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Labor Policies of the General Managers' Association of Chicago, 1886–1894

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  03 February 2011

Donald L. McMurry
Donald L. McMurry
Affiliation:
Dryden, N. Y.
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Extract

The activities of the General Managers' Association of Chicago in the great strike of the American Railway Union in 1894 are well known, but the earlier history of this association has remained obscure. Even the most scholarly writers on the Pullman strike have accepted statements made in testimony before the United States Strike Commission that this association first participated in a labor conflict in 1893. As a matter of fact, it originated in a strike, and early in its career it set precedents for many of its exploits a few years later.

Type
Articles
Information
The Journal of Economic History , Volume 13 , Issue 2 , Spring 1953 , pp. 160 - 178
Copyright
Copyright © The Economic History Association 1953

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References

1 United States Strike Commission, Report on the Chicago Strike of June-July 1894 … (Washington, D.C., 1895), pp. 10, 11, 242, 243, 149Google Scholar; cf. New York Railroad Gazette, XXVI, 450 (July 6, 1894), 515 (July 27, 1894)Google Scholar. The Railroad Gazette, vols. XVIII-XXV, and the Chicago Railway Age (later Railway Age and Northwestern Railroader), vols. X-XVIII, cover the period 1886–1894. Both had very complete coverage of the activities of railroad labor organizations, fully indexed. Neither indexed any item relating to the association before 1893.

2 Railway Age and Northwestern Railroader, XVIII, 660 (Sept. 1, 1893)Google Scholar.

3 John R., Commons and others, History of Labour in the United States (New York: The Macmillan Co., 1918), II, 273, 282, 384Google Scholar; Ruth Allen, The Great Sonthwest Strike, Uniwrsity of Texas Publication No. 4214 (1942), pp. 55 ff., 123, 124: David, Henry. History of the Hay market Affair (New York: Farrar and Rinchart. Inc., 1936), pp. 114 ff.Google Scholar, 120 ff., 125–77. 186, 187, 193–204.

4 Chicago Daily News, April 16, 17, 22–24, 1886; Chicago Inter Ocean, April 17–24, 1886; Chicago Tribune, April 18–20, 24, 1886; Railroad Gazette, XVIII. 281 (April 23, 1886), 290 (April 23, 1886), 305 (April 30, 1886), Railway Age, X, 212 (April 22, 1886).

5 Chicago Daily News, April 29, 30, May 1, 1886; Chicago Inter Ocean, April 30-May 8, 1886; Railroad Gazette, XVIII, 322 (May 7, 1886), 342 (May 14, 1886).

6 Potter, T. J. to Perkins, C. E., May 2, 1886, C. B. & Q., Perkins, In-Letters from Potter, No. 6, Burlington Archives, The Newberry Library, Chicago. Used by permissionGoogle Scholar.

7 Record of Proceedings of Gen'l Managers' Association of Chicago, May, 1886-Feb., 1890, pp. 1, 2. This is the binder's title of the first of three bound volumes of these proceedings in the John Crcrar Library, Chicago. It is typed manuscript, paged consecutively. Volume 11 has the same binder's title with the dates 1892, 1893. It is printed, containing an index, a list of bills, and sixteen numbers, one for each meeting or group of meetings, each paged separately, with the constitution and by-laws bound between Nos. 6 and 7. Citations of this volume will include both number and page. Volume III has the binder's title Minutes of Meetings, General Managers' Association, 1894. It is printed, paged consecutively throughout, with the constitution and by-laws inserted at the beginning. (Referred to hereafter as Gen. Man. Asso. Proc., with dates of volume.)

8 Gen. Man. Asso. Proc., 1886–1890, pp. 2, 3.

9 Ibid., pp. 5–9.

10 Ibid., pp. 4, 5, 9–11.

11 On an injunction issued in this strike, see Chicago Daily News, April 22, 1886; Chicago Inter Ocean, April 23, 1886; Chicago Tribune, April 26, 1886; Beckner, E. R., History of Labor Legislation in Illinois (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1929), p. 46Google Scholar.

12 Gen. Man. Asso. Proc., 1886–1890, p. 8.

13 Ibid., pp. 6–9.

14 Chicago Inter Ocean, June 22–26, 29, 30, 1886; Chicago Daily News, June 23, 24, July I, 2, 8, 12, 14, 1886.

15 Gen. Man. Asso. Proc., 1886–1890, p. 11; Chicago Daily News, July 8, 1886.

16 Gen. Man. Asso. Proc., 1886–1890, pp. 11, 12.

17 Ibid., p. 17.

18 Ibid., pp. 20, 21.

19 Ibid., pp. 30, 32, 33.

20 Ibid., pp. 17–29, 34–49, 52–54, 60 ff.

21 D. L. McMurry, The Great Burlington Strike of 1888 (MS in possession of the author), pp. 4–7, and chapters vii and viii; J. M. Forbes to C. E. Perkins, March 24, 1888, C. B. & Q., J. M. Forbes, Letters, Private, IV, 345, and Perkins to Forbes, March 27, 1888, C. B. & Q., J. C. Peasley, Out-Letters, XXI, 39, Burlington Archives. Used by permission.

22 Gen. Man. Asso. Proc., 1886–1890, pp. 57, 58.

23 Such as the formation of a Car Service Association to deal with delays, demurrage, etc., in addition to the subjects taken up in the earlier meetings.

24 Gen. Man. Asso. Proc., 1886–1890, pp. 105–110; Corliss, C. J., Main Line of Mid America: The Story of the Illinois Central (New York: Creative Age Press, 1950), p. 216Google Scholar.

25 Gen. Man. Asso. Proc., 1886–1890, pp. 29–29; Jeffrey to H. H. Porter, Feb. 16, 1888, E. T. Jeffrey, Out-Letters, 1, 75, Illinois Central Archives, Newberry Library.

26 Railroad Gazette, XXVI, 7 (Jan. 5, 1894); Gen. Man. Asso. Proc., 1892–1893, No. 1, pp. 1–4, 16.

27 Gen. Man. Asso. Proc., 1893–1893, No. 4, p. 7; No. 5, p. 5; No. 6, p. 4.

28 Sec above, Note 7.

29 Gen. Man. Asso. Proc., 1892–1893, No. 7, p. 4.

30 Ibid., p. 6.

31 Ibid., pp. 10, 11.

32 Ibid., pp. 14–18.

33 Ibid., pp. 19, 21, 22; Railroad Gazette, XXV, 188 (March 10, 1893), U. S. Strike Commission, Report, 1894, pp. 244–46.

34 Gen. Man. Asso. Proc., 1893–1893, No. 7, p. 26; No. 12, pp. 44–47.

35 Ibid., No. 12, p. 47.

36 Ibid., No. 7, p. 29.

37 Ibid., No. 12, p. 47; see also Ibid., No. 7, pp. 30–34, and No. 8, p. 11.

38 Ibid., No. 8, p. 12.

39 Ibid., No. 8, p. 12.

40 Ibid., No. 10, pp. 4, 5.

41 Ibid., No. 8, p. 11; No. 10, pp. 6–16; No. 12, p. 7.

42 Ibid., No. 8, pp. 12, 13.

43 Ibid., No. 7, pp. 19, 28.

44 Ibid., No. 8, pp. 13–15.

45 Ibid., No. 10, p. 6.

46 Ibid., No. 10, p. 25.

47 Railway Age and Northwestern Railroader, XVIII, 643 (August 25, 1893); cf. Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers' Journal, XXVIII, 850 (September, 1893)Google Scholar.

48 The Railroad Gazette thought that the establishment of the Car Service Association was worth all the effort that had gone into the Genera' Managers' Association during Jeffrey's chairmanship.—Railroad Gazette, XXVI, 7 (January 5, 1894)Google Scholar.

49 St. John's speech is in Gen. Man. Asso. Proc., 1892–1893, No. 12, pp. 3–8.

50 W. F. Guyon, reporter on labor activities for the United Press during the Pullman strike, testified that when he was covering A.R.U. meetings in the spring of 1894, his impression was that this was the most effective argument in inducing men to join the new union.—U. S. Strike Commission, Report, 1894, p. 209.

51 Gen. Man. Asso. Proc., 1892–1893, No. 12, pp. 47–49.

52 Ibid., p. 48.

53 See Railway Age and Northwestern Railroader, XVIII, 660 (September 1, 1893)Google Scholar.

54 Ibid.

55 Gen. Man. Asso. Proc., 1892–1893, No. 14, pp. 3–12.

56 See article “By a Chicago Railroad Man” on “The General Managers' Association of Chicago,” Railroad Gazette, XXVI, 7 (January 5, 1894)Google Scholar, which was a summary and paraphrase of St. John's speech to the meeting of August 17.

57 St. Louis Post Dispatch, July 1, 1894; Chicago Herald, July 3, 1894; article on the strike in Cincinnati by Eaton, James Shirley in The Railway Clerk, reprinted in the Railroad Gazette, XXVI, 637 (September 14, 1894)Google Scholar.

58 Gen. Man. Asso. Proc.; 1892–1893, No. 13, p. 4.

59 Ibid., p. 5.

60 Gen. Man. Asso. Proc., 1894, pp. 23, 24, 47–52.

61 The ideas of late nineteenth-century railroad executives in regard to labor will be discussed in a chapter of a forthcoming book by Thomas C. Cochran.

62 John M. Eagan, formerly general manager of the Great Western. See U. S. Strike Commission, Report, 1894, pp. 221, 227, 269 ff.