Pullman Strike DBQ

Child labor was a big deal and parents have to worry about their child not starving. The food use to be sitting out. If you would it; you would most likely become sick. The kids didn’t get any free time because they were working Child labor law was passed so that only a limited age can work. They would also low pay them for working. In the article (A History Of Child Labor) it states “In the United States it took many years to outlaw child labor. By 1899, 28 states had passed laws regulating child labor. Many efforts were made to pass national child labor law. The U.S. Congress passed two laws, in 1918 and 1922, but the supreme Court declared both unconstitutional. In 1924, Congress proposed a constitutional amendment prohibiting child labor, but the states did not ratify it.” Children coming home late is a problems because the crimes in the city.

Throughout history, children have always worked, either as apprentices or servants. However, child labor reached a whole new scale during the time period of the Industrial Revolution. Throughout the time frame of late 1800s-early 1900s, children worked long hours in dangerous factory conditions for very little wages. They were considered useful as laborers because their small stature allowed them to be cramped into smaller spaces, and they could be paid less for their services. Many worked to help support their families, and by doing so, they forwent their education. Numerous nineteenth century reformers and labor groups sought to restrict child labor and to improve working conditions.

Workers went on strike to earn a fair living wage and in 1902, President Theodore Roosevelt stepped in. His commission saw the truth awarded mine workers a wage increase and a nine-hour day. The department of Labor formed to help fix problems of the American worker. New York banned children from working under the age of sixteen for more than nine hours in a factory. To improve safety, in 1911, New York passed laws requiring fire escapes, fire drills and wired windows in all factories. In the next year, New York also passed a law requiring factory workers to have a “one-day-of-rest-in-seven”, meaning they needed to have at least one day break each week. After that, New York also made it illegal to hire children to do factory work in tenements or canneries, and made a fifty four- hour workweek the maximum for any working person under eighteen. (Doc 2)

Throughout the 1700’s and the early 1800’s child labor was a major issue in American society. Children have always worked for family businesses whether it was an agricultural farming situation or working out of a family business in some type of workplace. This was usually seen in families of middle or lower class because extra help was needed to support the family. Child labor dramatically changed when America went through the Industrial Revolution. When America’s industrial revolution came into play, it opened a new world to child labor. Children were now needed to work in factories, mills, and mines. These were not ordinary jobs for young children, these jobs required much time, effort, and hard work. “American

“People were forced to work in harsh, dangerous conditions in order to be able to provide for their families” (Document 8). Although most people were grateful to have a job, the conditions that they were forced to work for in order to provide for their families were unfair to them, and their families. Just because they obtained a job one day, doesn’t mean they would have it the next day, for example, if an employee was sick, or injured and had to miss a day of work the employee wasn’t guaranteed to continually have the job after they finally recovered. “I am at work in a spinning room tending four sides of warp which is one girl’s work” (Document 1) working conditions such as these are very harsh for the employees, not only do they have to keep up with the work of four people. Not only do the employees have to keep up with the sea of work, they also have to attempt not to get injured with the very harsh conditions lots of employees did in fact end up with serious injuries. “5 in the morning till 9 at night…” (Document 7) Those were the harsh working hours according to twenty-three year old Elizabeth Bentley. Long hours such as those were very common for factory workers, which made life hard for employees. Not only was harsh working conditions bad, but also the worst consequence that came about through the Industrial Revolution was child

The working conditions of the new arrivals were hardly any better, as employees of factories were often overworked, underpaid, and penned up in dangerous conditions. Perhaps the horrors of these conditions can be highlighted by the devastating 1911 fire at the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory in New York City. Tragically, over one hundred young women lost their lives in the fire, as there was no way to get out, and the doors were locked, trapping the women inside. Safety was not the only problem, as workers initially were not given the right to organize into unions, essentially doomed to the repetitive motions of factory operation. This meant that they had no way to protest against child labor, wage slavery, and unhealthily long working hours. Eventually, with their growing clout and ever-present industrial dependence on their labor, workers organized and demanded reform along all aspects of hazardous working conditions.

In Document B, which was explained by David A. Wells, an engineer and economist, was informative on how working condition were analogous to a military organization, “in which the individual no longer works as independently as formerly, but as a private in the ranks, obeying orders, keeping step, as it were, to the tap of the drum, and having nothing to say as to the plan of his work, of its final completion, or of its ultimate use and distribution. In short, the people who work in the modern factory are, as a rule, taught to do one thing—to perform one and generally a simple operation; and when there is no more of that kind of work to do, they are in a measure helpless.” (Document B) Which meant that workers at the factory basically don’t hold responsibility to themselves, as workers mainly are only trained to one job, relating to David A. Well theory. Document F sourced by Samuel Gompers, also portrays how the conditions were explaining that there was too many workers trying to fit in one factory place, and poor conditions. This was how union were created, to regain benefits, as well for better working

The capitalists and their industries greatly affected many citizens and even their own workers by dehumanizing them. Men would stand outside of factories for days, even weeks, waiting for the chance to get a job. The head of the industries would use this to their advantage by picking the strongest men and paying them a low amount of money and when they become injured or useless, they just hire someone else. The food industries were horrible with how they took care of their workers and their products. “For it was the custom, as they found, whenever meat was so spoiled that it could not be used for anything else, either to can it or else to chop it up into

This onslaught of capitalism directly revolutionized modern industrialism as well as the industrial city. Machines morphed the predominately agricultural nation to a herd of factory and corporate workers. Swarms of people, both native and immigrant, flocked to major cities. “The present century has been marked by a prodigious increase in wealth-producing power. The utilization of steam and electricity, the introduction of improved processes and labor saving machinery, the greater subdivision and grander scale of production, the wonderful facilitation of exchanges, have multiplied enormously the effectiveness of labor.”(George, p.20) The major problem with this newfound industrialism was the way in which the workforce was treated. Capitalism was supposed to provide a way out, a way ascend the financial and social staircase, if you worked hard enough. This however was not the case, if you were a loyal, hardworking employee you simply got to keep your job, and if you were in any way injured or incompetent you were fired.

The Industrial Revolution is a pivotal period in human history that allowed for the complete transformation of rural life. First coined in the 1830s, the Industrial Revolution was an eruption of inventions, technical adaptations, and economic expansion. The origins of the Industrial Revolution are traced back to Great Britain, the first pioneer in Westernization and technological change. Britain’s well-developed banks, large potential labor force, and abundance of raw materials made Britain the most industrialized country in the world during the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. Although the Industrial Revolution brought beneficial changes to Britain and the countries that followed Britain’s path, industrialization provoked reform

In the 1890s, Pullman’s played a pivotal role in the American History causing depression and stress on Pullman workers. This statement a Pullman striker wrote as a result of their suffering. The workers were unhappy with the fact that their wages were decreasing and their rents weren’t decreasing as well; which eventually pushed them in the direction of accumulating debts. Since it was written by an actual Pullman Striker at that time, it’s a primary source. Writing this was a way to channel their frustration and their reasons on why they decided to go on a strike.

Child labor was also a concern due to young children as young as give years old were working in factories for little pay and long working hours to assist in taking care of their families. They worked in what was known to me factory mills, coal mines, and sweat shops. Industrialization didn’t create labor, however, it aided in creating child labor reform policies.

One problem in the 1900s was child labor, which was not an uncommon sight in the factories. The children who worked at these factories would be exposed to harsh chemicals and could possibly lose and arm or limb to the machineries. Children as young as 16 years old would work in those unsafe, overcrowded factories instead of going to school to receive an education. To resolve the child labor issue, many states begun passing laws that made child labor illegal. As shown in the illustration in document 7, the state of Georgia passed the Georgia Child Labor laws, which took children out of Georgia Factories and into schools for education (document 7). Also shown in document 2, in

Pullman Strike was as a result of workers’ oppression in the workplaces. According to Curtis who was girls’ union leader said: “I was boarding at the time of my father’s death. He being laid off and sick for three months, owed the Pullman company $60 at the time of his death for back rent, and the company made me, out of my small earnings, pay that rent due from my father.” We can see the tough condition of those workers. Therefore, the workers joined the unions so that they could raise together their concerns on salary increment in the workplace. George Pullman did not listen to the workers’ economic complaint, and that has resulted in the Pullman Strike in 1894.

Two years after the infamous Triangle fire, 20,000 workers in Lawrence, Massachusetts; angered over wage cuts and deplorable conditions went on strike, prompting the twin reactions of police brutality and press coverage (Hodson & Sullivan, 2008). “As a result of the strike, not only were wages raised and conditions improved in the textile industry as a whole, but important legislation was also enacted that restricted the exploitation of child and female labor” (Hodson & Sullivan, 2008, p. 132). It is doubtful that working conditions would have evolved to the level of equity we find today, without the sacrifice and activism of unions and their members.