE GREATEST INDUSTRIAL BATTLE IN HISTORY.

The Chicago strike was in many respects the grandest industrial battle in history, and I am prouder of my small share in it than of any other act of my life.

Men, women and children were on the verge of starvation at the “model city” of Pullman. They had produced the fabulous wealth of the Pullman corporation, but they, poor souls, were compelled to suffer the torment of hunger pangs in the very midst of the abundance their labor had created.

A hundred and fifty thousand railroad employes, their fellow members in the American Railway Union, sympathized with them, shared their earnings with them, and after vainly trying in every peaceable way they could conceived to touch the flint heart of the Pullman Company, every overture being resented, every suggestion denied, every proposition spurned with contempt, they determined not to pollute their hands and dishonor their manhood by handling Pullman cars and contributing to the suffering and sorrow of their brethren and their wives and babes. And rather than do this they laid down their tools in a body, sacrificed their situations and submitted to persecution, exile and the blacklist; to idleness and poverty, crusts and rags, and I shall love and honor these moral heroes to my latest breath.

Continue reading “Hellraisers Journal: Eugene Victor Debs on the Chicago Pullman/ARU Strike of 1894: “The Grandest Industrial Battle in History.””

Hellraisers Journal: Terre Haute Toiler: John Peter Altgeld, Liberator of Class-War Prisoners, -by Eugene V. Debs

Share

Justice Guiding Light, Oratory p49, 1901—————

Hellraisers Journal – Saturday March 22, 1902
From Terre Haute, Indiana, Eugene Debs Pays Tribute to John Peter Altgeld

From The Toiler of March 21, 1902:

Altgeld, the Liberator

-by Eugene V. Debs

John Peter Altgeld, wiki
John Peter Altgeld

John Peter Altgeld has joined Abraham Lincoln in the realm of the immortals [March 12, 1902]. His career was tempestuous and heroic, and the end tragic and sublime. The gods must have set the stage for the last earthly act of the intrepid warrior and most nobly did he fill the leading role. When the last word of his impassioned plea for liberty died upon his eloquent lips the climax came and the curtain fell upon another martyr in the great drama of humanity.

John Altgeld was born in the throes of revolt [December 30, 1847]. A thousand years of feudal tyranny were culminating. The fateful year of 1848 had a violent temper. It rocked the cradle of the babe that was destined to become the tribune of the people.

The leader, now fallen, never took a backward step, never subordinated principle to policy, never sacrificed conviction to attain his end. He was fearless, he was determined, and he was incorruptible.

John P. Altgeld was in the highest sense a statesman, he was a daring leader and a fiery and intense orator whose eloquent and lofty appeals inspired the multitude.

His noblest and therefore greatest official act was the opening of dungeon doors to liberate innocent victims of corporate tyranny [Chicago’s Eight-Hour Class-War Prisoners]. If the gods have to do with politics they ordained the election of John P. Altgeld for this incomparable service to humanity.

Through the rain of fire he walked with steady step to the hideous bastille’s doors, nor faltered once until the captives walked forth men; his official robes turned to ashes in the ordeal, but lo! the flame of calumny to which our hero bared his head is even now become the aureole of his fame.

The robbers of the people, the stranglers of liberty, the foes of humanity feared and hated him; the fawning sycophants of wealth, the time serving mercenaries of power slandered him; this was the measure of his greatness.

The few honest men who knew John P. Altgeld loved him. He was genuine; he was true; he could look God and man straight in the eye.

In the railroad strikes in 1894 he expanded to his true proportions.There he proved to be the fearless champion of the people. He stood upon the boundary line of Illinois and protested against the military usurpation of the President, and though overwhelmed, he proudly vindicated his high honor, and he, more than any other man, retired Grover Cleveland and his pirate crew from American politics.

Altgeld was too great to become President; he will be remembered long after most Presidents are forgotten.

How glorious the final scene! See him summon all his wasted strength. Note the transfiguration in the last superhuman effort—the light of liberty in his eye, the flush of dawn upon his brow as he defiantly exclaimed:

Again to the battle, Achaians!
Our hearts bid the tyrants defiance!
Our land, the first garden of Liberty’s tree,
It has been, and shall yet be, the land of the free.

Workingmen and workingwomen never had a truer friend; he yearned to see them happy, and consecrated all he had to make them free.

He paid the penalty of all the earth’s redeemers. Socrates was poisoned, Christ crucified, John Brown strangled, Lincoln assassinated, and Altgeld stabbed by a million venomous tongues.

The grandchildren of his slayers will seek his works for knowledge and inspiration, and to the coming generations he will speak forever.

—————

[Photograph and emphasis added.]

Continue reading “Hellraisers Journal: Terre Haute Toiler: John Peter Altgeld, Liberator of Class-War Prisoners, -by Eugene V. Debs”

Hellraisers Journal: Eugene V. Debs: “The Martyred Apostles of Labor,” Judicially Murdered, Chicago, November 11, 1887

Share

The time will come when our silence
will be more powerful
than the voices you strangle today.
-August Spies

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Hellraisers Journal: Saturday February 5, 1898
Eugene V. Debs Remembers the Chicago Martyrs of 1887

From The New Time Magazine of February 1898:

EVD, New Time Magazine, Feb 1898

THE MARTYRED APOSTLES OF LABOR.

By EUGENE V. DEBS.

The century now closing is luminous with great achievements. In every department of human endeavor marvelous progress has been made. By the magic of the machine which sprang from the inventive genius of man, wealth has been created in fabulous abundance. But, alas, this wealth, instead of blessing the race, has been the means of enslaving it. The few have come in possession of all, and the many have been reduced to the extremity of living by permission. A few have had the courage to protest. To silence these so that the dead-level of slavery could be maintained has been the demand and command of capital-blown power. Press and pulpit responded with alacrity. All the forces of society were directed against these pioneers of industrial liberty, these brave defenders of oppressed humanity—and against them the crime of the century has been committed.

Albert R. Parsons, August Spies, George Engel, Adolph Fischer, Louis Lingg, Samuel Fielden, Michael Schwab and Oscar Neebe paid the cruel penalty in prison cell and on the gallows.

They were the first martyrs in the cause of industrial freedom, and one of the supreme duties of our civilization, if indeed we may boast of having been redeemed from savagery, is to rescue their names from calumny and do justice to their memory.

Continue reading “Hellraisers Journal: Eugene V. Debs: “The Martyred Apostles of Labor,” Judicially Murdered, Chicago, November 11, 1887″