INFORMATION TO USERS

This manuscript has been reproduced from the microfilm master. UMI films the text directly from the original or copy submitted. Thus, some thesis and dissertation copies are in typewriter face, while others may be from any type of computer printer.

The quality of this reproduction is dependent upon the quality of the copy submitted. Broken or indistinct pnnt, colored or poor quality illustrations and photographs, print bleedthrough, substandard margins, and improper alignment can adversely affect reproduction.

In the unlikely event that the author did not send UMI a complete manuscript and there are missing pages, these will be noted. Also, if unauthorized copyright material had to be removed, a note will indicate the deletion.

Oversize materials (e.g., maps, drawings, charts) are reproduced by sectioning the original, beginning at the upper left-hand comer and continuing from left to right in equal sections with small overlaps. Each original is also photographed in one exposure and is included in reduced form at the back of the book.

Photographs included in the original manuscript have been reproduced xerographically in this copy. Higher quality 6” x 9” black and white photographic prints are available for any photographs or illustrations appearing in this copy for an additional charge. Contact UMI directly to order. UMI* Bell & Howell Information and Learning 300 North Zeeb Road, Ann Arbor, Ml 48106-1346 USA 800-521-0600

NOTE TO USERS

This reproduction is the best copy available

UMI

THE PLOW AND HAMMER: FARMERS, ORGANIZED LABOR AND THE PEOPLE'S PARTY IN OHIO

DISSERTATION

Presented In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for

the Degree Doctor of Philosophy in the Graduate

School of the Ohio State University

By

Michael Cain Pierce, M.A.

The Ohio State University 1999

Dissertation Committee: Approved by Professor Warren Van Tine, Adviser

Professor Michael Lea Benedict Adviser Professor David Stebenne History Graduate Program UMI Number : 9941411

Copyright 1999 by Pierce, Michael Cain

All rights reserved.

UMI Microform 9941411 Copyright 1999, by UMI Company. All rights reserved.

This microform edition is protected against unauthorized copying under Title 17, United States Code.

UMI 300 North Zeeb Road Ann Arbor, MI 48103 ABSTRACT

The dissertation argues that the Ohio People's (Populist) party was essentially a labor party and permits new insights into the American political process. While Ohio farmers remained loyal to the traditional parties, most of the state's labor organizations — including the United

Nine Workers and the central labor bodies of Cleveland, Cincinnati, and

Columbus — endorsed the People's party. Moreover, the state's leading trade unionist, John McBride, led the forces attempting to take the

American Federation of Labor (AFL) into an alliance with the People's party and defeated Samuel Gompers for the presidency of the AFL in 1894.

The Populist's nomination of Democratic candidate William Jennings

Bryan for president in 1896 and the fusion of the two parties destroyed the coalition that Ohio trade unionists had built around the People's party. Although some of the state's unionists embraced Bryan and the free coinage of silver, most Ohio trade unionists saw the fusion as a betrayal. Instead, they joined other political parties or de-emphasized the role of politics in labor's salvation. At the national level the

AFL had been roughly divided between forces led by McBride wanting to transform the Federation into a partisan organization through an alliance with the People's party and forces led by Gompers feeling that the Federation should emphasize economic action. By leaving McBride and his allies without a party, the fusion undercut the political unionists and contributed to the triumph of Gompers and pure and simple unionism.

11 The dissertation challenges the existing historiography in three

ways. First, the supporters of the Ohio People's party do not fit the

agrarian-centered definitions of Populism offered by Hicks, Hofstadter,

and Goodwyn. Second, whereas most historians argue that organized labor

rejected farmers' appeals to enter into a producer-based political

alliance, in Ohio the opposite was true. Third, scholars seeking to

explain the triumph of pure and simple unionism within the AFL and

organized labor's acceptance of corporate capitalism have failed to look

at the fusion of 1896 and the activities of trade unionists working with

the People's party. Increasingly, scholars have sought to explain the

rise of pure and simple unionism in hopes of understanding the

conservative nature of modern American politics. They have noted that

while European trade unionists were forming political parties to contest

the emergence of corporate capitalism, American trade unionists rejected

the primacy of political action and implicitly accepted the emergence of

corporate capitalism. Without the support and legitimacy unions could

have provided, American socialist parties tended to be weak and vulnerable. By offering an additional explanation of the rise of pure

and simple unionism, this research understanding of modern American political life.

I l l Dedicated to my first teachers, my mother and father

IV ACKNOWLEDGHENTS

First and foremost, I wish to thank Professor Warren Van Tine for his friendship, enthusiasm, and guidance. Without him this project would never had been completed.

Michael Les Benedict's encouragement and advice have made me a better historian. This work has benefited immensely front his wisdom.

I am grateful for Professor David Stebenne'a reading of the work.

He has kept me focused on the forest rather than the trees.

The Ohio State University's Center for Labor Research provided material support for the project. Its director. Professor C.J.

Slanicka, and assistant director, Sandy Jordan, have provided something more important — friendship.

I want to thank the Ohio Bicentennial Commission and Ohio State

University's Graduate School. Both provided fellowships allowing me to devote all my energies to the research.

A number of graduate school colleagues have both consoled and counselled me. I would particularly like to thank Barb Terzian, Phil

Payne, B e m y Grindel, and Mark Spicka.

Most importantly, I want to thank Tricia Starks. Not only did she read every word I wrote five or six times, but her love sustained me throughout the project. VITA

January 5, 1965...... B o m - Columbus, Ohio

1987 ....A.B. Sociology, Kenyon College

1987-1989...... Editorial Assistant, Journal of Palestine Studies Institute of Palestine Studies Washington, D.C.

1990-1997 Graduate Teaching Associate, The Ohio State University

1997-1998 Research Assistant, Center for Labor Research, The Ohio State University

PUBLICATIONS

1. Warren Van Tine, C.J. Slanicka, Sandra Jordan and Michael Pierce, In the Workers' Interest; A History of the Ohio A.F.L.-C.I.O., 1958-1998. Ohio State University's Center for Labor Research: Columbus, 1998. (Distributed by Ohio State University Press).

2. Michael Pierce, "The Gutman-Bill Debate Revisited: R.F. Warren and the National Executive Board of the United Mine Workers." Labor History 38, no.l (Winter 1996-97), 76-80.

FIELDS OF STUDY

Major Field: History

V 1 TABLE OF CONTENTS

Page

Abstract...... il

Dedication...... iv

Acknowledgments...... v

Vita...... vi

List of Tables...... viii

Chapters :

1. Introduction...... 1

2. Producer Politics in Ohio, 1865-1890...... 9

3. Farmers and the Ohio People's Party, 1890-1893...... 51

4. Ohio Labor and the People's Party, 1890-1894...... 94

5. The People's Party as a Labor Party, 1894-1896...... 203

6. Labor Politics after the Fusion of 1896...... 257

7. Conclusion...... 301

Bibliography...... 303

V l l LIST OF TABLES

Table Page

2.1 Industrial Production in Ohio, 1860-1890...... 10

2.2 Industrial Production in Cincinnati's Hamilton

County, 1860-1890...... 11

2.3 Industrial Production in Cleveland's Cuyahoga

County, 1860-1890...... 13

2.4 Industrial Production in Columbus's Franklin

County, 1860-1890...... 14

2.5 Average Value Per Acre for Major Crops, 1880-1889...... 46

3.1 Third Party Candidates in 1890 County Elections...... 64

3.2 Third Party Candidates in 1890 Congressional Elections...... 65

3.3 Farmers Favoring Political Action...... 73

4.1 Results of Cleveland's Mayoral Election, 1891...... 102

4.2 Results of Cincinnati's Mayoral Election, 1894...... 135

viii 4.3 Wages for miners in Rendville, Ohio, May 1893-April 1894...... 177

4.4 Percentage of Populist Votes in the Coal Mining Regions of

Ohio's Six Largest Coal Producing Counties...... 196

4.5 1894 Populist Vote in Selected Working Class Wards

of Major Cities...... 197

4.6 1894 Populist Vote in Selected Medium-Sized

Industrial Cities...... 198

5.1 Results of Cleveland's Mayoral Election, 1895...... 228

5.2 Results of Columbus's Mayoral Election, 1894...... 233

IX CHAPTER 1

INTRODUCTION

On January 1, 1895 John McBride emerged from a small office in

Manhattan to talk to reporters. McBride, who had just been sworn in as the new president of the American Federation of Labor (AFL), insisted that the Federation was going to change course and go into politics. He told the reporters that the next year would witness a "union of labor men" organized for political activity. In the election of 1896 "we shall place a presidential candidate in the field," he said. Just five months earlier McBride had led the formation of an Ohio labor party and had merged it into the Jacob Coxey-led Ohio People's (Populist) party.

"By entering into politics we can free ourselves from the chain of slavery," he told the state's trade unionists. The Ohio Populists promulgated a platform, written largely by McBride, that was designed to check the growth of corporate capitalism and the rise of "wage slavery."

Most controversially, the platform declared:

Ne believe that the power of the government should be expanded as rapidly and as far as the good sense of intelligent people and the teachings of experience shall justify along the lines of collective ownership by the people of all such means of production and distribution as the people may elect to operate.i

McBride proved unable to fulfill his promise change or even to be

reelected to the organization's presidency. Nonetheless, he represented

a large segment of trade unionists who a political alliance with the

People's party as the route to labor's salvation. In cities and states

throughout the nation, but especially in the industrial Midwest, trade

unionists associated with the AFL endorsed the People's party and worked

to elect Populists to office.

This dissertation examines the relationship between organized

labor and the Populist movement in Ohio. By 1894 the Ohio People's

party had essentially become a labor party. The state's farm

organizations, including the state Grange, Ohio Farmers' Alliance, and

the Ohio Farmers' Union, all refused to endorse the Ohio People's party.

But the state's largest and most influential trade unions supported the

Populists. The party had the support of the state's most powerful

union, the United Mine Workers. The central labor bodies of the state's

three largest cities — Cincinnati, Cleveland, and Columbus — also

endorsed the People's party. Nearly all of the state's leading trade

unionists worked on behalf of the People's party.

Neither historians of the American labor movement nor the People's

party have paid much attention to the role that trade unionists played

1 National Labor Tribune. (Pittsburgh), 10 January 1895. Columbus Dispatch. 16 August 1894; United Mine Workers' Journal. (Columbus), 23 August 1894. McBride lifted much of the plank's language from the People's party's Cmeüia platform of 1892. The Omaha platform states: "We believe that the powers of the government — in other words of the people — should be expanded (as in the case of the postal service) as rapidly and as far as the good sense of an intelligent people and the teachings of experience shall justify, to the end that oppression, injustice and poverty shall eventually cease in the land." McBride, though, mentioned "collective ownership," a term that the People's party avoided for fear that it would splinter the party. Even, McBride's language when he insisted that there would be a "union of labor men" echoed the Omaha platform which called the People's party a "union of labor forces." 2 in the Populist movement. Recognition of labor's significant support of

the People's party challenges the historiography of both Populism and

the American labor movement. Populist historians have generally Ignored

the role of organized leüsor in the People's party. Quite

understandably. Populist historians have focused on the states in the

West and South, where the Populists captured governor's mansions,

controlled legislatures, and elected members to the United States

Congress, in these heavily agricultural states farmers and their

organizations formed the backbone of the Populist movement. Conversely,

in state's with large concentrations of organized workers, the People's

party failed to win elections or even to attract more than 10% of the

vote. Populist historians have taken this weak showing and a few anti-

People's party speeches by AFL President Samuel Gompers to indicate that

organized labor rejected the appeals of the People's party to form a

producer-based political party. Norman Pollack even asserted that the

A.F.L. was ultimately responsible for the failure of Populism. "The

Federation, through looking the other way, killed the farmer-labor

movement," he wrote. "[I]ts failure to act guaranteed the ultimate

downfall of Populism."2

The characterization of trade unions as unfriendly toward the

Populist movement is based on faulty analysis which fails to take into

account the fact that organized labor operated in political environments

that were fundamentally different from those where the People's party

had its greatest impact. Farmers turned to the People's party in states where one political party dominated in the 1880s; organized workers

2 Norman Pollack, The Populist Response to Industrial America; Midwestern Populist Thought (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1962), 64-65. Also see John D. Hicks, The Populist Revolt; A History of the Farmers Alliance and the People's Partv (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1946), 115; Michael Kazin, The Populist Persuasion: An American History (New York: Basic Books, 1995), 27-78; Lawrence Goodwyn, The Democratic Promise; The Populist Moment in America (New York: Oxford University Press, 1976), 308, 414. 3 generally labored in states with mature two-party systems. As Jeffrey

Ostler's recent study suggests, the two-party system discouraged producers from seeking to redress their grievances by forming independent political parties. Historians trying to understand the relationship between organized labor and the People's party should compare the actions of farmers and workers within the same political environment.3

The characterization of trade unionists and the AFL as hostile toward People's party does not stand up to close scrutiny. Ohio's trade unionists were not alone in their support of the People's party.

Indeed, what was happening in Ohio was occurring throughout the industrial Midwest, in cities such as Chicago, Indianapolis,

Minneapolis, Saint Paul, and Milwaukee, central labor bodies worked with the People's party. Labor supported the People's party beyond the

Midwest as well. Even New York City's Central Labor Onion endorsed the

Populist party.4

As this study of the Ohio People's party shows, the presence of trade unionists in the Populist movement had important consequences on its evolution. Labor-Populists demanded that the party's platform include planks that many Populists found too radical, such as the call for the collective ownership of the means of production. Led by party chairman Herman Taubeneck, Populist leaders took steps to cleanse the party of labor's radical influence. Most importantly, the party's leadership's emphasis on the free coinage of silver in 1895 and 1896, in

3 Jeffrey Ostler, Prairie Populism; The Fate of Agrarian Radicalism in Kansas. Nebraska, and Iowa. 1880-1892 (Lawrence; University of Kansas Press, 1993). * Philip Foner, History of the Labor Movanent in the United States Volume II; From the Founding of the American Federation of Labor to the Emergence of American Imperialism (New York: International Publishers), 301-44; Eli Goldschmidt, "Labor and Populism: New York City, 1891-1896" Labor History 13 (1972) 520-32. 4 part, was promoted to counteract labor's increasing presence in the

party.

Like historians of Populism, historians of the American labor

movement have ignored organized labor's significant support for the

People's party. This study suggests that an understanding of Populism's

role within the Federation is crucial to understanding the emergence of

"pure and simple unionism" as the nation's dominant trade union ideology

by 1900. Led by Samuel Gompers, pure and simple unionists accepted the

main contours of industrial capitalism, rejected attempts to improve the

lives of workers through partisan political action, discounted the

ability of non-wage earners to aid the working class, and saw the

conflict between workers and capital in essentially economic rather than

political terms.5

Led by John R. Commons and Selig Perlmann, the first generation of

American labor historians argued that pure and simple unionism was as

old as American democracy. Commons and Perlmann contended that social

mobility, racial and ethnic divisions among the nation's working class,

the absence of a feudal tradition, the individualism embedded in the

American character, and the nation's general prosperity caused American

workers to embrace capitalism and reject the type of class-based

political action which characterized European labor movements.6

About thirty years ago historians began to question how prevalent

"pure and simple" unionism was in the early and mid-nineteenth century.

David Montgomery, Leon Fink, and others saw within the National Labor

5 Julie Green, Pure and Simple Politics; The American Federation of Labor and Political Activism, 1881-1917 (New York, Cambridge University Press, 1998). ® John R. Commons et. al.. History of Labor in the United States. 4 vols. (New York: Macmillan, 1936); Selig Per Imam, A Theory of the Labor Movement (Philadelphia: Porcupine Press, 1928); Gerald Grob, Workers auid Utopia (Chicago: Quadrangle, 1961). Also see Louis Hartz, The Liberal Tradition in America (New York: Harcourt, Brace and World, 1955) and Richard Hofstadter, The American Political Tradition and the Men Who Made It (New York: Alfred Knopf, 1948). 5 Union and the Knights of Labor attempts to challenge the emergence of industrial capitalism and the "wage system" through political activity.

These workers feared that the concentration of capital and the rise of big business was destroying economic opportunity and creating a new form of aristocracy that was threatening the American republic. They directed most of their criticism at bankers and capitalists who did not engage in productive labor, but simply profited off the wealth produced by others through manipulations of the money supply and the corruption of public officials. Rather than rejecting the aid of entrepreneurs, shop owners, and farmers, these unionists saw them as allies in the fight of the "producers" against the "parasites."?

For the past decade and a half historians have tried to understand the transition from producerism to pure and simple unionism. Victoria

Hattam, Karen Orren, and William Forbath argue that the judiciary's hostility toward unions led organized labor to abandon dreams of a producer-based political movement and to view the government, and especially the courts, as allies of anti-union employers. This forced organized labor to embrace laissez-faire liberalism and argue that the government should remain neutral in the confrontation between labor and

7 David Montgomery, Bevond Equality; labor and the Radical Republicans, 1862-1872 (New York: Alfred Knopf, 1967). Also see: Leon Fink, Workingman's Democracy (Urbana, IL.: University of Illinois Press, 1983); Steven J. Ross, Workers on the Edge: Work Leisure, and Politics in Industrializing Cincinnati. 1788-1890 (New York: Columbia University Press, 1985); Seem Wilentz, "Against Exceptionalism: Class Consciousness and the American Working Class" international T.«h

nineteenth century exacerbated ethnic and occupational divisions among

the nation's producers and undermined the producer-based political

alliance.9 Kim Voss asserts that the growth of large national

corporations and manufacturers associations in the 1890s gave employers

the power to "crush broad-based unionism before class patterned ways of

acting and thinking had established deep roots."lo David Montgomery,

drawing on the work of Harry Braverman, maintains that the transition to

business unionism was rooted in changes on the shop floor. The

introduction of scientific management "deskilled" large segments of the

working class and undermined their power to confront the emergence of a

new corporate order.u Martin Shefter suggests that pure and simple

unionism allowed the A.F.L. to accommodate a variety of forces — the

deskilling of the labor process, the devotion of American workers to the

two-party system and local political forces, the concentration of

economic power, the failure of political unionism to achieve its goals,

the hostility of politicians and the middle class to labor activism, the

8 William E. Forbath, Law and the Shaping of the American Labor Movement (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1991); Victoria C. Hattam, Labor Visions and State Power; The Origins of Business Unionism in the United States (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1993); Karen Orren, Belated Feudalism. Labor, the Law and Liberal Development in the United States (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991). This is not to suggest that Forbath, Hattam, and Orren are in agreement. There are important differences in their analyses. Forbath focuses on labor's fight against the labor injunction, Hattam on labor's efforts to undermine the conspiracy doctrine, and Orren on trade unionists's confrontations with the master and servant doctrine. 9 Gwendolyn Mink, Old Labor and New Immigrants in American Political Development: Union, Partv, and State, 1875-1920 (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1986). 10 Kim Voss, The Making of American Exceptionalism; The Knights of Labor and Class Formation in the Nineteenth Century (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1993), 12. 11 David Montgomery, The Fall of the House of Labor; The Workplace, the State, and American Labor Activism. 1865-1925 (Cambridge; Cambridge University Press, 1987); Harry Braverman, Labor and Monopoly Capital; The Degradation of Work in the Twentieth Century (New York: Monthly Review Press, 1974). 7 inability of earlier labor organization to maintain effective

organizations — that threatened to tear apart organized labor. 12

While not disputing the work of these historians, this

dissertation argues that within the AFL producerxats of many stripes —

single taxers, Bellamyites, Greenbackers, Onion Labor party veterans,

former Democrats alienated by Grover Cleveland's labor policies, and

even a handful of disgruntled Republicans — coalesced around the

People's party and mounted the last and most significant challenge to

the domination of pure and simple unionism within the Federation.

Although the producerists proved unable to change the direction of the

AFL, they did elect John McBride president of the Federation in 1894 and

convinced all but two of the Federation's constituent unions to endorse

its political program.

The Democratic-Populist fusion of 1896, though, destroyed the consensus that the producerists had built around the People's party and had challenged Gompers and the "pure and simplers" for control of the

Federation. After 1896, the challengers to Gompers and pure and simplism were fragmented and disorganized, and this allowed Gompers to institutionalize his style of trade unionism in the Federation.

Historians have focused on the triumph of pure and simple unionism in hopes of understanding "American Exceptionalism," the United States' position as the only Western, industrialized nation without a strong anti-corporate capitalist political movement. They have noted that while European labor movements were organizing political parties to confront the rise of corporate capitalism, that the Gompers-led AFL followed an anti-statist policy and accepted the main contours of corporate capitalism.

12 Martin Shefter, Political Parties and the State; The American Historical Experience (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1994), 101-48. 8 CHAPTER 2

PRODUCER POLITICS IN OHIO, 1865-1890

When Ohio soldiers, mostly young farmers and urban workers, arrived home at the end of the Civil War, they felt that their sacrifices had preserved both the nation's republican form of government and the free labor society that provided them with economic opportunity.

They agreed with Abraham Lincoln who, in 1859, characterized the free labor as a "just and generous, and prosperous system" in which

The prudent, penniless beginner in the world, labors for wages awhile, saves a surplus with which to buy tools or land, for himself; then labors on his own account another while, and at length hires another new beginner to help him. . . . if any continue through life in the condition of the hired laborer, it is not the fault of the system.

Like most northerners, Ohio soldiers felt that the economic independence described by Lincoln formed the foundation of the American republic.

Only those who were economically Independent were free from the influence of others and able to exercise the political rights that secured by the American Revolution and resecured by the Civil War

Not only did Ohio workers and farmers consider the economic system

Lincoln described as necessary for the maintenance of the American

Republic, they also saw it as just. Wealth was created by mixing one's labor with the resources that God had freely given to the American

13 Roy P. Easier et al (ed.) The Collected Works of Abraham Lincoln, Volume Three (New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 1953), 478- 79; Steven J. Ross, Workers' on the Edge; Work Leisure and Politics in Industrializing Cincinnati. 1788-1890 (New York: Columbia University Press, 1985), 193-199. 9 people. Those who created wealth were the ones who should profit from

it. To be denied the profit from the wealth that one produced put one

in a position similar to that of southern slaves. Those who refused to engage in productive labor and profited instead from the labor of others were seen as parasites sapping the strength of the nation.

But Ohio soldiers returned to an economy in flux. Forces were at work that threatened to undermine the economic life that they had fought so hard to protect. The Civil War accelerated industrialization and the concentration of capital, trends which began in the 1840s and 1850s.

Between 1850 and 1870 the number of Ohioans employed in factories, mills and workshops more than tripled. In the years following 1870 these trends continued. As the chart below indicates, between 1870 and 1890, the capital invested per shop more than doubled, while the wages of industrial workers remained stagnant. In other words, the type of independence described by Lincoln was becoming more difficult for

American workers to achieve.

1860 1870 1880 1890 Population 2,339,51 2,6656,260 3,198,062 3672,316 No. of Factories, Shops 11,123 22,773 20,699 28,673 Capital Invested ($) 57,295,303 141,923,964 188,939,614 402,793,000 Capital/Shop ($) 5151 6232 9128 14,047 Wage Earners 75,602 137,202 183,609 N.C. Wage Earners/Shop 6.8 6.0 8.9 N.C. Wages Paid ($) 22,302,989 49,066,488 62,103,800 N.C. Wages Pd/Wage Earner ($) 295 358 338 N.C.

Table 2.1; Industrial Production in Ohio, 1860-1890. Historical United 2ta^g^jCgggusj£owge£^_Jittp ; //www. fisher . lib. Virginia. edu/census/. 14 N.C.: Not Compfurable. The Census Bureau changed its classification methods for the 1890 Census. 10 The concentration of wealth was even more apparent in Ohio's major

cities. Cincinnati was the state's largest Industrial center. Founded

in the late eighteenth century, the city quickly became the major

manufacturing center of trans-Applachian America. By mid century

trailed only New York and Philadelphia in terms of industrial output.

Although St. Louis and Chicago unseated Cincinnati as the Midwest's

industrial capital in the latter half of the nineteenth century, the

city's manufacturing center continued to be robust. As the chart below

indicates, the amount of capital invested in manufacturing more than

doubled between 1870 and 1890, while the value of goods produced

quadrupled. 15

1860 1870 1880 1890

Population 216,410 260,370 313,374 374,573 No. of Factories, Shops 2,084 2,469 3,494 3,979 Capital Invested ($) 18,983,693 42,646,152 52,689,910 109,948,973 Capital/Shop ($) 9,109 17,273 15,080 27,632 Wage Earners 30,268 37,344 56,053 66,177 Wage Earners/Shop 14.5 15.1 16.0 N.C. Wages Paid ($) 8,693,836 15,601,289 20,017,718 N.C.

Wages Pd/Wage Earner {$) 287 417 357 N.C.

Table 2.2: Industrial Production in Cincinnati, 1860-1890. Historical United States Census Browser. http://www.fisher.lib.Virginia.edu/census/.

15 John C. Teaford, Cities of the Heartland; The Rise and Fall of the Industrial Midwest (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1993), 50; Eugene H. Roseboom, The Civil War Era: 1850-1873 (Columbus : Ohio State Archaeological and Historical Society, 1944), 21-24, Ross, 219-39. 11 Although the chart above suggests that the average size of

Cincinnati's factories did not increase substantially between 1860 and

1880, a closer look reveals that the city's manufacturing workers were increasingly found in larger factories. Historian Steven Ross has calculated that in 1870 50.6% of the city's manufacturing workers labored in shops of fewer than fifty employees and 33.2% worked in shops with more than ICO employees. But ten years later these numbers were reversed as 34.8% of Cincinnati factory workers toiled in shops with less than fifty employees and 49.6% labored in shops with more than 100 workers. i«

Nowhere in Ohio was the mid-nineteenth century's growth of industry and concentration of capital more apparent than in Cleveland.

In 1850 Cleveland was scarcely more than a banking and commercial hub for the prosperous farmers of Ohio's Western Reserve. The city's population stood at just over 17,000. Cleveland's Cuyahoga County ranked eighteenth out of the state's eighty-five counties in terms of industrial output. But the development of railroads, the acumen of business leaders, and the city's strategic position between Ohio and

Pennsylvania's coal fields of Ohio and Pennsylvania and Lake Superior's iron ranges fueled spectacular growth, especially in the oil refining and iron industries. Between 1860 and 1870 the amount of capital invested in shops, mills, and factories increased fivefold and the number of manufacturing employees more than doubled. In 1870 the city's population stood at 92,829, and Cuyahoga County ranked second in the state in terms of industrial output. As the chart below indicates these trends continued through the 1890.n

IS Ross, 221. 17 Roseboom, 24-26; Teaford, 52. 12 1860 1870 1880 1890 Population 78,033 132,010 196,943 309,970 No. of Factories, Shops 387 1149 1270 2425 Capital Invested {$) 2,676,963 13,645,018 20,699,299 71,873,873 Capital/Shop ($) 6,917 11,875 16,298 29,638 Wage Earners 4,455 10,063 22,696 38,899 Wage Earners/Shop 11.5 8.8 17.9 N.C. Wages Paid 1,333,118 4,539,065 8,826,542 N.C. Wages Pd/Wage Earner (S) 299 451 388 N.C.

Table 2.3: Industrial Production in Cleveland, 1860-1890. Historical United States Census Browser. http://WWW.fisher.lib.Virginia.edu/census/.

Like in Cincinnati, the aggregated census data concerning

Cleveland does not tell the whole story of the concentration of capital

in the city. In 1870 the Cleveland Rolling Mills with 2,700 workers and

the Standard Oil refinery with 2,500 workers employed over half of the

10,069 factory workers enumerated in the census. In other words, over

half of the city's factory workers labored in plants with at least 2,500

employees. By the mid 1880s the Cleveland Rolling Mills increased the

number of employees to over 4,000.is

Columbus never became an industrial powerhouse. Established in

1812 by the Ohio General Assembly to serve as the state capital,

Columbus was primarily a governmental, transportation, and commercial

center rather than an industrial city. Throughout the late nineteenth

century Columbus had the lowest percentage of workers engaged in manufacturing pursuits among the state's major cities. Even though

18 Herbert Gutman, "The Labor Policies of the Large Corporation in the Gilded Age: The Case of the Standard Oil Company, " in Gutman, Power and Culture: Essava on the American Working Class (New York: The New Press, 1987), 214-17. 13 Columbus's Franklin county ranked third in the state in terms of population in 1870, the county only ranked seventh among Ohio counties

in terms of industrial output. After the completion of the Hocking

Valley Railroad, which connected the city to the rich coal reserves and natural resources of southeastern Ohio, the pace of industrial activity increased, but even then few factories employed more than 100 workers.:*

1860 N 1870 1880 1890 Population 50,361 63,019 86,797 124,087 No. of Factories, Shops 201 522 433 791 Capital Invested ($) 1, 889,320 3,379,915 5,874,115 16,639,341 Capital/Shop ($) 9,399 6,474 13,566 21,035 Wage Earners 2,285 4,578 6,137 9,945 Wage Earners/Shop 11.4 8.8 14.1 N.C. Wages Paid 649,092 1,560,699 2,103,333 N.C. Wages Pd/Wage Earner ($) 284 341 342 N.C.

Table 2.4: Industrial Production in Columbus, 1860-1890. Historical United States Census Browser. http:/ / W W W . fisher.lib.Virginia.edu/census/.

Not only was the concentration of capital uneven in terms of geography, it also happened in spurts throughout the period. Between

19 Roseboom, 28; Van Tine, "A History of Labor in Columbus, Ohio, 1812- 1992," Ohio State University Center for Labor Research Working Paper Series 10 (1992) 16-28; Henry Hunker, The Industrial Evolution of Columbus. Ohio (Columbus: Ohio State University), 1-63. 14 1865 and 1890 Ohio and the nation experienced three substantial economic

downturns. The first occurred immediately after the war, as the drop in

spending for war material and the flood of soldiers coming home led to

widespread unemployment and underemployment in industrial centers.

The post-war downturn proved brief. Within a few years times were more

prosperous. The second downturn was much more severe and lasted much

longer, from 1873 until 1879. During the depths of the depression,

according to contemporary sources, at least 20% of the American work

force was unemployed and 40% of those employed worked no more than six

or seven months out of the year. The last downturn began in 1883 and

was relatively mild lasting three years.20

Northerners recognized soon after the conclusion of the war that

industrialization and the concentration of capital posed many of the

same challenges to the nation's political and economic system that

chattel slavery had a decade earlier. In 1869 the New York Times warned

that the expansion of wage labor throughout the North was depriving

individual workers of the potential to achieve independence. It threatened to create a new form of slavery, "wage slavery." Not only had the amount of capital needed to start the average factory increased to a point beyond the reach of the average worker, but the concentration of economic power gave corporations greater ability to lower wages.

Waged labor was changed from a transitory station that allowed young workers to accumulate enough money to strike out on their own to a permanent condition. Wage slavery, the article warned, could become

as absolute if not as degrading as that which lately prevailed in the South. The only difference is that there agriculture was the field, land proprietors were the masters and Negroes were the slaves; while in the North manufacturers is the field, mxmufacturing capitalists threaten to became the masters, zuid

20 (Patterson, NJ) Labor Standard 19 August 1876, 10 February 1877 cited in Philip S . Foner, History of the Labor Movement in the Onited States (New York: International Publishers, 1947), 439; 15 it is the white laborers who are to be the slaves.

Ohio workers shared these concerns. The Iron Holders Union of

North American, which was especially strong in Cleveland and Cincinnati, declared in its constitution, "Year after year the capital of this country becomes more and more concentrated in the hands of the few; and in proportion as the wealth becomes centralized, its power increases and the laboring classes are impoverished." Likewise, the commissioner of the Ohio Bureau of Labor Statistics, a former union official, worried that with the "rapid concentration of capital" and "the massing of machinery in immense workshops" came "the destruction of the possibility of the workman becoming his own employer." Thus, the economic independence described by Lincoln was becoming harder for Ohio worker to achieve. 21

Ohio workers responded to the concentration of capital and the rise of waged labor by forming organizations for mutual protection.

Only a handful of trade unions existed in Ohio before the Civil War.

During the war and immediately afterwards the pace of trade union activity increased dramatically. Throughout the state iron molders, typographers, cigarmakers, miners, and iron workers organized craft locals to fight changes in work rules and to protect wages. In the larger cities these Local unions banded together to form city-wide labor assemblies or federations to give greater voice to the demands of workers. The first of these city-wide labor assemblies was formed in

Cincinnati in 1864 under the leadership of the city's printers and iron molders unions. Named the Trades and Labor Assembly (TLA), the body sought to unite the city's workers for "self protection" and included

21 New York Times 22 February 1869 cited in David Montgomery, Bevond Eoualitvt Labor and the Radical Republicans. 1862-1872 (New York; Alfred P. Knopf, 1967), 25; First Annual Report of the Bureau of Labor Statistics Made to the General Assemblv of Ohio for the Year 1877. [hereafter Ohio BLS. 18771 (Columbus, OH: Nevins & Myers, 1878), 12, 32; Ohio BLS. 1878. 32 16 two dozen local unions by the fall of 1865. Cleveland's trade unions

followed Cincinnati's lead and formed a city-wide assembly in the fall

of 1868. The Clevelanders felt that it was a "self evident fact to most

casual observers that all or nearly all of the mechanical branches of

industry are degenerating" and that only through unity could the city's workers "procure just recognition of their rights and fair renumeration

for their labors." Columbus's typographers union and the cigarmakers

led the formation of that city's central labor body in 1866.22

Ohio's labor assemblies and trade unions did not see an inherent conflict between labor and capital. A Cincinnati TLA member denied that capital and labor were "engaged in a life and death struggle, in which one or the other must go down," while the national coopers' union's 1870 constitution, largely written by Clevelanders Martin Foran and Robert

Schilling, declared,

this union recognizes the identity of interests between capital and labor, between employer and employe; and that instead of encouraging a spirit of hostility to employers that it is the policy of this Union, and all unions acknowledging its jurisdiction, to give no countenance or support to any project or enterprise that will interfere with the promotion of perfect harmony between employer and employe.23

Rather than blaming the entire economic system for the misery of wage laborers, Ohio trade unionists insisted that labor problems were

22 Raymond Boryczka and Lorin Lee Cary, No Strength without Union; An Illustrated History of Ohio Workers. 1803-1980 (Columbus : Ohio Historical Society, 1982), 74-76; Eugene H. Roseboom, The Civil War Era; 1850-1873 (Columbus: Ohio Historical Society, 1944), 32-39; Steven Ross, Workers on the Edge: Work Leisure and Politics in Industrializing Cincinnati. 1788-1890 (New York: Columbia University Press, 1895), 197- 205; Peter Witt, "History of the Labor Movement in Cleveland" Cleveland Recorder. 5 September 1897, 10; Warren R. Van Tine, 25; Lyder L. Unstad, "A Survey of the Industrial and Economic Development in Central Ohio with Special Reference to Columbus, 1797-1872" Ph.D. Ohio State University, 1937, 496-514. 23 Ross, 199; Ohio BLS 1877. 33. 17 rooted in the actions of a few individual capitalists who placed their own economic interests above the interests of the whole community. The constitution of the Iron Molders Union, which was based in Cincinnati,

insisted that there would be no labor conflict or poverty "if those possessed of wealth were all actuated by those pure and philanthropic principles so necessary to the happiness of all." In Martin Foran's

1872 labor novel. The Other Side, the villain was a greedy capitalist who resorted to robbery and murder to get ahead, while the hero organized his fellow workers into a union before becoming part owner of a factory in which he instituted a profit-sharing plan. Factory ownership was not in-and-of-itself harmful to labor; ownership only became destructive to the interests of labor in the hands of the greedy. 24

Not surprisingly given such views, membership in labor federations in the 1860s and 1870a was not limited to union members. The TLA allowed reform groups to send representatives to the assembly and one of its leaders owned a factory. The constitution of Cleveland's assembly included a mechanism for the selection of community members who were not members of a trade union. Even the National Labor Union, a loose federation of trade unions formed in 1868, allowed reform groups working for "the amelioration of the condition of those who labor for a living" to take part in its proceedings. As Herbert Gutman has demonstrated, many Ohio businessmen and professionals actively supported the labor movement. 25

Ohio's trade unions sought to redress their grievances and to protect the rights of producers through economic cooperation and

24 Ohio BLS 1877. 31-32; Martin A. Foran, The Other Side; A Social Studv Based on Fact (Washington, D.C.: Gray and Clarkson, 1886). The novel was serialized in the Workingman's Advocate beginning 28 September 1872. 25 Ross, 199; Witt, "History," 10; Montgomeiry, Bevond Eguality, 180, 387-425; Herbert G. Gutman, "An Iron Workers' Strike in the Ohio Valley, 1873-1874," Ohio Historical Quarterly 68 (1959), 353-70. 18 political activity. Rather than seeing political action and economic

activity as alternatives, the workers fused to the two. As David

Montgomery has argued, gilded age workers saw themselves as "citizen

workers," with economic and political roles so entwined e? to make any

distinction meaningless. Banding together to demand higher wages or to

limit the number of apprentices were political acts because they helped

to make workers better citizens, while voting and other partisan

activities were ways to preserve economic opportunity.z*

while Ohio trade unionists often resorted to strikes to win wage

increases or stop wage reductions, they saw strikes as ultimately

undermining the well being of the community and the harmony of interest

that naturally existed between employer and employee. During the

railroad strike of 1877, the Ironworkers local representing the Columbus

Rolling Mills insisted that strikes "tend to create a spirit of discord

and hatred between the two parties." Likewise, a set of resolutions passed in Cleveland declared, "it is evidently necessary to devise a more peaceable way to settle difficulties between employers and employee than by strikes, they being detrimental to both parties."27

Ohio trade unionists preferred to solve labor disputes through arbitration and conciliation, which they felt would provide both sides with the information needed to reach an agreement that benefited all parties. The National Miners' Union, composed of mostly Ohio and

Pennsylvania miners, saw "the principle of arbitration" as the best method "to promote the interests of the miners morally, socially, and financially." The Amalgamated Association of Iron, Steel, and Tin

Workers, whose formation was led by Columbus ironworkers William Martin and David Plant, declared conciliation to be the most useful tool to

26 David Montgonery, Citizen Worker; The Experience of Workers in the United States with Democraev and the Free Market during the Nineteenth Century (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993), 1-53. 27 Columbus Dispatch 24 JUly 1877; Witt, 10. 19 obtain "a fair remuneration to the members for their labor" and to protect members against "broken contracts, obnoxious rules, unlawful discharge, or other systems of injustice or oppression." The National

Industrial Congress, which was organized by Cleveland unionists John

Fehrenbatch and Martin Foran simply insisted that "all unions adopt a system of arbitration."zs

Ohio workers also sought political solutions to labor problems.

According to Samuel Gompers, most workers "looked at industrial problems from the point of view of American citizens and turned instinctively to political activity for reform." Almost all agreed that the nation's economic system was fundamentally sound, but just perverted by the concentration of capital, Ohio trade unionists demanded changes to reform the system rather than to replace it. However, there was very little agreement about the best policies to correct the problems. Some trade unionists focused on the nation's trade policies and demanded a reduction in the tariff. Trade unionists in industries, like iron making, that needed protection from lower-priced British imports, however, denounced attempts to reduce tariff schedules. Some trade unionists alleged that bankers in New York and London had fostered the growth of monopolies by controlling credit and manipulating the currency. To counteract the power of these bankers, some trade unionists demanded an expansion of the money supply to make more credit available. Other trade unionists focused on the lemd question. They thought that as long as land was cheap and available capitalists would be hesitant to exploit labor for fear that labor would simply quit and work the land. Still other trade unionists faulted corrupt legislators for passing class legislation and tax codes which aided the concentration of capital.29

28 BLS 1877; Witt, 10 29 Samuel Gompers, Seventv Years of Life and Labor: An Autobiography (New York: E.F. Dutton & Co., 1925) 48; Witt, 10 20 While individual craft unions advocated one reform or another,

Ohio's city trade federations tended to focus on the one issue on which

all trade unionists could agree — the eight hour day with no reduction

in pay. In Cincinnati the TLA demanded the passage of a law giving workers "Sight Hours For Work, Eight Hours For Sleep, and Eight Hours

For Mental and Moral Improvements." In Cleveland the Industrial

Congress made the eight hour day its main demand. Trade unionists saw the reduction in the work day from ten or twelve hours to eight as a way to combat the emergence of wage slavery. Not only did the eight hour day promise to shorten the period of bondage, but it increased economic opportunity by allowing the worker time to improve o n e s e l f .30

When Ohio trade unionists entered the political arena, they initially shunned partisan activity. Endorsing a party might alienate trade unionists who were not members of that party and destroy the organization Instead, union leaders argued that pressuring candidates from the two main parties to support labor's demands offered the best chance for successful reform. In Cincinnati, the TLA organized the

Eight Hour League to convince Democratic and Republican candidates to support the shortening of the workday. Cleveland's central body refused to align itself with any political party and insisted that unionists should vote only for candidates who pledged themselves to support the reforms demanded by labor.3i

30 Cleveland's central labor body changed its name to the Industrial Congress sometime in the early 1870s. In 1872 Cleveland labor leaders Foran and John Fehrenbatch, the national president of the blacksmiths and machinists union, called for the nation's trade unions to send representatives to a National Industrial Congress. It is unclear which industrial congress came first, but the two organizations shared more than just names. Not only did they have the same leaders, they had similar platforms. John R. Commons et al (ed), Documentarv Historv of Industrial America (New York: Russell amd Russell, 1958) ix, 273; Montgomery, Bevond Equality. 193-94; Witt, 10. 31 Ross, 199-201; Witt, 10. 21 Both the Democratic and Republican parties proved adept at maintaining the support of individual trade unionists. The platforms of

both parties asserted opposition to monopoly and contained planks

championing at least some of labor's demands. The state's Republicans

denounced the "oppression of monopolies" and included planks calling for

high tariffs to protect American jobs from European competition, land policies designed make cheap land available for settlement, patent reform, and limits on the "importation of Mongolians." The Democrats called for lower tariffs and after 1868 advocated the "Ohio plan" to increase the currency supply and make credit more accessible .32

The major parties played on the people's prejudices and fears to keep the allegiance of the state's voters, including trade unionists.

From the 1860s through the 1880s the Republicans continually waved "the bloody shirt" portraying the Democrats as responsible for the Civil War and themselves as defenders of the union. The Democrats, on the other hand, often race-baited Republican candidates and portrayed the GOP as agents of miscegenation. Other issues such as temperance reform, Sunday closing laws, and the degree and character of religion in the public schools kept the state's workers committed to one of the major parties.

Catholics tended to view the Democrats as defenders to their personal freedom and religious liberties, while Protestants usually looked to the

Republican party to promote community morals.33

Non-partisan action proved effective at times. In Cleveland the two major parties were so desirous of trade union support that they both pledged to support the eight hour day and other reforms demanded by labor and placed union leaders on their slates. In 1873, for instance, the Republican party recruited John Fehrenbatch, head of the national

32 Rosa, 198-216; Witt, 10-11; Joseph P. Smith, Historv of the Republican Party (Chicago: Lewis Publishing 1898) 215-410; Chester McArthur Destier, American Radicalism. 1865-1900 (Chicago: Quadrangle, 1966) 32-49. 33 Ross, 204. 22 blacksmiths' union, to run for state representative, while the city's

Democrats nominated coopers Robert Schilling and Thomas Stow for the same office. The following year the city's voters elected Martin Foran city attorney on the Democratic ticket. The presence of good labor men on the slates of both parties led Cleveland's central body to decide that partisan activity would be "detrimental to the interests of labor" and urged trade unionists to vote for the best candidate regardless of party. 34

In Cincinnati too the TLA's non-partisan strategy met with initial success. In 1865 the TLA secured pledges to support eight hour day legislation from all nine of the Democratic candidates for the Ohio

General Assembly and six of the Republicans. But when the General

Assembly failed to pass the legislation the following winter the TLA turned to third party action, forming the Workingman's party. That fall the voters of Cincinnati elected the Workingman's peurty nominee Samuel

P. Carey to a seat in the Onited States Congress. The Workingman's party's success proved to be short lived. Both major parties offered jobs and nominations to TLA officials. As union officials moved back to the traditional parties, the TLA resumed its non-partisan stand.3S

Capitalists did not stand idly by while unions organized workers

Many employers saw unions as illegal conspiracies to raise wages, and so they lobbied the state legislature to pass bills restricting their power. In 1865, for instance, a legislator introduced a bill prohibiting employees from "entering into any league or combinations for the purpose of threatening or forcibly preventing anyone from engaging in any employment at any wages or compensation." While this bill was defeated, employers were able to water down bills regulating factory and mining conditions. Additionally, many employers refused to recognize

34 Witt, 10. 35 Ross, 200-03. 23 unions and utilized a variety of other measures, including blacklists,

the employment of armed guards, and the importation of strikebreakers,

to undermine the power of labor. This anti-labor backlash reinforced

the decision of trade unionists to work through the traditional parties.

In order to defeat anti-labor legislation, trade unionists needed allies

in the Ohio General Assembly. Third parties, with few, if any,

representatives in the legislature made poor allies.36

While the employer reaction to unions proved effective at certain

times and in certain industries, it was not until the Depression of

1873-1877 that Ohio employers were able to seriously erode the power of

trade unions. High unemployment robbed the workers of one of their most

important weapons — the ability to withhold labor. With thousands of

unemployed workers willing to take almost any job at almost any wage,

employers began demanding wage reductions which the unions could not

resist. Unable to resist the wage cuts, workers began questioning the

effectiveness of their unions and stopped paying union dues. As Peter

Witt wrote, "In 1873 the labor organizations of Cleveland were

practically wiped out of existence. The few that managed to retain

their charters were reduced in membership and power." In Cincinnati,

according to historian Steven Ross, "trade unions either dissolved or

experienced a precipitate loss of members." In Columbus not only did

the central labor body dissolve, but so did all of the locals with the

exception of the iron workers and the typographers. 37

36 Gutman, "The Labor Policies"; Gutman, "An Ironworkers' Strike"; Herbert 6. Gutman, "Reconstruction in Ohio: Negroes in the Hocking Valley Coal Mines in 1873 and 1874," Labor Historv 3 (1962), 243-64; Ross, 198; Herbert G. Gutman, "The Workers' Search for Power: Labor in the Gilded Age" in H. Wayne Morgan (ed.) The Gilded Ace a Reappraisal (Syracuse: Syracuse University Press, 1963) 38-68; Jean Y. Tussey "An Introduction to the History of the Cleveland Labor Movement, 1865-1929," (Cleveland: Greater Cleveland Labor History Society, 1996), 4. 37 Witt, 10-11; Ross, 246, Van Tine 25-26; Boryczka and Cary, 77. 24 As trade unions dissolved throughout the state and the economy

remained depressed, the remaining trade unionists became increasingly

dissatisfied and frustrated with the traditional political parties and

looked to third party politics. In Cleveland labor leaders, including

Robert Schilling and Isaac Newton, broke off from the traditional

parties to form a local branch of the Greenback party in 1875. Two

years later Columbus trade unionists responded to the railroad strike of

1877 and the nation's abysmal economic conditions by organizing a

Greenback party in Franklin County. The movement was led by the local

ironworkers, including David plant and William Martin, who insisted that

labor trouble "can only be rectified by proper and judicious

legislation" and called for the nation's "working classes" to combine

for political action.as

While trade unionists in Cleveland and Columbus turned to the

Greenback party, Cincinnati's trade unionists turned to the socialistic

Workingman's party. Although many of the party's leaders were recent

immigrants from Germany and other European countries, the Workingman's party echoed producerist concerns. The party thought that "all

legitimate property belonged to the producer" and called for the creation of industrial cooperatives. Support for the party was limited to a handful of activists, until the railroad strike of 1877 radicalized many of Cincinnati's workers. The party's local slate captured about

20% of the vote in both October and November of 1877.39

In the fall of 1877, the state's Greenback party and one branch of the Workingman's party (the non-Cincinnati branch) merged for the state's gubernatorial election. Although the party included many lawyers and small businessmen, it portrayed itself as the party of the workingman. The party complained that "labor, the creator of all

38 Witt, 10; Tussey, 6; Columbus Dispatch. 24 July 14 September 1877; Ohio State Journal. 25 July 1877. 39 Ross, 248-51. 25 wealth, is either unemployed or denied its just reward" and blamed

politicians for creating the situation through "class legislation and

the mismanagement of our national finances." Rather than calling for

wholesale changes in the economic system, the party called for the

repayment of all government bonds "according to the laws under which

they were issued" rather than with specie, the restoration of silver

coinage, the enforcement of corporate charters, the adoption of a

graduated income tax, the issuance of paper money directly by the

national government, reservation of government land for actual settlers,

and the abolition of scrip payment. Stephen Johnson, the party's

gubernatorial nominee, received 16,912 votes, just over 3.0% of the

votes cast. The branch of the Workingman's party that refused to fuse

with the Greenback party nominated Lewis Bond, who received 12,489 votes

(2.3%) about two-thirds of which came from Cincinnati.

The following year the rest of the Workingman's party merged with

the Greenback party to form the National Greenback party. In Ohio the party nominated Andrew Roy, who had held a number of offices in miners unions, for the top spot on the ticket, secretary of state. Roy polled

38,332 votes or just over 6.5% of the votes in a race the Republican candidate won by less than 3,200 votes. Like in 1877, most of the

Greenback party supporters came from the state's industrial centers and mining areas. In Columbus Roy collected slightly more than 10% of the vote, while he received just over 28% of the vote in Cleveland.

The rapid rise of the Greenback Labor party from just over 3,000 votes in 1876 to close to 40,000 votes in 1878 caused concern among politicians from the traditional parties, especially the Democrats.

40 R.C. McGrane, "Ohio and the Greenback Movement," The Mississippi Valiev Historical Review 11 (1925), 526-42; Reginald Charles McGreme, William Allen; A Studv in Western Democracy (Columbus : Ohio State Archaeological and Historical Society), 259-63; Annual Report of the Secretary of State. 1878, (Columbus: Nevins and Myers, 1879), 207-21. 41 McGrane, "Ohio and the Greenback Movement," 537-40. 26 Since 1868 the Democrats had been calling for many of the same reforms

demanded by the Greenbackers and party leaders saw Greenbackers as

potential supporters. To win the Greenback vote, the Democrats

nominated Thomas Ewing Jr. for governor in 1879. Ewing was the one

Democrat who could command the respect of Greenback party leaders. He

had been a steadfast supporter of Greenback issues and had worked with

the National Labor Union and Ohio trade unionists to bring about

currency reform.

Ewing's nomination split Ohio's Greenback Labor party and spelled

an end to the party in Ohio. The larger of the factions endorsed Ewing

and the Democratic platform, while the smaller of the two factions

insisted that the party retain its independence, but refused to nominate

a candidate to oppose Ewing. In the end, not only did Ewing lose the election, but the supporters of the Greenback labor party drifted back

to the major parties. The miners' leader Andrew Roy became a

Republican, while Robert Schilling rejoined the Democrats. «2

By the end of the 1870s, trade union activity was virtually non­ existent in Ohio. The depression which started in 1873 had decimated the membership rolls of the state's traditional craft unions, while enthusiasm for independent political action waned after 1878 when the

Democrats nominated Ewing and made Greenbackism the cornerstone of their platform. Out of the wreckage of the late 1870s emerged two separate worker movements — craft unionism and the Knights of Labor.«3 Both of these movements articulated a form of producerist thought and challenged the emergence of corporate capitalism. Although each of these movements maintained a distinct identity throughout the decade, the lines separating the movements often blurred. Many individual trade unionists

42 McGrane, "Ohio and the Greenback Movement," 538-42; Destler, 1-49. 43 The state's socialist movement in the 1880s was limited to a handful of hardcore activists. These activists who usually worked through traditional craft unions and the Knights of Labor. 27 and local unions were affiliated with both the Knights of Labor and national trade unions, despite the fact that the national leadership of the Knights and moat craft unions discouraged the practice.

Only the strongest of the state's craft union locals survived the five years of depression, but they provided the craft union movement with leadership when the more prosperous early 1880s brought an increase in membership. In Cleveland the typographers and iron molders formed the core of the craft union movement, while in Columbus the typographers, cigar makers, and iron molders organized the Columbus

Trades and Labor Assembly in 1882. The local miners' unions that survived formed the Ohio Miners' Amalgamated Association in 1882 which by the end of the decade included about half of the state's coal miners.

In Cincinnati the surviving craft unionists reestablished the TLA in

1878 and the organization quickly grew. Although the Columbus craft union movement never had more than a few thousand members in the 1880s, in Cleveland craft unionists numbered about 5,000. By 1883 membership in the Cincinnati's TLA had climbed to 12,000.44

In the first half of the decade, craft unionists in each of the major cities pursued a non-partisan policy. As the leader of the

Columbus Trades and Labor Assembly declared.

We hold the balance of power, and by the proper use of that power, we can accomplish vastly more than anyone can possibly hope to accomplish by independent political action. . . . As organized bodies, political action and the enunciation of political principles can only divide us, just what our enemies want to see happen.

In Cleveland the trade unionists joined Knights of Labor-dominated

Trades Assemblies and helped elect a number of trade unionists and pro-

44 Ross, 259-61; Tussey 6-7; Hayes, 4-5; Witt, 10; "History of Trade Onions in Columbus," (Columbus: Columbus Trades and Labor Assembly, 1895), 1; Boryczka and Cary, 82 28 labor candidates on both the Republican and Democratic tickets, including Democrat Martin Foran who won a seat in the United States

House of Representatives. In Cincinnati a TLA official insisted that it was the "duty of all union men to hold the cause of labor above and superior to party.«

To gain a greater voice in state political affairs, craft unionists led the formation of the Ohio State Trades and Labor Assembly

(OSTLA) in 1884. From the outset, the organization's constitution called for non-partisan political action. As John McBride, one of the

OSTLA's founders declared, "As workingmen, we can best ameliorate our condition — so far as legislation will do it — by rewarding political friends and punishing political enemies, it matters not what party they belong." The trade unionists acknowledged that dedicated trade unionists could be found in both major parties and worried that partisan activity would alienate members. The state assembly was so fearful of being used for partisan purposes that its constitution forbade elected officials from holding office in the organization.46

Ohio trade unionists were instrumental in the establishment of the

American Federation of Labor (AFL) in Columbus in December of 1886.

McBride, the head of the Ohio miners, chaired the sessions and declined the organization's offer to serve as the first AFL president. Like

Ohio's city-wide labor federations and the Ohio State Trades and Ledaor

Assembly, the AFL brought trade unionists together to lobby in the workers' interest. Most of the founders agreed with a Columbus delegate that the organization would do well if trade unionists would work "in

45 Columbus Dispatch. 11 December 1886; Witt, 10; Ross, 261. 46 Ohio State Journal. 25, 26 June 1884; Columbus Dispatch. 25, 26 June 1884; John McBride, "The Democratic Party the Party of the Workingmen," (NP: 1885), 1; John McBride, "The Best of All Yeti: Speech of Hon. John McBride, President of the State Miners' Union, Delivered to the Miners at Melsonville, October 4th. 1884" (NP: 1884) . 29 support of friendly candidates and against obnoxious ones on the ticket of the dominant parties."*?

Seeking labor-friendly candidates in order to win the labor vote, both the Democrats and the Republicans recruited trade unionists to run for office. In the major cities both parties nominated trade unionists for city council seats, administrative boards, and county positions.

Throughout the 1880s about a dozen trade unionists served in the Ohio

General Assembly, including Democrats John McBride and Nial Bysell from the Ohio Miners' Union and Republican A.D. Fasaett, an ironworker from the Mahoning valley. The Democrats even nominated McBride for secretary of state, the top slot on the state ticket in 1886, a non gubernatorial election year.**

Organized labor's non-partisan lobbying efforts paid off in the first half of the decade. The votes of trade unionists were too important for politicians to ignore and candidates from both parties pledged themselves to reforms demanded by labor. Between 1880 and 1886, the Ohio General Assembly passed a number of measures demanded by leibor, including bills regulating conditions in coal mines, establishing a system to inspect factories, changing the method by which convict labor was employed, and making eight hours an official workday. Additionally, labor leaders convinced the state legislators to defeat a number of bills detrimental to labor, including the "Wendy Bill" which would have made it illegal for trade unions to strike.*:

While craft unionism dominated the Ohio labor movement in the first half of the 1880s, the Knights of Labor dominated in the last

47 Columbus Dispatch. 11 December 1886; Gompers, 268-69. 48 Ross, 261; Witt, 10; Ohio State Journal. 25 June 1884; Michael Pierce, "The Populist President of the American Federation of Labor: The Career of John McBride, Labor Historv. forthcoming. 49 McBride speech; Ross, 261; Ohio State Journal, 17, 18 February 1885, 27,28 January 1886; Columbus Dispatch, 17, 18 February 1885, 27,28 January 1886. 30 half. Founded as a secret organization in Philadelphia in 1869, the

Knights first appeared in Ohio in the late 1870s. Unlike traditional unions which had organized workers along craft lines, the Knights sought to unite all producers in one organization to work for "the complete emancipation of wealth producers from the rhralldom and loss of wage slavery." The Knights did not distinguish between employers and employees as the organization saw them both as producers. However, it barred from membership those who did no productive labor and simply profited from the wealth produced by others — for example lawyers, bankers, saloonkeepers, gamblers, and speculators. The non-producing parasites, the Knights maintained, robbed the producers of the wealth they had created and were at the root of America's difficulties — poverty, crime, drunkenness. To solve the nation's problems and end wage slavery, the Knights called for the establishment of cooperatives, the reservation of public lands for actual settlers, the eight-hour day, equal pay for women and men, government ownership of the railroads, the elimination of private banks, the establishment of government owned postal savings banks, and paper money to be issued directly by the national government.

The Knights remained relatively small through the mid 1880s. in

1885 the nationwide membership stood at just 110,000. But in 1886 successful railroad strikes and fights for the eight hour day led to a dramatic increase in membership. At the start of 1887 membership had soared to over 700,000. Membership in Ohio followed the same pattern, with the biggest increase coming in 1886. The Knights were especially active among the state's coal miners, with assemblies being established in every one of the state's mining areas. John McBride, who led the

Ohio miners through much of the 1880s and served as president of the

American Federation of Labor in 1895, claimed to be the first Knight west of the Allegheny Mountains. By 1886 about a quarter of the state's

31 14,000 coal miners belonged to the Knights, and the organization set up a national trade assembly composed only of coal miners. In Cleveland the first Knights Assembly was established by Robert Schilling in 1876.

Growth was slow until the mid 1880s, but by 1887 the city had forty- seven assemblies which were, according to one observer, "in good condition and ready for battle." The Knights established their first assembly in Columbus in 1880. By the end of the decade at least seventeen separate assemblies were located there. Cincinnati shoemakers founded the Knights of Labor's first assembly in that city in 1877. In

1884 Cincinnati Knights numbered 787 in twenty-two assemblies. Just three years later the membership of the Knights in the city reached close to 17,000.50

Like the trade unions, the Knights believed that the power of corporations and capitalists could be checked through a combination of economic and political action. Seeing strikes as disruptive of the community and the harmonious spirit that should exist between employer and employee, the Knights discouraged members from striking. Instead, the Knights urged the creation of producer cooperatives as the ideal solution for the problems associated with wage labor. As an official in the Ohio State Assembly declared, "Cooperation is the key to the labor problem .... It will remove the tramp, the stock jobber, the bribe giver, as well as the taker of the same .... General prosperity must follow, which will infuse new life and vigor into the masses of the people." Throughout Ohio the Knights set up more than a score of cooperative ventures. Most of them were among the state's miners, but others were formed in urban areas. In Columbus the Knights formed a cooperative glove making factory. All of these cooperative ventures

50 Proceedings of the Twentv-Second Annual Convention of the Onited Mine Workers of America. (Indianapolis: Cheltenham Press, 1911), 581; Twenty- Year Historv of District Assembly 47. Knights of Labor (Cleveland: Knights of Labor, 1902), 21; Van Tine, 26-27; Ross, 263. 32 failed after a couple of years, due to lack of capital, poor management, and too much competition.si

The Knights saw political action as central to their mission of checking the "alarming development and aggressiveness of capitalists and corporations." As the preamble to its declaration of principles stated,

"the objects herein set forth can only be obtained through legislation."

While advocating political action. Grand Master Workman Terence V.

Powderly and the Knights' national leadership told the members to avoid being closely identified with any partisan activity. As the Journal of the Kniahta of Labor warned.

With men in our ranks of all shades of political affiliation it would be the depth of folly to take action which would not fail to injure our Order a thousand times more than it could aid the conference. Let political parties alone as an Order. 52

In Cleveland the Trades Assembly, which the Knights had come to dominate by 1686, pursued the non-partisan strategy suggested by

Powderly and the Knights' national leadership. The strategy met with initial success. The Trades Assembly helped elect a number of sympathetic candidates from both parties, including Foran. Indeed, the endorsement of the Trades Assembly became so important to the success of individual candidates that the Assembly was inundated by office-seeking politicians.53

In Cincinnati the Knights of Labor shied away from independent political action in the early 1880s. This changed, however, in the wake

51 (Philadelphia) Journal of the Kniahts of Labor 28 April 1888; Michael R. McCoinnick, "A Comparative Study of Coal Mining Communities in Northern Illinois and Southeastezm Ohio in the Late Nineteenth Century" Ph.D. Dissertation Ohio State Oniversity 1978. 52 Labor: Its Rights and Wrongs; Statements and Comments bv the Leading Men of our Nation on the Labor Question To-dav (Westport, CT: Hyperion Press) 29-30; Journal of the Kniahts of Labor. 5 February 1887. 53 Witt, 11; Hayes, 4. 33 of the movement to institute the eight hour day. The movement began in the Spring of 1886 after the Ohio General Assembly passed legislation to take effect May 1, 1886 declaring "in any mechanical, manufacturing, or mining business a day's work, when the contract is silent on the subject, or where there is no express contract, shall consist of eight hours." The language of the bill, though, made it useless in the eyes of employers, unions, and authorities. Not only did the law allow contracts to require more than eight hours of labor a day, there was no enforcement mechanism. Thus employers ignored the law. Almost all labor organizations, including the TLA and Knights of Labor, insisted that a strike to enforce it would be disastrous. Nonetheless, a handful of trade unionists, mostly German socialists called for a general strike on Monday May 3 to enforce the eight hour day. At the end of the first week about 15,000 workers were on strike. Over the next few weeks the strike picked up momentum. By the middle of the month between 20,000 and 30,000 workers were striking. However, the strike petered out by the end of the month as employers made concessions most of which fell well short of the eight hour day.

The strike radicalized Cincinnati's labor community and alienated them from the traditional parties. The strike leaders accused the city's employers of violating the law and the city's politicians of ignoring the violations. The radicalized workers began flocking to the

Knights of Labor, which saw its Cincinnati area membership increase to

17,000 by 1887. As membership in the Knights climbed, Hugh Cavanaugh, the District's Grand Master Workman, increasingly embraced third party political action.54

Cavanaugh and Cincinnati-area Knights hosted the founding convention of the Union Labor Party (OLP) in the winter of 1887, which centered its platform on Henry George's single tax. George and his

54 Ross, 270-311 34 followers argued that the land of the United States belonged to all its citizens but speculators and railroad monopolists had gained control it, robbing the common people the opportunity to settle it and gain independence. To break the hold of the "land monopoly," the party called for "a graduated land tax on all large estates, especially those held for speculative or tenant purposes; the reclamation of all unearned land grants" and the passage of "laws preventing corporations from acquiring real estate beyond the requirements of their business."ss

Cincinnati's Knights, along with the smaller Central Labor Onion, a federation of trade unions dominated by German socialists, organized the local ULP party in the Spring of 1887. To attract the support of the Amalgamated Council of Building Trades, the party nominated William

H. Stevenson, the president of the local bricklayers' union, for mayor.

The local platform included calls for an eight-hour day on all public works projects, municipal ownership of the city's street railroads and the telephone and telegraph companies, and the remuneration of city officials by salaries rather than fees.

With memories of the eight hour strikes still fresh, the OLP polled well in the spring of 1887. Mayoral nominee Stevenson came within 682 votes of defeating Republican candidate Elmore Smith, and the party won nine of the twenty-five seats on City Council. Seven OLP candidates were elected to the school board, nine as assessors, and ten as constables. Encouraged by the results of the municipal election, the

OLP predicted that it would sweep the coming fall's election. The municipal elections, however, would prove to be the high point of OLP success in Cincinnati.

The Knights dominance of the Ohio labor movement disappeared almost as quickly as it appeared. Nationally the Knights saw dramatic declines in membership from late 1887 through the end of the decade.

55 Cincinnati Enquirer. 22-24 February 1887. 35 The decline can be attributed to a number of factors including anti­ labor sentiment in the wake of the Baymarket riot, the reluctance of the

Order to sanction strikes, and the alienation of members upset with the increasing political nature of the Knights.

In Cleveland the success of the Knights of Labor-dominated Trades

Assembly contributed to its undoing. The Assembly's endorsement of candidates was so important to electoral success that both parties sought to control it. According to Max Hayes, the Assembly "became the happy hunting ground for designing politicians."

[A]t meetings of the Trades Assembly the politicians and hustlers who were members of the Republican and Democratic parties lined up on opposite sides of the chamber and battled each other for endorsement for elective and appointive positions to such an extent that unions uninterested in political spoils withdrew their delegates.

Representatives of the typographers, brewery workers, iron molders, carpenters, and bakers set up a rival central body called the Central

Labor Union (CLU) in November 1887 and affiliated with the AFL. The CLU accepted only delegates from bone fide trade unions, and it prohibited partisan activity. As future CLU President Peter Witt remembered, "So careful were they in forming the new body, to keep out politicians, that the constitution prohibited political discussions." To ensure that trade unionists would not use leadership positions in the CLU as a stepping stone to elective or appointed office, the organization initially refused even to have a president .57

Not only had the leading figures in the CLU been active in the

Knights of Labor, but the CLU's platform also mirrored the platform of

56 James M. Morris, "The Cincinnati Shoemakers' Lockout of 1888: A Case Study in the Danlse of the Knights of Labor," Labor Historv (Fall 1972) 13:505-19; Elizabeth amd Kenneth Fones-Wolf, "The War at Mingo Junction: The Autonomous Workman and the Decline of the Knights of Labor," Ohio Historv. 92 (1983), 37-51. 57 Witt, 11; Hayes, 4. 36 the Knights and the Trades Assembly. The CLU demanded municipal

ownership of public utilities, the eight hour day, equal pay for women,

more stringent inspection of mines and factories, compulsory education,

liability for employers of work injuries, a form of the single tax, an

expansion of the currency, and the abolition of capital punishment,

convict labor, and child labor. The preamble embodied the principles

that had motivated Cleveland's trade unionists since the Civil War —

fear of the concentration of capital and the need to reestablish the

harmony of interests that should exist between labor and capital.

As the power of capital combines and increases the political freedom of the masses becomes more and more a delusion. There can be no harmony between capital and labor under the present industrial system.

As the Knights of Labor slowly collapsed in Cleveland, the CLU became

the city's largest and most influential labor organization. By the

beginning of 1891 the CLU had the support of twenty-two trade unions

representing at least 3,000 workers.ss

In Cincinnati the Knights's support of the UIP contributed to its

rapid decline. In the wake of the municipal elections of 1887, both the

Republicans and the Democrats redoubled their efforts to capture the

labor vote from the ULP by offering jobs and nominations to prominent

labor leaders. As memories of the eight hour strike waned so did the

radicalism which they engendered. More significantly, cleavages

developed among the city's labor forces. In the wake of the Haymarket

riot, Cavanaugh and the Knights sought to distance the party from any

taint of radicalism. Declaring that "Socialism and other isms

antagonistic to American institutions" have no place in the party,

Cavanaugh sought to attract the more "respectable" members of the community to the pairty, and in the summer of 1887 the paurty changed its name to the Union Labor party and dropped support of the single tax from

58 Witt, 11; Hayes, 4. 37 its platform. Although an open split with the socialists and single

taxers associated with the party was avoided that fall, the party saw

its support fall off significantly. While in the spring 37% of

Cincinnati voters cast their ballots for the party, that fall just 17%

of the voters cast their ballots for John Seitz, the OLP's gubernatorial

candidate and not one ULP candidate was elected to office. Just one

year later, in the Fall of 1888, only 1.2% of Cincinnati voters cast

their ballot for the OLP presidential nominee.

In June 1889 the remnants of Cincinnati's labor movement —

Knights of Labor's craft assemblies, the CLU, building trades locals,

and the fledgling Congress of Amalgamated Labor — realized divisions

within the l«d)or community weakened them all and formed the Central

Labor Council (CLC). The CLC embraced many of the same ideas that

informed both the TLA and the Knights of Labor. As the CLC's

declaration of principles stated.

There can be no harmony between capital and labor under the present industrial system, for the simple reason that capital in its modern character, consists largely of rents, interests, and profits wrongly extorted from the producer, who possesses neither the land nor the means of production and is therefore compelled to sell his arms, brains, or both, to the possessor of the land or the means of production, and at such prices as an uncertain speculative market will allow.

Additionally, many of the CLC's founders, including Frank Rist and Louis

Benjamin, were veterans of the eight hour strike and campaigned for

office under the ULP banner.59

Like Cleveland's CLU, Cincinnati's CLC recognized both the value

and the danger of political activity. To minimize the danger the CLC

sought to keep clear of partisan activity. Not only were elected

officials forbidden from having a seat in the CLC, the organization's

59 CLC Minute Books, 20 June, 8 August 1889; Cincinnati Chronicle. February 1892. 38 constitution prohibited any activity to further the interest of any political party. To maximize the benefits of political activity, the

CLC pursued a policy of supporting Democratic and Republican candidates who would protect the "just rights of all working men" and punishing those who would "assist in the enactment of laws to subjugate and oppress labor.

Farmers 1865-1879

Ohio's urban workers were not the only ones upset with the economic changes that accompanied the middle of the nineteenth century.

The New York Times reported that by 1873 Ohio farmers were on the verge of "revolt." The farmers's main complaints involved falling prices and the railroads. Hard times for Ohio farmers began before the start of the 1873-1879 economic downturn, as prices for agricultural staples began falling in the late 1860s. Ohio corn, which sold for $0.92 a bushel in 1867, was fetching $0.50 by 1871-1872, while the price of wheat dropped from $2.79 per bushel in 1866 to just over $1.50 a bushel in 1871-1872.61

Even as farmers felt the sting of declining prices, they faced price increases, especially from the railroads. The state's farmers depended on railroads to transport their products to markets. They accused the railroads of using their monopoly position to rob farmers of

"the larger portion of the profits of their toil." Farmers pointed to

"unjust, unreasonable, and outlandish" disparities in the rates the railroads charged to transport goods, it cost twice as much to ship grain from Chillicothe, in south-central Ohio, to Baltimore, Maryland as it did to ship from Cincinnati, even though the trains traveled along the same tracks and Chillicothe was 100 miles closer to the final

60 cxiC Minute Books, 12, 26 September, 3,10 October 1889, 5 January 1892. 61 New York Times. 22 August 1873; Roseboom, 82. 39 destination. It cost so much to transport livestock from London, in west-central Ohio, directly to New York city that farmers sent livestock to New York by way of Chicago. Additionally, if the farmer did not have enough product to fill a whole car, he was forced to sell his product to a middle man who would consolidate the shipments of many farmers. The middle man, farmers complained, only paid the farmers one-half of the market price and reaped a large profit even though he did not engage in any productive labor."

while the state's farmers concentrated most of their animosity on railroad corporations, they also attacked the corporate concentration of capital generally and the consequent decrease in competition. Farmers accused large corporations, especially the makers of farm machinery and finished goods, of using their financial position to inflate prices and rob farmers of the wealth and money that they worked so hard to produce.

Additionally, the farmers complained about these corporation's use of middle men to sell goods to farmers. Middle men, the farmers declared, used their position to artificially raise the price of goods and profited off the sale of machinery and goods which they did not produce.

After listing the wrongs endured by the state's farmers, one Ohio farmer declared, "We create the wealth of the country and yet we do not retain sufficient to educate ourselves to the standard that rightfully belongs to us; we create the wealth, and the wealth builds the cities and is the incentive to all improvement; yet we hold it not, it is enjoyed by others who manipulate it for their own advancement."S3

Like the state's workers, Ohio farmers responded to the rise of corporations and the concentration of capital by forming organizations

62 New York Times. 22 August 1873. 63 Journal of the Proceedings of the Second Annual Session of the Ohio State Grange of the Patrons of Husbandrv Held at Columbus. March 9th. 10th. 11th. 12th. and 13th. 1875 [hereafter Ohio Grange Proceedings. 18751 Sandusky, OH; Register Printing, 1875), 9-12; R. Douglas Hurt, "The Ohio Grange, 1870-1900" Northwest Ohio Ouarterlv 53, no. 2 (Spring 1981), 20-22. 40 for mutual protection. While hundreds of independent farm organizations

sprang up around the state, Ohio's farmers made the Grange the state's

largest farm organization during the Gilded Age. The Grange's founder,

Oliver Kelly, an agent for the O.S. Department of Agriculture,

envisioned the Grange as a Masonic-like organization which would improve

the lives of farmers and farm families by providing educational and

social opportunities. Although Kelly chartered one of the nation's

first subordinate granges in Ohio in the Spring of 1868, the Grange got

off to a slow start in Ohio compared to states further west. Not until

April 1872 did representatives from the state's three dozen subordinate

granges form the Ohio State Grange. The Grange grew rapidly from three dozen subordinate granges in April 1872 to over 1,100 subordinate granges by March of 1875 with over 50,000 members.«4

The Ohio Grange directed most of its attention to railroad rates, criticizing the power of railroad corporations as a threat to the

American republic. The Grand Master of the Ohio State Grange called railroad corporations "a great and dangerous power" which "holds in its grasp of iron every industry of our people" and "buys legislatures, bribes courts, muzzles the press and silences the pulpit."

Consequently, "the producer stands helplessly by and sees the profits which rightfully belong to him turned aside into the coffers of these corporations."«s

Grange officials extended their criticisms to all large corporations and the concentration of capital generally. The development of large corporations, one Grange official complained, was

"fostered by lavish expenditures of public moneys and strengthened by protective duties," yet the corporations sought only to enrich

Ohio Grange Proceedings. 1875. 41-57; New York Times. 22 August 1873; Hurt, "The Ohio Grange," 20-25; John F. Dowler, Centennial History; Ohio State Grange. (Aahville, OH; Ohio State Grange, 1972), 33-49. 65 Ohio Grange Proceedings 1875. 7-8; Ohio Grange Proceedings. 1876. 5- 8; Ohio Grange Proceedings 1879. 8-9 41 themselves and not the whole nation. These corporations ran "honest

industry" out of business. They corrupted the nation's and the state's

political system and threatened the republic. The official bluntly

warned, "Where wealth accumulates men decay.

To check the power of the railroads and the growth of grasping

corporations, the Grange called for the Ohio General Assembly to pass a

series of measures. The Grangers insisted that the state pass such laws

"as will bring these [railroad] corporations fully within control of the

state." They called for the state to enforce corporate charters and to

equalize the tax code, so that each corporation "bear[s] its just burthen of taxation." Additionally, the Grange demanded increased

support for public schools and the state's agricultural college.67

Both political parties supported at least some of the Grange's demands. Farmers constituted about 40% of Ohio voters and state-wide elections were often decided by less than 3,000 votes, neither the

Democrats nor the Republicans could afford to ignore the demands of the state's largest farm organization. Both declared their commitment to the state's farmers and issued vague calls for further regulation of railroads and the elimination of monopolies and trusts. The 1873

Republican platform called for an end to "all improper and arbitrary uses of the growing power of railroad and other corporations." Ohio's

Democrats were even more solicitous of the state's farmers. Not only did they support railroad regulation, they embraced the Greenback idea to increase inflation and ease credit. The Democrats and the

Republicans also nominated farmers for office. "Whenever one party nominates a professional man," the New York Times reported, "the other

Ohio Grange Proceedings. 1878. 11-13. 67 Ohio Grange Proceedings. 1875. 27; Ohio Grange Proceedings. 1876. 51, 88. 42 very quickly avails itself of the little advantage to be gained by bringing out a representative farmer." «8

As almost all of the state's farmers remained committed Democrats or Republicans and both parties proved receptive to the Grange's demands, the Grange followed a non-partisan policy. The Grange urged subordinate organizations to investigate the qualifications and positions of candidates for office, telling members to vote for the candidate most sympathetic to agrarian concerns regardless of party affiliation. The Grange also encouraged farmers to seek office as farmers would be less likely to be motivated by greed and self-interest than businessmen or lawyers.«9

During the 1873 legislative session the Ohio General Assembly responded to Grange pressure by passing a law to eliminate railroad price discrimination and lowering freight rates to five cents a mile.

Although Grange officials saw five cents a mile as too high for agricultural goods and complained that the law had no enforcement mechanism, they believed that the law was a step in the right direction.70

The Grange also sought to use the combined economic clout of the state's agricultural population to protect farmers. The Grange advised farmers to "trade in our trading centres where the merchant and mechanic deal fairly." In areas where the farmers could not get a fair deal the

Grange recommended that subordinate granges form cooperatives to buy machinery and goods and to market their products. To carry out its recommendations, in 1874 the Grange appropriated $5,000 to establish a

58 Joseph P. Smith (ed.) History of the Republican Partv in Ohio (Chicago: Lewis Publishing Company, 1898), I, 317; Reginald Charles McGrane, William Allen; A Study in Western Democracy (Columbus: Ohio State Archaeological and Historical Society), 187-207; New York Times 22 August 1873. 69 New York Times 22 August 1873; Grange Proceedings. 1875 74-90 passim. 70 Hurt, "The Ohio Grange," 22; Grange Proceedings. 1875. 6. 43 "business agency" in the Cincinnati area that would purchase products to be sold to members at cost. According to historian Douglas Burt, this cooperative venture was successful "beyond all expectations." From early 1875 to early 1876 Ohio Grangers bought $1,250,000 worth of farm implements and consumer goods through the Grange saving an estimated

$250,000. The next year the numbers climbed, with Grangers spending over $3,000,000 through the Grange and saving close to $800,000.

Additionally, the Grange marketed wheat, rye, barley, corn, oats, and livestock produced by its members.

The initial success of the Grange's business agency prompted the

Grange to expand its operations by opening an office in Cleveland and encouraging subordinate granges to open local cooperative stores. To make the business agency self-supporting the Grange began charging a commission of up to 8% on purchases. The fee was used to pay overhead costs and the salaries of business agency officials. Charging that this change had transformed the Grange into the type of middleman that the

Grange had previously deplored, many Grangers stopped buying and marketing goods through the business agency. Additionally, local merchants responded to the challenge posed by the Grange's business agency and local cooperative stores by reducing prices. In many areas local merchants sold staples at below cost in order to win back the business lost to the Grange. Overexpansion and competition took its toll on the Grange's cooperative ventures, and by 1879 the Grange was selling less than $500,000 worth of goods annually. Nonetheless, the

Grange continued the business agency. The mere existence of the agency forced rival merchants and manufacturers to keep prices down. More important, the Grangers believed in the principle of cooperation. As

Cincinnati-area Grangers declared, the organization should push for

71 Ohio Grange Proceedings. 1875. 10-14, 27; Ohio Grange Proceedings. 1876. 29-30; Ohio Grange Proceedings. 1877. 25; Burt, "The Ohio Grange," 23-26. 44 cooperation until it"shall become universal between every city and every

trading point in this O n i o n . "72

The late 1870s Grange membership began to decline dramatically.

In many areas farmers had joined the Grange to take advantage of the

lower prices and the marketing opportunities. When the Grange's price

advantage disappeared, so did those manbera. More importantly, the end

of the 1873-1878 Depression brought prosperity to the state's farmers

and lessened their frustration with the economic system. From a peak of

around 50,000 in 1877, the Grange's membership dropped steadily until it

bottomed out at about 20,000 in 1890.

Ohio farmers generally prospered in the 1880s. Well situated to

take advantage of the growing urban markets along the Great Lakes and on

the Eastern Seaboard, Ohio farmers did not suffer from the pernicious

effects of single crop agriculture. They saw steadily rising prices

until the last few years of the decade. Indeed, as the following chart

shows, the state's farmers enjoyed higher returns per acre than farmers

on the Great Plains or in the Deep South.

72 Hurt, "The Ohio Grange," 25-26; Ohio Grange Proceedings, 1878. 18-19; Ohio Grange Proceedings. 1879. 17, 48-49 45 State/ Average value ($) per ac■re---- Territory Corn Wheat Oats Rye Barley Bay Tobacco

Ohio 13.16 12.42 9.73 7.61 15.00 12.71 66.28

The Great Plains Dakota Territory 8.67 7.52 7.29 7.21 9.02 5.10 —— Iowa 8.63 7.56 7.34 6.42 10.34 6.39 — — Kansas 7.90 9.41 6.64 6.12 7.90 5.55 —— Minnesota 10.86 9.31 8.63 7.20 10.93 6.76 — —

Nebraska 7.58 6.87 5.78 5.51 7.59 4.82 — —

The Deep South Georgia 6.81 7.01 5.85 6.07 13.57 17.31 53.10 Louisiana 9.54 —— 7.07 11.19 — — 14.10 54.03 N . Carolina 7.15 6.42 4.56 4.82 9.65 13.45 51.21 S. Carolina 6.19 6.73 6.18 5.09 14.88 15.71 ——

Texas 9.62 9.25 9.98 3.51 10.79 12.20 — —

U.S. Average 9.47 9.95 8.16 8.27 12.76 11.08 61.51

Table 2.5: Average value per acre for major crops, 1880-1889. Report of the Secretary of Agriculture. 1890 (Washington: Government Printing Office, 1890), 333.

Not only did Ohio farmers receive higher returns per acre, Ohio farmers also had much lower levels of debt than farmers on the Great

Plains. Since Ohio farms were, for the most part, purchased before

1860, Ohio farmers were able to use the inflation accompanying the Civil

War to pay off their debts. The Ohio Farmer concluded in the early 1890s that "the mortgaged indebtedness of the farm property of Ohio today will not exceed $125,000,000, and possibly not $100,000,000." The paper then divided this indebtedness by the state's 20,323,029 acres of farm land to argue that there was an average farm indebtedness of five to six dollars per acre. Given that Ohio c o m farmers received $5.26 more per

46 acre per year than Kansas corn farmers and Ohio wheat farmers received

$5.55 more per acre per year than Dakota wheat farmers, Ohio farmers did

not feel the sting of the debt crisis sweeping the Great Plains.

Indeed, The Ohio Farmer complained that discussions of the debt crisis had been distorted by "gross exaggerations and misrepresentations. "73

Despite the prosperity of the state's farmers in the 1880s, Ohio

Grange leaders remained critical of the state's political and economic environment. They continued to argue that the corporations, with the help of corrupt politicians, were robbing the nation's producers of their profit. As John Brigham, the Grand Master of the Ohio Grange, insisted in 1888,

Trusts and combinations formed to oppress both the producer and the consumer should be given no quarter; should be allowed to hide behind no legal technicality, but be promptly crushed.

After the passage of the Interstate Commerce Act in 1887, the farmer's main complaint involved the state's tax code. Although the state's Constitution required that all forms of property, including "all moneys, credits, investments in bonds, stocks, joint stock companies, or otherwise; and also all real and personal property," be taxed at a uniform rate, in practice this was not done. As the Grand Master of the

State Grange complained in 1887,

Capital shrinks from its fair share of the burdens and not a respectable fraction of it appears on the records. Millions of dollars in notes and mortgages, as well as bank deposits are withheld from taxation by the wealthy who claim protection under the best governments. Ninety-nine hundredths of the moneys deposited in our banks go scot free from the assessor's books. 73 Ohio Farmer 11 April 1891. The debt statistics can be found in Twelfth Annual Report of the Bureau of Labor Statistics to the 68th General Assembly of the State of Ohio for the Year 1888 (Columbus: Westbote, 1889), 1381-1567. 47 Another commentator noted that in Cincinnati's Hamilton County, the

value of personal property appearing on the tax duplicate declined 23%

from 1865 until 1685. Grange officials complained that while the

capitalists were hiding their assets from the assessors, the farmers's

main source of wealth, land, had no place to hide.?*

Despite the fact that the members of the Ohio State Grange were

unable to secure legislation to force the state's business community to

shoulder a larger share of the tax burden, the Grange remained committed

to non-partisan action. The leaders of the Grange realized that the

state's farmers could be found in both the Democratic and Republican

party's and that if the Grange endorsed a party it would alienate As

Brigham insisted in 1888, that members should "refuse to be hampered or

bound to any party."75

In the late 1880s the National Farmers' Alliance arrived in Ohio

to challenge the Ohio State Grange for the loyalty of the state's

farmers. Originating on the Plains earlier in the decade and strongest

in Kansas and Nebraska, the National Farmers Alliance and its southern

cousin, the Farmers' Alliance and Industrial Onion (FAIU), tended to be

much more critical of the rise of corporate capitalism and the nation's

economic system, than the members of the Grange. According to historian

Lawrence Goodwyn, the alliances spawned a "movement culture" in which

alliance members were schooled in the fundamentals of producerist

thought and mobilized to affect political change.?s

74 Ohio Grange Proceedings. 1887. 8; W.C. Thompson, "Taxation" (Oxford, OH, 1894); Akron Beacon 1 September 1890; also see Hoyt Landon Warner, Prooressivism in Ohio. 1897-1917 (Columbus: Ohio State University Press, 1964), 7-10. 75 Ohio Grange Proceedings, 1888. 10. 76 Lawrence Goodwyn, The Democratic Promise; The Populist Movement in America (New York: Oxford University Press, 1976); R. Douglas Hurt, "The Farmers' Alliance and the People's Party in Ohio." The Old Northwest 10 (1984-85), 439-40. 48 Farmers organized the first local alliance in Ohio in the spring

of 1887, and for the next two years the organization remained relatively

small. Only twenty local alliances existed in the state, when alliance

members met in May of 1889 to form the Ohio State Farmers' Alliance,

which was renamed the Ohio Farmers' Alliance within a year. Around the

time of the first state-wide meeting membership in the organization

started to boom and by September of 1890 over 460 local alliances with

about 20,000 members belonged to the Ohio Farmers' Alliance.??

The leaders of the Ohio Farmers' Alliance spoke in the producerist

tradition. W.H. Likins, the president of the Ohio Farmers' Alliance in

1890, recited the complaints of the state's farmers and concluded, "we

see discontent on every side and hear the mutterings on every hand, and

the burden and refrain is the same, 'farming does not pay." Rather than

blaming the hard working farmer for this misfortune, Likins attributed

the farmers' plight to the concentration of capital and the rise of

large corporations.

Hand in hand, and aide by side we see unlawful combinations, unjust corporations, soulless monopolies, steals, swindles, defalcation, with plots and schemes of the deepest dyes, all seeking to fasten upon the body politic, euid like heinous vampires, co drain the life blood of the nation.

Another Alliance leader agreed, "A wealthy aristocratic class has been

built up during this time that overshadows in wealth and magnificence

the worst despotism the world has ever seen, and this at the expense of

the producer."78

To remedy these problems, the Alliemce called for farmers to be vigilant in the performance of their political duties. Alliance

77 Hurt, "The Fairmers' Alliance," 440; "Constitution of the Ohio State Feunners' Alliance," (Mt. Gilead: Register Steam Printers, 1889). 78 "Constitution of the Ohio Faunners' Alliance," (Des Moines: The Iowa Homestead, 1890), 11, 13. 49 speakers chastised farmers for ignoring politics while lawyers and professional politicians have used "trickery and chicanery" to impoverish the nation's producers. Like the Grange, the Alliance did not favor the creation cf a new political party. Instead, the organization told its members to work with "a strictly non-partisan spirit."79

By examining the response of the state's farmers and workers to the concentration of economic power in the years after the end of the

Civil War, this chapter has suggested that both Ohio farmers and workers mobilized to protect Ohio producers from the pernicious effects of the growth of large corporations and to secure economic opportunity for the state's citizens. Both farm groups and labor organizations relied on a combination of political action and economic mutuality in their attempts to check the rising power of capital. While the enthusiasm for reform waxed and waned over this twenty-five year period, it remained strong on the eve of the Populist era in Ohio.

79 "Constitution of the Ohio Farmers' Alliance," 3, 13; "Constitution of the Ohio State Farmers' Alliance," 2. 50 CHAPTER 3

AGRARIAN RADICALISM, THE OHIO PEOPLE'S, AND THE OHIO FARMER

In August of 1891 many of the nation's most prominent Populists

gathered in Springfield, Ohio, for the inaugural convention of the Ohio

People's party. The Populists were confident of success. The previous

fall's elections had swept Farmers' Alliance candidates into office throughout the South and on the Great Plains. In Kansas the Populists controlled the statehouse and elected William A. Peffer to the United

States Senate, while Alliance-endorsed candidates sat in governors's mansions throughout the South. The Populists were certain that they could "Kansasize" Ohio. Peffer thought that Ohio had "precisely the same" conditions that had created the Populist success in Kansas.

Kansas Congressman "Sockless" Jerry Simpson predicted that the new party would hold the balance of power in the Ohio General Assembly and force the retirement of Republican Senator John Sherman.so

Ohio was crucial in the Populists's plan to expand beyond the

South and the Plains and create a national party which could challenge the dominance of the Democrats and Republicans. The state was at the center of the nation's political life during the Gilded Age. Three of the six men elected president between the Civil War and the turn of the century called Ohio home, while two others were born in the state. More importantly, if the party was to fulfill its promise to unite the producers of wealth and to defend workers and farmers from the greed of

80 Cleveland Plain Dealer. 31 July 1891; Warren Western Reserve Democrat. 7 August 1891; New Nation (Boston), 12 September 1891; Peter Argersinger. Populism and Politics; William Peffer and the People's Partv (Lexington: University Press of Kentucky), 99 51 speculators, monopolists, and other non-producers, it had to do well in

Midwestern states like Ohio with large agricultural populations and major industrial centers. To ensure success in Ohio, the People's party

sent some its best stump speakers, including Anna Diggs, Ralph Beaumont,

W.B. Farmer, B.B. Taubeneck, Robert Schilling, John F. Willlts, and M.L.

Wilkins, into the state.

The Populists'a confidence of success in Ohio proved to be misplaced. Not only did the People's party fail to elect a single member to the Ohio General Assembly, the party's 1891 gubernatorial nominee, John Seitz, received less than 3% of the popular vote.

Historians trying to understand the failure of Populism in Ohio and the

Midwest offer three different interpretations. John Hicks, Richard

Hofstadter, and others equate Populism with economic hard times and suggest that Populism failed to take root in the Midwest because the region's relative agricultural prosperity bred contentment with the nation's political system. In the only published study farmers and

Populism in Ohio, R. Douglas Hurt agrees, "In the absence of severe economic problems, most [Ohio] farmers were too conservative to switch parties." In short, economic concerns tied the region's farmers to the traditional parties. As Republican Senator John Sherman observed in

1895, "The prosperity in Ohio was a great aid to Republicans. . . .

Prices were good and the farmers as a rule prosperous. This naturally made them regard with grim humor the talk of the Alliance lecturers about poverty and distress."82

Argersinger, 99; New Nation. 20 June, 4 July 1891; Ohio State Journal (Columbus), 28 August, 3, 9, 12 September 1891. 82 John D. Hicks, The Populist Revolt; A History of the Farmers' Alliance and the People's Partv (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1931); Richard Hofstadter, The Ace of Reform: From Brvan to F.D.R. (New York: Knopf, 1955), 99; Douglas Hurt, "The Farmers' Alliance and the People's Party in Ohio," The Old Northwest 10 (Winter 1984-85), 439-462; John Sherman, John Sherman's Recollections of Fortv Years in the House. Senate and Cabinet: An Autobiography (Chicago: Werner, 1895), 1,130. 52 Richard Jensen and Paul Kleppner argue that the loyalty of

Midwestern farmers to the traditional parties was not simply a function of economic concerns. Ethnic and cultural ties bound Midwestern farmers to both the Democratic and Republican parties and made the efforts of third parties difficult. As Kleppner writes, "The social norms connected with his [the Midwestern voter] religious values were an integral part of his daily experiences. It was these that he defended through the agency of his partisan affiliation. As long as he perceived the party to serve this function, to sever that allegiance would have been as disruptive and wrenching an experience as religious conversion."

Both Jensen and Kleppner suggest that the farm crisis of the 1880s and early 1890s was not severe enough in the Midwest to convince farmers to cut the cultural ties that bound them to the traditional parties.83

Jeffrey Ostler argues that economic prosperity and the strength of cultural ties to the traditional parties do not fully explain the failure of Populism to take root in certain areas. Ostler suggests that the success of Populism depended on the degree of party competition in a state. In Kansas and Nebraska, where the Republican party dominated in the 1880s, Populism flourished, while in Iowa, a state marked by party competition in the 1880s, the People's party met with little success.

Ostler concludes, "state political environments were crucial in determining whether agrarian radicalism took a third party turn."

Little research has been done to assess the validity of Ostler's conclusions east of the Mississippi and north of the Ohio. As Ostler

83 Paul Kleppner, The Cross of Culture; A Social Analysis of Midwestern Politics 1850-1900 (New York: Free Press, 1970), see especially 35-91; Richard Jensen, The Winning of the Midwest: Social and Political Conflict. 1888-1896 (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1971), see especially 58-88. 53 notes, most of the research on Populism has concentrated on states in which Populism flourished.S4

By examining the activities of Ohio farm organizations and the creation of the state's People's party, this chapter supports Ostler's contention that a state's political environment may contribute to the poor showing of the Populists. Agrarian radicalism did exist in Ohio.

Deeply troubled by the increasing concentration of capital, big business's corruption of the political process, and the Inability of workers and farmers to enjoy the wealth which they had created, the state's farm organizations, including the Grange, Farmers' Alliance, and

Farmers' Onion, formulated a reform agenda. For the most part, this reform agenda echoed the People's party platform and the Populists's critique of American political life. However, given Ohio's competitive two-party political environment, the farm organizations concluded that reform could best be accomplished by working through the existing parties.

Even though the state had the nation's second largest agricultural population, farm organizations tended to be small in Ohio when to similar organizations on the Plains. According to the Ohio Farmer. membership in statewide farm organizations totaled about 50,000 in May of 1891. The Ohio Grange and the Ohio Farmers' Alliance each had about

20,000 members, while the Patrons of Industry and the Ohio Farmers'

Alliance and Industrial Union together had about 10,000 members. While the region's economic prosperity may account for the low membership in national organizations designed to redress the farmers's needs, there are other factors. In the sparsely populated Plains, granges and alliances provided social activities for the area's geographically isolated farm families, while in more densely populated Ohio granges and

84 Jeffrey Ostler, Prairie Populism; The Fate of Agrarian Radicalism in Kansas. Nebraska, and Iowa. 1880-1892 (Lawrence; University of Kansas Press, 1993), 10. 54 alliances had to compete with political pstrties, voluntary organizations, and nearby towns and cities for the farm family's attention. The state's farm organizations also had to compete with local, independent farm organizations, many of which predated the establishment of the Grange or the alliances. There is no way to estimate the number of farmers belonging to local groups, but clearly they were more popular than the Grange or the alliances. For example, over 10,000 people regularly attended the Erie County Agricultural

Society's annual picnic and close to 5,000 attended similar events in

Summit County.es

Despite the relative prosperity of Ohio farmers, the leaders of the state's farm organizations were deeply troubled by changes in the nation's political and economic life. This anger reached a peak in

August of 1890 when the editor of the Ohio Farmer convened a meeting of representatives of the state's farm organizations. He suggested that the decentralized and local nature of the state's farm organizations had robbed the state's farmers of their proper share of political influence and envisioned the meeting as uniting "all of the different farmers' organizations under one head for the benefit of agricultural interests."

The new organization, called the Ohio Farmers' Union, received the endorsement of the Ohio State Grange, the Ohio Farmers's Alliance, and the Patrons of Industry as well as the Cincinnati-based American Grange

Bulletin. Over a thousand farmers representing local granges, alliances, and hundreds of independent county farm organizations attended the meeting. Democratic and Republican papers alike called the meeting the greatest assembly of farmers in the state's history and suggested that all of the state's farmers would now speeüc with one voice.

85 Ohio Farmer (Cleveland), 6 June 1891; Akron Beacon. 1 September 1890; Sandusky Daily Register. 17 August 1891; Cleveland Plain Dealer. 4 August 1895. 55 A series of speeches kicked off the first Farmers' Union convention. John Seitz, a former democratic legislator who had run for governor on both the Greenback and United Labor tickets, told the farmers that hard times "are the results of other interests being arrayed against the farmer and are especially those of the capitalists."

For Seitz these interests were destroying American democracy by corrupting politicians, depriving workers of the product of their labor, and creating a new aristocracy. Be told the crowd, "Wealth passes from the hands of those who produce to the 25,000 men who own half the wealth of this country." John Brigham followed Seitz. The Grand Master of the

National Grange as well as a Republican candidate for Congress, Brigham sounded as radical as Seitz. Be warned, "The farmers only ask to receive a fair reward for the results of their labor, and if they cannot receive it by peaceable methods then the time will come when they secure it by revolution." Like Seitz, Brigham rooted the problems of farmers in the state and national legislatures. Be told the farmers that they had to elect farmers to public office because the "bankers and professional men" who run the government are "not as much awake to the interests of agriculturalists as farmers would be."as

Brigham, the convention chairman, and the leaders of the Ohio

Farmers ' Union faced the daunting task of uniting these farmers for political action. The American Grange Bulletin noting the strong ties between farmers and the existing parties suggested that it would take "a severe wrench to sever the connection." For nineteenth-century farmers steeped in the nation's republican traditions, political participation was a serious matter. They attributed the greatness of the nation to

86 Ohio Farmer. 23, 30 August 1890. Although both the National Farmers' Alliance (NAF) and the Farmers' Alliance and Industrial Union (FAIU) were active in Ohio, the NAF, which was strongest on the Great Plains, was the more influential of the two. The FAIU, which was stronger in the South, did not have its first statewide organizational meeting until the spring of 1891. Unless otherwise noted, the term Alliance will refer to the Ohio branch of the NAF. 56 its political institutions and saw themselves as the guardians of this

American greatness. This need to strengthen and defend the nation, in turn, fostered an intense devotion to party. Kleppner estimates that in

1888 47.5% of rural Ohio voters cast their ballots for the Democratic party, while 48.7% voted for Republicans. In the last five years of the

1880s Democrats dominated in the western counties along the Indiana border, while the Republicans controlled the counties of Northeast

Ohio's Western Reserve and the Appalachian counties along the Ohio River in the Southeast part of the state. Given the divisions among Ohio farmers, the American Grange Bulletin suggested that it would be impossible to create a farmers's party. But "[i]t ought not to be a difficult matter to get them [Ohio farmers] earnestly to work in their party organizations to secure a fairer representation of farmers in their representative bodies," the paper argued. Brigham understood the difficulties associated with uniting the farmers for political action.

He told the convention, "we are here . . . not to antagonize especially any political party, nor to endorse or bolster up any political party .... we are here as farmers, with the idea that it is possible for us as farmers to do something in the way of influencing state and national legislation." In order to accomplish this goal, Brigham suggested, "We must keep in the background, if we can, those questions over which we will quarrel and divide and wrangle, and from which no good can come."a?

At the convention, delegates from the Knox County Alliance tried repeatedly to discuss the creation of a new political party. Fearing an effort to organize a political party would divide the farmers and destroy any chance of united action, Brigham ruled the Knox County delegates out of order each time they broached the subject. Brigham's use of the gavel was so heavy-handed that the Columbus Post charged him

87 Ohio Farmer. 23, 30 August 1890; American Grange Bulletin (Cincinnati), 14 August 1890; Kleppner, 5-24. 57 with "gross violations of parliamentary law and usage." The

convention's final declaration simply stated, "Can this position

[political reform] best be reached by the formation of a farmers' party

or by making our influence felt in the control of the existing parties?

It is the sense of this convention that we should first thoroughly test

the latter and hope we shall not be compelled to resort to the

former. "aa

The decision to forgo the creation of a farmers's party, though,

did not indicate that the state's farmers were content with their

political situation. The Farmers' Union's Declaration of Principle's

expressed producerist fears that the concentration of capital threatened

the nation's political institutions: "Corporations, banks, and

syndicates have for years directed largely the legislation of this

country .... These interests gorged with the wealth wrested from the

hand that earned it, manage still to have their say, no matter which

political party holds the reigns of power. The farmers have waited

long, too long, for the fulfillment of partisan pledges so lavishly made

before the election and so soon forgotten afterwards." As a remedy the

Farmers' Union called for farmers to take a more active role in the

political arena: "The fanner must henceforth be a factor in politics;

not the patient burden-bearing ass of the present content with an

occasional thistle, but a wide-a-wake, intelligent directing power."

The Farmers' Union's platform placed tax reform at the top of its

platform. For years farmers had been trying to reform Ohio's tax code which they felt overtaxed farmers and under taxed corporate wealth. The platform also called for the regulation of the railroads and telegraphs,

direct election of United States Senators, the Australian ballot,

forfeiture of unearned land grants, a ban on alien land ownership.

88 Ohio Farmer. 23, 30 August 1890; Columbus Post. 14, 15 August 1890; Ohio State Journal. 14, 15 August 1890. 58 unlimited coinage of silver, pure food laws, an end to speculation on agricultural goods, and school books at cost.

Some Ohio farmers followed the convention's advice to work through the existing parties to bring about the needed reforms. Others sought to create a new political party. Joshua Crawford, the secretary of the

Ohio Farmer's Alliance, asserted, "We are not yet as numerous as we should be. It will certainly be better for us, in politics, to adhere to Ohio principles (the Farmers' Onion platform] and vote independently than to organize a new party." Crawford later suggested that the

Alliance had to grow from 20,000 members to 80,000 if it was to create a viable political party. The Preble County Farmers' Convention, a coalition of granges, sub-alliances, and independent farmers, simply passed a resolution demanding that the political parties "place such men

(farmers) upon their respective tickets for representative of this county." In Jackson County the alliance urged members to vote for the best men regardless of party and endorsed a slate composed of candidates nominated by the Democratic, Republican, and Prohibitionist parties, as

Farmers flooded both Democratic and Republican county nominating conventions to ensure that farmers would be nominated for office. In almost every section of the state both parties openly courted farmers as the farm vote was essential for the success . A Warren County farmer declared, "Never has there been such deference paid to the farming element," while a Greene County alliance man insisted, "The politicians are getting scared and knocking at the doors, on all sides for admittance." 90

Both parties presented themselves as the true champion of the Ohio farmer and promised to fight for the Farmers' Onion agenda. At the

State Fair's "Alliance Day" Democratic Governor James Campbell read

89 Ohio Farmer. 16 August, 4 October, 1, 8 November 1890; The Hammer and the Plow (Tiffin), 29 October 1890. 90 Ohio Farmer. 4, 18 October 1890. 59 approvingly from a copy of the National Farmers' Alliance's platform.

He praised the Alliance's position on the tariff, tax reform, regulation

of railroads, alien landownership, and ballot reform. At its annual

convention, the Democratic party not only nominated a farmer, Thaddeus

Cromley, for secretary of state, the top spot on the ticket, but it also

applauded "the awakening of the farmers to the evils of Republican

legislation" and asked the farmers "to with join us to correct those

evils." Democratic Senator Calvin Brice predicted that Cromley's

nomination alone would win the Democrats the votes of an additional

10,000-15,000 farmers.91

The Republicans also portrayed themselves as the party of the

agrarian interests. At their annual convention they pledged their

fealty to the Ohio Farmers' Union platform. In the words of one

Republican politician, it was time "for us to stop and listen to the

voice of the farmer." While Ohio's Republicans did not place a farmer

at the head of the ticket, they did recruit farmers to run for Congress

and local offices. The Republicans of the ninth Congressional district

nominated Thomas Wilson, a Madison County farmer, championing him as a

"Simon-pure, honest farmer." Wilson tried to sell the tariff, a staple

of the Republican domestic program and an anathema to most farm

organizations, to farmers. Wilson asserted that farmers could not

compete in a free market with "wheat grown by serfs in Russia, peasants

in Austria or pariahs in India" and told farmers to look toward domestic markets, especially New England. By strengthening New England industry, he told farmers the tariff increased the demand for Ohio agriculture.

Candidates who were not farmers portrayed themselves as defenders of

agrarian interests. William McKinley, running for reelection to

Congress in a district which had been redrawn to include a sizable

91 Ohio Farmer. 4, 11 October 1890; Ohio State Journal. 29 August 1890; Columbus Post. 29 August 1890; Joseph P. Smith, History of the Republican Partv in Ohio (Chicago: Lewis Publishing, 1898), I, 590. 60 Democratic majority, addressed a letter to the Holmes County Farmers'

Alliance criticizing the power of trusts and railroads, calling for the end to the alien ownership of land and the holding of large tracts of land for speculation, and demanding "the use of all the silver product of the United States for money; as a circulating medium." 92

As the Ohio Farmer pointed out, farmers dedicated to reform could be found on both tickets. It called on farmers to vote for the best candidate regardless of party affiliation. The paper praised Republican congressional nominee Brigham as one of the nation's ablest farm champions and endorsed J.Q. Smith, the Democratic candidate for the 10th district, as "a farmer, and a worthy and capable man, earnest in his advocacy and support of the farmers' movement." The paper felt that reform could best be accomplished by lessening the farmer's devotion to party.93

Not all agrarian activists worked through the traditional parties.

The Plow and Hammer, an Alliance paper from Tiffin, demanded the creation of a new party. In early September the Knox County Fainners'

Alliance formed a county ticket. The Knox County farmers noted that the

"influence of liquor interests" and the "corruption of our local legislature by the lobby" had forced farmers and workers to bear an

"unequal and unjust" tax burden. The Knox County party offered a twelve-plank platform to reform both the county and the state governments. Among the demands were tax reform, prohibition of speculation, reduction of interest rates to no more than 5%, regulation of the liquor trade, the end of alien landowner ship, the restriction of immigration, reduction in the price of school books, and reduction of the salaries for public officials.94

92 Ohio State Journal. 15, 21 August 1890; Cleveland Leader. 2 November 1890. 93 Ohio Fanner. 13 September 1890. 94 Ohio Farmer. 13 September 1890; The Plow and Heunmer. 15 October 1890. 61 The Knox County Fanner's Alliance was not alone in organizing a new political party. In Wood County a convention of fanners declared,

"The fanners must henceforth be a factor in politics and not a patient bearing ass, content with an occasional thistle, but a wide awake, intelligent, courageous, directing power." The Wood County fanners produced a complete slate of candidates for local office and a platform which mirrored the Ohio Fanners' Union's platform. In Jefferson County,

Alliancemen met in Steubenville and formed a "people's party." The

Jefferson county Alliancemen did not offer a complete platform as they were concerned only with taxes. They called for "a reduction of county official salaries and thus a reduction of taxes to the already overburdened taxpayers." Nine other counties produced Alliance tickets. 95

Not only did alliances offer slates for county and township offices, they ran candidates for the United States Congress. In Lima the Knights of Labor and Alliance men nominated John Smith, the vice- president of the state Alliance, for Congress. W.B. Likins, the president of the state Alliance, ran for Congress from the eighth district on both the Prohibition and "People's party" ticket. In the third district S.H. Ellis, the master of the state Grange, ran under a

Farmer-Labor banner. Isaac Freeman, the overseer of the Ohio State

Grange, ran in the fourth district. In six other Congressional districts the local alliances fielded candidates.96

Third party activists asserted that both parties had aligned themselves with speculators, corporations, and bankers to rob the producers of wealth of their just reward. The candidates portrayed themselves as the defenders of the producing classes. Likins called capitalists and politicians from the major parties "maggots that are

95 Ohio Parmer. 11, 18 October, 15 November 1890; American Grange Bulletin. 11 December 1890. 96 Ohio Farmer. 10, 25 October, 1 November 1890. 62 feasting on the hard earned labor and sinew of the land." The candidacy of Alliance men, Likins continued, "will teach the producer that neither of the old parties will give them correct and pure legislation so long as money, rum, and corrupt partisan demagogues rule supreme." John

Seitz criticized the government's railroad subsidies as creating a

"dozen railroad kings" who have been able to "accumulate mightier fortunes than the house of the Rothchilds," while the farmer and the worker toil in poverty. The Plow and Hammer portrayed the election as replay of the Federalist-Republican contest of ninety years earlier.

Like the earlier Federalists, the leaders of the Democrats and

Republicans believed that "the better policy was to have . . . power concentrated in the hands of the few; the masses must be governed; the well born and the wealthy to govern the rabble; legislation for the rich and they to take care of and keep the poor in subjection." The paper saw the Alliance's political movement as the embodiment of the ideas of

Jefferson and Madison: "a government of the whole people; the poorest citizen to have equal rights and privileges with the wealthiest."97

For the state's farmers in 1890, the paramount issue was tax reform. Although the state's Constitution required that all forms of property, including "all moneys, credits, investments in bonds, stocks, joint stock companies, or otherwise; and also all real and personal property," be taxed at a uniform rate, in practice this was not done.

Stocks, bonds, bank accounts, and personal property were easily hidden from assessors and thus escaped taxation. One commentator called the state's tax system "a game of hide and seek" noting that in Cincinnati's

Hamilton County, the value of personal property appearing on the tax duplicate declined 23% from 1865 until 1885. On the other hand, the farmers's main source of wealth, land, had no place to hide. At a time when unprecedented fortunes were accumulating in urban areas, farmers

97 The Plow and the Hammer. 22 October 1890. 63 were paying a disproportionate share of the state's taxes. For example, in 1890 Toledo's Lucas county paid about the same in taxes as mostly rural Muskingum county even though Lucas county had twice the population and over three times the bank deposits.*»

The election of 1890 proved a disaster for third party tickets.

While a handful of alliance candidates were elected to township office, at the county level not a single third party candidate succeeded. As the following chart shows, the Highland County Alliance ticket fared the best receiving close to 12% of the popular vote.

County votes received total votes percentage

Darke 300 9150 3.3 Delaware 70 6400 1.1 Highland 800 6700 11.9 Jefferson 360 6500 5.5 Knox 300 6800 4.4 Licking 20 9400 0.2 Logan 300 5850 5.1 Pickaway 400 6200 6.5 Seneca 140 9450 1.5 Union 90 5650 1.6 Williams 580 6050 9.6 Wood 35 9150 0.4

Table 3.1: Third party candidates in 1890 County Elections Annual Report of the Secretary of State to the Governor of Ohio for the Fiscal Year Ending November 15. 1890 [hereafter, Report of the Secretary of State!(Columbus: Westbote, 1891), 287- 347. The "votes received" and the "total votes" are rounded averages as in most cases there were six candidates on the county slate.

98w.O. Thompson, "Taxation" (Oxford, OH, 1894); Akron Beacon. 1 September 1890; also see Hoyt Landon Warner, Prooressivism in Ohio, 1897-1917 (Columbus: Ohio State University Press, 1964), 7-10. 64 Third party Congressional candidates fared just as poorly as none of

the eight candidates polled more than 4% of the vote and only two polled

more than 2% of the vote. Only in the Eighth District did the third

party candidate possibly affect the result of the election. Likins

received 1436 votes in a race decided by 194 votes.

Candidate votes received total votes percentage

Seth Ellis (3rd District) 447 41307 1.1 Isaac Freeman (4th) 198 41800 0.5 John Smith (5th) 684 38288 1.8 C. Storer (7th) 33 34620 0.1 W.H. Likins (8th) 1436 36070 4.0 H.W. Rhodes (11th) 955 31041 3.1 J. Junkins (14th) 30 36052 0.1 D.T. Adams (15th) 414 37825 1.1

Table 3.1: Third party candidates in 1890 Congressional Elections. Report of the Secretary of State. 246-51.

Not only did farmers running on third party tickets fare badly, so did

farmers on major party tickets. Republicans Brigham and Wilson lost by

1702 and 2132 votes, respectively, while Democrat Smith lost by 3754.

As each of these candidates had the support of farm organizations and did not face competition from an Alliance candidate, the losses demonstrated how hard it would be for farmers to win seats in the national legislature.99

99 Report of the Secretary of State. 1890. 246-51. 65 Three months after the election of 1890 both the Grange and the

Alliance held their annual statewide conventions. Both organizations

and their leaders responded to the election in the same way: they

praised the farmers's newfound activism, predicted a responsive

legislative session, and committed themselves to reform through the

traditional parties.

Despite the losses of farmers running on both third party slates

and on the major tickets, many Grange and Alliance leaders saw the

campaign and the election of 1890 as producing the desired results —

the creation of a General Assembly sympathetic to the needs of the

farmers. Henry Talcott, the treasurer of the state Grange, suggested

that the political activities of the farmers had changed the political

climate as "[o]ffice holders and the press are now all in favor of the

farmer." B.F. Swingle, lecturer for the Grange, declared, "Great

reforms are anticipated in the future, ballot reforms, legislative

relief, proper representation in proportion to our interests are all

foreshadowed in the future if we are true to our interests." Even the

Grange's lobbying arm felt that the farmer's newfound political activism

would be strong enough "to compel these officials to do their duty."

Many Ohio farm leaders also interpreted the results of the

election of 1890 as a warning against the formation of a political

party. Reminding farmers of the "battle scars" of Brigham and Alliance

candidates in the last election, Talcott declared that it is "difficult

and dangerous . . . to attempt to create a new party" and concluded that

reform "can be accomplished best by the exercise of level headed counsel on the part of grangers with their present party associates." Grange

Master Seth Ellis, perhaps disappointed with his own showing in the election, abandoned the idea of third party action and told farmers to reform the existing parties to bring about relief for the farmer.

66 Alliance President Likins, also a casualty of the previous election, told farmers to work through the existing parties to

[bjreak down partisan lines, help to educate and elevate our brother and sister to a higher state of manhood and womanhood. Make no radical demands; discountenouce office seekers of every name, tribe or calling; shun the politician; attend the conventions; see that good men are nominated and stop voting for bankers, lawyers, railroad attorneys, stockholders in Standard oil companies, and millionaires and you will fill the mission this great alliance system set out to accomplish.

The Grange reiterated its non-partisan policy, and the Alliance announced that it would work through the existing parties, but warned

"in the event that the demands of our state and national legislators are unheeded, we shall co-operate with other reform organizations and all those desiring political reform, in a call for a mass convention to form a people's party that shall enforce our demands with the ballot."

Despite the decisions to forego the creation of a third party,

Ohio farm leaders remained critical of the state's and the nation's political climate. John Brigham asserted, "There needs to be a great many political funerals in both political parties. It is very difficult to discover which of the parties furnishes the most obedient servants of

Wall street and monopoly." Perhaps the most outspoken critic continued to be Alliance President Likins. For Likins the troubles of the farmers were rooted in capital's corruption of politicians: "For him [the politician] are silken couches, the store of gold and the applause of men who worship present success, no matter how obtained. But in the better and fairer days that are coming the life of the selfish and cruel time server shall be deemed an awful failure." The Alliance convention declared, "corporate monopolies . . . absolutely control . . . the general government, state legislatures, executives and courts . . .

67 [and] have .... robbed the farmers of millions and made millionaires

by the thousand; have taken millions from labor without giving adequate

equivalent therefore, and virtually placed capital above labor."

Clearly, the süjandonment of third party action did not entail a

moderation of political views. Ohio farm leaders felt that given Ohio's

vigorous two-party system, working through the existing parties offered

the best chance for reform.

At their conventions, the Grange and the Alliance reiterated the

demands of the Ohio Farmers' Union. They called on the General Assembly

to pass the Rawlings Bill, which would make manufacturers bear a greater

share of the state's tax burden; adopt the Australian ballot; reduce the

salaries of state and county officials; lower the cost of schoolbooks;

and amend the state's constitution to allow for some form of initiative and referendum. 100

Ohio farmers were not alone in their enthusiasm for the farmers's newfound political activism. On the Plains Alliancemen were agitating for the creation of a national third party, while southern Alliancemen continued to believe that activity through the Democratic party offered the best chance for success. Partisans of these two views met in Ocala,

Florida, in December of 1890 as part of the convention of the Supreme

Council of the Southern Alliance. The Kansas delegation, which had left the plains alliance for the Southern alliance the year before, pushed for the creation of a new party, while southerners thought that it was possible for the alliance to capture the Democratic party at the national level. N.A.Z.S U. President Charles William Macune worked out a compromise. There would be a national convention of "organizations of producers" on the eve of the 1892 national campaign at which time

100 Journal of the Proceedings of the eighteenth Annual Session of the Ohio State Grange of Patrons of Husbandry. Held at Tiffin. Ohio. December 9th. 10th and 11th. 1890. [hereafter Ohio Grange Proceedings. 18901 (Sandusky, OH.: I.P. Mack & Bro., 1891); American Grange Bulletin, 18, 25 December 1890, 8 January 1891; Ohio Farmer 7 February 1891. 68 delegates could consider the creation of a third party. Radical third

party men at Ocala rejected the compromise. Wanting immediate action,

they called for reformers to meet in Cincinnati in May of 1891 to form

a new party, in

In January of 1891 the state legislature began a new session.

Farmers serving in the General Assembly immediately formed a bipartisan

caucus dedicated to passing legislation in the farmers's interest. The

thirty-six member Farmers' Independent Committee made the passage of tax

reform, in the form of the Rawlings Bill, its first priority. The

Rawlings Bill required the state's manufacturers to pay taxes on their

inventories. Although some farm legislators disagreed on certain

provisions of the Rawlings Bill, all of them pledged themselves to

support its passage. Commenting on this caucus the Ohio State Journal

predicted, "recent political developments added to the growing and

united strength of the farmers' organizations, have impressed the

general assembly with the merits of bills they have overlooked in the

past." Immediately legislators on both sides of the aisle introduced

legislation demanded by farmers: abolition of gambling and speculation

in agricultural commodities; the exemption of mortgaged property from

taxation to the amount of the mortgage; the election of dairy and food

commissioner; the adoption of the Australian ballot; and restriction of

hunting on private property. 102

When the legislature was about to adjourn in late Winter, it

looked as though the General Assembly was not going to pass tax reform

or the farmers's other demands. Urban legislators held up tax reform

arguing that it would drive Ohio factories to other states. Predicting

101 Hicks, 205-09. 102 Ohio State Journal 21 January 1891; Ohio Farmer 24 January 1891; Ohio Grange Proceedings. 1890; American Grange Bulletin. 12 March 1890. The thirty-six farmers in the General Assembly included twenty-eight representatives and eight senators. Seven of the senators and sixteen of the representatives were Republicans. 69 that "the present legislature would not pass a single measure that would

relieve the farmers from paying more than their fair share of taxes,"

the Ohio Farmer threatened, "the farmers will undoubtedly show their

hands at the ballot box the coming fall. It is to be hoped that this will not come in the shape of a farmers' party." The equally

conservative American Grange Bulletin sounded a similar alarm suggesting

that the farmers could follow the Kansas example and abandon the two major parties. One Alliance activist even declared his desire to see the Rawlings bill defeated as it would drive the farmers into a

farmers ' s party. 103

On April 18 the Ohio General Assembly blunted the third party movement by passing the farmers's main legislative demand, the Rawlings

Bill. Although the final bill was not all that the fainners wanted, the

Ohio Famer considered "it is very much better for farmers than the old bill." According to the paper, "the demand for legislation was so great that it could not be ignored." Voting on tax reform did not break down along party lines. Legislators from rural districts tended to vote for the Rawlings Bill, while the opposition came from the industrial centers. The General Assembly also passed several other measures demanded by Ohio f a m organizations: the Australian ballot, the direct election of the dairy and food commission, cheaper school books, and a reduction in the salaries of county officials. The actions of the

General Assembly were so sympathetic to the state's farmers that the

Cincinnati Enquirer complained of the "tendency of the country people this year to go against the towns."104

The Ohio General Assembly's passage of most of the fanners's political agenda made the state's farm leaders wary of the upcoming

103 Ohio Farmer. 28 February 1891, 30 January 1892; American Grange Bulletin. 2 April 1891. 104 Ohio Farmer. 18, 25 April, 2, 9 May 1891; Cincinnati Enquirer. 16 July 1891. 70 Cincinnati conference and the creation of a new party. They no longer saw the existing parties as hostile to the concerns of farmers and increasingly characterized the urban politician, regardless of party, as the chief enemy of the farmer. Likins announced his opposition to sending Ohio Alliance delegates to the Cincinnati conference. He told the Ohio Farmer. "if a third party is organized or an independent ticket placed in the field at that convention, our hopes of success in the future will be blasted." Other Ohio farm groups — F.A.Z.U., Patrons of

Industry, and the Grange — refused to send delegates to the Cincinnati conference. 105

The Cincinnati convention of third party proponents opened on May

18th with over 1,417 delegates. Although the Farmers' Alliance was the strongest voice at the convention, reformers of all stripes — Bellamy

Nationalists, Knights of Labor, Union and United Labor Party activists.

Single Taxers, and trade unionists — were granted credentials. To no one's surprise, the Cincinnati convention created a new political party and named it the People's party. Fearing that the new party would not succeed without Southern support the convention adopted the Southern

Alliance's Ocala platform and created a committee to attend the third party meeting called by F.A.I.U. President Leonidas Polk in hopes of winning Southern support for the party.

Because the convention was held in the state, Ohio had the convention's second largest delegation with 317 delegates. Only Kansas with 407 delegates had a larger representation. While there were a number of Ohio Farmers' Alliance leaders present, including Seitz,

Craifford, J.H.C. Cobb, B.F. Barnes, and T.R. Smith, urban reformers dominated the Ohio delegation. Of the 317 Ohio delegates over 100 were from Cincinnati's Hamilton County, while another forty delegates represented Cleveland's Cuyahoga County. The Ohio delegation took the

105 Ohio Farmer. 16 May 1891; American Grange Bulletin. 14 May 1891. 71 first, step toward the creation of the state's People's party by calling

for reformers to meet in Springfield on August 5th and 6th. The

convention's call stated, "We . . . declare our adherence to the

doctrine proclaimed by Lincoln that this should be 'a government of the

people, by the people and for the people, ' that peace may reign and

prosperity be established." The call also asserted that the leaders of

the traditional parties "blind their eyes to the inequities now being

inflicted on out people by the monied interests of the l a n d . " i o s

The Ohio Farmers' Union was scheduled to meet the week after the

Cincinnati convention, and the call to form an Ohio People's party was

pushed to the top of the meeting's agenda. On the eve of the Farmers'

Union meeting, the Ohio Farmer published the results of a poll of the

state's farmers. The paper printed questionnaires for both alliances,

the Grange, and the Patrons of Industry asking members if they were "in

favor of independent political action by farmers this fall?" and other political questions. The Ohio Farmer asked farmers not affiliated with one of the organizations to send in a post card with answers to the same questions. 107

Although the poll's methodology was less than scientific, it

suggested that Ohio farmers supported independent political action by a margin of more than two to one.

10® Ohio State Journal 28 May 1891; Hicks, 209-15; William F. Zomow, "Bellamy Nationalism in Ohio 1891 to 1896" Ohio History 58 (1949), 152- 170; Larry G. Osnes, "The Birth of a Party: The Cincinnati Populist Convention of 1891" Great Plains Journal 10 (1970), 11-24; Ernest I. Miller, "The Farmers' Party" Bulletin of the Historical and Philosophical Society of Ohio 15 (1957), 49-65. 107 Ohio Farmer 18 April. 72 Farm Group Yes No

Independent Farmers 862 794 National Alliance 4008 1552 National Alliance (pro rated) 14000 4500 Grange (voting as granges) 60 43 Granae fnro rated) 2857 2048 Total (pro rated) 17719 7342

Table 3.3; Farmers favoring independent political action. Ohio Farmer 28 May 1891.

The PAIO and the Patrons of Industry did not return the surveys, but the Ohio Farmer, noting that these two organizations generally favored the creation of a farmers' party, estimated that at least two- thirds of their members endorsed independent political action. The paper's editor, an opponent of independent political action, conceded that a majority of all of the state's farmers, not just the ones responding to the survey, probably favored the creation of a farmers' party, but he feared that, without the unanimous support of the state's farmers, a farmers' party would be easily overwhelmed by urban and industrial interests. loa

At the start of the Farmer's Onion convention the state's most prominent farm leaders, including Ellis, Brigham, and Likina, announced their opposition to aiding the new party. The farmers's non-partisan pressure had transformed an indifferent General Assembly into a body sensitive to the demands of the farmers. Ellis, Brigham, and Likina

108 Ohio Farmer. 28 May 1891. The poll also suggested that Ohio farmers opposed the two-percent loan plan, a conservative alternative to the sub-treasury plan, by a five-to-three ratio. 73 feared that third party action would jeopardize the farmers's newfound

political strength by alienating the traditional parties. Moreover, the

leaders feared that the endorsement of the People's party would destroy

the unity that had pressured the General Assembly into action. While

all of the farmers could unite behind a non-partisan platform, the endorsement of a third party would alienate a sizable number of farmers who would remain loyal to the traditional parties. Brigham listed the demands that the Farmers' Union had made in 1890, "the Rawlings tax bill, the Australian ballot bill, school books at cost, restriction of

fees and salaries of public officers, reduction of railroad rates, and the election by the people of the food and dairy commissioner" and concluded, "every demand we made was granted except for one — the reduction of railroad passenger rates." Ellis simply reminded the convention, "Most of the legislation we asked for from this body [Ohio

General Assembly] we got." Likins declared that although he had supported independent political action for over a decade, Ohio farmers were not ready for third party action. At no time did opponents of third party action criticize the ideals of the People's party or suggest that its complaints were not valid. Indeed, Likins, Brigham, and Ellis simply felt that the reforms demanded by the People's party could best be achieved through the traditional parties.

Not all Farmers' Union delegates opposed an alliance with the new party. These delegates portrayed the existing parties as too corrupt for the people to trust. John Seitz suggested that even though the

General Assembly passed the farmers's program, the members of the legislature could not be trusted. He told the convention, "We want men who love the truth and will fight for the right." Another delegate declared, "The people want Jacksonian democracy and Lincoln republicanism, and can get it only through a new party." T.R. Smith, a state Grange official, told the convention, "It is a fact that under

74 both political parties, in less than 25 years a thousand men have become millionaires on the basis of nothing, and a million men who were in good circumstances have become poor as church mice." In the end, much to the surprise of the state's major newspapers, the Farmers' Union refused to endorse the People's party by the smallest of margins. Sixty-three delegates voted for independent political action, while sixty-four delegates voted against endorsing the new party. Despite the defeat, supporters of the People's party vowed to continue without the aid of the Farmers' Union and the state's farm organizations. 109

The Ohio People's party's first convention opened August 5th in

Springfield. Draped behind the stage were banners reading "Seven hundred millionaires: the result — 9,000,000 mortgaged homes, 15,000 business failings per annum, 1,500,000 tramps and millions of paupers" and "The voice of the people is the voice of God. Then let the voice speak and the nation prosper." The convention attracted over five hundred delegates. The Davton Journal reported that the new party drew most heavily from the Republican ranks as more than three hundred of the delegates were former Republicans. Between 125 and 150 delegates left the Democratic party to attend the convention, while thirty to forty ex-

Greenbackers and a scattering of former Prohibitionists made up the rest of the contingent. 110

Convention chairman Hugh Cavanaugh, a longtime Knight of Labor from Cincinnati and Union Labor Party activist, opened the meeting by declaring "there appears to be no question paramount to the one who shall succeed the gentleman from Mansfield (John Sherman] in the United

States Senate." For Cavanaugh, Sherman represented all that was wrong with the American political and economic system. Not only had Sherman

109 Ohio State Journal. 28 May 1891; Columbus Dispatch. 27 May 1891; Columbus Press. 28 May 1891; Ohio Farmer. 6, 13, 20 June 1891. 110 Cincinnati Enquirer. 4 August 1891; Sorinofield Republic-Times. 6 August 1891; Davton Journal. 7 August 1891. 75 turned a blind eye to the suffering of the "10,000,000 people in the

United States who do net receive enough to eat in any day of the year," he was "contaminated by the descendent of the money changer and shy locks who were scorned out of the Temple and found lodgement on Wall Street."

Cavanaugh insisted that if the party produced an honest slate that the state's workers and farmers would flock to the it. Other convention speakers stressed the European and Jewish domination of the nation's financial and political systems. Robert Schilling, the national secretary of the People's Party and a former Cleveland labor leader, asserted that "the entire United States is controlled by British capital," while J.C.B. Cobb, an early favorite for the party's gubernatorial nomination, announced, "it is the Rothschilds . . . who control the legislation in this country."

The convention ratified a platform which affirmed the party's allegiance to the ideals enunciated at the Cincinnati conference.

Additionally, the platform included a number of state demands: restriction of the ability of politicians to change city charters and the requirement that voters approve all charter changes; initiative and referendum; "suppression of gambling in futures and all agricultural and mechanical products;" direct election of United States Senators; enforcement of laws prohibiting the adulteration of food; free school books and compulsory education; prohibition of child labor; abolition of contracting out prison labor; revocation of the charter of the Standard

Oil Company; etnd the eight hour day. In an effort to attract

Prohibition party voters without alienating the party's more liberal elements, the platform denuuided state control of the liquor trade. The backers of the plank, which was based on a proposal by Edward Bellamy, insisted that the removal of the "profit-motive" would make the problems associated with liquor evaporate.

76 The selection of a candidate for governor proved to be troublesome. Given the party's emphasis on Ohio General Assembly races in order to defeat Sherman and its willingness to concede the governor's race to the major parties, the party had difficulty finding a top flight candidate. The convention's first choice was Alva Agee, the young president of the Ohio Farmers' Alliance and Industrial Union. Agee declined the nomination fearing that voters would confuse his nomination with an F.A.I.U. endorsement of the People's party. Newspapers speculated that A.J. Warner, a former democratic Congressman from

Washington County and one of the nation's leading free silver advocates, would receive the nomination, but Warner wanted to maintain close ties to the state's Democratic party in hopes of convincing it to come out for the free coinage of silver. Warner was probably angling for a seat in the United States Senate. If the Populists held the balance of power in the General Assembly, he would become the ideal person for the

Populists and the Democrats to rally behind. One alliance delegate proposed that the party nominate Prohibition party candidate John

Ashenhurst as part of fusion between the party. Although the two parties agreed on almost every issue except the liquor question, delegates from Cleveland and Cincinnati threatened to walk out of the convention if Ashenhurst was nominated or if fusion was seriously contemplated. Other names circulated before the party choose former

Greenback and Union Labor party gubernatorial nominee John Seitz. The party saw Seitz, a farmer from Seneca County, as an experienced campaigner who could draw both the farm and labor vote, yet no one considered him to be a top flight candidate. The rest of the slate was composed of laborites and Bellamyites from urban areas.m

■111 Cincinnati Enquirer. 6 August 1891; Springfield Republic-Times. 5, 6 August 1891; Ohio Farmer. 25 August 1891; Jack S. Blocker Jr., Retreat from Reform; The Prohibition Movement in the United States. 1890-1913 (Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 1976), 52 77 Fearing the new party would draw support from the party's farmers, the Republicans, especially those associated with the Sherman-Hanna faction, denigrated the new party and asserted that it was "organized in the interests of the Democrats" as part of a "plot" to steal the election of 1892. The Ohio State Journal called the party a "grotesque political pygmy" composed of "fad planks." The Athens Messenger declared the new party to be "moved and managed and manipulated as completely by Democratic Bourbon politicians of the South as was ever a set of puppets" and suggested the "existence within the farmers alliance of a secret and independent body pledged to carry out their views by violence and bloodshed. "112

Another faction of the Republican party tried to work with the

Farmers' Alliance during the summer and fall of 1891. Led by former governor Joseph Foraker, these Republicans sought to capitalize on the unpopularity of John Sherman in order to place Foraker in Sherman's senate seat. Populists and Alliancemen throughout the nation blamed

Sherman for the demonetization of silver in 1873 and considered him the architect of the financial policies which had brought ruin to the

American farmer. They accused him of being at the center of a European conspiracy which sought to "enslave" the American people through the manipulation of the currency. The Cincinnati Enquirer noted that in county Republican conventions "the Foraker people are hand in glove with the Alliance people." Not only did Foraker believe that the Farmers'

Alliance could help him win control of the state's GOP, he thought that the People's party would win some seats in the General Assembly and that its support could be crucial to his election to the Senate. Despite working with the Farmers' Alliance, Foraker had little sympathy for the group. Privately he insisted that he had "little patience for the

112 "Farmers and Working Men of Ohio Read and Consider" (n.d., n.p.); Ohio State Journal. 7, 28 August 1891; Athens Messenger. 19 September 1891 78 Simpson-Peffer crowd" and that he did not "like seeing Jerry Simpson and that class attacking Sherman because of his financial views." Foraker concluded that the triumph of Alliance ideals "would be a calamity both to the country and the end of Republicanism." m

The Democrats, on the other hand, were more sympathetic to the new party's demands and hopeful that the People's party could cut into the

Republican's farm support. Like the People's party,the Ohio Democrats had endorsed the free coinage of silver, a lower tariff, and most of the reforms demanded by the Ohio Farmers' Union. So alike were the

Democrats and the People's party that the politically astute Sherman remarked, "The Democratic platform of Ohio had unfortunately committed that great party to the ideas of the new party calling itself the

People's party."114

Not surprisingly. Democrats flooded county People's party conventions in hopes of persuading the new party to endorse local

Democratic tickets. In Columbus's Franklin County so many Democrats attended the county nominating convention that the organizers declared that those who refused to sign a pledge to support the ticket had to leave. Of the roughly 100 people in the hall about half promptly exited. In Youngstown's Mahoning County the People's party's organizers announced that only those who support "the principles of the People's

113 Cincinnati Enquirer. 15 August 1891; Jeffrey Ostler, "The Rhetoric of Conspiracy and the Formation of Kansas Populism" Agricultural History 69 (1995), 1-27; Sherman II, 1119-1126; Charles L. Kurtz (Columbus) to a.S. Bundy (Hellston, Ohio) 21 July 1891, Box 45, Folder 6, Charles L. Kurtz Papers, Ohio Historical Society, Columbus; Joseph Benson Foraker (Cincinnati) to Kurtz, 5 August 1891, Box 45, Folder 7, Kurtz Papers; C.E. Prior (Cincinnati) to Kurtz, 22 September 1891, Box 46, Folder 2, Kurtz Papers ; Foraker to A.V. Dockery (Carthage, North Carolina) 22 June 1891, Joseph B. Foraker Papers, Cincinnati Historical Society, Cincinnati, Ohio; Foraker to Murat Halstead (Cincinnati), 5 August, 1891, Box 27, Folder 4, Foraker Papers ; Foraker to J.Q.A. Campbell (Beliefontaine, Ohio), 16 August 1891, Box 27, Folder 4, Foraker Papers. 114 Sherman, 1,134. 79 party and are in favor of independent political action" could

participate in the party's proceedings.us

During the campaign, representatives of the Alliance and Grange

distanced their organizations from the People's party. The Farmer's

Alliance issued an official "manifesto" asserting its political

independence from the Populists. Joshua Crawford, the Alliance's

secretary, told farmers that the "Alliance is not a party organization.

It is not (working) in the interests of any party." Seth Ellis, grand

master of the state Grange, declared, "The grange, the church or any

other organization has no right to dictate how people use their ballots.

. . . I don't belong to the Peoples' Party, but belong to the people and

did not have anything to do with the late convention."ue

The Republicans nominated one of their rising stars, William

McKinley, for governor. McKinley had been a Congressman from Canton and

chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee until the Democrats

gerrymandered him out of office. A leading proponent of the protective

tariff, McKinley kicked off the campaign by attacking the incumbent

Democratic Governor James Campbell and the Democrats on the tariff and

currency questions. McKinley told the citizens of Ohio that the free

coinage of silver would contract the currency as "the gold dollar will

be taken from the circulating medium of the country and hoarded." Like

the Populists, McKinley played on fears of British domination of the

American economic system by portraying free traders as pawns of the

115 Columbus Dispatch. 12 June, 5 JUly, 15 August 1891; New Nation. 29 August 1891; Youngstown Vindicator. 12 September 1891.In eleven of the state's 107 Ohio house districts and five of the twenty-six senate races the People's party endorsed the Democratic nominee. These districts were located in heavily Republican areas in which both the Democrats and the People's party had little hope of upsetting the incumbent. In one race the People's party endorsed the Republican nominee. Report of the Secretary of State. 1891. 271-290. 116Warren Western Reserve Democrat. 18 September 1891; Sanduskv Daily Register. 31 July 1891, 17 August 1891; Ohio Farmer. 17, 31 October 1891. 80 British. He concluded that the British industrialists's "alliance with

one wing of the Democratic party can no longer be denied." He assured

Ohioans that the tariff would aid in "furnishing employment to labor and

giving a home market for products of the farm." n?

The Democrats nominated Campbell, a wealthy Butler County lawyer.

Although the Ohio Democratic platform had declared for the free coinage

of silver, important elements within the party, including Ohio's Senator

Brice and the Grover Cleveland wing, opposed the plank. Fearing that a

campaign emphasizing silver would damage party unity, Campbell and the

Democrats sought to downplay the currency issue and centered their

campaign around the tariff. The convention's resolutions declared, "we

accept the issue tendered to us by the Republican party on the subject

of the tariff . . . confident that the verdict of the people of Ohio will be recorded against the iniquitous policy of so-called protection. "118

During the campaign it was often difficult to differentiate the

Populists from the Democrats. Not only did both parties endorse the

free coinage of silver and a lower tariff, they employed similar

rhetoric by playing on the themes of monopoly and British domination of the American political system. During the campaign Columbus's

Democratic mayor declared, "we have a constitutional government corrupted by millionaires and politicians. We see legislators, judges and other officials using their places for private gain. We see capitalists and speculators bribing the lawmakers and lobbying for

schemes to enrich themselves." He questioned, "what is there to hinder the growth and accumulation of wealth until the disposition between the

117 H. Wayne Morgan, William McKinley and His America. (Syracuse, NY: Syracuse University Press, 1963), 154-57; William McKinley, Speeches and Addresses of William McKinley; From His Election to Congress to the Present Time (New York: D. Appleton and Company, 1893); Sherman, 1,130- 1,135; Joseph Benson Foraker, Speeches of J.B. Foraker (n.p., n.d.), II, 22-53; Cincinnati Commercial Gazette. 9 October 1891. 118 Cleveland Plain Dealer. 16 July 1891; Smith, I, 603; Morgan 154-57. 81 insignificance of the common laborer and the gigantic power of the capitalist is still more monstrous?" Allen Thurman, a former United

States Senator who received the party's 1888 vice presidential nomination, played on these same fears. He attacked McKinley as the agent of "Intrenched monopoly" and the Republicans as assisting "England in her attempt to establish monometallism." Campbell, himself, accused the Republicans and their tariff policy of creating a government "of monopoly, by monopoly, and for monopoly." He also raised the specter of

British domination by telling the citizens of Ohio that the tariff benefited a select group of "capitalists who live in England" and invested in protected American industries.us

People's party speakers tried unsuccessfully to shift the emphasis of the campaign away from the tariff and currency questions. William

Farmer, the former head of Texas's Knights of Labor, told a Columbus crowd that the "tariff is not the leading issue of to-day in this country" and enumerated the reforms spelled out in the People's party platform. H.F. Barnes, the chairman of the Ohio People's party, declared, "it will matter very little whether we have free trade or protection, as the money power will control our industries and plunder the products under protection or free trade." Peffer informed a

Cleveland crowd that, "The free coinage of silver would be but a drop in the bucket which eventually must be filled." The People's party's attempts to turn the campaign away from the tariff and silver did not work. The National Labor Tribune declared, "the issue, shorn of the red fire of rhetoric, is 'tariff'" and later insisted that "the Ohio

119 Columbus Dispatch. 7 September 1891; Cleveland Plain Dealer. 16 July 1891. For an overview of the McKinley-Campbell contest's role in defining national politics see Jensen, 154-165. 82 election is regarded all over the country as a test of the protective policy as formulated in the McKinley act in Congress. "120

Through their use of the press and party workers, the major parties were able to make the tariff and, to a lesser extent, the free coinage of silver the defining issues of the campaign and, thus, were able to marginalize the People's party. There was no effective difference between the People's party and the Democratic party on these two issues and no reason for workers or farmers to abandon the

Democratic party for the People's party. Moreover, if a Republican was going to abandon the G.O.P. over the tariff or the free coinage of silver, it made more sense to go to the party that stood the best chance of winning — the Democrats.

Compounding the People's party's inability to shift the focus of the election away from tariff and currency was a lack of funds. The traditional parties used money to print campaign literature, pay speakers fees, provide travel money as well as to pay newspaper editors for support and to buy votes. As Warren G. Harding, then a young newspaper editor, declared, "campaigning without funds [was] very hard sledding." At the Springfield convention the Populists collected only about $100 for the fall campaign. Seitz and the other People's party candidates had to dip into their own pockets to finance speaking tours.

At most campaign appearances a hat had to be passed in order to pay for the speaker's food, lodging, and transportation. The existing parties, on the other hand, had tremendous financial resources. Republican leaders, including Hanna, Sherman, and foraker, spent tens of thousands of dollars apiece in hopes of securing the nominations of allies and getting out the vote in the general election. The Democrats, led by

120 Columbus Dispatch. 7 September 1891; Ohio State Journal. 29 June 1891; Springfield Reoublic-Times. 7 August 1891; Cleveland Plain Dealer. 31 July 1891; National Labor Tribune (Pittsburgh), 24, 31 October 1891. 83 Campbell and Calvin Brice, also distributed tens of thousands to party

activists.121

The election of 1891 was a disappointment for the Ohio People's

party. Not only did the party fail to elect a single member to the

General Assembly, Seitz fell far short of gaining the 75,000-100,000

votes expected. In the end Seitz received 23,472 votes or 2.9% of the

795,629 votes cast. The big winners were republicans McKinley and

Sherman. In defeating Campbell by 21,511 votes, McKinley kept his

political career alive. By recapturing the General Assembly, the

Republicans controlled the election of Ohio's next senator and, amid

charges of vote buying, elected Sherman over Foraker.122

The Populists polled best in the predominately agricultural

counties of western and northern parts of the state. In these counties,

the party won 3.4% of the vote. In Mercer and Defiance counties,

heavily agricultural counties along the Indiana border, the Populists won close to 15% of the vote. In the state's urban counties the

People's party polled 2.9% of the vote with the highest totals in

Akron's Summitt County (7.1%), Cincinnati's Hamilton County (4.3%),

Cleveland's Cuyahoga County (3.5%). In Toledo's Lucas County and

Dayton's Montgomery County, the party polled less than 1% of the vote.

The People's party vote was the lowest (1.7%) in the Appalachian counties of the southern and eastern part of the state. These counties were dotted with small farms, coal mines, and mills and factories.

Adding insult to the poor results was the fact that the

Prohibition party, whose platform mirrored the People's party platform except on the liquor question, out polled the People's party in the non-

121 Marion (Ohio) Star. 20 November 1891; Croly, 158-63; Morgan, 155. On the role of money in Ohio politics is Allen 0. Myers, Bosses and Boodle in Ohio Politics; Some Plain Truth for Honest People (Cincinnati : Lyceum, 1895). 122 Herbert Croly, Marcus Alonzo Hanna: His Life and Work (New York; Macmillan, 1923), 161-63; Sherman II, 1155-57; Smith, I, 630, 644, 655. 84 urban counties. The Prohibition candidate for governor, John

Ashenhurst, polled 20,200 (2.5%) to Seitz's 23,472 (2.9%). The

Prohibition party polled 2.9% of the vote in the predominately

agricultural counties, 3.1% in the Appalachian counties, and 1.6% in

the urban counties. 123

The failure of the People's party to elect a single member of the

Ohio General Assembly only seirved to reinforce the decision of the Ohio

farm organizations to forgo participation with the People's party. The

passage of the Rawlings Bill, in the Spring of 1891 produced a backlash.

Many of the state's manufacturers, urban politicians, and trade

unionists vowed to reverse the legislation, and Ohio famers were

looking for allies for the coming fight. With no voice in the General

Assembly, the People's party made a poor ally for the farmers. The

simple fact was that third party politics was the refuge for those with

nothing to lose, and with the General Assembly's passage of most of the

Farmers' Union demands the state's farmers thought they had something to

lose.

Not surprisingly, in the winter of 1891-1892 the Grange and both

alliances refused to revisit the question of political participation

with the Populists. An Alliance official told the state convention,

farmers "must stay out of party politics" and vote for the best

candidates regardless of partisan affiliation, while an F.A.I.U.

official insisted that "in no sense can the order be partisan or

nominate a party ticket." The State Grange's lobbying arm, the

Executive Committee, implicitly told farmers to ignore the People's

party by declaring that "we can generally accomplish our purposes best

by acting within the lines of the two great parties." Unlike a year

earlier, the farm organizations did not threaten third party action if

123 Report of the Secretary of State. 1891. 298-357 85 the two major parties proved to be unreceptive to the farmers'

demands. 124

While the Ohio Constitution called for biennial sessions of the

General Assembly meeting in the winter of odd numbered years, much to

the anger of the state's farm leaders the legislators met in a special

session in the Winter of 1892 to address a number of outstanding issues.

Manufacturers, bankers, and trade unionists saw the special session as

an opportunity to repeal the Rawlings Act, and urban legislators pushed

the issue to the top of the legislative agenda. The state's manufacturers and trade unions claimed that by taxing the inventories of

factories the Rawlings Act was putting the state at a competitive

disadvantage with its neighbors and driving manufacturers from the

state. Many of the state's trade unions joined the fight to repeal the

Rawlings Act. Not only did the unions fear the loss of jobs, but echoing the arguments of Henry George they argued that taxing production

and improvements to land was fundamentally wrong. By taxing manufacturers's inventories, the trade unionists claimed, the state was in essence taxing production rather than encouraging it.

In the legislative battle over the repeal of the Rawlings Act the anti-repeal forces marshaled their resources and turned back the repealers early in the session by winning a vote to send the bill to the agricultural committee rather than the manufacturers and commerce committee. The agricultural committee, dominated by the Farmers'

Independent Caucus, killed the measure by refusing to allow it to come to a vote. Like the 1891 battle to pass the Rawlings Act, the contest to repeal the measure did not break down along partisan lines. Urban legislators, regardless of party, generally favored the repeal while rural legislators of both parties fought any attempt to weaken the

124 Ohio Farmer, 30 January 1892, 19 March 1892; "Journal of the Proceedings of the Nineteenth Annual Convention of the Ohio State Grange" (Sandusky: I.P. Mack & Bro., 1891), 27 86 Rawlings Act. In spite of losing both the 1891 and 1892 battles, those

hoping to repeal the Rawlings Act promised to bring the issue up in 1893

when the legislature elected in 1891 began its session. The farmers'

success during the 1892 legislative session functioned much like the

farmers' success in 1891 — to convince the farm organizations that

urban legislators, rather than the traditional parties, were the real

roadblocks to reform.

The miserable showing of Seitz and other Populist candidates in

the Fall of 1891, as well as the party's failure to secure the support

of farm organizations, demoralized the state's People's party. The

party's 1892 convention proved to be a series of frustrations. While

the 1891 convention had attracted close to 500 delegates, just over 200

delegates attended the 1892 convention which was held in Massillon. On

the eve of the convention, the party held a mass meeting with a series

of speakers and musical entertainers. Although the party's officials made a point of inviting the city's working class to attend the

festivities, "only about one dozen of the 5000 workermen of Massillon were there," according to one newspaper

Convention delegates spent most of their time discussing the wisdom of merging with the state's Democratic party. After all, a

number of delegates noted, there were few differences in the two party's platforms and the combined totals of the populists and Democrats in 1891 would have been enough to defeat McKinley and the Republicans. A delegate from Medina County proposed that the Democrats and Populists merge, with the People's party naming one-third of the Democrat's presidential electors in the upcoming elections. In the end, two reasons convinced the Populists not to pursue fusion with the Democrats.

First, the Populists felt that the Democratic peurty, led by Calvin Brice in Ohio and Grover Cleveland, the probaüsle nominee for President, was too corrupt and beholden to financial interests. Secondly and perhaps

87 most importantly, the Populists doubted that the Democratic party would be willing to fuse on terms favorable to the Populists. The delegates insisted that the party could survive and prosper if it had the support of the state's farm organizations. The delegates believed that a majority of the state's farmers would have supported the Peoples' party in 1891 had it not been for the opposition of the "so-called" leaders of the Grange, Alliance, and Farmers' Union. The party attached to its platform a resolution denouncing Seth Ellis, W.H. Likins, and John

Brigham for betraying the state's farmers by steering their organizations away from the Peoples' party.

The People's party had trouble securing a nominee for the top spot of the state ballot, secretary of state. As in the year before, none of the more notable Populists allowed their names to be considered by the convention. In the end the convention prevailed on Solon C. Thayer,

Stark County milk dealer, to run. As a condition of his nomination,

Thayer insisted that the party reimburse him for the time that he was away from his job while campaigning. The near-destitute party agreed to pay Thayer two dollars a day plus expenses during the campaign.

Although other Ohio politicians, including William McKinley and James

Campbell, received secret payments from their parties during campaigns, the public disclosure of this financial relationship opened the People's party to the ridicule of the partisan press. The rest of the ticket was made up of relative unknowns. As one newspaper noted, the Populists's ticket was "as crisp and new as it is possible for a Treasury note to be. "125

The 1892 election did not go well for Thayer, People's party presidential nominee James B. Weaver, and the other Populist nominees.

125 Akron Beacon. 17, 18 August 1892; Toledo Blade. 17, 18 1892; Columbus Dispatch. 18 August 1892 Most of the state's major newspapers held the People's party in such low regard that they did not even bother to run coverage of the convention. 88 At the county and township levels the Ohio People's party did not elect a single candidate, and Weaver collected only 14,850 votes. On the state level the percentage of voters casting their ballots for the

Populists declined 41% from 2.9% to 1.7%. The steepest decline was in the state's urban counties were the percentage of Populist voters was cut almost in half from 2.9% to 1.5%. In the predominately agricultural counties the Populists received just under 2% of the vote as opposed to

3.4% a year earlier. In the Appalachian counties, the decline was less precipitous from 1.7% to 1.5%.

Most discouraging for the Ohio People's party was the fact that the election stripped the party of its third party status as the it finished fourth behind the two major parties and the Prohibition party.

John Bidwell, the Prohibitionist candidate for president, out polled

James Weaver 26,012 (3.1%) to 14,850 (1.7%). While the Prohibitionists were only able to attract 1.9% of the vote in urban counties, the party collected 3.7% of the vote in the Appalachian counties and 3.4% of the vote in the predominately agricultural counties. Clearly, agrarian third party activists increasingly saw the Prohibition party, with its anti-urban message, rather than the People's party, as the most attractive vehicle through which to voice their discontentment.

The election of 1892 did nothing to convince the state's farm organizations that they had made a mistake by refusing to work with the

People's party. The poor showing suggested that whatever support the party had among the state's farmers was rapidly fading, and the party's lack of influence in the General Assembly made it a poor ally.

Reflecting the growing belief that urban legislators and not the traditional parties were the main impediments to reform, the grange and the alliances called for farmers to exercise non-partisan political action. T.R.Smith, the grand master of the state grange and a former

People's party activist, told farmers that a farmers' party was

89 unnecessary as long as farmers voted for the best candidate regardless of party affiliation. He declared, "our partisan shackles must be broken, or set so loosely around our shoulders that we are not bound to vote for the devil if he should be nominated by our party." The secretary of the rapidly declining Ohio Farmers' Alliance reported that at the organization's annual meeting "no time [was] wasted in discussing party questions" and that the organization was placing "justice" over

"party. "126

The state's farmers and their organizations approached the January

1893 opening of a new legislative session with both hope and fear. They were hopeful because they considered the legislators to be generally sympathetic to the farmers's cause. T.R. Smith, the recently-elected master of the Ohio State Grange, insisted, the Ohio General Assembly has

"never before paid such deference to our [the farmers] expressed will as now," while the Ohio Farmer praised the state legislature "as willing to look after the interests of the farmers as any other class." But the farm leaders were also apprehensive. The state's manufacturers and urban legislators promised to launch a bid to repeal the Rawlings Act, the cornerstone of the farmers's legislative triumph in 1891.127

The Ohio General Assembly did not disappoint farmers in the Winter of 1893. Farmers serving in the legislature reorganized the Farmers'

Independent Caucus and announced their intentions to pass legislation favored by the state's farm organizations. Not only did the much anticipated attempt to repeal the Rawlings tax bill fizzle, but the legislature created a special commission to study the state's tax code and make recommendations to equalize the burden. The General Assembly also considered the Nichols Bill to further reform the state's tax code.

The Nichols bill sought to increase the revenue collected from gas

126 Ohio Farmer. 23 February 1893. 127 Ohio Farmer. 9, 16 February 1893. 90 companies, electric utilities, telegraphs, oil pipelines, street railway systems, and transfer companies by having the value of the franchise included in any assessments. While the Ohio Farmer called passage of the bill "the most important matter that has come up [before the legislature] or will come up this winter," urban politicians, including

Joseph Foraker and Marcus Hanna, worked feverishly to prevent passage.

The pressure of the farmers proved to be too much as the General

Assembly passed an amended version of the Nichols Bill. In deference to

Hanna, who owned a street railway in Cleveland, and Foraker, who served as General Counsel for Cincinnati's main streetcar company, the General

Assembly excluded street railways from the bill. 128

During the winter of 1893, the Ohio General Assembly continued to take actions demanded by the state's farmers. The legislature passed a constitutional amendment altering the makeup of the General Assembly to increase the political power of rural districts at the expense of urban areas. The amendment provided that each of the state's eighty-eight counties would have a representative in the lower chamber regardless of population. As the number of legislators in the House of

Representatives would remain the same, the measure would entail the loss of five legislators from urban counties and the addition of five legislators from rural counties. The Ohio Farmer boasted that the measure would break "the grip of the political boss" and cleanse the state's political machinery. As changes to the state's constitution needed to be ratified by the voters, the measure was sent to the state's electorate where it was defeated. Yet despite this setback, the

128 Ohio Farmer, 26 January 1893, 9, 23 February 1893, 6, 27 April 1893, 11 May 1893; Everett Walters, Joseph Benson Foraker; An Uncompromising Republican (Columbus: Ohio State Archaeological and Historical Society, 1948), 124-25; Warner, 7-10; Morgan, 159-60. 91 amendment's initial passage by the General Assembly reminded the state's

farmers that the legislature was sympathetic to their demands. 129

Despite minor quibbles, the Ohio Farmer praised the General

Assembly for enacting "many good laws." The paper reflected the

growing anti-urban sentiments of many farm leaders when it declared, "as

great a percent of moral level headed men as any preceding legislature,

and a larger number of farmers, and it is a notable fact that not many

of the doubtful measures considered by this assembly originated with the

members outside of the cities. Observation has led us to believe that a

greater number of country members in the legislature would be to the

advantage of the general public." At the conclusion of the session the

Ohio Farmer insisted that there were too many good legislators to

list.130

While the Ohio General Assembly was passing legislation demanded

by the state's farm organizations in the winter and spring of 1893, the

People's party's fortunes continued to descend. The January 1893 meeting of the party's executive committee was a comedy of errors.

First, the state committee forgot to inform national People's party

chairman Herman Taubeneck about a change in the meeting's date.

Taubeneck arrived on the original date and missed the meeting.

Secondly, most of the meeting's time was devoted to a dispute between

state party chairman H.F. Barnes and the rest of the executive board over $28.25. Barnes maintained that he was entitled to the money as compensation for expenses, while the board insisted that the money

should be placed in the party's treasury. Although the amount of money appeared insignificant, the party only had slightly more than ten dollars in its coffers and more than thirty-six dollars in bills waiting to be paid. Executive committee meeting members collected about fifty

129 Ohio Farmer. 27 April 1893; Ohio Grange Proceedings. 1892 (Sandusky, OH: I.F. Mack and Brothers, 1893), 39. 130 Ohio Farmer. 4 May, 8 June 1893. 92 dollars which paid off the outstanding bills and left the party with a balance of about $20.i3i

In the Spring of 1893 the petty dispute between Barnes and the state's executive committee reached a climax. Barnes resigned over the monetary dispute and refused to return the party's records to the executive committee. The records contained the only copy of the names and addresses of county People's party chairmen and secretaries as well as local activists. Without this list the party's organization would become useless. To reassemble these records, the new chairman of the executive committee, George Flummerfelt, used the pages of the Plow and

Hammer to ask county parties to "report the name and address of the chairman and secretary of the county committee as soon as they they see this letter." Flummerfelt ended the letter by invoking the memory of the Revolution, "The men of '76 had their Benedict Arnold and we have ours, and his action has done more harm to the movement in Ohio, but our cause is just and will prevail, as did that of our forefathers.'132

Just when The Plow and Hammer pronounced the Ohio People's party

"dead," it twitched back to life. But it did so not as a vehicle of agrarian protest, but of urban labor reform.

131 The Plow and Hammer. 4, 11 January 1893. 132 The Plow and Hammer. 3 May 1893. 93 CHAPTER 4

ORGANIZED LABOR AND THE OHIO PEOPLE'S PARTY, 1890-1894

In early August of 1894, John McBride, the president of the United

Mine Workers of America, announced his intention to form an Ohio labor

party and to merge the party with the state's People's party. McBride

told the state's trade unionists that recent labor strife had convinced

"all honest, ardent advocates of labor's cause that corporate power, when aided and abetted by the judicial, executive and military arm of

the state and national governments can and will override the rights of our people." Believing that labor unions had proven ineffective in protecting the rights of workers, McBride told trade unionists to reform

their organizations, abandon their emphasis on strikes, boycotts, and

arbitration, and enter into partisan politics. "By entering into politics," McBride explained, "we can free ourselves from the chain of

slavery."!

The response to McBride's call was tremendous, as Ohio trade unions and central labor bodies sent over 250 delegates to the convention in Columbus. The delegates came from every section of the state and represented almost every craft. By far the largest numbers came from the United Mine Workers and the American Railway Union, but urban workers also were well represented. The Toledo Central Labor

Union's president, George Braunschweiger, served as convention chairman.

The Columbus Trades and Labor Assembly, many of whose leaders had been

1 United Mine Workers' Journal. 9 August 1894; Columbus Dispatch. 14 August 1894. 94 active in People's party politics since the party's inception, hosted

the proceedings. The central labor bodies of Cleveland and Cincinnati,

which had both already forged alliances with the People's party, were

well represented.

McBride's party ratified a broad platform calling for the free

coinage of silver at the ratio of sixteen to one, a form of the single

tax, compulsory school attendance and free school books, an end to

"undesirable" immigration, the initiative and referendum, the eight-hour

day, sanitary inspection of homes and workplaces, employer liability for

work-related injuries, abolition of both the contract system for public

works and the sweating system, municipal ownership of utilities and

street railways, and national ownership of railroads, telegraphs,

telephones, and mines. Most controversially, the platform insisted

that:

the power of the government should be expanded as rapidly and as far as the good sense of an intelligent people and the teaching of experience shall justify, along the line of collective ownership by the people of all such means of production and distribution as the people may elect to operate.2

McBride scheduled his labor convention to coincide with the

state's annual People's party convention also meeting in Columbus. On

the convention's second day McBride and other prominent trade unionists, most of whom were already active in the People's party, convinced the

People's party to adopt the labor platform with only a few additions.

The People's party insisted that the platform declare in favor of

liberal pensions for disabled soldiers, the Omaha platform, and Jacob

Coxey's road plan. McBride and the laborites readily agreed, and the labor party merged with the Populists. After the merger Ohio People's

2 Columbus Dispatch. 16-18 August 1894; United Mine Workers' Journal. 23 August 1894. 95 party leader Jacob Coxey appeared with McBride before a crowd of 10,000

assembled on the lawn of Lhe statehouse. Together they proclaimed that

the revitalized party would end the reign of large corporations and

restore democracy not only to the people of Ohio, but to the nation in

general.3

This merger transformed Ohio's weak and impotent People's party

into a labor party with the potential to transform Ohio and national

politics. Not only had the central labor bodies of the state's three

largest cities — Cleveland, Cincinnati, and Columbus — endorsed the

People's party, but so had the state's most powerful union, the United

Mine Workers. Nearly all of the state's leading trade unionists joined

the People's party. Besides McBride, Ohio Labor-Populists included: Max

Hayes and Robert Bandlow, the editors of Cleveland Central Labor Union's

Citizen: James Brettell, a member of the Amalgamated Association of

Iron, Steel and Tin Workers's national executive board and the third

vice president of the American Federation of Labor in 1894; William

Mahon, the president of the Amalgamated Association of Street Railway

Employees; Hugh Cavanaugh, member of the Executive Board of the Knights

of Labor; Phil Penna, the president of the United Mine Workers in 1895;

Patrick McBryde, the secretary treasurer of the United Mine Workers; and

A A Adams, the president of the Ohio Miners' Union in 1894 and 1895.

The chapter looks at the reasons the United Mine Workers, more

than half of whose members resided in Ohio, and central labor bodies of

Cleveland, Cincinnati, and Columbus abandoned their commitments to non- partisanship and entered into alliances with the People's party. In each case, the trade unionists concluded that local and state politicians had become so corimpted by the influence of corporate money

and beholden to corporate interests that the economic future of working people and the fate of the republic were both in peril. By depriving

3 Columbus Dispatch. 16-18 August 1894; United Mine Workers' Journal, 23 August 1894. 96 workers of the product of its own labor, corporations had transformed

free workers into "wage slaves," and through the use of money these

corporations had made the nation's politicians more interested in

enriching corporations than in working for the welfare of the people.

While the analysis will emphasize local and immediate events

affecting the trade unionists, it is important to keep in mind that

these people were responding to national and regional episodes as well.

Like their counterparts throughout the nation, Ohio trade unionists

could recite the long list of labor conflicts that occurred after the

Great Upheaval and the Haymarket conflict, including Homestead,

Briceville, Coeur d'Alene, the Buffalo switchmen's strike, and most

importantly the Pullman boycott. These conflicts both contributed to,

and reinforced, the perception of the state's unionists that the

nation's governments had been corrupted by the use of corporate money.

Cleveland

Aside from being the best organized and most radical central body

in the state, Cleveland's Central Labor Union (CLU) was the first of

Ohio's large central labor bodies to ally with the People's party.

Angered and energized by an 1892 streetcar strike, in the spring of 1893

the CLU began working with the the city's Populists to elect a pro-labor mayor and a city council willing to put the interest of the people ahead

of the needs of the city's utilities. By fall, the CLU was the driving

force of the Ohio People's party writing its platform and selecting its

candidates.

The People's party in Cleveland predated the establishment of the

national People's party at the May 1891 Cincinnati convention. The

founders of the Cleveland-eurea People's party earlier had been involved with the Union Labor party and the Edward Bellamy-inspired Nationalist party, but third party politics had all but disappeared from Cleveland

97 by 1890. Union labor party candidates had garnered fewer than 300 votes in recent elections. But the success of Farmers' Alliance candidates in the South and Great Plains in the fall of 1890 excited Cleveland-area reformers and gave them renewed energy. In the winter of 1891 Wade

Shurtleff, the president of the local Nationalist party's Executive

Committee and a member of both the Knights of Labor and the local musicians union, announced the formation of a new party. Shurtleff urged the city's trade unionists, Knights of Labor, and reform clubs that they "could most rapidly advance the interests of labor by following the example set by the Farmers' Alliance and other labor organizations of Kansas and voting unitedly against both the old corrupt political rings." He called on the organizations to send delegates to a convention to select candidates for the upcoming municipal election.«

Although the Nationalist party issued the call, the Franklin Club was the real force behind the movement, according to the Plain Dealer.

Organized by followers of Henry George and Edward Bellamy, the Franklin

Club was as the center of producerist thought in Cleveland. With no official membership role or officers, the club functioned as a free forum for the exchange of progressive ideas. The informal leadership included physicians L.B. Tuckerman and Woodbridge and factory owner Tom

Fitzsimmons, but most of the other leaders were prominent unionists, among them David Rankin, Peter Witt, Edmund Vail, and John Kirchner.

Like most of Cleveland's labor leaders, these men were dual unionists, maintaining ties to both the Knights of Labor and craft unions.

According to Max Hayes, the Franklin Club served as a "post graduate course" for CLU activists. There they discussed the greatest

4 Annual Report of the Secretary of State to the Governor of Ohio for the Fiscal Year Ending November 15. 1890 [hereafter. Report of the Secretary of State11 Columbus: Westbote, 1891), 89-90, 285; Cleveland Citizen. 20 February, 13, 27 March 1891; New Nation (Boston), 28 February 1891. 98 progressive thinkers of the day, from Marx and DeLeon to Bellamy and

George, and honed their public speaking and debating skills.s

The People's party's first meeting in Cleveland was a disappointment. Only 108 delegates from twenty-two of the city's labor organizations and reform clubs attended. They condemned the "class legislation" and denounced the Democrats and Republicans as "agents of the classes." There was "no hope of wresting these political machines from the plutocrats," they insisted. The only answer was for "the wealth-producing classes of Cleveland [to] strike unitedly at the ballot box as the farmers of Kansas have." The convention delayed concrete action creating a party or selecting a ticket. It called for another meeting later in March, hoping for "more enthusiasm."6

But the attendance and enthusiasm at the March meeting was not much better. Nonetheless, the party selected a ticket and a platform and took the name the Citizen's party. It nominated Henry C. Wolf, a downtown Jeweler, for mayor. The rest of the slate was selected in a pattern that the People's party would follow in subsequent elections.

Most of the other city-wide slots went to professionals who were members of the Franklin Club. This was because laborites would have difficulty securing the necessary bond to serve as treasurer or auditor and did not have the legal training necessary to serve in a judicial post.

Laborites received nominations for almost every city council slot, which were selected by wards. The platform focused on the corruption of the

5 Cleveland Plain Dealer. 2 March 1891; Max S. Hayes, "A History of Cleveland Labor" (Cleveland: Cleveland Labor History Society, reprint 1994), 4; In one of the few articles that discusses the Ohio People's party, William F. Zornow argues that the party was plagued by a rivalry between trade unionists emd Bellamy nationalists. This argument, though, ignores both the fact that most of the Nationalists he discusses were trade unionists and the harmonious relationship the Franklin Club and the CLU. Zomow, "Bellamy Nationalism in Ohio 1891 to 1896," Ohio State Archaeological and Historical Quarterlv 58 (1949), 152-71 S Cleveland Plain Dealer. 2 March 1891; Cleveland Leader. 2 March 1891; Cleveland Citizen. 13 March 1891. 99 city's government by contractors and public utilities. It called for municipal ownership of the street railways and other utilities, even though state law prohibited it, the abolition of the contracting system

for public wcrhs, and the creation of a civil service system, comprising experts rather than political hacks to run city departments.?

The CLU'a response to the new Citizen's party was mixed. The CLU remained committed to its policy of non-partisanship. When Franklin

Club members asked the trade unionists to join the third party movement, its directors tabled the motion and never considered it. In the week following the Citizen's party's formation, the lead editorial in the

CLO's newspaper. The Citizen, sang the praises of the AFL's renunciation of partisan politics.

Instead of making the organization a political one and demanding twenty reforms at once, the Federation . . . attends purely to trades interest. A great deal of its prestige is based upon the fact that it does not advise workingmen how to vote or for whom, and therefore its course is conservative, safe, and substantial.

The same edition reprinted excerpts of Samuel Gompers's recent speech warning against all types of partisan activity under the headline "Wise

Words." "As for your political parties," the paper quoted Gompers, "I say a plague on all of them. . . . We are looking to the welfare of people, not to the welfare of parties."s

Despite their commitment to non-partisanship, the leaders of the

CLU were clearly sympathetic to the Citizen's party and its platform.

Not only were many of the Citizen's party's leaders, including Kirchner,

Witt, Robert Bandlow, and Max Hayes, active in the CLU, but the central body had close ties to the Franklin Club. The new party's platform

7 Cleveland Plain Dealer. 16, 23 March 1891; Cleveland Leader. 23 March 1891. 8 Cleveland Citizen. 20 February 1891. 100 mirrored, almost to the letter, the CLO's municipal platform. In an

editorial just after the Citizen's party's first organizational meeting,

the Citizen praised the growing third party movement among farmers on

the Plains and called for urban workers to follow the farmers's example.

Endorsing the Alliance's "spirit of reform which is necessary to make

this a government of the people," the Citizen continued,

Laugh if you like at the man with the hayseed in his hair, but he sees the light. He realizes that industrial reform must come through political action, and that every question affecting labor is necessarily a political question. It took the farmer many years to find this out, but he now understands it and is hunting for b'ar. . . The farmer is in the saddle, and only awaits the word to storm the citadel of Wrong and Oppression! Where is the tradesman?

Throughout the campaign, the Citizen ran articles touting the reforms demanded in both the CLO's platform and the Citizen's party's platform.

Thus while the CLU was reluctant to have any organizational ties to the

Citizen's party, it urged the city's workers to embrace the party's ideals and the ideals that would inform the founding of the People's party.9

The campaign pitted the Citizen's party mayoral candidate Wolf against two veteran Cleveland politicians. The Republicans nominated

William G. Rose who had served as mayor in 1877-78. The Democrats ran

John Farley, who had sat on City Council in the 1870s and served as

Director of Public Works through much of the 1880s. Neither Rose nor

Farley had much support in the labor community. Rose had provoked the wrath of labor for his actions during in 1877, when local coopers, led by national coopers' union president Martin Foran, struck the John D.

Rockefeller's Standard Oil Company to protest a 20% reduction in wages.

Rose had ordered the police to break up the rallies of strikers and

9 Cleveland Citizen, 27 February, 6, 13, 20 March 1891. 101 mobilized the police force to protect Rockefeller's interests. Farley had opposed raises for workers on public projects and was friendly with city contractors and utilities, which the CLU blamed for most of the corruption in the city government.lo

The Republicans took the challenge of the Citizen's party seriously and must have considered it to be a factor in the race. On the eve of the election the Republicans printed fake "Citizen's

Committee" literature calling on the city's workers to vote for

Republican candidate Rose. But it turned out that Rose and the

Republicans had little to fear from the Citizen's party. As the chart below shows, Wolf collected only 314 votes, while Rose won over 53% of the votes cast.u

William Q. Rose (Republican) 18,376 53.4 John Parley (Democrat) 15,498 45.1 Henry Wolf (Citizen's) 314 0.9 W. Teachout (Prohibition) 205 0.6 Total 34,393 100.0

Table 4.1: Results of Cleveland's 1891 Mayoral Election. Cleveland Plain Dealer 6 April 1891.

10 Herbert Gutman, "The Labor Policies of the Large Corporation in the Gilded Age" Gutman, Power and Culture; Essavs on the American Working Class (New York: New Press, 1987) 213-54; Peter Witt, "History of the Labor Movement in Cleveland" Cleveland Recorder. 5 September 1897, 10- 11. 11 Cleveland Plain Dealer. 6 i^ril 1891. 102 Shortly after the April municipal election representatives of the

farmers alliances, labor groups, and reformers met in Cincinnati to form

the People's party. The Citizen's coverage of the convention and

Populist movement suggests that both it and the CLU were trying to work

out their relationship to the new political movement. The leaders of

the CLU shared the Populist's critique of American economic life. In

the spring of 1891 the Citizen reprinted the Hazard and Buell circulars,

which were widely circulated in Populist circles to provide "proof" that

British capitalists and Wall Street bankers were conspiring to deprive

American producers of the wealth which they had created. The Hazard

circular purported to be a private communication written by an agent of

"English capitalists" during the Civil War. It detailed a plan to

deprive American labor of economic freedom. The circular declared:

Slavery is likely to be abolished by the war power, and chattel slavery destroyed. This, I and my European friends are in favor of, for slavery is but the owning of labor, and carries with it the care of the laborer; while the European plan, led on by England, is capital control of labor by controlling wages. This can be done by controlling the money. The great debt that capitalists will see to it is made out of the war, must be used as a measure to control the volume of money. To accomplish this the bonds must be used as a banking basis. We are now waiting to get the secretary of the treasury to make his recommendation to Congress. It will not do to allow the greenback, as it is called, to circulate as money for any length of time, for we cannot control that.

Populists cited the Buell Circular to prove that current banking laws were part of a conspiracy to deny Americans access to money and

opportunity. Purportedly written by James Buell, secretary of the

National Bankers Association, the circular warned bankers, "To repeal

the law creating national banks, or restore to circulation the

government issue of money, will be to provide the people with money and

103 will therefore effect your individual profits as bankers and lenders."

Although the Hazard and Buell circulars have been proven to be

fraudulent, they offered leaders of the CLU proof that "when brave men

were fighting gallantly on the field to save the union, the bankers of

this country were conspiring to rivet upon the government a banking

system that would bring millions of dollars into their coffers directly

and give them a hold upon the government for a half a century."12

Despite the Citizen's belief in the Populist critique of American

economic life, it did not support the Populist's remedies, opposing

opposed key portions of the Ocala platform. The paper argued that both

the free coinage of silver and the subtreasury plan amounted to class

legislation. An editorial in the Citizen recognized the "fact that the

currency of this country is insufficient for its business exigencies"

but added that "it is hard to disguise what is apparent to all — that

the clamor for unlimited silver coinage comes from the men who own the

silver mines. Mine owners are so disinterested in that matter that they

are willing to accept one dollar for eighty cents worth of silver."

Moreover, the paper concluded that the free coinage of silver "would not

increase the circulating medium to the volume needed to relieve the

financial distress of the country." Rather than advocating the use of

silver or any other metallic currency, the Citizen called for "Uncle Sam to issue his own currency, repudiate the national debt, and dethrone the national banking system." Greenbacks would give the people through their elected representatives control over the nation's financial

system, while the free and unlimited coinage of silver would give silver mine owners the ability to manipulate the nation's currency.

The Citizen considered the sub-treasury plan to be both impractical amd solely for the benefit of one segment of the nation's

12 Cleveland Citizen. 3 April 1891; Jeffrey Ostler, "The Rhetoric of Conspiracy and the Formation of Kansas Populism" Agricultural History 69 (1995), 1-27. 104 producers. The paper argued that if the sub treasury system became law,

"we do not see how the government could refuse to issue certificates for warehoused lumber, clothing, iron, steel, copper, coal, furnishings, dry goods, hardware or, in fact, any commodity of value." Later the Citizen suggested that "to denounce class measures in one breath and advocate the Sub-treasury plan in the next is a good example of the devil rebuking sin." i3

In addition to Greenbacks, the leaders of the CLU saw Henry

George's Single Tax as the way to rid the nation of "wage slavery" and to preserve essential American rights. Generally opposed by farmers who feared higher taxes and ignored by the Populists, single taxers would tax all land at a uniform rate per acre regardless of improvements. By taxing improvements on a property, George insisted, states and localities were taxing labor and discouraging production. A uniform rate, single tax advocates argued, would make it financially impractical to hold unproductive land and suppress land ownership for speculative purposes. The tax would make land available to those willing to put it to productive use. As the Citizen insisted

The two factors land and labor create all wealth .... If a man is debarred from taking advantage of either the primary two elements, he cannot produce wealth; and to that extent he is barred from life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness .... Everyman is made a slave who is forbidden to apply his energies to the earth auid its products .... Slavery may be imposed in two ways, wither by taking possession of the laborer's person, or by taking possession of the land and its products.

Despite the CLO's opposition to key portions of the Populist platform, local conflicts pushed the Cleveland labor movement into an alliance with the party. The city's government was dominated by

13 Cleveland Citizen. 20 February, 19 September 1891, 16 March 1892. 105 business interests, especially public contractors and utility owners.

Not surprisingly, two of the city's most influential political figures

were utility owners. Republican Marcus Hanna controlled the city's

second largest street car line, the Little Consolidated, while

Democratic Congressman Tom Johnson owned the largest, the Big

Consolidated. Neither man was above using his political influence to

help his business interests. As Hanna's sympathetic biographer, Herbert

Croly, wrote, "The municipal government of Cleveland . . . was as

corrupt as that of the average American municipality. The council, to

whom was entrusted the grant of franchises, was composed of petty local

politicians whose votes had to be secured by some kind of influence. . .

. A street railway company that applied for and needed a particular

franchises had to purchase this influence or else go out of business."

Johnson characterized Cleveland's government in similar terms. "The city

government belonged to the business interests generally, but as the

public utility companies had more use for it than other kinds of

business enterprise had, they paid the most attention to it," he wrote,

"They nominated and elected the councilmen and of course the councilmen

represented them instead of the community"

Trade unionists were the most vocal critics of the cozy

relationship between Cleveland's governmental leaders and the utility

companies. For the laüsor leaders, utility franchises embodied all of

the bad characteristics of monopolies. They used their monopoly

position to rob the city's people, and they used these profits to bribe

city council and subvert democratic government. Moreover, the utility owners treated their employees with contempt. Refusing to recognize unions, they underpaid and mistreated their employees.is

14 Tom L. Johnson, Mv Storv (New York: B.W. Huebsch, 1911), 114; Herbert Croly, Marcus Alonzo Hanna: His Life and Work (New York: Macmillan, 1923), 80-81. 15 Witt, 10-11; Leslie Hough, The Turbulent Spirit: Cleveland. Ohio and its Workers, 1877-1899 (New York: Garland, 1991), 175-82. 106 The tension between the city's labor community and Cleveland

utilities came to a head in the late spring and summer of 1892. In mid-

May the drivers and conductors of the East Cleveland Street Railway

Company walked off the job after the ccsnpany fired three employees for

belonging to the local streetcar workers union, a Knights of Labor

Assembly which belonged to the Central Labor Union. Beyond the

reinstatement of the fired men, the strikers demanded a ten hour work

day and an increase in wages to twenty cents an hour. After only six

hours as company agreed to rehire the dismissed workers, reduce the

workday to ten hours, and increase wages to eighteen cents an hour for

drivers and nineteen cents for conductors. The agreement did not last

long. Less than a week later, the East Cleveland Street Railway Company

began hiring "regular extras" at twelve and a half cents an hour,

instituting a two tier wage structure. Although the institution of the

two-tier wage structure did not precipitate another walkout, it

increased tensions on the line.is

The agreement between the East Cleveland Street Railway Company

and the street-car workers union had repercussions throughout the city's

other street railway lines. On these lines drivers and conductors were

already unhappily working twelve to sixteen hours a day, receiving about

fifteen cents per hour. The Bast Cleveland agreement increased tensions

as it set a new standard for hours and wages. Workers on the other

lines demanded the new standard and joined the street car workers's assembly in droves. So many wanted to enroll, the Citizen reported,

"that it is simply impossible to handle them at one meeting place."i?

The tensions boiled over on June 20, 1892 when the employees of the Me«d>urgh and Broadway line walked off the job to protest the firing of three union leaders for minor infractions of company rules. The

16 Hough, 182-83. 17 Cleveland Citizen. 11 June 1892. 107 strikers demanded the same wages and hours as the East Cleveland workers as well as the rehiring of the dismissed workers. At the beginning of the walkout, the strikers insisted that the strike would be peaceful.

As one of the leaders declared, "What we need is unity. To acquire unity we need the sympathy of the people and to win that we must be gentlemen. "is

The strikers's hope for peace, though, was not realized. The company brought in replacement drivers and conductors from Buffalo and secured an injunction enjoining the strikers from interfering with the operation of the line. On the third day of the strike the company tried to resume operations. When the first car left the barn, strikers and onlookers stopped the car, disconnected the horses, turned the car around, and pushed it back into the barn. The threatened replacement driver ran away. After a few more tries ended with similar results, the company ceased operations for the day. However, the victory was short lived as fifteen strikers were arrested for violating the injunction and fined $100 to $200 apiece.

The drivers and conductors of the East Cleveland line walked off the job to force the company to live up to its earlier agreement and to show their sympathy for the Nevdsurgh men. The East Cleveland line also secured an injunction enjoining the strikers from interfering with the operation of the line and hired replacement workers. Violence broke out when the company began running its cars on June 24. Loaded with police intent on preventing a disruption of the line, the first car out of the b a m was able to run its route. But the strikers ran a buggy ahead of the car both to alert sympathizers of the car's arrival and to warn potential riders to stay off the car. Along the route residents rushed from their homes and businesses to heckle the driver and the police.

Crowds formed at every major intersection, and many threw rocks and

18 Cleveland Plain Dealer. 21, 22 June 1892; Cleveland Leader. 21, 22 June 1892. 108 bottles at the car. The police responded in kind. One account summed the day up in simple terms, "Women threw stones [at the car], heads were broken by police, and several of the rioters were arrested."is

The CLU organized a mass protest meeting on Public Square. The virulently anti-labor Cleveland Leader, estimated that about 10,000

Clevelanders attended, while rally organizer Peter Witt suggested that the crowd numbered between 20,000 and 25,000. Whatever the attendance, the Citizen called the rally "the largest demonstration of its kind known in the history of this city. "20

Populist leaders, including Peter Witt, Dr. C.W. Woodbridge,

Robert Bandlow, Edward Vail, and David Rankin, took center stage and dominated the proceedings. The speakers saw the strike as just one of the symptoms of a larger malady that was confronting the nation — the concentration of capital and the rise of the wage system. They called on the residents of Cleveland to rise up to confront these threats.

E.B. Bennett, the head of the local carpenters, told the crowd that just as "in 1861 thousands of brave men went to the front to save the country" that now the workers should fight to protect the nation. "This was the land of the free and the home of the brave," he continued, "but it is now the land of the rich and the home of the slave."21

Rather than setting up boycotts of the street railway lines or contributing to the strikers defense fund, the speakers called for a political solution. Arguing that the street railway companies oppressed their workers and threatened the well being of the community, the meeting passed a resolution demanding that the "city administration proceed at once to forfeit the franchises of said corporations [the street railways] and to operate the same as a branch of the public service." In an editorial the Citizen agreed declaring that only the

19 cited in Hough, 188. 20 Cleveland Leader. 26 June 1892; Cleveland Citizen. 2 July 1892. 21 ibid.; Cleveland Plain Dealer 26 June 1892. 109 municipal ownership of the street railways would ensure that the street railway workers were accorded their rights as workers and citizens.22

At the public rally, the organizers announced another meeting on

Public Square three days later if the strikes were not settled. When the leaders of the CLU applied for a permit for the second rally.

Republican mayor Rose refused to grant for fear of a violent confrontation. Insisting that the fear of violence were unfounded, the

CLU accused Rose of working with the city's capitalists to infringe the rights of workers. Calling the rights to assembly and speech the foundation of American democracy, the leaders insisted that in any conflict between American liberty and the interests of the streetcar companies, liberty should prevail.

The Franklin Club conducted the rally on Public Square despite

Rose's refusal to grant the permit. It is not clear if the Franklin

Club conducted the rally in order to shield the CLU and the labor organizations from the legal repercussions of holding the rally without a permit, or if the Franklin sought to sponsor the meeting hoping to attract workers to the People's party. What is clear, though, is that

Cleveland's Populists worked closely with the CLU during the strike. As

Peter Witt declared, "The strongest supporters of the strikers in this contest were the populists."23

Two days after the second public rally the street-railway workers settled their strikes. The two companies agreed to wage increases, the ten hour day, and the reinstatement of the dismissed workers, but refused to grant a closed shop or even recognize the union. Not only did the labor community see the end of the strike as a victory for the street can: workers, but they saw the community's support of the strikes

22 Cleveland Leader. 26 June 1892; Cleveland Citizen. 26 June 1892, 2, 7 July 1892. 23 Cleveland Plain Dealer. 29 June 1892; Witt, 10. 110 ad a sign of widespread dissatisfaction with both the city's

administration and the city's street car companies.

The resolution of the conflict strengthened the bond between the

Populists and the CIO. The two groups had worked together and

ultimately prevailed. The strike forced the CLO's leaders to reconsider

their policy of non-partisanship. The use of the injunction and the

police to protect strikebreakers suggested that a friendly

administration would aid the workers. The strike also reinforced the

opinion of many CLU leaders of the need for political solutions to labor

conflict. If the remedy for streetcar conflicts was municipal

ownership, it made no sense for the CLU to avoid politics. For many of

the CLU leaders the strike emphasized the importance of friendly

administration as well as the need. Perhaps most importantly, the two

events convinced both the CLU and Cleveland's People's party that there

was broad public animosity against public service corporations and the

existing political structure.

Soon after the streetcar strike of 1892 the pages of the Citizen were filled with articles, letters, and editorials advocating Populist

ideals and suggesting that the city's workers should look to the

People's party to improve their lives. The first direct advocacy of the

People's party occurred in the Fall of 1892 when Max Hayes, the editor

of the Citizen, used the paper to urge workers to support the People's party. Hayes compared the platforms of the People's party and the CLU

and suggested that they were virtually identical. He pointed to only two substantive differences: the CLU opposed the Populist's subtreasury program and that the Populists were not on record as supporting the

single tax. Bayes was careful, though, to make it clear that the article should not be construed as a CLU endorsement of the People's party .24

24 Cleveland Citizen. 3 September 1892. Ill The Populists and the CLU cemented their alliance in the winter of

1893. With a substantial overlap in the leadership of the local

People's party and the CLU, the alliance was consummated with little

difficulty and an ease suggesting that it was well-planned. In February

of 1893 the Central Labor Union announced its intention to run a

candidate for mayor and called on the city's "Istbor unions and

industrial organizations" to convene to nominate a slate. Twenty-eight

locals, including locals traditionally weary of political action like

the carpenters, typographical workers, iron and steelworkers, and

bakers, sent delegates to the meeting. The Plain Dealer, which

generally mocked political enterprises not associated with the

Democratic party, was impressed by the quality and quantity of the

turnout. "The enthusiasm and excitement which prevailed throughout the

convention," the paper declared, "showed the earnestness and sincerity

of purpose felt by most of the members. " From the outset the meeting was

run by trade unionists who were active in the People's party. Robert

Bandlow and John Tonsing presided over the meeting, while David Rankin,

Peter Witt, and Bandlow were the principle speakers.25

At every turn the convention pursued a moderate course. The

speeches were relatively tame emphasizing the need for workers to have a

voice in local government. Rather than demanding a list of reforms

which might alienate potential supporters, the convention stressed that

the first step to reforming city government entailed the election of

officials who could not be bought by public service corporations, would

treat all citizens impartially, and enforce the city's and state's labor

laws. Deciding that the nomination of a whole slate would open the movement up to criticism and provoke controversy over places on the

ticket, the convention voted to nominated only a mayoral candidate.

25 Cleveland Plain Dealer. 26 February 1893; Cleveland Citizen. 4 March 1893. 112 while a number of labor leaders and Populists, including Rankin,

Bandlow, Woodbrldge, and Tuckerman, were mentioned as potential mayoral nominees, the convention unanimously nominated Edward S. Meyer. The

Plain Dealer considered the nomination of Meyer as something of a surprise. A lifelong Republican who had never been associated with labor politics, Meyer was Cleveland's Corporation Counsel, a position similar to city attorney. As Corporation Counsel, Meyer had impressed trade unionists by challenging the prerogatives of many of the city's public utilities, especially the gas company. Meyer led the fight against the supplier of natural gas for the city's street lights and forced the company to reduce the price it charged to the city and many customers by two-thirds. The convention appointed a committee to inform

Meyer of his nomination and to convince him to accept it.26

A week after the CLU's nomination of Meyer, the city's People's party met to nominate a slate for the upcoming municipal election.

Presided over by many of the seune men who conducted the CLU's meeting, the convention also nominated Meyer. While the CLU's convention had been reluctant to nominate a whole slate of candidates, the People's party had no such compunction and fielded a ticket composed mostly of trade unionists. The CLU's vice president received the nomination for police judge, while the nominees for city council were, with a singular exception, trade unionists active in the CLU.27

For the next couple of «reeks Meyer seemed unable to decide if he should run. Calling the nomination the greatest honor of his political career, Meyer "declined." but he left the door open by announcing that he would happily serve if elected. Moreover, he did not object when both the People's party and the CLU filed the lOOO signatures required for his name to appear on the ballot. But when the Cleveland Leader.

26 Cleveland Plain Dealer. 26 February 1893; Cleveland Citizen. 4, 18 March 1893. 27 Cleveland Citizen. 11, 25 March 1893. 113 the city's leading Republican paper, published a series of articles

attacking him in the last week before the election, Meyer officially

accepted the CLU's and the People's party's nomination and campaigned

for office. 28

Meyer and other People's party candidates attacked the city's

public utilities, especially the city's street railways. City Council

candidate L.B. Tuckerman called public utilities the worst form of

monopoly and insisted that a vote for Meyer and the People's party was a

vote against "a monopoly of land, a monopoly of labor, a monopoly of

money, and monopoly in general." Meyer's speeches called for the

professionalization of city departments to remove partisanship from the

administration of public laws, a public works program in which the city,

rather than private contractors, completed the work, and the Ohio

General Assembly to pass legislation to enable the city to assume

control over the city's street railway lines.29

In spite of his late entry into the campaign, Meyer did well for a third party candidate. He received 6,092 of the 37,683 votes cast, or

16.2%. John Blee, the Democratic candidate, won the election receiving

43.2% of the vote, while Republican candidate received 39.2% of the votes. The Republicans charged that Meyer's candidacy garnered enough

Republican voters to swing the election to the Democrats, but a Plain

Dealer analysis of returns showed that Meyer polled best in traditionally Democratic working class wards. The Plain Dealer admitted that the CLU had "delivered the votes" to Meyer.3o

28 Cleveland Plain Dealer. 19, 26, 31 March 1893; Cleveland Leader. 26, 27 March 1893. 29 Cleveland Plain Dealer. 6, 31 March, 6 April 1893; Cleveland Citizen. 1, 8 April 1893. 30 Cleveland Plain Dealer, 4 April 1893. In 1892 Grover Cleveland carried the Democratic wards of the west side with 65% of the votes (6306-3298), but in 1893 only 4208 (52.5%) of these voters cast their ballots for Blee, while 1404 (17.5%) voted for Meyer and 2399 (29.9%) voted for Akers. 114 The CLU and the People's party were generally pleased with the results. The Citizen noted that Meyer had received over 15% of the vote

"despite the cracking of the party lash, despite the opposition of every street railway monopoly in the city, despite the opposition of every boodler, heeler, ward worker, and boss in the city, and despite the fact that there was no party organization." 3i

The election also revitalized the nearly-dead Ohio People's party.

Populist leaders realized that party's hopes resided with urban and industrial workers rather than the state's farmers. The party's leadership passed from the hands of agrarian leaders like George

Flummerfelt and John Seitz to the Populists centered around Cleveland's

CLU who in the late spring began planning for the fall's gubernatorial contest.32

Ohio's Republican's met in June of 1893 and nominated the incumbent McKinley for governor. The party promulgated a typical

Republican platform. It denounced the actions of the Democratic- controlled U.S. Congress and Administration, while praising the efforts of McKinley and the Republicans who controlled the Ohio General

Assembly. Like most state platforms, the Republican's effort barely touched on state issues, devoting most of its attention to the tariff and money questions. The Republicans praised the McKinley tariff as

"the best exemplification of the principles of protection and reciprocity that has found expression" and favored "honest money composed of gold, silver, and paper, maintained at equal value."

Although most political obseirvers interpreted Cleveland's 1892 election as a major defeat for protection, McKinley was not about to let the issue die. McKinley had built his reputation as the Republican's tariff expert and to have abandoned the issue would have damaged both

31 Cleveland Citizen. 8 April 1893; Witt, 10. 32 The Plow and Hammer. 12 April 1893; Cleveland Citizen. 8 April 1893. 115 his presidential aspirations and the party's chances of retaining

control of the Ohio General Assembly and governor's office. As such,

McKinley and Ohio's Republicans were determined to make the tariff the

cornerstone of its 1893 campaign. As early as February 1893 McKinley

was attacking the Democrat's tariff plank and telling audiences that the

party would fight its coming battles on the basis of the tariff. The

keynote speaker at the state Republican convention. Congressman Charles

Grosvenor, praised the McKinley tariff as a "marvel of wisdom" and the

"wisest tariff legislation the country has ever seen." While making 130

speeches in eighty-six of the state's eighty-eight counties, McKinley

stressed the benefits of the tariff and paid only passing attention to

other issues including the currency question.33

The Democrats were only too happy to center their campaign on the

tariff. The issue, they thought, had propelled Cleveland into the White

House in 1892, and would deliver them control of the state's government.

The convention chairman called the argument that protection led to

higher wages "a delusion and a snare" and insisted that the money became

"lodged in the pockets of employers." In an obvious attack on McKinley,

he went on to denounce "the leading advocates of the doctrine of

taxation for the protection of capital" and blamed protection for the current depression. The Democrats choose their best expert on the issue,

Lawrence Meal, to inin against McKinley. A Chillicothe lawyer, Neal led the free trader forces at the Democrats's 1892 convention in Chicago and authored the platform's tariff plank. The plank called protection a

"robbeiry of the great majority for the benefit of a few" and insisted that "the Federal Government has no Constitutional power to impose and collect tariff duties, except for the purpose of revenue only." The

33 Morgan, 174-75; McKinley, Speeches. 633-39; Smith 642; Sherman, 1199; Ohio State Journal. 8, 9 June 1893. 116 platform singled out the McKinley tariff as "the culminating atrocity of

class legislation. "34

As they did in 1891, the Democrats avoided the monetary question.

Except for its endorsement of the Democrats 1892 monetary plank, the

state platform «ras conspicuously silent on the issue even though just

days earlier President Cleveland had called a special session of

Congress to repeal the Sherman Silver Purchase Act. The Democrats knew

that the issue had the potential to tear the party apart. While

President Cleveland was arguing that the limited coinage of gold allowed

under the Sherman Silver Purchase Act had driven gold from the market,

other Democrats were calling for the unlimited coinage of silver to

increase the currency supply and end the "stringency" gripping the

nation. In Ohio free silver advocates, led by Cleveland Plain Dealer

publisher Holden, introduced a resolution condemning the Republican party for demonetizing silver and calling for the free and unlimited

coinage of silver at sixteen to one, but Democrats who feared that the plank would displease Cleveland joined hard money Democrats to defeat the measure.35

While the state's Democrats and Republicans wanted to fight the election of 1893 on the tariff question, the state's Populists insisted that the paramount issue of the day was the money question and criticized "the hypocrisy of the sham battle over tariff schedules."

Reenergized by the strong shovring in Cleveland in the spring, the

state's Populists saw the currency shortage and the resulting unemployment associated with the Panic of 1893 as clear evidence of the need to both increase the money supply and to free the nation from the grip of speculators and bankers. The party's 1893 platform began by

34 povrell I, 233-34; Smith I, 624-625; Columbus Press-Post. 10 August 1893. 35 Columbus Press-Post. 10-12 August 1893; Cleveland Plain Dealer. 11-12 August 1893. 117 denouncing both the Democrats and Republicans as "servile tools of the money power" who had surrendered "the treasury administration to the

control of British bankers and their Wall Street agents and allies."

Unlike the two previous Ohio People's party conventions which

fretted about the lack of farm support and condemned the leaders of the

Grange and Alliance, the 1893 convention ignored the farmers and turned

its attention to urban workers and organized labor. The party's strong showings in Cleveland and Akron and the continued indifference of farm

leaders convinced the Populist leaders that the party's future resided in the cities.

Cleveland Populists were largely responsible for writing the party's platform, which was divided into national and state sections.

Other than the obligatory endorsement of the Omaha platform, the national section dealt entirely with the money question. Reflecting the party's new urban bias, the platform warned of the gold standard's

"deadly consequences for the industrial classes," but made no mention of its impact on the state's farmers. To avoid these deadly consequences, the Populists demanded both the free and unlimited coinage of silver at sixteen to one and the government issue "full legal tender paper money .

. . in volume sufficient to restore and maintain normal and healthy prices." Additionally, the platform called for the abolition of national banks.

The state section of the platform also sought to attract urban voters as most of the planks dealt with urban concerns. Planks called for the municipal ownership of street railways, gas and electric plants, and all other natural monopolies, the end of the contracting system on public works, and home rule for the cities. The only other planks demanded the initiative and referendum and the state provide free school books for public school students.

118 The party nominated B.J. Bracken, a well-connected Columbus labor leader, for governor. Bracken's labor credentials were impressive. A lasterer by trade, he was a leader of Columbus's Phoenix Assembly No.

2960 of the Knights of Labor, a former Recording Secretary of the

Columbus Trades and Labor Assembly, a longtime member of the Ohio State

Trades and Labor Assembly's three-man legislative committee, the editor of a small Columbus labor newspaper. The Sun, and the legislative correspondent for the Cleveland Central Labor Union's Citizen. Bracken also had impressive People's party credentials. He attended the inaugural convention of the Ohio People's party and presided over the creation of the Franklin County People's party.36

The election proved to be a disappointment for Bracken and the

Ohio Populists. Bracken garnered 1.9% of the vote, only a slight increase over the 1.7% that Weaver had polled the year before. The increase was more dramatic in the state's ten most urban counties. In these counties Bracken collected 2.2% of the vote, whereas Weaver only polled 1.5%. Cleveland's Cuyahoga county lead the way with 4.5% of the voters casting their ballot for the Populist ticket. The party would not substantially increase its urban vote until the following fall.37

C i n c i n n a t i

As in Cleveland, the third party movement in Cincinnati predated the establishment of the People's party. In March 1891 reformers, socialists, and trade unionists met to foinn a party and nominate a slate of candidates for the upcoming municipal election. Although the

Cincinnati Commercial Gazette argued that there was only a "sprinkling" of trade unionists present, the Cincinnati Times-Star characterized the new organization as a "labor" ticket and a "workingman's party."

3® Columbus Dispatch. 4 July 1893; Columbus Press-Post. 5 July 1893; Ohio Fazmer. 13 July 1893. 37 Report of the Secretary of State. 1894. 278-460. 119 Calling their new organization the "Citizen's party," the 150 delegates declared that politicians from the two major parties had betrayed the interests of the people and were manipulated by the city's "monopolists, trusts, and corporations." To purify city politics and restore democracy, the party called for home rule and the municipal ownership of the city's gas, electric, and street railway franchises. The new party drew up a slate of candidates for office which included Gustav Tafel, the Democratic nominee for mayor, and Theodore Horstmann, the Republican nominee for city solicitor.

The selection of candidates provoked controversy. Led by ULP veteran and Knights of Labor Executive Board member Hugh Cavanaugh, the delegates associated with the rapidly declining Knights of Labor

District Assembly 48 argued that by nominating candidates belonging to the traditional parties that the Citizen's party would attract few voters and do little to change the status quo. The delegates argued that only by nominating "new names" could the party gain the trust of the voters and be sure that those elected would not be tools of capitalists. The controversy was so disruptive that the party rescinded its nominations, but vowed to continue as a party.3s

Although a number of the Citizen's party's leaders were active in the Cincinnati Central Labor Council (CLC), including CLC's founders

Frank Rist and Louis Benjamin, the central body steered clear of any formal affiliation with the new body. The CLC had a formal policy prohibiting partisan activity. As the first issue of the CLC's newspaper, the Chronicle, declared, "The Central Labor Council is a purely labor concern. Politics and religion are entirely excluded from the deliberations of the council." When the Citizen's party was formed, a few delegates suggested that the CLC should join, but after "a lengthy discussion" the trade unionists "concluded that the Central Labor

38 Cincinnati Ccanmercial Gazette. 22 March 1891; Cincinnati Times-Star. 23 March 1891. 120 Council as a body take no definite action concerning the matter, leaving

that to each local or individual member" according to CLC minutes. 3»

Despite its refusal to join the third party movement, the CLC saw

political reform as the only way to redress the problems facing the

nation's workers and clearly supported the ideals of the Citizen's party

and the Alliance's growing third party movement. The central body's

declaration of principles called the existing industrial system "wrong

and immoral" as it allows "idlers to roll in luxury," while "wealth producers live in poverty." The CLC's declaration continued.

It is self-evident that as the power of capital combines and increases the political freedom of the toiling masses becomes more and more a delusive farce. There can be no harmony of between capital and labor under the present industrial system, for the single reason that capital, in its modern character, consists very largely of rents, interest and profits wrongly extorted from the producers, who possesses neither the land or the means of production, and is therefore compelled to sell his arms, brains, or both, to the possessor of the land and the means of production, and at such prices as an uncertain and speculative market may allow.

The CLC blamed this injustice on the government for allowing the "ruling moneyed classes" to profit from "high rents, costly transportation, gigantic corners in grain and other provisions, and by monopolizing the issue of money." The CLC also demanded a series of reforms, including the eight hour day, the prohibition of the contract system for public works, the enforcement of all labor laws, the issuance of Greenbacks directly from the government, and the abolition of conspiracy laws and

"all class privileges."40

The CLC's reluctance to join the new third party movement can be in part attributed to the organizations's small size and fragile nature.

39 "Cincinnati Central Labor Council's Minutes Books," 4 March 1891; Chronicle. February 1892. 40 Reprinted in Cincinnati Chronicle. February 1892. 121 It is not clear how many trade unionists belonged to unions affiliated with the CLC in 1891, but the numbers were small. The previous year the organization voted down a measure to count its total membership for fear that the "numbers will reveal our weakness." Probably no more than 2,000 workers belonged to unions affiliated with the CLC. Hoping to become the sole laibor body in the city, the CLC did not want to pursue policies that would detract from its efforts to unite with other labor bodies such as the Building Trade Council and the once-powerful but rapidly declining Knights of Labor District Assembly 48. Working with the

Citizen's party and making the central body a partisan organization would undoubtedly have alienated potential trade unionists.

Thus when the third party movement was founded in Cincinnati, the

CLC found itself in a dilemma. CLC leaders believed that political action was the best way to improve the lives of workers and that the

People's party was the best political vehicle to do so, but the organization feared political action would divide workers and derail its efforts to expand. To skirt this problem, CLC leaders participated in third party politics as individuals rather than as CLC leaders.

For no other reason than the convenience of its central location and the city having played host to the OLP's inaugural convention, those organizing the People's party choose Cincinnati to host the party's first convention. The decision was a boon for the local third party movement. As the convention's organizers were liberal with credentials, about 100 Cincinnatians attended. The rousing speeches and presence of thousands of delegates and reporters encouraged local party officials to believe in the vitality of the new movement. Following the convention, local People's party's leaders were predicting that the party would poll

41 "Cincinnati Central Labor Council's Minutes Books," 122 between 15,000 and 40,000 votes in Cincinnati's Hamilton county in the fall elections.42

Despite the CLC's official reluctance to work with the third party movement, in the wake of the Cincinnati conference trade unionists with ties to the CLC began vying with Cavanaugh and the Knights of Labor for control of the local People's party. The conflict between the trade unionists and the Knights had little to do with People's party issues or strategy. It continued a rivalry dating back to the mid 1880s. The trade unionists won the initial battle when the Hamilton County People's party elected as its chairman CLC founder Frank Rist. The rivalry again erupted on the eve of the state People's party convention as the trade unionists initially opposed the state central committee's plan to make

Cavanaugh the convention's chairman. To appease the trade unionists

( and to increase support in the state's largest city), the executive committee promised that the lieutenant governor's slot would go to a

Hamilton County trade unionist.43

Cincinnati trade unionists were active at the state People's party's August 1891 convention. The New Nation reported that 137

Cincinnati trade unions supported the People's party, but that number was definitely an exaggeration. There were not that many trade unions in the whole city. The Times-Star reported that the Building Trades

Council as well as the printers, metal workers, shoemakers, and tin workers unions sent delegates to the convention. A number of trade unionists, including O.P. Rowland, W.H. Stevenson, and Rist, began campaigning for the lieutenant governor's nomination. The state's

People's party selected Rist who passed out cards at the convention

42 Cincinnati Commercial Gazette. 31 May 1891, 7 August 1891; Cincinnati Times Star. 6 August 1891 43 Cincinnati Commercial Gazette. 5, 7 August 1891; Cincinnati Times- Star. 5, 6 August 1891. 123 declaring, "Frank L. Rist for Lieutenant Governor means 40,000 votes in

Hamilton County and the [election of] the legislative ticket.

Rist was not alone in thinking that the new party would poll well in Cincinnati. The OLP came within 1000 votes of capturing the mayor's office in 1887 and local observers predicted that the People's party would do the same. On labor day, former Republican Governor Joseph B.

Foraker wrote a political ally:

McKinley is here today to address the Labor people at Woodsdale. I was not down town early enough to see the parade, but I am told it was a monstrous demonstration. One gentleman estimated the number in the procession at 15,000. I think that he must surely have been mistaken, but, however, that may be, our people are considerably disturbed by it, since the impression seems to be prevailing among them, that they will nearly all vote for Sites [Seitz] and the straight labor ticket.

Both Rist's enthusiasm and Foraker's fears proved to be misplaced.

When the votes were counted Populist gubernatorial candidate John Seitz polled only 3,182 votes in Hamilton County or about 4.3% of the total vote. 46

In 1892 and 1893 the CLC and Cincinnati trade unionists enjoyed tremendous success in organizing new workers and building membership in the CLC. In a number of highly publicized labor disputes, trade unionists won union recognition, substantial wage increases, and improved working conditions. In April of 1892 Cincinnati's 2000 union carpenters threatened to strike unless the Builders' Congress agreed to a pay increase to 33 1/3 cents per hour by May 1. Shortly before the

44 New Nation (Boston), 1 August 1891; Cincinnati Times Star. 6 August 1891; Cincinnati Commercial Gazette. 5, 7 August 1891 45 J.B. Foraker (Cincinnati) to Charles L. Kurtz (Columbus) 7 September 1891. Charles L. Kurtz Papers Box 45 Folder 1, Ohio Historical Society, Columbus, Ohio. Also see Foraker to Asa Bushnell (Springfield, OB) 7 September 1891. Joseph Bensen Foraker Papers Box 27 Folder 4, Cincinnati Historical Society, Cincinnati, Ohio 46 Report of the Secretary of State. 1892. 277. 124 deadline, the Builders' Congress granted the pay increase as well as

time-and-a-half for overtime and double time for Sunday. Plasterers

avoided a strike after the Contracting Plasterers' Association agreed to

hire only union members, raise wages to 40 cents per hour, and reduce

the workweek to 53 hours. In September of 1892 Brewery Workers Local

No. 12 won a five year fight with local Beer Brewers' Association. The

agreement provided for a union shop, the right of workmen to live and

board where they choose, a limitation on the number of apprentices, a

reduction in the workweek to 55 1/2 hours, weekly pay, 25 cents per hour

more for overtime, and an arbitration system for grievances.4?

While local unions gained members, the CLC focused on uniting all

of the city's labor organizations under its banner. Maintaining the

divisions within the labor movement robbed workers of their influence

over political affairs, the CLC called for Knights of Labor craft

assemblies, the Amalgamated Council of Building Trades (which already

worked with the CLC on political matters through a standing joint

committee), the Carpenters' District Council, the Furniture Workers'

Council, and the Machinery Trades Council to work with the CLC to form a

single central body. After several meetings and the drafting of a

proposed constitution, the merger movement fell apart due to the fear

that the CLC leaders would dominate the new organization and push other

leaders out the of the way. Surprisingly, the failed merger brought new

members to the CLC as many locals sought affiliation in the CLC as well

as the more craft oriented councils .48

47 Morris, 352-358. CLC Minutes, 17 October 1893, 7 November 1893, 5 December 1893; Cincinnati Chronicle. March 1893, April 1893, October 1893, December 1893. The leaders of the merger movement were also the leaders of the Cincinnati People's party. The joint merger committee, all of whom endorsed the merger, was composed of William Brown and J.B. Heberle, both of whom were Populist candidates for the Ohio General Assembly in 1893, R.H. Wheeler, a member of the executive board of the Hamilton Count People's party and the Grand Master Workman of D.A. 48 of the Knights of Labor, Frank Rist, emd A.A. Varelman. 125 The successful organizing drives and strikes led to increases in the number of Cincinnatians belonging to unions, while the merger drive increased the number of Cincinnati locals affiliated with the CLC. By the fall of 1893 membership in CLC-affiliabed unions numbered just under

20,000. This increase in membership gave CLC leaders increasing confidence in the political power of the central body. Whereas the 2,000 or so members the CLC claimed in 1891 would make little impact in local election, the close to 20,000 CLC members in 1893 equaled about one- third of the city's electorate.49

The most immediate concerns of Cincinnati trade unionists revolved around corruption in municipal affairs. Like in Cleveland and other major cities, Cincinnati's public utility companies and contractors regularly bribed local politicians to secure contracts, franchises, and favorable legislation from the city. Historian Zane Miller has referred to Cincinnati's government in the early and mid 1880s as "a chaotic political system based on unorganized political corruption." By 1892 this unorganized corruption had given way to the much more efficient, organized corruption under the local Republican machine led by George

"Boss" Cox and former governor Joseph B. Foraker. To secure political favors utilities and contractors paid vast sums to Cox, Foraker and the

Republican party. For example, Andrew Hickenlooper, the owner of the

Cincinnati Gas, Light and Coke Company, which supplied manufactured gas for city street lights, agreed to pay Cox $3,500 four times a year for his help. Payments to Foraker took on a more legitimate appearance.

Since he was a lawyer, utilities and contractors simply placed him on retainer. 50

49 Cincinnati Chronicle. October 1893. 50 Zane L. Miller, Boss Cox's Cincinnati; Urban Politics in the Progressive Bra (New York: Oxford University Press, 1968) 59-110; Everett Walters, Joseph Benson Foraker: An Oncomnromisina Republican (Columbus: Ohio History Press, 1948), 124. 126 Cincinnati trade unionists became Increasingly active In local politics as they became concerned with what they saw as the rising corruption of the city's government. Issue after Issue of the CLC's newspaper. The Chronicle, contained complaints about the "boodle ring" composed of "the gas company, electric light combine. Consolidated street railroad company, and corrupt politicians." The Chronicle accused the Consolidated Street Railway of "charging exorbitant fares and furnishing slow and Inadequate facilities." Declaring that "the power of boodle has been too great," the paper protested the granting of a $1,000,000 contract to the "electric light combine" and fought the construction of a new water works on the grounds that the cost of the

"stealage" would be born by the workingman's pocketbook. The Chronicle called on trade unionists to exercise vigilance to ensure that the municipal government functioned In the "Interests of the people Instead of machine politicians."sx

Not only did the franchises exploit their monopoly position by charging Cincinnatians inflated rates and providing poor service, the

CLC maintained that each of these franchises sought "to make slaves of its employes" by refusing to recognize unions, harassing union members, paying low wages, requiring workers to labor more than eight hours a day, and Ignoring labor laws. The CLC scored the Board of

Administration for giving the contract to build a large viaduct to a company which brought In outside workers willing to work for half the standard rate. The CLC also carried on a two year battle to force the

Consolidated Street Railway to comply with a state law requiring the

Installation of vestibules on each car for the protection of drivers and conductors. Not only did the company Ignore the law, the county

51 Cincinnati Chronicle. April 1892, July 1892, December 1892, February 1893, March 1893, May 1893; CLC Minutes, 17 March 1893. 127 prosecutor refused to take action against the company's transgression of the law.5:

Particularly offensive to the CLC was an incident involving the

Edison Light Company. Despite a state law forbidding employers from coercing employees to quit membership in labor unions, the company dismissed six employees for belonging to the Electrical Workers' union.

The dismissed employees promptly won a judgment in the local police court and the company's superintendent was fined $100 plus costs. The company appealed the ruling to Hamiliton's County's Common Pleas court, where its lawyer, Joseph Foraker, admitted that the employees were fired for belonging to the union, but insisted that the law was an unconstitutional restriction on the right of the company toengage in commerce. The judge upheld the constitutionality of the law, but did so in a manner which greatly mitigated its effectiveness. The judge declared that an employer may discharge an employee "for any reason, but shall not attempt to coerce him to quit the labor organization." The ruling infuriated the CLC and local trade unionists. The Chronicle suggested that the effect of the ruling was as dangerous as if the court declared that "the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution of the United States are unconstitutional."s3

To rein in local franchises the CLC called for the Ohio General

Assembly to pass bills giving municipal governments greater control over the franchises and the authority to operate them if necessary. Not only would this improve service and reduce costs to consumers, it would rid the city and state of corruption. The Chronicle declared.

The ownership of light and transport facilities of this city should be vested in the people, where it rightfully belongs, and such men as

52 Cincinnati Chronicle. December 1892, May 1893, December 1893, December 1894; CLC Minutes, 21 November 1893, 16 October 1894. 53 Cincinnati Chronicle. December 1892, May 1893; L.W. Davis v The State of Ohio 30 Ohio Weeklv Law Bulletin 342. 128 [telephone and streetcar magnet] John Kllgour, Andy Hickenlooper, etc will be deprived of their incentive to bribe members of the Legislature and city boards.

Not only did the state legislature refuse to heed the calls for municipal ownership, it also — thanks to the combined efforts of rivals

Foraker and Banna — passed legislation exempted street railways from certain state taxes.5<

To protest the General Assembly's decision, the CLC organized the

Direct Legislation League of Hamilton County, an organization designed to work for the adoption of an amendment adding the initiative and referendum to the state constitution. By undermining the power of the

Ohio General Assembly and empowering the people, the CLC hoped to free the state from a state legislature corrupted by capitalists and other monopolists. Although the Direct Legislation League was not officially connected with the People's party, the roster of officers reads like a who's who of Hamilton County Populists. Rist served as the organization's president, E.M. Davis held the vice-presidency, and Louis

Benjamin was the secretary. Other officers included People's party leaders E.P. Foster and J.R. Jacobs. Of the league's officers, only

Foster, a minister, was not active in the CLC. The Direct Legislation

League allowed the CLC to coordinate political activity with the

People's party without actually forming a formal political alliance. In this way it served as a crucial intermediary step in the CLC's evolution from non-partisanship to a formal alliance with the People's party.ss

The financial difficulties associated with the panic of 1893 compounded the CLC's frustration with the with the city and the state's political environment. The panic hit Cincinnati particularly hard.

According to the state's Bureau of Labor Statistics, "almost every man

5* Cincinnati Chronicle. February 1893; CLC Minutes, 5 January 1892, 1 March 1892; New Nation. 5 March 1892 55 Cincinnati Chronicle. June 1893. 129 it seems was out of work" in the wards populated by the city's

industrial workers during the fall of 1893. Families quickly depleted

what savings they had been aüsle to accumulate, forcing women and

children into the labor force. As a state official observed, "strong,

abled bodied men remained in enforced idleness while the wives and

children supported them by taking in washing and scrubbing." s6

Drawing heavily upon the Populist critique of the American

economic system, the CLC blamed the financial crisis on a conspiracy of

European capitalists and Washington lawmakers. Particularly offensive

to the leaders of the CLC was Grover Cleveland's proposal to repeal the

Sherman Silver Purchase Act (1890) which allowed a limited coinage of

silver.

[F]oreign capitalists . . . have in the past secured legislation by our Congress which has robbed the American producers of millions of dollars at one fall swoop. And still again we are met with a demand that our coinage laws be so amended as to demonetize our silver dollars and establish the gold standard of coinage to conform to the idea of the Bank of England and the Rothschild. Once this scheme is effected the masses of the people of the United States will have descended one more step toward absolute slavery.

To combat this conspiracy, the Chronicle called for Cincinnati workers to "rise to the full dignity of their manhood" and "throw off the yoke of the thieving statesmen and financiers who now do our law making and banking. "57

A Chronicle editorial on the eve of the 1893 election reveals the growing closeness between the CLC and the People's party. Although the paper insisted that the "Central Labor Council has wisely forbidden the introduction and discussion of partisan politics on its floor and

56 Raymond Boryczka and Lorin Lee Cary, Wo Strength Without Onion; An Illustrated History of Ohio Workers. 1803-1980 (Columbus: Ohio Historical Society, 1982), 148. 57 Cincinnati Chronicle. August 1893. 130 through the Chronicle," it praised the People's party as the "only party whose platform approximates the declaration of principles promulgated by the Central Labor Council." Noting that the People's party's legislative ticket was composed mostly of "faithful and energetic delegates and officers of the Central Labor Council," the paper argued that only the election of Populists would assure "honest and just laws" and an economical administration.ss

Labor organizations and the CLC were not the only ones angry with

Boss Cox and the administration of Cincinnati's government. A growing number of business and civic leaders saw rampant corruption as the cause of higher taxes and inefficient services, and church and moral reformers disliked the wide open nature of the town, which they asserted was run from Cox's downtown saloon. To unite the anti-Cox forces, a committee of six business and civic leaders, three Democrats and three

Republicans, formed a new Citizen's party. The leaders of the Citizen's party choose Theodore Horstmann as their standard bearer. The choice was politically shrewd. The incumbent Corporation Counsel who had a long record of battling both Cox and the city's utility companies,

Horstmann had already won city-wide election and had ties to the city's large German community. Rather than promising a wide range of reforms, the Citizen's party simply guaranteed that their ticket would provide a

"clean administration of city affairs." sa

Soon after the Citizen's party nominated of Horstmann, the city's

People's party held its convention to plan for the upcoming municipal election. Discord broke out as soon as he meeting began, and the party divided into two factions. Led by labor leaders Thomas Butterworth,

Voiles, Rist, and Benjamin, the larger of the two factions urged the party to endorse Horstmann. They argued that the Citizen's ticket

58 Cincinnati Chronicle. October 1893. 59 Miller, 88-89. 131 offered the best chance of winning the election and freeing the city

from the corruption of the Cox machine. The other faction, led by minister E.P. Foster and shopkeeper Zadoc Griffiths, insisted that the

party nominate its own candidate. They maintained that the party's

nominee should support the Omaha platform and that long lasting reform

could only come through a permanent organization. The non-labor faction

supported John L. Grover, a former Republican with close ties to the

African-American community, for the party's mayoral nomination. The rift in the party was so great that each faction nominated its candidate

in the name of the People's party.so

Although a number of prominent Democrats, including Congressman and Enquirer publisher John McLean, urged the city's Democrats to

support Horstmann, "Cox Democrats" insisted that the party nominate its own candidate and prevented Horstmann's nomination. With neither

Horstmann Democrats nor Cox Democrats wanting a strong candidate, the nearly-moribond Cincinnati Democratic party nominated Isaac Miller, a weak candidate with little support either inside or outside of the party. Like Horstmann, Miller ran as a reformer and promised a clean administration, but he was unable to generate much enthusiasm during the campaign and newspapers and the other campaigns dismissed any possibility of his election. Horstmann supporters feared that he would divide the anti-Cox vote and keep disgruntled Democrats from voting for the Citizen's party.6i

Although the Chronicle criticized the Citizen's party for failing to endorse the municipal ownership of street railway and light franchises, the CLC joined the labor-led People's party faction in

60 Cincinnati Enquirer. 8 March 1894; Cincinnati Tribune. 8 March 94. The Horstmann faction had the support of six of the seven members of the Hamilton County People's party's Executive Committee, and five of these six were active in the CLC — Thomas Butterworth, Rist, John Crofton, Louis Benjamin, and John Jacobs. 61 Miller, 89; Cincinnati Tribune. 16-19 March 1894. 132 endorsing Horstmann. Although it marked the first time in the CLC's

history that the body had endorsed a candidate for office, there was

almost no opposition to the endorsement of a mayoral candidate. The

only controversy arose over which People's party candidate the CLC would endorse. A minority of CLC delegates supported Grover's candidacy on the grounds that he was the only candidate to support the People's party's Omaha platform and the municipal ownership of public utilities.

The majority of the CLC delegates, though, saw Horstmann as the only candidate able to defeat Cox's nominee John Caldwell. The CLC's resolution declared:

Whereas, the political bosses have obtained such complete control of our municipal affairs that the will of the people can no longer be expressed in their respective party conventions, and the corruption among our city officials is such that large corporations can violate their contracts, under which they hold valuable public franchises from the people, and defy the law at will. . . . Resolved, that we, the members of the Central Labor Council representing twenty thousand workingmen, heartily approve the action taken by a committee of citizens in putting a citizen's ticket into the field, holding that such action was not only justifiable, but imperative, under prevailing circumstances, and we hereby endorse the whole ticket and ask all union men and friends to give their unqualified support to the Citizen's Ticket and especially to Theodore Horstmann for Mayor, in order that the gang of boodlers which now infest the city may be ousted by an overwhelming majority and honesty in municipal government take the place of corruption; be it furthers:

62 CLC Minutes, 20 March 1894; Cincinnati Commercial Gazette. 21 March 1894; Cincinnati Enquirer. 21 March 1894; Cincinnati Tribune. 24 March 1894. The municipal election of 1894 cemented the CLC's position as the preemimient labor organization in the city. Not only did the Building Trades Council, most of whose members belonged to the CLC, follow the CLC's lead in endorsing Horstmann, but the Knights of Labor's praised the CLC as the most important element of the city's labor movement. 133 During the campaign the labor-led People's party faction and the

CLC worked closely to secure Horstmann's election. They scheduled a series of mass meetings in which the heads of a dozen local unions made five-minute speeches urging workers to support Horstmann and the

Citizen's party's slate. During Horstmann's public appearances Rist and

CLC officials occupied prominent places on the podium, and the candidate invoked labor's support as a sign of his popular support. As historian

Zane Miller has argued, Horstmann was "overwhelmingly popular among the workingmen. "«a

Throughout the campaigpi, the laborites avoided class rhetoric.

Not only did they support a reform effort begun by business and civic leaders and the nomination of a lawyer, they portrayed the fortunes of business leaders and workers as intertwined. The Chronicle blamed the city's low wages and high unemployment on the high taxes caused by Cox's corruption of the city's administration. The city's high tax rate, the paper argued, "has driven many of our largest manufacturers from the city, and in that manner thousands of our citizens, with families depending upon them, were thrown out of employment and forced to compete with their more fortunate brethren."64

Despite his support among workers and others dissatisfied with

Cox, Horstmann was unable to overcome Cox's formidable machine. Cox kept his party workers in line and secured the support of a number of

Democratic leaders with the promise of contracts and 1,500 city jobs.

Although he was unable to win a majority, Cox's candidate, John

Caldwell, won the election easily as the chart below shows.

Cincinnati Commercial Gazette. 21, 25 March 1894; Cincinnati Tribune. 30 March 1894; Miller, 88. 64 Cincinnati Chronicle. March 1894. 134 Candidate (party) Vote % Caldwell (Republican) 26,667 45.6 Horstmann (Citizen's/People's) 19,912 34.1 Miller (Democrat) 11,657 19.9 Grover (People's) 216 0.4 Total 58,452 100

Table 4.2: Results of Cincinnati's 1894 Mayoral Election. Cincinnati Enquirer. 3 April 1894.

Although Horstmann and the Citizen's party lost the election to

Cox's candidate, the contest offered some hope to labor and People's party activists. In a little more than six weeks, the Citizen's party was able to form, nominate a candidate, organize a campaign, and collect over a third of the vote in a three-way race. This suggested a dissatisfaction with the traditional parties as well as the potential for the party to do well in Cincinnati. While moving the CLC and the

People's party closer together, the municipal election of 1894 did not see the two organizations forming a formal political alliance. That would not come until the late summer after the city and the nation witnessed the turbulent events of spring and summer of 1894.

Soon after the start of the American Railway Union's (ARU) boycott of Pullman Sleeping Cars in late June of 1894, Cincinnati area switchmen reluctantly agreed to participate. Their reluctance stemmed from the fear that area railroads would simply replace them as there was, according to one striker, a "good number of unemployed switchmen looking for work." Their fears were realized on the second day of the boycott when the Cincinnati, Hamilton, and Dayton Railroad fired its switchmen for refusing to hauidle Pullman ceurs. Thirty-five hundred Cincinnati-

135 area yard men and switchmen immediately walked off their jobs in a

sympathy strike, and stopped the movement of freight through Cincinnati.

With the exception of the Pennsylvania Railroad, all of the city's rail

yards were shut down.«5

From the cutset, the local ARU organizer, Phelan, warned the

strikers to act responsibly. "He have no malice toward the railroad companies," he insisted, "He are fighting . . . the actions of the

Pullman Company. If any man gets drunk or interferes with company property or with scabs who the officials may hire, he will be discharged and if he gets thrown into jail, he will have to get himself out."ss

On July 2, Federal Appeals Court Judge Hilliam Howard Taft intervened. One of the roads shut down by the strikers, the Cincinnati,

New Orleans, and Texas Pacific Railroad (commonly called the Cincinnati

Southern), was in receivership. After the railroad's engineers refused to work with "scab" switchmen, Taft, at the request of the receiver, enjoined the strikers from interfering with the operation of the line.

"Any act to intimidate the men operating it is forbidden," he declared,

"The trains of that line are going to run, whether certain men approve their running or not." «7

The following day, at the request of the Cincinnati Southern's receiver, Taft ordered the arrest of Phelan and the leaders of the ARU for impeding the operation of the railroad. Not only did the receiver present affidavits asserting that Phelan had threatened violence against those remaining at work during the strike, he asserted that the strike

65 Cincinnati Tribune. 27, 28, 30 June 1894. 66 Cincinnati Tribune. 29 June 1894. 67 Cincinnati Tribune. 1-3 June 1894. 136 was part of a conspiracy by Bugene Debs, Phelan, and other American

Railway Union officials to stop the railroad from doing b u s in ess .«8

The arrest of Phelan and strikers outraged the CLC and its leaders. At a special meeting the CLC passed resolutions supporting

Phelan and the strikers. The resolutions insisted that the first amendment guarantee of freedom of speech protected Phelan when he called for workers to join the strike and strikers when they yelled at strikebreakers. Rist declared, "The present fight of the ARU is the fight of every labor organization in this land, and every laboring man."

Cincinnati newspapers feared that the CLC might launch a general strike to support Phelan and the ARU strike. 69

The CLC did not launch a general strike to protest the arrest of

Phelan, but it did organize a series of mass meetings. The first took place the day after Phelan's arrest as 1,500 strikers marched from strike headquarters to Workman's Hall, the CLC's meeting place. At workman's hall thousands of workers jammed inside, while over 2000 were turned away and waited in the streets. Those inside heard speeches from

Phelan and CLC President T.J. Donnelly detailing the abuses of George

Pullman, William Howard Taft, and Grover Cleveland. On each of the next four nights, the CLC organized smaller rallies in every part of the city. The protests culminated on July 9th as the CLC rented the Music

Ball for what it hoped would be the largest mass meeting in the city's history. One CLC leader predicted that over 50,000 would attend the parade and meeting.

Cincinnati was so tense on the eve of the Music Ball rally that civic leaders feared that the city was on the verge of riot like it had

68 Cincinnati Tribune. 4 July 1894. Other strikers were arrested after confrontations with strikebreakers. One striker was arrested for calling a strikebreaker "a dirty scab" and advising him to quit working. This striker was later acquitted after witnesses testified that he did not make the remarks. 69 Cincinnati Tribune. 5 July 1894; Cincinnati Commercial Gazette. 5 July 1894; Cincinnati Enquirer. 5 July 1894. 137 seen in 1884. Mayor Caldwell wired Governor McKinley requesting that

the state militia send 250 stands of arms to the city's police and

asking that the national guard be ready if needed. Cincinnati police

began making preparations for a large riot. The Commercial Gazette

assured readers that the police department's Gatling gun "is stored in

the police armory, and conveniently placed near it are 10,000 rounds of

Springfield cartridges."70

The Music Hall event lived up to its billing as the largest

protest meeting in the city's history. Over 6,000 workers paraded from

city hall to the Music Ball. Along the route tens of thousands of

supporters cheered the protesters on. Workers and citizens jammed the

hall and thousands more were turned away. Inside, the CLC officials

railed against the nation's railroads, corporations generally, the policies of the Cleveland administration, and the corruption of the whole political system, but most of venom was reserved for Taft and the use of the labor injunction.71

On July 13, Taft found Phelan guilty of violating the injunction enjoining him from interfering with the Cincinnati Southern and sentenced him to six months in jail. The evidence against Phelan was inconsistent and fragmentary, but Taft nonetheless insisted that Phelan had engaged in "that secret terrorism which is so effective for discouraging new men from filling the strikers' places and which is so hard to prove in a court of justice." Soon after Phelan's conviction, the strike petered out and the defeated workers returned to w o r k .72

Phelan's conviction and the defeat of the ARU exacerbated the tensions between the CLC and the traditional parties and propelled the

70 william McKinley (Columbus) to John A. Caldwell (Cincinnati) , 5 July 1894, McKinley Letterbooks, Ohio Historical Society, Columbus, Ohio; Cincinnati Commercial Gazette. 71 Cincinnati Tribune. 9 July 1894. 72 Cincinnati Tribune. 17 July 1894. 138 CLC into a formal alliance with the People's party in the fall of 1694.

In late August, the CLC announced the formation of an independent party.

We demand the unconditional emancipation from the thralldom of capital and ask for freedom, equality, and fraternity. And knowing that the people's arsenal of strength is the ballot-box, we hereby call upon all liberty-loving and patriotic citizens to sever their affiliations with the Plutocratic parties, and aid in the advancement of a movement which will secure justice and righteousness, fraternity and equality to all.73

The principle speaker at the CLC's meeting was John McBride who had just announced his intention to f o m an Ohio labor party and to merge the party with the People's party. McBride told the workers that only through the formation of an independent labor party could they free themselves from the chain of slavery. Although McBride's speech was met with great enthusiasm, the crowd went wild when CLC president Thomas

Donnelly read a letter Phelan sent from his jail cell.

The unwarranted and illegal usurpations of authority by the tools of monopoly as represented by the Republican and Democratic judges of the Federal Courts during the mine and Pullman strikes, has shown the workers that their supposed friends are their worst enemies . . . join the forces of that party whose principles every tmie reformer holds dear to heart — the People's party.74

The delegates to the CLC's meeting voted to work with the People's party in the upcoming election and passed a platform that contained many

Populist demands, including the initiative and referendum. Greenbacks, a form of the single tax, nationalization of mines, public utilities, and

73 "A Manifesto to the Citizens of Hamilton County in General, and the Labor and Reform Organizations in Particular" (Cincinnati Central Labor Council: Cincinnati, 1894); Chronicle. August 1894. 74 Cincinnati Commercial Gazette. 9 September 1894; Cincinnati Enquirer. 9 September 1894. 139 all means of communications and transportation, compulsory education, the eight hour day, and "productive labor for the unemployed."

Shortly afterwards the Hamilton County People's party met and ratified the CLC's platform. The convention also produced a slate of candidates for office. Heeding the ticket were two CLC activists. CLC

President T.J. Donnelly received the party's nomination for Congress in the First District, while shoemaker Robert Wheeler received the nomination in the Second Congressional District. Trade Unionists were also nominated for County Clerk, Sheriff, and Board of Control.7s

Noting that many of the nominees "have held or are still holding positions of honor and trust in the Central Labor Council," the CLC endorsed the People's party's slate of candidates. Until the collapse of the Ohio People's party following its fusion with the Democrats in

1896, Cincinnati's CLC worked closely with the Populists to nominate candidates and to coordinate political activity.76

Columbus

While the Columbus Trades and Labor Assembly (CTLA) had an official policy of non-partisanship at the beginning of the 1890s, organized labor and the city's working class had a de facto alliance with the city's Democratic party. The most prominent men in the city's labor movement, including Perd Balesteria, John McBride, Patrick

McBryde, William Mahon, euid Louis Bauman, were active in the Democratic party, and in many cases used their connections to labor organizations to secure jobs and appointments from the party. In return for this support Columbus's Democrats generally aided labor whenever possible.

The relationship was so beneficial to labor that even CTLA President

75 Cincinnati Chronicle. October 1894. 76 Cincinnati Chronicle. October 1894. 140 s.p. Ewing, who one Republican newspaper described as a "bitter partisan" Republican on national issues, extolled the "pleasant

relations" between organized labor and the Democratic-controlled municipal and state governments.77

The undisputed leader of the city's Democratic party was Allen 6.

Thurman. Active in Democratic politics since the Civil War, Thurman had

served in the United States Senate and on the Ohio Supreme Court and had run as Grover Cleveland's running mate in 1888. Since the late 1870s,

Thurman had been one of the strongest Greenback/Anti-Monopoly advocates in the Democratic party. In 1891 he attacked Republican gubernatorial candidate William McKinley's tariff policy as a part of a conspiracy to aid "intrenched monopoly" and led the free silver forces at the state's

Democratic convention. Bis activities on behalf of monetary reform and against monopolies won Thurman the respect of the state's labor community. As historian Chester McArthur Destler pointed out, Thurman and other Ohio Democratic Greenbackers served as a crucial link between antebellum economic thought and the ideals of the Populist party.7s

Following Thurman's lead, the city's most prominent Democrats spoke in a language that echoed the concerns of the city's workers and the party's anti-monopoly tradition. Mayor George Karb told a labor crowd in September 1891 that the concentration of capital threatened the ideals that Americans had died for during the Civil War and the American

Revolution. "Instead of kings and lords," he said, "we have a constitutional government, corrupted by millionaires and politicians.

We see legislators, judges and other officials using their places for private gain. We see capitalists and speculators bribing the lawmakers and lobbying for schemes to enrich themselves." The president of

77 Columbus Dispatch. 7 September 1891. 78 Chester McArthur Destler, American Radicalism. 1865-1900 (Chicago: Quadrangle, reprint 1966), esp 32-77; McGrane, "Ohio and the Greenback Era." 141 Columbus's Democratic-controlled city council declared, "Labor and capital should be a team that will work side by side, but, unfortunately, labor has to pull most of the load." "It is the unscrupulous and avaricious employer," he continued, that has caused the

"products of labor to be unevenly distributed."79

Not only did the city's Democratic leaders speak in a language that appealed to Columbus's labor community, they also sided with organized labor during strikes and other confrontations with employers.

The most dramatic example occurred during the June 1890 streetcar strike, in which nearly 300 of the city's 350 streetcar drivers, conductors, and barn workers walked off the job demanding that the city's streetcar monopoly pay higher wages and end arbitrary punishment.

The workers, who had been averaging just under twelve cents an hour for a twelve-hour day, demanded fifteen cents an hour for an eleven-and-a- half-hour day and changes in work rules to allow for meal breaks. City and county Democratic officials rallied behind the strikers and promised to use the municipal structure to aid the strikers. The city's police chief, John E. Murphy, declared that he considered the strikers's cause to be "just" and that the department's officers were "in sympathy with the strikers." Murphy initially refused to order the police to remove strikers from company property on the grounds that "the men wear the company's badges and claim they have neither been paid off or discharged." Officers harassed and arrested strikebreakers on a variety of pretexts ranging from disorderly conduct and vagrancy to assault. In one instance, the police filed fraud charges against a strikebreaker who took money from strikers to quit work, but was seen attempting to drive a car the next day. When the streetcar company secured injunctions enjoining the strikers from damaging property or interfering with the operation of the cars, the county sheriff refused to serve the

79 Columbus Dispatch. 1 September 1890; 7 September 1891. 142 injunctions claiming disingenuously, that he did not know who the enjoined men were or where they could be found. Former Democratic

Congressman George Converse volunteered to serve as the strikers's attorney during the dispute, while a Democratic judge organized a relief

fund for the strikers' families. The biggest boost to the strikers came from the Democratic-controlled city council, which urged the streetcar company to meet the strikers's demands and threatened to revoke the company's franchise for failing to meet the requirements of its charter to provide service..so

Public sympathy for the strikers was strong. One city councilman suggested that 90% of the city's residents supported the strikers and opposed the company. When the company attempted to run cars, strikers and supporters often blocked the tracks coming out of the company barns and disconnected the horse teams from the streetcars. When streetcars made it out of the bams, residents would stream into the streets pelting the drivers with debris and blocking the path of the cars. On the fourth day of the strike a few streetcars made their way downtown where crowds numbering close to 5,000 surrounded the cars and lifted them from the tracks.si

Facing a hostile public, 300 striking workers, an unsympathetic police force harassing strikebreakers and unwilling to protect streetcars attempting to operate, and a city council threatening to revoke its charter, the Consolidated Street Railway Company quickly abandoned its efforts to run the streetcars with strikebreakers and agreed to the strikers's demands. The agreement, brokered by Democratic mayor Philip Bruck and the leaders of the city's business community, gave the strikers the pay increase they demanded and changes in work rules. The strikers viewed the agreement as a complete victory. E.K.

Stewart, the general manager of the Consolidated Street Railway Company,

80 Ohio State Journal (Columbus), 5, 6, 8, 10 June 1890. 81 Ohio State Journal 10 June 1890. 143 agreed, complaining that with the Police department working "hand in

hand with the strikers" it was impossible for the company to win the

strike .82

Given the close relationship between organized labor and the

city's Democratic party, it is not surprising that the People's party

had an inauspicious start in Columbus and Franklin County. Local

Populists had to meet twice in the summer of 1891 in order to organize

the Franklin County People's party. Democrats flooded the first meeting, hoping to convince the party to simply endorse the local

Democratic slate. The local People's party organizers had to adjourn

the meeting and invite those willing to support the People's party to

reconvene at a later date. Newspapers suggested that nearly two-thirds of the 150 people who attended the first meeting were Democrats hoping

to control the new party.83

When the Franklin County People's party reconvened in August, the

Democrats again tried to take over the party, but the organizers insisted that only those who would pledge to support the local ticket and the party's platform would be allowed to participate. Of the over

100 people in attendance, only thirty-four people, seven of whom were women and could not vote in Ohio elections, signed the pledge. After expelling the Democrats from the hall these thirty-four people set edsout nominating a local slate.

Led by Ohio State Trades and Labor Assembly official and Columbus labor editor B.J. Bracken, the Franklin County People's party split the slots on the local ticket between labor unionists and members of the

Farmers' Alliance. The unionists were active in Local Assembly 2490 of the Knights of Labor. Although a mixed assembly, L.A. 2490, or the

Phoenix Assembly as it was known, contained mostly workers from the iron

82 Ohio State Journal. 4-10 June 1890. 83 Columbus Dispatch. 30 July 1891. 144 trades — rollers, puddlers, molders, and chainmakers — and was one of

the most active locals in the Columbus Trades and Labor Assembly.

During the 1880s the Phoenix Assembly was the only Columbus-area labor

organization to flirt with third party politics, and some of the

individual members had founded the local chapter of the Greenback party

in 1877. Phoenix Assembly members Tim Shea, Layfayette Mann, and

Bracken were placed on the party's ballot.84

While the streetcar strike of 1890 reminded the city's labor

leaders and workers of the benefits of a close relationship with the

Democratic party, it alarmed and mobilized the business community.

Businessmen and the Republican party looked on in horror as the police

refused to oust strikers from company property, protect those attempting

to operate streetcars during the strike, or break up the crowds

harassing non-striking drivers. Nothing irritated the business leaders

more than hearing that the police department was in "sympathy" with the

strikers. One prominent Republican businessman insisted that for the

city government "to stand by apathetically and allow laws to be

violated, and men's rights to be disregarded is to invite and encourage

lawlessness. " He continued that it was the duty of the police

department to protect the property of the street car company and to

ensure that strike supporters did not interfere with the operation of

the cars. The president of the Columbus Board of Trade suggested that

the mayor's, police chief's, and city council's actions during the

strike threatened the property rights of the entire community. Since

the actions of the mayor emd the city council were extremely popular with the community, the business leaders and their Republican allies had

little hope of electing a more sympathetic mayor or council and had to

look elsewhere for a solution to their dilemma.ss

84 Columbus Dispatch. 15 August 1891; Ohio State Journal. 15 August 1891. 85 Ohio State Journal. 7, 13 June 1891. 145 The complaints of the business comnunity echoed the complaints

that the city's moral reformers had been making for years. Led by

Congregationalist minister Washington Gladden, the moral reformers

argued that the police had shirked their duty by allowing the operation

of saloons on Sundays and past midnight and by turning a blind eye to

gambling and prostitution. Since the moral reformers realized the

difficulties of electing officials willing to enforce unpopular laws,

they had been advocating changes to the city's municipal code which they

hoped would force the police department to enforce the law. Gladden

blamed problem on the decentralized nature of the city's government.

The city's departments were governed by popularly-elected five member

boards, and the mayor was mostly a figurehead with a few judicial

duties. Not only did Gladden argue that this system allowed police

board members to escape individual blame for failing to enforce the

laws, he suggested that the proliferation of offices encouraged the

election of petty politicians. Talented individuals, he maintained,

grew frustrated trying to make changes in the cumbersome system and

working with politicians who placed party over the needs of the city.

By replacing the city's decentralized structure with one modeled on the

distribution of power in the Federal government. Gladden wanted to make

the mayor solely responsible for the enforcement of laws. The "Federal

plan," as it was called, would make it difficult for the mayor to evade

responsibility for the police force's failure to enforce unpopular laws

and would encourage the election of talented individuals.

While Gladden had been calling for municipal reform for half a

decade, his calls were ignored until the streetcar strike of 1890. The

strike convinced the business conaitunity of their merits. In 1890 the

Board of Trade invited Gladden to present the details of his plan to its members. Impressed with his ideas, the Board of Trade formed a committee

86 Ohio State Journal. 7 June 1890; Cincinnati Commercial Gazette. 12 June 1890. 146 to work for the implementation of such a plan. As Ohio cities received

their charters from the Ohio General Assembly, state legislators, rather

than Columbus residents, determined the city's governmental structure.

The Board of Trade began lobbying the General Assembly, but these

efforts got nowhere as the Democrats, who saw the reform as nothing more

than a Republican attempt to undermine the city's Democratic

administration, held enough seats to ensure that the measure did not

receive the necessary two-thirds majority.

The legislative elections of 1891, however, gave the GOP an

overwhelming majority in the General Assanbly and renewed the Board of

Trade's hope for a new charter from the new legislature which would meet

in January of 1893. To build momentum for reform and to fend off

criticisms that the charter movement was a partisan attempt to undermine

the Democratic administration, the Board of Trade announced that it would hold a special election so the citizens of Columbus could elect a

commission to draw up a new charter. Only about 1,000 Columbusites,

less than five percent of the electorate, voted in the Board of Trade's

election, which created a Republican-dominated charter commission. Not

surprisingly, the charter commission simply proposed a charter based on the Federal plan advocated by Gladden and the Board of Trade.

As the Board of Trade's agitation for a new charter was in full

swing, the streetcar workers launched another strike in November of

1892. Although the action was prompted by the dismissal of a conductor who refused to accept a plugged dime, trouble had been brewing between the company and the drivers for months. The conductors main complaint involved the company's use of "shortage slips." If the receipts turned in by a conductor did not match the number of tickets sold, the company gave the conductor a shortage slip and the difference was deducted from the conductor's paycheck. The conductors charged that the company was intentionally miscounting the money and unjustly deducting pay. In one

147 publicized incident a conductor reconciled his receipts and tickets in

the presence of a lawyer before turning it In to the company, but was

nonetheless given a shortage slip. In an effort to demonstrate the

union's power, the workers demanded the immediate reinstatement of the

driver dismissed for refusing to take the adulterate coin.a?

As in 1890, the strikers had the support of the general public.

The Consolidated Street Railway company was not very popular with the

citizens of Columbus. A few days before the strike the company nearly

set off a riot by tearing up a street without getting the necessary

permission from the streets residents or the city. Residents turned

water hoses on the company's workers before the police arrived to

separate the parties. The company's officers were arrested for

violating an injunction enjoining them from continuing work on the line.

The public's animosity for the street car company continued during the

strike. Large crowds gathered along the streets to harass non-striking

drivers and to ridicule company officials, as

This time, the police and the mayor did not openly side with the

strikers. The Board of Trade's agitation following the 1890 strike had

changed the city's political climate. The voters of Columbus no longer

controlled the future of the city's administration. The future of Mayor

Karb and the Democrats at city hall rested the hands of the Board of

Trade and Its Republican allies In the Ohio General Assembly. As soon

as the strike began Karb assured the city that he would do his "duty as

an executive officer," while Police Chief Murphy warned that "men wanting work will receive the protection that the law affords them."

The strike was settled before the strikers and the police had a

change to test the other's resolve. The strikers and the company agreed

87 New York Times. 9 November 1892; Ohio State Journal. 9 November 1892. 88 Columbus Dispatch. 7 November 1892; Ohio State Journal. 7, 11 November 1892 148 to submit the dispute to arbitration with Karb serving as the arbitrator. While Karb found in favor of the dismissed employee and ordered his reinstatement, the strike revealed laüjor's changing relationship with the Democratic party. No longer could the city's labor movement count on the support of Columbus's Democratic officials, and labor leaders started moving closer to the People's party. For example, William Mahon, the head of the streetcar workers, joined the

People's party shortly before he was elected head of the CTLA in January of 1893. 89

In January of 1893 during the opening days of the legislative session, the Republican-controlled Ohio General Assembly passed the municipal charter proposed by the Board of Trade. The leaders of the

Columbus Trades and Labor Assembly were quick to criticize both the new charter and the legislative action. They understood that the new charter threatened to undermine the working class's political power and sought to make the municipal government a tool of the business community. Former Trades and Labor Assembly President Louis Bauman called the new charter a scheme to disenfranchise the people, while E.J.

Bracken saw it as another example of the business conspiring to control the political systan.so

The CTLA leaders were not far from the truth when they claimed that business leaders were conspiring to control the city's government.

In a fictional account of Columbus's municipal reform movement written shortly after the legislature's passage of the new charter. Gladden revealed the class nature of the reform. Gladden insisted that the government should be controlled by business leaders and professionals who he saw as the "natural leaders of society."

The educated men, the professional men, the active business men of our cities, are the men 89 Ohio State Journal. 11, 13 November 1892; Columbus Dispatch. 11 November, 12 December 1892, 16 January 1893. 90 Columbus Dispatch. 24 January 1893 149 to whom the political leadership of the community belongs; we shall never have good government until these men come to the front and take hold of it.si

The unwillingness of the police and the mayor to side with strikers during the 1892 streetcar strike and the anger over the new charter increased labor's support for third party politics. Labor leaders joined Mahon in jumping from the Democratic party to the

People's party, which had been unorganized for much of 1892 in Franklin

County. In the spring of 1893 Columbus's Populists fielded a slate to run in municipal elections for the first time. Led by Bracken and

Mahon, the People's party's convention insisted that the city's government had been captured by monopolists and capitalists who sought to use it for their own gain. To free the city from the grips of capitalists, the Populists centered their campaign around the demand for the initiative and referendum. By making the people the source of legislation and giving them a veto over the actions of elected officials, the Populists hope to purify the political system by making politicians accountable to the people rather than the monied interests who ran the two major parties. Other demands included municipal ownership of public franchises, a civil service system, the abolition of the contracting system for public workers, the eight-hour day for public employees, and a rationalization of public salaries .92

The organizers of the city's People's party were, with almost no exceptions, associated with the CTLA. The three nominees for city-wide office were active trade unionists as were most of the nominees for city council, including CTLA Treasurer Martin Krumm and past president Louis

Bauman. From the outset of the campaign, mayoral nominee William Rentz,

91 Washington Gladden, "Cosmopolis City Club," Century 45 (1893), 395- 406, 566-76, 780-92. 92 Ohio State Journal. 19, 23, 24 March 1893; The Plow and Hammer. 29 March 1893; Columbus Dispatch. 9 Mfurch 1893. 150 a patternmaker, conceded that he had little chance of getting elected as

long as the other two parties were dominated by the "money power," but

insisted that the campaign was being waged for educational purposes. He

predicted that the party would only attract 200 votes, but added that

this would be a good start.93

Unfortunately for the People's party, the mayoral election was

dominated by the issue of the American Protective Association (APA).

The APA asserted that there was a papal plot to take over the United

States and dedicated itself to attacking any perceived source of

Catholic power in the nation. The organization distributed a number of

documents which they alleged supported their claims. One such document,

billed in the Columbus Record and other APA newspapers as an encyclical

from Pope Leo XIII, claimed that since Columbus discovered America that

the land belongs to the Pope and that on September 5, 1893, the feast of

Ignatius Loyola, the Pope would assume control over the nation by force

if necessary. The so-called encyclical further asserted that once the

Catholic church iniled the nation, "it will be the duty of the faithful

to escterminate all heretics found within the jurisdiction of the United

States. "94

The APA was especially active in Columbus and functioned much as

Republican club. Not only did one of the organization's leading

spokesmen, the Reverend Adam Fawcett, use Columbus as his base of

operations, five local chapters boosted that they had over 1000 members

apiece. In late 1892 the newspapers reported that the organization had

about 8000 members in Columbus and growing rapidly. Bands of APA members attacked Catholic priests on the streets and Catholics physically attacked prominent APA figures. Rumors that a local Catholic

93 Ohio State Journal. 23, 24 March 1893. 94 Washington Gladden, "The Anti-Catholic Crusade," Century 47 (1894), 789-95; Columbus Dispatch 7 November 1892; Ohio State Journal 8 November 1892. 151 priest was receiving a shipment of rifles and bayonets in anticipation

of the feast of Ignatius Loyola prompted the APA to launch a campaign to

purchase weapons and form a protestant militia.@5

During the mayoral campaign, the two major candidates and the

city's newspapers talked of little except the APA. In the month before

the campaign, Fawcett stirred up the public with a series of

inflammatory speeches. Speaking before crowds of 200-3000, he insisted

that the APA flag be flown over city hall. The Republican candidate

John Hayden spent most of the campaign denying rumors that he agreed

with Washington Gladden's denunciations of the APA and attacking Karb's

management of the police force, which was reputed to be a bastion of

Catholicism. While not openly attacking the APA, Karb assured voters

that his administration would not discriminate against Roman Catholics

and argued that the city had the finest police force in the nation.

With a campaign centered on the APA and the place of Catholicism in the

city, the Populists could make little headway as they saw the real issue

of the campaign as revolving around a conspiracy of monopolists and

capitalists to control city hall rather than a Papal conspiracy. The

party's mayoral candidate received only 155 of the 20,000 votes cast as

Karb narrowly won reelection.

The financial distress associated with the panic of 1893 hit the

city hard. Although there were no reliable estimates of the city's

unemployment rate, contemporary sources guessed that one in five

Columbusites was without regular work. As one railroader told the

Columbus Dispatch. "I have been running out of this town twenty-one

years and I never saw so many tramps than I have in the past week. I

say tramps; they ought not to be called tramps, for the great majority

Ohio State Journal. 7, 8, 12 November 1892; New York Times. 18 November 1892; Columbus Catholic Colombian. 26 November 1892; Columbus Dispatch 20, 27 March, 18 April 1893. 96 Columbus Dispatch. 22, 23, 27 March 1, 1, 5 April 1893. 152 of them are men just as good as you or I, except they are less

fortunate. I never saw so many idle men in my life in this city."97

Not only did the unemployment rate go up, those with jobs saw

their hourly wages drop and the number of days worked decline. The Ohio

Bureau of labor Statistics reported that 20% of Columbus workers saw

their wages decline in 1893, while only 1.5% saw their wages go up. Of

the city's major occupation groups, only the brewery workers did not see

their number of working days cut. At the city's largest factory, for

example, the 360 saddle hardware makers toiled forty fewer days (over

six weeks) in 1893 than they did in 1892. The Bureau of Labor

Statistics data, though, does not reveal the true depths of the crisis

as only the most prosperous and stable firms tended to supply employment information to the state.98

The financial crisis pushed the C'TLA closer to the People's party as the city's trade unionists increasingly adopted the Populist critique of the American financial system. In mid August the CTLA held a meeting to discuss the financial crisis and declared:

The American people no longer tolerate a system of finance which permits the social, industrial and commercial interests to be dominated by foreign governments and capitalists; that the full and unlimited coinage of silver be restored to the people; that the present national, state and private beuiks be abolished and that the issue of [paper] money be exercised exclusively by the government.

A mass meeting of city workers two weeks later blamed "the widespread disaster, idleness, and untold suffering" on the financial manipulations of "designing persons." The thousand workers present passed a resolution demanding the passage of legislation to "secure the free and unlimited coinage of gold and silver and provide for the issue of paper

97 Columbus Dispatch. 1 August 1893. 98 Ohio BLS 1894. 217-225 153 money in such an amount as will increase our currency to an amount not

less than $40 per capita.

Although the CTLA did not officially endorse the People's party or its gubernatorial candidate, Columbus labor leader E.J. Bracken, during the fall of 1893, the two organizations worked so closely during the campaign that the Dispatch referred to the People's party as the "Labor party" and denounced CTLA initiatives to relieve unemployment as

"Populist schemes." CTLA president William D. Mahon, who was also president of the national streetcar union, toured the region on behalf of the People's party. The CTLA invited Populist candidates, but not

Democratic or Republican candidates, to address their meetings.

Sentiment in the CTLA ran so high that when nationally prominent labor scholar George McNeil came to town on a AFL-sponsored speaking tour and warned the CTLA "to keep out of [partisan] politics," he was practically booed off the podium, too

At the height of the campaign, on October 25, the street car workers launched another strike against the Consolidated Street Railway.

Trouble between the company and workers had been brewing since the summer as the company fired several union members and continued to its practices regarding shortage slips. The immediate cause of the strike centered on the dismissal of two union members for trivial violations of company rules. The employees saw the firings as part of a company strategy to break the union, while the company insisted that it had a right to enforce work rules as it saw fit. The union demeuided the reinstatement of the two workers and company recognition of the union.

From the outset, the strike went badly for the workers. The financial crisis had created a pool of unemployed willing to work under almost any condition, and the reform movement created a police force

99 Columbus Dispatch. 15 August 1893, 5 September 1893. 100 Columbus Dispatch. 2, 12, 19 September, 10 October 1893. 154 willing to protect the strike breakers. At the outset of the strike,

the police chief told a gathering of strikers to return to work and

announced that the department would not tolerate any interference with

the operation of the cars or harassment of strikebreakers. The police

department lived up to the chief's promise. Not only did the police

arrest scores of strikers trying to disrupt the operation of the cars or

harassing strikebreakers, but the police refused to allow strikers and

sympathizers to congregate in public. Able to run its cars and recruit

replacement workers, the Consolidated Street Railway company quickly

resumed operations and announced the firing of the strikers. Both the

strike and the union were broken.

The 1893 strike completed leüsor's alienation from the Democratic

party in Columbus. The municipal reform movement had transformed the

city's government and police force into a tool of the business

community. During the 1890 streetcar strike the police force announced

its sympathy with the strikers and refused to intervene. In 1892 the

police force took a more neutral stand and announced that it would

enforce the law. In 1893 the police force sided with the company. Not

only did the police chief advise the workers to return to their job, but

the police force refused to allow the strikers to assemble on city

streets. To compound problems, even though the changes in the municipal code were inspired by business leaders and the Republican party, it was

labor's traditional ally, the Democratic party, that held power during

the period.

The end of the streetcar strike was not the end of labor unrest in the city, but just the beginning. In the spring and summer of 1894

Columbus witnessed, what one newspaper called, an "epidemic of strikes."

In the city's small manufacturing sector employers responded to the

financial crisis that began in the late summer of 1893 by demanding wage reductions. They argued that only by lowering costs and prices could

155 they capture enough business to keep their plants operating. Although workers at a number of factories agreed to reductions, the chainmakers and wagonmakers walked off the job, but were unable to stop the reductions. The epidemic though was not limited to the city's manufacturing sector. Bricklayers, hod carriers, and tailors also struck to protest wage reductions, but were only able to limit the amount of the reductions. Although it did not involve Columbus workers, the nationwide coal strike (which will be discussed in the next section) also affected the city. As the United Mine Workers' headquarters were in the city, the strike captured the attention of the city's workers and added to the growing impression that an accommodation between labor and capital was impossible.loi

The strike that had the most dramatic effect on the city's workers was the ARU's strike of the Hocking Valley Railroad which began in late

June at the height of the Pullman boycott. With its headquarters and main yards in Columbus, the Hocking Valley Railroad connected the rich coal fields of southeastern Ohio to markets along the Great Lakes and had a long history of anti-union activity. The company had a rough winter and spring in 1894. Not only did the panic cut the demand for the line's most important freight, coal, but coal strike idled much of the line. Moreover, due to the financial crisis, many of the railroad's customers were paying in promissory notes rather than hard currency.

The company responded to the crisis by delaying wage payments to workers and reducing wages 10%. Some Hocking Valley workers had not been paid for three months. Perhaps emboldened by the Pullman boycott, the

Hocking Valley yard men and switchmen struck to restore the 10% wage reduction and to win immediate payment of back wages. The ARU also expressed willingness to submit the dispute to arbitration.

101 Columbus Press. 3 July 1894; Ohio State Journal. 4 July 1894; Columbus Dispatch. 17 April, 18 July 1894. 156 At the outset of the strike, the ARO's local organizer, Mark Wild,

counseled non-violence and told the strikers to avoid any confrontations

with non-union workers. The railroad, meanwhile, sought an injunction

from the Franklin County Common Pleas court enjoining the ARU and local

organizer Mark Wild from conspiring to disrupt the operation of the

railroad. While the initial request was denied on procedural grounds,

two days later the judge enjoined Wild and the local ARU leadership from

conspiring to take any action designed to disrupt the operation of the

railroad. The company also secured an injunction from Federal Appeals

Court Judge William Howard Taft enjoining the strikers and sympathizers

from "entering upon, impeding, interfering with or in any other way

interrupting by word or act the operation of the road."102

While the Hocking Valley railroad was arguing that it was illegal

for workers to "conspire" to impede the operation of a road, the company and the managers of the other Columbus rail yards announced the formation of a "mutual benefit association." The purpose of the organization, according to one of the organizers, was "to keep one another posted on the character of the men who are employed or might come up for employment." The strikers and the city's leüaor community quickly denounced the new organization as nothing more than a blacklist.

They questioned why it was legal for corporations to conspire to deny economic opportunity to individual workers, but was illegal for workers to conspire to withhold their labor from a corporation. Insisting that the use of the labor injunction had perverted the nation's constitution,

Columbus trade union leaders concluded that corporations now enjoyed greater rights and liberties than the workers they employed. As the president of the CTLA later declared, "if you raise your hand and say

102 Columbus Press. 14 July 1894. 157 you have rights, you are shot down like a dog, or else arrested for violating an injunction placed on you by the courts."io3

Support for the strikers was strong in both the city's labor community and among the working classes. The Columbus Trades and Labor

Assembly held a series of mass meetings to support the strikers which attracted thousands. At these meetings Populists leaders associated with the CTLA were at the forefront. Noting that British stockholders owned the Hocking Valley Railroad, E.J. Bracken told the crowds that the strikers were fighting a British conspiracy to enslave the American worker. John Gayton, a former railroader who had been blacklisted, denounced the "tyranny of organized capital against the working classes." After the CTLA called for local merchants to boycott non­ striking railroaders, the Columbus Post reported that landlords were asking for union cards, lunch counters were refusing to serve meals to the scabs, and that barbers denied service to anyone suspected of remaining in the employ of the Hocking Valley Railroad.

The most important support for the strikers came from the United

Mine Workers. During the miner's strike ARU members worked with strikers to halt the flow of non-union coal from West Virginia, and the miners agreed to curtail production of the railroad's main freight.

After meeting with Wild, local officials in the Hocking Valley announced that "not a pound of coal would be dug by the four thousand miners of the valley to be hauled by scabs." UMWA President John McBride denounced the use of injunctions as a threat to American liberties.

"These injunctions are directed at everyone and forbid free thought, not to mention free speech."

Despite the support of the city's labor community and working class, the strike went badly for the ARU. The threat of imprisonment, the readiness of unemployed railroaders to take the strikers's

103 Columbus Dispatch, 14 August 1894. 158 positions, and the police's protection of non-striking workers, allowed

the company to resume operations on a limited basis. On the verge of defeat, ths ARU accepted an agreement brokered by McBride and Hocking

Valley coal operators anxious for the resumption of normal operations.

The company recognized the union and agreed to negotiate a new wage

scale. As part of the agreement, the company stipulated that Wild would not be rehired. Realizing the situation might worsen. Wild insisted that the strikers agree to the settlement and he became a local labor hero.

The local ARU strike combined with the national events of the summer of 1694 to push Columbus's labor community into an alliance with the People's party. Six weeks after the conclusion of the strike,

Columbus labor leaders Bracken, Wild, and Mahon met with John McBride and UMWA officials to plan the formation of a state labor party which they intended to merge with the state's Populists. The call for the labor party's convention, issued by McBride, noted that partisan action was the only remedy available to labor. Capitalists had rejected labor's preferred remedy, conciliation and arbitration, and the injunction had taken away labor's second option, the strike. This left politics as labor's only alternative, McBride insisted. With the two major parties controlled by "concentrated corporate wealth," McBride declared that the People's party offered the best chance to free labor from corporate bondage.io«

Calling the formation of the new party the most remarkable upheaval in Ohio politics since the formation of the Republican party, the Columbus Press-Post predicted that it would "revolutionize state politics" and that every labor union in the city would support the movement. At its regular meeting the CTLA took up McBride's call. CTLA

President Mark Wild opened the discussion, insisting that the

104 Columbus Press-Post. August 1894. 159 organization's rule forbidding partisan activity was no longer feasible.

The use of the labor injunction made it necessary for labor to enter the

political arena. By making it impossible for workers to strike, the

injunction. Wild insisted, forced labor to use the only weapon it had

left, the ballot, to "free ourselves from the chain of slavery." After

a brief discussion the delegates voted overwhelmingly to endorse the new

party and to send delegates to the convention. Of the CTLA's close to

eighty delegates representing twenty-four locals, only two voted against

working with the Populists.los

United Mine Workers

Unlike the central labor bodies of Columbus, Cincinnati, and

Cleveland, the United Nine Workers of America (UMWA) was not founded to

secure legislation helpful to the labor movement or to elect politicians

friendly to labor. Like other national trade unions, the UMWA's primary purpose was economic. At its founding in Columbus in January of 1890 the organization dedicated itself to the improvement of the material

lives of its members through increasing wages, reducing hours, and

improving safety conditions in the mines.

The most pressing problems facing the UMWA and the coal industry were overproduction and the industry's fragmentation. In Ohio and the rest of the coal belt, stretching from Western Pennsylvania into Iowa, there were few barriers to entry into the mining industry. Coal was plentiful and easily accessible. An Ohio mining engineer noted that in the eastern half of the state one could start digging in the side of almost any hill and find coal. Small mining operations proliferated.

Some of these small operators formed syndicates or were bought out by large owners trying to rationalize production, but excessive competition characterized the industry. Although using experienced and skilled

105 Columbus Press-Post. 3, 4, 14 August 1894; Columbus Dispatch. 3, 4, 8, 9, 13, 14 August 1894. 160 miners made mines safer and more efficient, unskilled laborers could easily dig coal. Thus, mining communities attracted large numbers of unskilled workers whose very presence kept wages low. As the union's leader, John McBride, put it, the industry suffered from "too many mines and too many miners."io«

In such an environment, it made little sense for the miners union to seek changes at individual mines. An operator agreeing to decent wages, a small screen, and safety improvements would be placed at a competitive disadvantage. The operator could not compete with coal produced in mines paying low wages, using a large screen, and not investing in safety equipment and, in all probability, would go out of business. To escape the pernicious effects of this competitive environment, the miners' unions sought an effective industry-wide agreement which would set wages for each region based on the ease of mining and the transportation costs to market.

Although previous miners' unions had secured a "joint interstate agreement" with the largest of the nation's operators in 1686, it did not translate into improved conditions for miners. Most of the nation's coal mining operations remained outside of the agreement. Operators and miners who participated in the interstate agreement tended to be located in the region stretching from Western Pennsylvania to Illinois where cheap transportation systems made competition especially fierce. But these miners and owners feared that cheap coal from non-union areas in

Virginia, Tennessee, and West Virginia, or from producers who refused to join the agreement, would undercut the scale. Thus the joint conference kept the scale relatively low. After fours years of the interstate

106 John McBride with T.T. O'Malley, "Coal Miners" in George McNeill (Ed.) The Labor Movement; The Problem of To-Dav (Boston: Bridgeman & Co.: 1887), 254, 267; Andrew Roy, The Practical Miners' Companion; or Papers on Geology and Minina in the Ohio Coal Field ( Columbus : Westbote, 1885), 91; Andrew Roy, A History of Coal Miners in the United States (Columbus, Ohio Trauger, 1907), 178-261. 161 agreement:, the Ohio Bureau of Labor Statistics found that the average

state miner earned only $324 per year. University of Chicago professor and reformer Edward Semis compiled Census Bureau statistics and found that in 1890 79% of a sample of 500 miners from Ohio, Indiana, West

Virginia, Pennsylvania, and Alabama earned less than the $500 that he calculated was the minimum a family needed to survive.lo?

Thus at its birth in January 1890 the UMWA saw the market, rather than coal-mine owners, as the biggest threat to the welfare of the nation's miners. The UMWA saw mine owners as allies in their efforts to escape from the cutthroat competitive system which made profit margins small and forced operators to slash wages in order to capture market share. Many large coal operators, including William Rend and Marcus

Hanna, who controlled Ohio's two largest mining companies, saw the miners union as the only force capable of bringing stability to the chaotic industry. A statement issued by one of the forerunners of the

UMWA and a group of operators insists, "Apart and in conflict labor and capital become agents of evil, while united they create the blessings of plenty and prosperity, and enable a man to enjoy the bounteous resources of nature intended for his use and happiness by the Almighty."loa

While the primary strategy of the UMWA focused on the creation of an industry-wide agreement to insulate wages from the competitive market, the miners also saw political action as essential to the success of the union and the improvement of their lives. Like an industry-wide agreement, legislation could help the miners overcome the effects of the

107 United Mine Workers Journal. 28 July, 1892; Edward W. Bends, "The Coal Miners' Strike" Outlook 49 (12 May 1894) 822-23. Richard Jensen suggests that the earnings of miners were slightly higher than the Bureau of Labor Statistics estimates. He argues that the miners of Ohio and Illinois averaged $406 in 1890. Richard Jensen, The winning of the Midwest : Social and Political Conflict, 1888-1896 (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1969), 240. 108 s.M. Jelly, The Voice of Labor (Philadelphia: H.J. Smith & Co., 1888), 351-52. 162 market by requiring all operators to improve work conditions. The

miners sought laws to regulate the size of screens, improve safety

conditions, require regular inspections, and allow miners to appoint a

man to weigh the coal.

While the economics of the industry forced miners to seek state

legislation, the geography of mining gave the miners a great deal of

political leverage. Mines tended to be concentrated in the thinly

populated hills of eastern Ohio where miners made a significant

percentage of the electorate. Both Democrats and Republicans believed

that the votes of miners were crucial to success in a dozen counties,

including Perry, Hocking, Athens, Jackson, Stark, and Tuscarawas, and

that these counties held the key to controlling the General Assembly.

To win miners' votes, both parties courted union leaders, offering them

slots on the ticket or appointed office.t09

Nearly every Ohio miners' union leader had ties to the Republican

or Democratic party in 1890. Republicans included Chris Evans, who

served as President of the Ohio Miners' Union in the late 1880s and as

secretary of the AFL in the early 1890s; W.T. Lewis, who had been Master

Workman of the Knights of Labor NTA 135: Michael Ratchford, a member of

District Six's Executive Board from the Massillon subdistrict; John P.

Jones who was president of the Ohio Miners' Union in 1890 and served as

president of the Ohio Trades and Labor Assembly; and UMWA President John

Rea. Influential Democratic miners included W.C. Pearce, secretary of

the Ohio Miners' Union; Nial Hysell, a member of the Ohio Miners' Union

Executive Board who served as speaker of the Ohio House of

Representatives from 1889-1891; John McBride, the president of the Ohio

109 Partisan papers tended to exaggerate the influence of the mine vote. The Ohio State Journal, for instance, insisted in 1890 that the miners' union controlled 10,000 votes in Perry county alone. Given that there were 20,000 miners in the whole state, this number clearly wrong. Ohio State Journal. 19 August 1890. Also see Columbus Press-Post. 12, 17 September 1890 for the importance of the mine vote to Ohio politics. 163 Miners' Union during the 1880a who served two terms as a State

Representative from Stark County; and Robert Hatchom, the UnWA's secretary-treasury.

The creation of the UMWA in January 1890 ended half a decade of internecine struggle between the Knights of Labor and the National

Progressive Union of Miners and Mine Laborers and its predecessors, which had undermined the unity of the nation's coal miners and hampered attempts to expand the joint agreement to include more mines and more miners. Although the UMWA only included about 20,000 of the nation's

192,000 soft coal miners at its inception, 10,000 of which were in Ohio, the organization's influence went beyond mere numbers. Almost all of the major operators and miners in the nation's most productive bituminous coal region, an area stretching from Western Pennsylvania through Illinois, observed the UMWA-negotiated scale. The creation of the union increased the union leadership's hope of expanding the number of miners and operators covered under the joint operating agreement and improving the lives of the nation's miners.no

Enthusiastic about the UMWA's potential to improve the lives of the nation's miners, the union's officers met with the AFL'S executive council in the winter of 1890 and agreed to participate in the AFL's eight hour campaign. The AFL hoped that devoting resources to help two strong unions win the eight hour day would spread the eight hour movement would spread across the nation. The first part of the AFL's campaign succeeded when the Carpenters instituted the eight hour day on

May 1, 1890. Shortly thereafter the AFL and UMWA agreed to a May 1,

1891 deadline for the institution of the eight-hour day in the nation's coal mines.Ill

110 Chris Evans, History of the United Mine Workers of America (Indianapolis: United Mine Workers of America, 1918-1920), 3-29; Frank Julian Wa m e , The Coal Mine Workers (New York; Longman, Green and Company), 205-09. 111 Cleveland Citizen 12 June 1891. 164 At the February 1891 annual meeting of operators and miners held

to negotiate the scale for the upcoming year, the UMWA pushed the eight

hour day to the top of the agenda. Seventy eight operators who employed

75,000 miners attended the meeting as did seventy-three miner delegates

who represented 35,000 miners. While the primary purpose of the eight-

hour day was to provide relief to the nation's workers, the miners told

the operators that the reform was mutually beneficial as it would help

curtail overproduction. Moreover, since the eight hour day would be

established industry-wide, the added costs would not alter the

industry's competitive balance and could be passed along to the consumers. In short, the miners saw little reason for the operators to oppose the movement.

Although a few operators, most notably William Rend, supported the eight-hour movement, most operators were adamantly opposed to meeting the miner's demand. Some operators insisted that setting hours and other working conditions were among the prerogatives of the operators and that the conference could only negotiate issues dealing directly with wages such as the scale and screen size. Others operators took a more paternalistic attitude, insisting that a long work day benefited the miners since they would spend their extra time drinking or gambling.

As one mine operator declared, "the most prosperous man is the one who works ten hours a day." Still other operators conceded the benefits of the eight hour day, but doubted that that it could be implemented industry wide and insisted that it would place the operators who did adopt it at a competitive disadvantage.

Stunned by the operators refusal to even discuss the eight-hour day, the OMWA walked our of the joint conference without negotiating a scale for the upcoming year. At their annual convention the following week, the union's leadership announced plans for a nationwide miners' strike to force the operators to adopt the eight hour day. The union

165 believed that with the assistance of organizers sent by the AFL that nearly all of the nation's soft coal miners would walk off the job. By allowing work to resume only at mines that granted the eight hour day, the minera' union sought to reward those operator's who shortened the day. Those operators who granted the shortened day would profit from the decreased supply, while those who refused to grant the increase would watch prices climb while their mines sat idle. The convention gave the union's leadership the authority to call the strike to start on

May 1, 1891, the day chosen by the AFL to inaugurate the eight hour movement in the coal industry.

Almost immediately after the convention, local and state union leaders announced their opposition to the planned strike. They doubted whether the miners were ready to endure a strike. Times had been lean, and the miners had not been able to build up the food and cash reserves necessary to withstand a long conflict. Without such reserves the miners might be forced back to work before the achieving the eight hour day. Second, they argued that the timing was wrong for a strike.

Although May 1 had symbolic meaning for the AFL and other labor organizations, the date occurred at a slack time in the cyclical demand for coal. Many operators would be happy to see their mines sit idle, while the market price of coal climbed enabling them to sell their stockpiles at higher prices. Third, the local and state leaders feared that many organized and all of the unorganized miners would not join the strike. Under these conditions the local and state officials feared that the strike would not only fail, but also destroy both the union and chances of reviving the joint agreement. Bowing to the arguments of the state and local officials, the UMWA's leadership "postponed" the strike.

Called by one observer "a chapter of accidents," the failed attempt to establish the eight hour day set off a period of chaos in the

166 mining industry. Before the 1891 interstate conference the miners

generally believed that the interests of the miners and the operators

were in harmony, but the refusal of the majority of operators even to

consider the request for the eight hour day caused the miners to

reexamine that assumption. The miners were genuinely shocked that most

of the operators opposed the eight hour day which the miners saw as a

way to lessen overproduction and to root out pernicious competition.

Miners increasingly saw operators as obstacles rather than as allies in

their efforts to improve the industry. 112

The collapse of the 1891 joint conference before a settlement on

scale could be reached sent the industry's wage structure into chaos.

Instead of negotiating a scale for the entire region stretching from

western Pennsylvania to Illinois, the miners and operators in each

region had to reach agreements for the upcoming year. Since coal from

each region was competing with coal from other regions, each region

sought a competitive advantage. In well organized areas, like Ohio's

Hocking Valley, the miners and operators simply extended the existing

scale for another year, but in less well organized areas the operators

demanded and won a lower scale. This placed coal from well-organized

areas at a competitive disadvantage, and soon operators were lowering

wages in order to meet the competition. In spite of the nation's

general prosperity and an unusually harsh winter which increased demand

for coal, the real wages of the miners fell by 5-7% in 1891.113

Compounding the collapse of the interstate agreement, Ohio miners

also failed in their attempts to secure legislation from the Ohio

General Assembly. In 1889 Pennsylvania and Illinois passed laws

regulating the size of the screen coal passed over before it was weighed. Although coal that fell through the screen was marketed.

112 Evans II, 96-138; Roy, A History of Coal Miners. 271-75; United Mine Workers' Journal (Columbus), 14 May 1891. 113 United Mine Workers' Journal. 7 May 1891; Jensen, 240. 167 operators only paid the miners for coal that was large enough to pass over the screen. Trying to limit an exploitative process, Ohio miners demanded that the state's General Assembly pass a similar measure. The miners also insisted that the passage of a screen law would help the entire soft coal industry as it would remove a competitive advantage

Ohio operators held over their two biggest rivals. Although the bill easily passed the Ohio house, the UMWA's lobbying efforts got nowhere in the state senate as the influence of the state's miner operators was too powerful to overcome. One of the bill's sponsors, Cuyahoga County

Senator John P. Green, accused the state's coal operators offering him

$500 to kill the bill and suggested that the most of his colleagues accepted similar offers.im

Following the failure of the eight-hour movement, the collapse of the interstate agreement, the inability to secure passage of a screen law, and a fall in mine wages, miners began seeing the operators as much as the market as obstacles to improvements in the lives of miners.

Although Ohio mine union leaders remained committed to the two major parties and believed that mine operators' and miners' interests were in harmony, they increasingly shared the Populists' fears that the concentration of wealth was destroying individual economic opportunity and that capitalists were corrupting the nation's political system in order to deprive workers of the product of their ladaor. John P. Jones, the president of the UMWA's Ohio district and a devoted Republican, told the state's miners that the concentration of wealth "imperils the liberty that our fore-fathers fought and died for." For Jones it was clear that "the most illiterate among us perceive that the concentration of power and control of opportunity must in a very short time increase dependency to an extent never equaled in a civilized country." "Unless

114 United Mine Workers' Journal. 9 July 1891; John Patterson Green, Fact Stranger than Fiction; Seventv-five Years of a Busv Life with Reminisences. of Manv Great Men and Women (Cleveland: Riehl, 1920), 197. 168 something is done to arrest this iniquitous concentration of wealth," he continued, "a few plutocrats will own the whole of this country within a quarter of a century."us

Democrat John McBride, the former president of the Ohio Miners, echoed these concerns. McBride insisted that the concentration of wealth and the rise of large corporations worked to "crush the manly hopes of labor, trample humanity to death, and make our republican form of government seem but a mockery." He called for the nation's miners to use the ballot to pass laws limiting the growth of "corporate and concentrated wealth," regulating the introduction of labor saving machines, and suspending the laws giving special privileges to the wealthy. By checking the concentration of wealth, McBride believed, workers "will hasten the day of their deliverance by the realization of

Edward Bellamy's beautiful vision."iia

The miners increasing embrace of Populist ideas and the People's party was clear at the December 1891 convention of UMWA District Six, which covered all of Ohio except for a few dozen mines in Meigs County.

In spite of the poor showing that the Populists had made that November,

John Fahey, the secretary treasurer of Sub-District Nine, called for

Ohio miners to join the People's party. He told the miners that the

Democratic and Republican parties had become too corrupt and that they would "die and fall of their own weight." The Ohio miners must have agreed with Fahey as they voted to send him and John Nugent to

St. Louis for the convention that formally created the People's party.n?

The failures of 1891 took their toll on the OMWA. The collapse of the interstate agreement, the failure of the eight hour movement, the fall in wages, and the lack of success in the political arena undermined the miners' faith in the union and its officials. Membership in the

115 Dnited Mine Workers' Journal. 9 July 1891. 115 United Mine Workers' Journal. 10 September 1891 117 United Mine Workers' Journal. 28 January 1892. 169 union dropped from close to 17,000 to 13,955, of whom 9,645 (69.1%) were

from Ohio. Given 1891'a failures, it was not surprising when OMHA

President John Rae and Secretary-Treasurer Robert Watchorn announced

that they would not seek reelection in 1892.u*

To replace Rae and Watchhorn, the miners elected John McBride and

Patrick McBryde. McBride, who had just concluded a term as the

commissioner of the Ohio Bureau of Labor Statistics, had a long history

as a leader of miners. Along with Illinois's Dan McLaughlin, he had been the guiding force behind the creation of both the 1886 interstate

agreement and the UMWA. McBryde had been one of the leaders of the

Knights of Labor National Trade Assembly 135 and, like McBride, was

active in Democratic politics.xis

McBride and McBryde refocused the UMWA's attention on the

negotiation of an interstate agreement. Unlike their predecessors, who

agreed to launch the eight hour movement without securing the support of

local officials or allies among the operators, McBride and McBryde were cautious men who placed the creation of a new interstate agreement above all other concerns. McBride worked diligently among the operators, while McBryde led the efforts to organize the miners. By the spring of

1892 McBride and McBryde cobbled together a semblance of an interstate agreement. Miner's and operators met by states and regions to set wage scales, but these conferences respected the differentials that had been negotiated in the 1890 agreement. But such state-by-state agreements made it difficult for the miners to improve their situations as individual state conferences were unlikely to take any action, such as improving the scale, that would change the industry's competitive

11® United Mine Workers' Journal 9 March 1893. 119 Michael Pierce, "The Populist President of the American Federation of Labor: The Career of John McBride, 1880-1895" forthcoming Labor History. 170 balance. The most that state-by-state conference could deliver was stability and the status quo. 120

While District Six had sent representatives to the People's party's St. Louis convention, the union did not actively support

Weaver's nomination or the party's local candidates that fall. The

United Mine Workers Journal followed its non-partisan policy and remained silent on the issue of politics. Newly-elected District Six

President John Nugent was the only important union official to work with the Populists, and his participation provoked criticism at the state's convention in early 1893. Led by former District Six President John

Jones, a number of Republican miners complained that Nugent had used his position to advance the Populist cause. Nugent was able to withstand a censure motion by claiming that he campaigned as an individual rather than as a union official. 121

Most other union officials continued to work with the major parties during the presidential election of 1892. McBryde, McBride, and

Nial Hysell campaigned for Grover Cleveland and the Democratic ticket.

McBride even defended Democratic vice-presidential candidate Adlai

Stevenson from charges that he had treated his employees poorly as an

Illinois mine operator. John Jones and Michael Ratchford, Massillon area officials who were close to Massillon area-operator Marcus Hanna, worked on behalf of Benjamin Harrison and the Republican slate. During the campaign Cleveland supporters and Harrison partisans traded charges that the others were violating union rules by mixing politics with union affairs. 122

In late 1892 and early 1893 times had improved for the nation's coal miners. An interstate agreement had been cobbled together, and it

120 Evans, 121 National Labor Tribune. 14 April 1893. 122 Cincinnati Enquirer. 3 November 1892; Columbus Dispatch. 6 April 1893; Robert P. Skinner, "The New President of the American Federation of Labor," Harper's Weeklv 39 (1895), 4. 171 stabilized the region's coal market. The market price of coal rose

close to 10%. With the rise in demand for coal, miners worked more days

and saw an increase annual income. Historian Richard Jensen provides

data suggesting that the miner's wages, adjusted for inflation, rose over 4% in 1892. The union's paid membership increased 45% from 13,955

to 20,187 over the course of twelve months. The UMWA leaders were guardedly optimistic about prospects for miners in the coming year.

John McBride told the nation's miners that "the future appears bright and full of promise." Patrick McBryde insisted that market conditions were the best that they have been in a number of years. District 6

President John Nugent boasted of the "material progress" that Ohio miners made in 1 8 9 2 and predicted continued improvement .^23

While union leaders were pleased with improving market conditions, they were angered over political developments and the attitudes of many of the operators, in the winter of 1893 union officials lobbied the

Republican-controlled Ohio General Assembly to pass an anti-screen bill.

Coal operators only paid wages for coal that was large enough not to fall through a screen, but operators routinely sold the coal that passed through the screen on a secondary market. The practice outraged miners who argued that they should be paid for all marketable coal which they produced. As District Six Board Member R.L. Davis insisted, the use of the screen perverted the natural order as it robbed the producer and rewarded "the idlers, the drones sometimes called capitalists." As operators refused to discontinue the use of the screen, the miners sought state legislation prohibiting the screening of coal before it was weighed. Anti-screen legislation had already passed in Illinois and

Pennsylvania and Ohio miners insisted that they should work under the same conditions. Additionally, Ohio union officials argued that the

123 Jensen, 240; United Mine Workers' Journal, 9 Maurch, 6 April 1893: National Labor Tribune (Pittsburgh), 14 April 1893; Columbus Dispatch. 6, 12 April 1893. 172 continued use of screens in the state gave Ohio operators a competitive advantage over other operators and thus threatened the interstate agreement.

A sympathetic member of the House of Representatives introduced an anti-screen bill during the winter of 1893. While the bill had little trouble passing in the House, operators mounted a fight against the bill in the Senate. The operators did not dispute the claims of the miners or attack the purpose of the bill. Instead they asserted that the anti­ screen law would violate the state constitution by breaching "the right of contract" and amounted to class legislation. Additionally, rumors circulated that a number of operators spent money lavishly to persuade

Senators to oppose the bill. In the end the senate defeated the bill as it was supported by only six of the state's thirty-four senators.

The defeat of the screen bill provoked an outcry from union officials. The District Six board issued a "manifesto" complaining that the "rights of capital are of far greater importance than the honest and fair treatment of the laborer" and attributing the defeat to collusion between the Republican party and the operators. John Nugent urged the miners not to forget the Senate's "insult" of the state's miners. 124

Any optimism the UMWA had after the failure of the screen bill came to an end late in the summer of 1893 as a financial panic gripped the nation. The panic devastated the nation's miners and mine operators.

As factories throughout the nation shut their doors, the demand for coal dropped precipitously. Exasperating the drop in demand, the panic hit during the summer when demand for coal traditionally declined and operators increased their stockpiles for the following winter. While mines with long term contracts continued to operate, mines producing coal for the open market had trouble finding buyers. As mine operators were loath to close mines for fear that miners would simply pack up and

124 United Mine Workers' Journal. 5, 12 January, 2, 23, February, 30 March, 6 April 1893. 173 leave the area moat mines continued to work a day or two a week. Miners

from throughout the state wrote the United Mine Workers' Journal complaining about the lack of regular work. 125

At the beginning of the panic the miners did not blame the mine owners for their situation. Instead, they blamed the nation's monetary

system and the actions of Wall Street and British bankers for their economic ills. A circular signed by District 6's executive board simply asserted that "many mines are now idle because operators cannot secure money." While Democratic administration and the Republican leaders in

Congress called for the repeal of the Sherman Silver Purchase Act and the temporary demonetization of silver, the miners called for an expansion of the nation's currency supply. John Rea, the first president of the U.M.W.A., organized a mass meeting which called for the free and unlimited coinage of both gold and silver as well as the "issue of paper money in such amount as will increase our currency to an amount not less than forty dollars per capita."126 Sherman Glasgow, president of District 6's subdistrict 5, advised the miners to join with the

Farmers' Alliance and the Knights of Labor to reform the nation's monetary system. District Six Executive Board Member Executive William

H. Crawford rooted the nation's economic woes in the concentration of wealth and capital's control of the nation's banking system. The economic system, he insisted, had so "reversed the true order of nature" that "actual producers are made slaves to non-producing capitalists."

He called for the abolition of the private banking system and the issuance of Greenbacks. 127

In the Hocking Valley, currency-short customers bought coal from operators on credit. This squeezed the operators who had to pay their miners while waiting for payment from their customers. To solve their

125 onited Mine Workers' Journal. 6 July 1893, 17, 24 August 1893. 126 United Mine Workers' Journal. 5 September 1893. 127 United Mine Workers' Journal. 28 December 1893, 4 January 1894. 174 own cash shortage in early August the operators asked the UMWA to allow them to pay miners with notes of credit. Noting that "[m]any miners are now idle because operators cannot secure money to pay their employees", the UMWA felt that it had no choice but to accept the offer. After the

Hocking Valley miners agreed to accept notes instead of cash, operators in Pomeroy and other regions demanded similar concessions.

By late October the use of notes was taking a toll on the state's miners, and the union demanded that the companies return to cash payments. Throughout the region many merchants refused to take the notes for fear that the coal companies would not suzrvive the panic or that the notes could not be redeemed in the near future. Alex Johnson, a UMWA delegate to a joint convention of Ohio miners and operators, complained that a Nelsonville businessman had told him that notes with a face value of "twenty some odd dollars and 27 cents" were worth about twenty-seven cents. Those merchants who accepted the notes discounted them at least 10-20%. R.L. Davis, a member of District Six's executive board, suggested that the companies issued the notes as part of a scheme to force the miners to use company stores. While the miners insisted that economic conditions had improved enough to resume cash payments, the operators ignored the union's plea and continued to issue n o t e s . 128

The use of notes to pay miners was not the only problem facing

Ohio miners. The panic also set off cutthroat competition throughout the Ohio Valley. Mines in Pittsburgh that had supplied the iron and steel industry looked for new markets as the panic closed many of the region's mills. Pittsburgh operators cut their prices and the wages paid to miners in an effort to find a market for their coal.

The hard times that began with the panic of 1893 continued through the winter of 1893-1894, normally the most prosperous season for miners.

128 Columbus Disnatch, 9, 24 August; 19 September; 3 October 1893; United Mine Workers Journal 10, 24 August, 21 September, 12 October 1893 175 Ohio miners blamed competition from Pennsylvania and West Virginia for the low wages of Ohio miners. John McBride told a convention of Hocking

Valley Miners, "the price at which Pittsburgh and West Virginia coals are offered has caused a reduction in the price of Ohio coal to such an extent that it is being sold at a loss." District Six President John

Nugent blamed "the almost incredible reductions in the Pittsburgh district, and consequent invasion of our markets." McBride and the

Hocking Valley miners did not blame the area's operators for the low wages. They understood that if wages were not lowered, the area's operators could not compete with operators from other regions and that there would be no demand for Hocking Valley coal. McBride told the valley's miners that they should lower the scale in order to maintain the demand for the regions coal and to punish Pennsylvania miners and operators for trying to secure market share "by unfair practices and at the expense of Ohio miners." The miner's praised Hocking Valley operators for their efforts to keep the interstate agreement alive. 129

Richard Davis, a member of District Six's executive board, collected wage statistics for the miners at his mine, Rendville Mine #3, to show the deterioration of wages.

129 Onited Mine Workers Journal. 8 February 1894; Evans II 303-04. 176 Month Average Earnings ($) Number of Days Average Earninc per man per day worked per month per month

May 1893 1.96 11.75 23.12 June 1893 1.63 10.25 16.74 July 1893 1.85 14.75 27.33 August 1893 1.78 11.50 20.57 September 1893 1.79 21.50 38.55 October 1893 1.67 23.25 38.92 November 1893 1.55 18.50 28.76 December 1893 1.41 16.50 23.36 January 1894 1.65 10.00 16.53 February 1894 1.27 13.50 17.18 March 1894 0.95 19.50 18.58 April 1894 1.32 12.50 16.53

Table 4.3: Wages of Miners at Rendville Mine #3, May 1893 to April 1894. United Mine Workers' Journal. 26 April 1894.

The situation of other miners was even worse. New Straitsville miners earned an average of just $20.33 a month from May 1893 until December

1893. This was $6.84 leas per month than the Rendville miners made.uo

Miner's were reluctant to agree to a lower scale. A correspondent form North Industry told the United Mine Workers' Journal that it would be impossible for miners and their families to survive at a lower rate and that miners felt "that it is better to starve above ground idle than to starve under ground working.

The events surrounding the panic of 1893 — the unemployment and poverty caused by the drop in demand, the intrusion of Pennsylvania and

West Virginia coal into Ohio markets, the desire of President Cleveland

130 United Mine Workers' Journal. 8 February, 26 April 1894. 131 United Mine Workers' Journal. 15 March 1894. 177 to further contract the money supply, the continued payment of notes to

miners, the demands to lower the scale, and the collapse of the

interstate agreement — radicalized Ohio coal miners, who increasingly

looked to the People's party for deliverance. When the state's miners

met in early 1894, they endorsed the AFL's political program.

Introduced at the 1893 AFL Convention by Chicago machinist Tommy Morgan,

the political program would have committed the AFL to the creation of a

producer-based political party. Additionally, the program included most

of the reforms demanded by the Omaha platform, with the exception of the

subtreasury plan, as well as a plank calling for the collective

ownership of the means of production and distribution. As Morgan was at

the forefront of efforts to build a Populist-labor alliance in Illinois,

most observers saw ratification of the political program as an

endorsement of the Populist party. Morgan's proposed political program

proved to be so contentious that the 1893 AFL convention postponed

voting on the program until the following year. In the meantime, the

1893 convention asked local and international unions to vote for or

against the proposal.

Not only did Ohio miners endorse Morgan's proposed political

program at the 1894 district convention, they also elected a number of

officers associated with the People's party. The two main candidates

for president, John Nugent and A.A. Adams, both had extensive ties to

the Populists. Nugent had attended the Populist St. Louis convention in

1892 and campaigned for Weaver the following fall, while Adams ran for

public office in 1894 on the Populist-Socialist Labor Party slate in

Perry county. Considered the more radical of the two, Adams narrowly

defeated Nugent and vowed to take the union in a "radical direction."

At least three of the five miners elected to state executive board had

ties to the People's party. 132

132 United Mine Workers' Journal. 12 April 1894. 178 Shortly thereafter, at the national United Mine Workers convention, the miners voted overwhelmingly to endorse the AFL's proposed political program. McBride told the convention that "radical reforms are needed in our industrial system." The enactment of the political program was the "only way to deal a death blow to tyranny and oppression as practiced upon the wage workers . . . and administer a telling and lasting rebuke to legislative imbecility and administrative corruption," he threatened. "[T]he people must either own or control the means of production and distribution or be subjected to the dictation, as they now are, of those who own and control these two powerful agencies."133

At the same convention, the miners voted to launch a nationwide strike on April 21, 1894 to raise the price of coal and make operators more willing to join an interstate conference to stabilize the industry.

McBride argued that by stopping the production of coal the miners could create a shortage and drive up the market price for coal. With the market price high, the operators would be willing to pay the negotiated scale and join an interstate conference to stabilize the entire industry for the benefit of both miners and operators.

Although only about 10% of the nation's soft coal miners belonged to the UMWA, the nation's miners almost unanimous supported the strike.

Initial reports indicated that 160,000 of the nation's 184,000 miners walked off the job. As a Hocking Valley miner declared, "I have never seen as discouraged a set of men as the miners in this neighborhood have been sine the last reduction was made. They know it matters not how steady they work, they cannot make enough money to keep a small sized family in the necessary food, and they have concluded that if they are to starve they prefer doing so at once, and not by degrees." In Ohio and the central competitive field nearly all of the miners participated

133 United Mine Workers' Journal. 12 April 1894 179 in the strike. Most of the 10,000 miners who continued working were

found in Southern West Virginia and Southwestern Virginia. 134

The UMWA's leaders realized that for the strike to be successful

the flow of coal out of non-striking mines and from existing stockpiles

had to be stopped. Only a severe shortage and the resulting rise in

coal prices would allow the operators to reestablish a scale high enough

to allow miners to provide for their families. To stop the production

of coal, the UMWA sent organizers to the non-striking areas to convince

the miners to join their effort. To stop the flow of coal, McBride met

with Eugene Debs, the head of the American Railway Union. Debs and

McBride agreed that the A.R.U. would refuse to carry nonunion coal and,

if the A.R.U. went on strike, the U.M.W.A. would refuse to provide coal

for scab trains. i3s

The first weeks of the strike were generally quiet. Ohio

operators, with the exception of a few in the Massillon region,

supported the strike and the strikers. The collapse of the scale and

the invasion of low priced Pennsylvania coal into Ohio markets had hurt

them too. The managers of a couple of Booking Valley mines put miners

to work making improvements around mines and paid them union scale. The mining village of New Straitsville put hundreds of miners to work

repairing streets, bridges, and public buildings. Ohio operators made

no effort to bring in strike breakers and announced their willingness to participate in a new interstate agreement and increase wages. The

Pomeroy Weeklv Tribune Telegraph declared, "The strike has been a

remarkable one in the apparent perfection of its organization.

134 BLS 1894. 125; New York Times. 22 April 1894. 135 Columbus Dispatch. 21, 22 May 1894; Columbus Post Press. 21 May 1894; Cleveland Citizen. 26 May 1894; Onited Mine Workers' Journal. 24 May 1894. 180 the peaceful methods used and the extent of the territories it covers.

There has been no violence or riots in this part of the country." i3«

On May 14, 1894 operators representing 300 mines and miners from

fourteen states and territories met in Cleveland to try to work out an

end to the strike. The miners argued that the market price of coal had

improved enough to allow the operators to pay the scale they agreed to

in the Spring of 1893. Most operators insisted that the miners accept a

lower scale, arguing that the dollar had increased in value since the

last agreement had been reached and that they should accept the lower

scale for the good of the industry. There was another reason many

operators refused to grant the increase. Operators and miners alike

asserted that many of the reluctant operators wanted to see the strike

continue as they were disposing of large stockpiles of coal at inflated

prices.

The operators course angered the miners and convinced the UMWA's

leadership that a harmony of interests no longer characterized the

mining industry. Leading the miners out of the conference, McBride

accused the operators of being more interested in their profits than the

good of the whole industry. A UMWA resolution declared that since the

operators had "contemptuously" rejected the "hand of peace and

conciliation" offered by the miners, any agreement was "utterly

impractical." 137

The failure of the Cleveland conference destroyed the peace that

had characterized the strike. Confrontations between strikers and

operators and between strikers and authorities became more pronounced.

Most of the conflicts occurred in towns just north of the Ohio river as miners and railroaders tried to stop trains carrying coal from non­

striking mines in Virginia and West Virginia to industrial areas along

New Lexington Tribune. 25 April 1894; Pcmerov Weeklv Tribune Telegraph. 23, 30 May 1894. 137 Evans II, 304-320; Columbus Post Press. 16 May 1894; BLS 1894. 126. 181 the Great Lakes. The strikers realized that as long as the flow of coal continued hopes of ending the strike remained remote. In Belmont County strikers and ARU members blocked a bridge and placed the coal cars on a side track. In Perry County miners and railroaders burned a bridge to stop the flow of coal, and in Jackson County railroaders simply refused to attach coal cars to trains. Governor McKinley responded to these incidents and other incidents by dispatching national guard troops to protect the flow of coal in southern Ohio.iaa

The miners and local governmental officials charged that mine operators colluded with local sheriffs to exaggerate the level of violence in order to provoke the intervention of state troops. A common pleas judge from Belmont County criticized the presence of the state militia and told McKinley, "I do not see the necessity of this large force." The mayor of Corning, Ohio, two councilmen, and the president of the local miners union wrote an open letter to Governor McKinley arguing that reports of miner violence were overblown. "The railroad men themselves refused to haul anymore scab coal, and they told the sheriff of Athens, County so . . . . [MJiners paid strict attention to the advice given by our national officials and are determined to win this fight without resorting to any unlawful m e a n s . "139

McKinley's actions produced a backlash from the state's coal miners. When McKinley donated ten dollars to the Massillon miners' relief fund, the miners refused to accept the money. They would not accept money "from the hand that assists in smiting them." A Masaillon- area local denounced McKinley as "ever ready to aid and assist capital in crushing labor." When a Columbus paper reported that the city's bankers had advanced the state money to pay for the state militia's

138 New York Times. 5 May 1894. 139 Columbus Dispatch. 2 June 1894. McKinley to James C. Howe, Adjt. General (Bridgeport), 15 June 1894, McKinley Letter Books, Ohio Historical Society, Columbus Ohio. 182 strike duty and that the local board of trade had thanked the militia

for their service, the Onited Mine Workers' Journal simply wrote, "We

leave to our readers whether there seems to be anything incongruous in

the above medley — bankers, boards of trade, militiamen and the

governor. "140

Unaüole to convince the operators to agree to the restoration of

the May 1893 scale or to stop the flow of non-striking coal from

Virginia and West Virginia, the leaders of the UMWA concluded that the

continuing of the strike would do little but increase the suffering of

the coal miners and their families. Meeting with leading operators,

McBride and the leaders of the UMWA agreed to a new scale which reduced

payments to mines by nine cents a ton from the May 1893 scale and told

the nation's coal miners to head back to work. Although many local

leaders criticized the concession, almost all of the nation's coal

miners went back to work.

The events surrounding the miners's strike and the Pullman boycott

led to the UMWA's final break with non-partisanship and its embrace of

the People's party. McBride, accompanied by the leaders of the UMWA,

announced the formation of a state labor party and his intent to merge

the party with the state's Populists. He told the state's workers that

"corporate power, when aided and abetted by the executive, judicial, and

military arm of the state and national governments, can and will

override the rights of the our people and oppress wage workers,

regardless of the efforts of organized labor, as now constituted and

directed, to prevent it." For McBride it was "evident that ledsor cannot

hope for relief at the hands of either the Republican or Democratic

140 United Mine Workers' Journal. 14, 21 June 1894; Ohio State Journal. 10 June 1894. Bankers in Springfield and Cleveland also advanced the state money to pay for the Ohio National Guard's service during the strike see McKinley to George Garretson (Cleveland), 29 June 1894; McKinley to Asa Bushnell (Springfield), 5 July 1894 McKinley Letter Books. 183 party." McBride scheduled the labor party's first convention on the eve

of the Ohio People's party convention in hopes that a merger could be

worked out.Ki

Coxey-KcBrlde Convention and the Election of 1894

The Ohio People's party had undergone dramatic changes in 1894

even before McBride announced his intention to form a labor party and to merge the party with the Populists, . Not only had labor troubles and

local political turmoil increased support for the Populist cause, but

the party had found a wealthy and charismatic leader around whom to

rally. Since the creation of the Ohio People's party in 1891 Jacob

Coxey had been a second tier leader. A veteran Greenbacker and wealthy

industrialist, he attended the 1892 St. Louis convention as an alternate and headed the local arrangements committee for the Ohio People's party's 1892 convention. But Coxey was never one of the party's principle leaders. Active in monetary reform circles, Coxey developed a bond plan which he asserted would increase the amount of money in circulation and put the unemployed to work. It was relatively simple.

It called for the national government to issue bonds to state and local governments to be used for building roads and making public improvements. The bonds, which were to circulate as legal tender, would allow local governments to finance local projects, put the unemployed to work at $1.50 a day, and make improvements in infrastructure that would help private business and stimulate growth. The localities would repay the bonds over the course of twenty-five yeaurs. Although the bonds would not collect interest, the Federal government could charge 1% to pay for the costs associated with the program. To meet the immediate needs of the nation in the midst of a depression, Coxey devised the

141 Onited Mine Workers' Journal. 9 August 1894; Columbus Dispatch. 8, 14 August 1894. 184 "good roads plan" which called for the Federal government to make available $500,000,000 in bonds to local governments to build roads.

Although Coxey convinced the Ohio People's party and the AFl to endorse his "Good Roads" program in 1893 and Kansas Senator William

Peffer to introduce his program as a Senate Bill in early 1894, support for Coxey's plan was limited to reform circles. This changed in the winter and spring of 1894. Angered at what he perceived to be congressional indifference to the plight of the nation's 3,000,000 unemployed, Coxey and fellow monetary reformer Carl Browne came up with the idea of a march of unemployed men to the nation's capitol to demand jobs and the enactment of his bond program. Calling his proposed march a "petition in boots" and the marchers an "industrial army," Coxey called on the nation's unemployed to meet in his hometown of Massillon to begin their march on Easter Sunday, March 25, 1894. Although only a a little more than one hundred men began the march in Massillon, similar industrial armies formed throughout the nation with the intention of linking up with Coxey's contingent.

Thanks to Browne, who was an expert showman, Coxey's march attracted publicity out of proportion to its modest. Major newspapers dispatched reporters to travel with the marchers and documented every day of the two month march. Coxey and Browne made great stories.

Described by one reporter as "mild looking and of medium size, with rounding solders, an oily face, a straw colored moustache, and gold bowed spectacles," Coxey appeared more like a scholar than the leader of a protest movement. Yet he had a flair for the dramatic. He would ride in a expensive carriage pulled by white horses and named his youngest child "Legal Tender." Browne, in contrast, dressed like the former carnival barker that he was. Journalist Ray Stannard Baker described him as "strongly built with a heavy moustache, and a beard with spirals.

He wore a leather coat fringed around the shoulders and the sleeves. A

185 row of buttons down the front were shining silver dollars. Calvary

boots, tight fitting, well polished came to his knees." In the words of

historian Carlos Schwantes, "What Coxey and Browne did was to create an

unemployment adventure story that the press found irresistible."i42

Although the march was generally uneventful and always peaceful,

most of the press's coverage of Coxey, Browne, and the march was

negative. Leslie's Weeklv complained that Coxey's "marauding columns"

were spreading anarchism and communism. The Nation described Coxey's

adventure as a "filthy eruption" of socialism. One commentator labeled

the marchers as "worthless drifters as homeless and taxless as the

aborigines who spent their money on tobacco, whiskey, and cards."

A health official warned that the marchers were "an un-American and

unsanitary horde" spreading disease in it wake.i»

While the mainstream press was vilifying Coxey and the marchers.

Populists and labor leaders supported the Coxey movement. AFL president

Samuel Gompers lobbied Congress to give Coxey s plans a hearing, while

the Knights of Labor Journal praised the marchers as "serious, honest

and determined" and as "eüssolutely right." Even the Socialist Labor

party's Daniel DeLeon, who derided most middle class reformers, praised

Coxey. When an industrial army patterned after Coxey's movement passed

through Cincinnati and Columbus, the Cincinnati Central Labor Council

and the Columbus Trades and Labor Assembly appropriated funds to pay for

food and housing, organized speeches and parades to support the marchers, and protested the authorities efforts to restrict the

142 Ray stannard Baker, American Chroniclet The Autobioaraohv of Rav Stannard Baker (New York: Charles Scribners Sons, 1945), 7; Carlos Schwantes cited in Robert C. McMath, American Populism: A Social History (New York: Hill and Wang, 1993), 186-87. 143 "Where Responsibility Lies" Leslie's Weeklv. May 10 1894, "The Coxey 'Problem,'" The Nation LVIII (1894) cited in Howson, 141. The final two denunciations are cited in Russel B. Nye, A Baker's Dozen: Thirteen Unusual Americans (East Lansing: Michigan State University Press, 1956), 216, 220-221, 186 activities of the marchers. Populist Senator William Peffer introduced a motion calling for the United States Senate to form a committee to receive Coxey's petition, while Nebraska's Populist Senator William

Allen introduced a resolution defending the marchers' right to carry their petition to Congress.i«4

The march alarmed the citizens and authorities of Washington D.C.

The Washington News called for government officials to "consider what could be done to avert the threatened invasion of the District by this swarm of human locusts." President Cleveland saw the march as an attack on his administration, while Democrats, Republicans, and even most of the Populists in Congress viewed Coxey as a crank and his "army" as potentially dangerous. After consulting with his cabinet, Cleveland decided to ignore the marchers and delegated the task of containing them to the officials of the District of Columbia. District authorities, in turn, announced that they would rigidly enforce laws regulating vagrancy, parades, and the use of the Capitol grounds.us

As Coxey approached Washington, he was joined by two other industrial armies, one from Philadelphia and another composed of local residents, bringing the total to about 500. Coxey applied for and received a parade permit, but his request to speak on the Capitol's steps was neither denied nor granted. When the marchers entered the city and paraded to the Capitol they drew thousands of spectators. When they arrived at the capitol, the marchers stopped before entering the grounds. Coxey and Browne tried to speak on the Capitol steps, but were promptly arrested. While legend has it that Coxey and Browne were arrested for walking on the grass, they were convicted of displaying

144 Samuel Gompers, Seventy Years of Life and Labor (New York: Dutton, 1925) II, 11-12; Public Opinion 17 (12 April 1894), 43; Public Opinion 17 (19 April 1894), 69; Public Opinion 17 (26 April 1894), 94; Bowson, 146; Hicks 322-23 145 Washington News editorial reprinted in Public Opinion 17 (7^ril 5, 1894), 24; Bowson, 146-147; Nye 224; 187 banners on the Capitol's grounds. In Coxey's case the banner was a

small badge pinned to his lapel. After telling Coxey that he deserved a harsher sentence, the District of Columbia's judge sentenced Coxey and

Browne to twenty days in the local jail.

While politicians and newspaper editors associated with the major parties saw the arrest and imprisonment of Coxey as fitting punishment for a dangerous crank, for many Populists and trade unionists Coxey's arrest came to symbolize the government's indifference to the nation's unemployed and its willingness to trample the rights of those challenging the economic status quo. Populist leaders, many of whom were suspicious of Coxey and his ideas, complained of the summary trial and Coxey's persecution for his political ideals. Trade unionists, including radicals like Eugene Debs and the more moderate Samuel

Gompers, complained that Coxey was prosecuted for his ideas rather than any violation of the law. Most trade unionists and Populists undoubtedly agreed with Coxey when he pointed to the steps of the

Capitol and complained, "Up these steps the lobbyists of trusts and corporations have passed unchallenged on their way to committee rooms, access to which we, the representatives of the toiling wealth producers, have been denied.

The notoriety and publicity associated with the Coxey's march and arrest transformed him into the undisputed leader of Ohio's People's party. While Coxey was in prison, the Populists of Stark, Summitt, and

Columbiana counties nominated him for a seat in the United States House of Representatives. Upon his release from prison, Coxey called on those who had marched to Washington to remain in the city to remind the

146 C. Van Woodward, Tom Watson; Agrarian Rebel (New York: Macmillan, 1938); Martin Ridge, lonatius Donnellv: Portrait of a Politician (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1962) 329-30; Gompers II, 1-12: Public Opinion 17 (April 19, 1894), 70; The Coxey quotation is from the speech Coxey planned to give on the Capitol steps. It was later printed am a pamphlet and can be found as Appendix Three in Bowson, 429. 188 politicians of the suffering of the nation's unemployed. In the hope of raising funds to feed and cloth the marchers as well as the participants

in other industrial armies making their way to Washington, Coxey

launched a speaking tour. As most of his speaking engagements were in

Ohio, the tour served to increase Coxey's popularity among the state's

Populists. So when McBride announced his intention to form a labor party and to merge the party with the state's People's party, the Ohio

Populists had already found the type of leader that they had been lacking since 1891 — a dynamic, well-known figure who could attract a crowd and was willing to spend money on the cause.i*?

The response to McBride's call was tremendous. Locals unions sent over 150 delegates to the convention. Although the UMWA and the

American Railway Union sent the largest contingents, delegates represented locals from almost every craft and trade. The central labor bodies of Columbus, Toledo, Zanesville, and Springfield endorsed

McBride's move and dispatched members to the convention. Contingents from Cleveland and Cincinnati, where the central bodies had already endorsed the People's party, were especially strong. Attendance was so large that the attendees could not all fit into the Columbus Trades and

Labor Assembly's Ball. The stfurt of the convention was delayed until local delegates could secure a room large enough to hold the 150 delegates and dozens of journalists. Partisan papers that mocked the movement and predicted that the convention would draw but a handful of delegates conceded that the state's workers were "well represented" by

"sober" delegates with "sincere motives."i«a

Unlike most labor meetings, the convention witnessed few disputes and little controversy. This was probably due to the fact that McBride made his intentions clear. He wanted to create a labor party which

147 Bowson, 171-75. 148 Columbus Dispatch. 15 August 1894; Columbus Press-Post. 15 August 1894; Ohio State Journal. 16 August 1894. 189 would merge with the People's party. Trade unionists who did not

support these goals elected to stay at home. The delegates elected

Toledo Central Labor Union President John Braunschwiger convention

chairman and made Charles Martin, a Knight of Labor from Tiffin,

convention secretary. Committees were selected and set off to work.

The two most important committees were the resolutions committee which

would draft the convention's platform and the merger committee which

would work out an alliance with the Populists.

The convention's platform and preamble reflected the trade

unionists' desire to reclaim the nation's republican past or at least

what they thought was the nation's past. The preamble asserted that the

party's aims were identical to the aims of the national constitution —

"to form a more perfect union and establish justice." The preamble

insisted that a republican government can only be built "on the love of

the whole people for each other," but that this love had been destroyed

by the "concentrated and corporate wealth" which had fostered greed, want, and competition. To rekindle the spirit that the American people

constituted "one united brotherhood," the convention first demanded that

"the power of the Government should be expanded as rapidly and as far as the good sense of intelligent people and the teachings of experience

justify along the lines of the collective ownership of the means of production."

Although such a formulation can be seen as a politically expedient attempt to satisfy both labor radicals and the more conservative

supporters of the People's party, it also reflected the desire to balance traditional property rights with welfare of the commonwealth.

Unlike labor leaders, like Samuel Gompers, schooled in European radical thought, Ohio trade unionists did not see a natural conflict between labor and capital. Rather they thought that in an ideal state labor and capital operated in harmony. The rise of leurge corporations which

190 sought profit above all else undermined the natural harmony that existed between labor and capital and harmed both the small producer and the wage laborer. By giving the government the power to distinguish between means of production which benefited the oomminity and those which threatened the community, the proposed "collective ownership" plank sought to preserve what labor leaders saw as the natural harmony between labor and capital. This would allow individual entrepreneurs who did not exploit labor, like Jacob Coxey, to continue operations, but allow the government to take over exploitative corporations such as Standard

Oil.

The rest of the party's platform included traditional Populist demands: government issue of greenbacks and elimination of private banks; the free and unlimited coinage of silver at a ratio of sixteen to one; nationalization of the telegraph, telephone, railroads and mines; municipal ownership of municipal franchises; abolition of alien landownership; prohibition of child labor and compulsory education; the initiative and referendum; a legal eight hour day; the end of the sweating system; inspection of factories and mines; the end to

"undesirable immigration;" and women's suffrage.

Only the plank to end "undesirable immigration" generated any controversy. Ernest Heier, a longtime Populist and printer from

Cincinnati, asserted that the nation should remain "a harbor for the oppressed of all nations" and that the plank would hurt the party's chances among foreign-born voters. McBride countered that he was

"willing to welcome to our shores all men who were honest and upright and would make good citizens" but that the nations should not allow in paupers and criminals. In the end McBride's view prevailed as the delegates rejected Weier's motion to strike the plank from the platform.

After ratifying the platform, the convention adjourned for the day and the merger committee was dispatched to meet with the leaders of the

191 Populist party. The merger committee, led by McBride, and the

Populists' Central Committee, headed by Springfield printer and labor

convention delegate T.J. Craeger, had little trouble agreeing to a merger. The Populists needed the votes premised by the trade unionists, while the trade unionists needed both a party and allies. The merger talks were aided by the fact that there was a significant overlap of delegates for the two conventions. As E.J. Bracken remarked, "A large number of the delegates to the McBride convention came also as delegates to the Populist convention."

The only opposition to the merger came from members of the fast fading Farmers Alliance. Led by L.B.C. Cobb, the alliance men feared that after merging with the laborites the Populist party would "fall into the hands of the of persons who will run it in the interest of either of the other parties." Republican newspapers insisted that

McBride intended to fuse the parties with the state's Democrats. The fact that the state's Democratic Executive Committee was meeting in

Columbus at the same time as the labor and Populist conventions fueled the xnimors. Cobb and the alliance men, though, were unable to convince the rest of the Populist convention of the potential threat posed by

McBride and the laborites. The state's People's party, already dominated by trade unionists, saw an alliance with McBride's labor party as crucial to victory in the fall.Ks

The merger agreement provided that the Populists would accept the labor convention's platform and that the laborites would join the

Populist convention for the nomination of a slate for the upcoming fall.

The acceptance of the labor platform, even with the qualified call for the collective ownership of the means of production, generated little disagreement. Since the municipal elections of 1893, in which the labor-led Cleveland Populists collected 16% of the popular vote, trade

149 Ohio State Journal. 16 August 1894. 192 unionists had effectively controlled the Ohio People's party, and

Coxey's presence only reinforced the dominance of urban and labor

forces. As the Ohio State Journal remarked, the platforms of the two

parties "are not that far apart."

Under the merger agreement, the labor delegates were to attend the

Populist convention and vote as delegates at large, but when the two

parties met to nominate a slate of candidates for state-wide office the

labor delegates were seated with their county delegations thus depriving

them of an independent vote. Although partisan newspapers charged that

this was part of a Populist plot to deny a voice to the laborites, this

does not appear to be the case. First, the laborites were assigned to

their county delegations before members of the merger committee arrived

at the convention. The merger committee had been meeting in downtown

Columbus well past midnight, while the convention convened early the

next morning outside of the city. Not wanting to wait for the merger committee's arrival, John Seitz, the convention chairman, integrated the new delegates according to party rules. Second, as almost all of the candidates were selected by acclimation, it made no difference how the delegated were seated or how votes were divided. Third, after the convention the laborites voiced no dissatisfaction with the procedures.

As John McBride declared, "the labor delegates got all the recognition they asked for and a good deal more and are perfectly satisfied."iso

There was little controversy or even interest in the nomination of a slate of candidates for the fall's election. The populists conceded that they had no chance of winning a state-wide election, pinning their hopes on congressional and local races. Adding to the lack of enthusiasm for the state-wide races was the fact that the most important office up for grabs was the Secretary of State, hardly a position that

150 Columbus Dispatch. 17 August 1894; Columbus Post-Press. 18 August 1894; Ohio State Journal. 18 August 1894; Cleveland Citizen. 25 August 1894; United Mine Workers' Journal. 23 August 1894. 193 inspired the faithful. By acclamation the delegates nominated Charles

Martin for Secretary of State. The choice symbolized the union. Martin had close ties to leaders of both the Cleveland Central Labor Union and the United Mine Workers, which had supported his failed attempt to unseat Knights of Labor General Secretary John Hayes the previous winter. He had served on People's party's Executive Committee since its founding. The delegates nominated E.O. Stark, one of the party's few lawyers, for the Supreme Court, while candidates for the board of public works and state school commissioner were selected to give the ticket geographical balance. is i

Unlike the three previous conventions of the state's People's party, the 1894 convention took on the trappings of a major party's political convention and generated public excitement. On the evening of the convention's last day, Columbus's Central Populist Club, which was closely associated with the Columbus Trades and Labor Assembly, organized a parade followed by public speeches. Thousands of

Columbusites crowded into the streets to watch Populist clubs from around the state march in formation. Many of the clubs carried Chinese lanterns and marched behind bands. The parade ended at the state capitol, where a crowd of 8,000 to 12,000 heard Coxey present the specifics of his bond plans and recount the details of his arrest and imprisonment. isz

The Election of 1894

The election results were disappointing. The new party did not

"revolutionize" state politics as one Columbus newspaper had predicted.

Statewide Martin polled just under 50,000 votes (6.5%) in a race won by

151 Columbus Dispatch. 17 August 1894; Columbus Post-Press. 18 August 1894; Ohio State Journal. 18 August 1894. 152 Columbus Post-Press. 18 August 1894; Ohio State Journal. 18 August 1894. 194 the Republican candidate, who captured 54% of the vote. Worse, the

party failed to capture any Congressional or local offices. Realizing

that Martin was not going to win, officials had placed most of their

hope on local races. The failure at the local level was even more

di sheartening .153

Despite the returns, Ohio's Populists had reason to be hopeful as

the party made sizable gains over the results of previous years.

Running for the Eighteenth District's Congressional seat, Coxey

captured 21.9% of the vote, more than quadrupling the percentage

captured by any previous Populist candidate. Martin tripled the vote

General James Weaver had received in the state just two years earlier.

As the charts below suggest, Martin did very well in many of the state's

industrial areas. In the state's coal mining regions Martin's showing

was particularly impressive.is4

153 Columbus Post-Press. 3, 4 August 1894; Smith I, 655-56. 154 Annual Report of the Secretary of State to the Governor of the State of Ohio for the Year Ending November 15. 1894 [hereafter. Report of the Secretary of StateUColumbus; Westbote, 1895). 195 Township/precinct (1890 pop) 1891 1892 1893 1894

Perry County Coal Twp. (3,747) East Precinct 3% 6% 10% 22% West Precinct 1% 3% 6% 16% Monroe Twp. (4,506) Buckingham Precinct 5% 6% 5% 21% Corning Precinct 0 1% 3% 9% Rendville Precinct 1% 4% 2% 15% Salt Lick Twp (4,682) East Precinct 3% 5% 7% 19% Middle Precinct 15% 10% 15% 22% West Precinct 6% 4% 5% 9% Athens County Trimble Twp (4,966) E. Glouster Precinct 4% 6% 5% 17% W. Glouster Precinct 4% 6% 12% 35% Holister Precinct 1% 4% 20% 38% Jackson Precinct 1% 4% 21% 41% Trimble Precinct 4% 10% 13% 18% York Twp Bessemer Precinct 5% 7% 9% 33% Dover Twp Millfield Precinct 3% 0 9% 16% Hocking County Ward Twp. (5,090) 8% 7% 7% 35% Green Twp. Haydenville Precinct 10% 1% 2% 33% Stark County Lawrence Twp. (4147) Canal Fulton #1 Precinct 2% 4% 7% 26% Canal Fulton #2 Precinct 1% 1% 1% 16% Lawrence Precinct 2% 9% 6% 26% Youngstown Bill Precinct 6% 6% 36% 55% Jackson County Coal Twp. (4,585) First Precinct 3% 4% 2% 11% Second Precinct 3% 10% 6% 14% Third Precinct 6% 5% 6% 34% Belmont County Pultney Twp. Pultney Precinct 0 0 3% 26% Richland Glencoe 0 0 1% 23%

Table 4.4: Percent of Populist Vote in the Selected Areas of the State's Six Largest Coal Producing Counties. Reoort of the Secretary of State. 1894. 196 In Cleveland, Cincinnati, and Columbus the support of the central

labor bodies did not translate into victories for the People's party, but, as the chart below suggests. Populist candidates fared best in

heavily working class wards and neighborhoods.

City/Ward Pop. Vote Total Vote Pop. Vote as % of Total

Cincinnati 10 th 194 1903 11.1 11th 282 2287 12.3 12 th 231 2181 10.6 30 th 152 1513 10.0

Cleveland 23rd 127 1172 10.8 24 th 197 1814 10.9 25 th 257 1807 14.2 26 th 198 885 22.4 30 th 78 664 11.7 34 th 86 816 10.5 35 th 113 1072 10.5 36 th 149 1272 11.7 37th 188 1428 13.2 39 th 208 1498 13.9 40 th 224 1192 18.8

Columbus 9th 148 1500 10.0 13 th 140 1309 10.7

Table 4.5: 1894 Populist Vote in Selected Working Class Wards of Major Cities. Report of the Secretarv of State. 1894.

197 The results were more encouraging in a number of smaller industrial cities. Here the Populists were able to climb out of the simple digits and, in some cases capture over a quarter of the vote.

City 1890 Population Populist vote as % of total vote

Springfield 31895 11.7 Akron 27601 25.4 Canton 26189 24.0 Sandusky 18471 10.4 Lima 15987 11.7 East Liverpool 10956 17.6 Ironton 10393 14.4 Massillon 10092 18.0 Ashtabula 8336 30.6 Alliance 7606 13.7 Galion 6326 20.0 Bucyrus 5974 17.2 Salem 5780 20.0

Table 4.6: 1894 Populist Vote in Selected Medium-Sized Industrial Cities. Report of the Secretarv of State. 1894.

McBride's Election as President of the AFL

Three months after the merger of McBride's labor party with Ohio's

People's party, the AFL held its annual convention in Denver. Due to consider the political program that had been introduced in 1893 and would have committed the AFL to independent political action, the convention promised to be divisive. Although only four of the AFL's constituent unions had failed to endorse the political program prior to

198 the convention, Gompers opposed key parts of the program. He disliked

tne preamble which called for the adoption of the "principle of

independent labor politics" and plank ten calling for the "collective ownership by the people of all means of production and distribution."

In opening the 1894 convention Gompers told the delegates that "[i]t would be ridiculous to imagine that wage-workers can be slaves in employment and yet achieve control at the polls" and that partisan politics led to "misery, deprivation, and demoralization."155

Although the supporters of the political program were called socialists, they really came from two distinct groups — Midwestern labor-Populists and East-Coast Socialist Labor Party (SLP) activists.

This same coalition had ousted Terence Powderly from his position as

Grand Master Workman of the Knights of Labor in 1893. As the Knights's experience demonstrated this was an uneasy alliance. The Midwest labor-

Populists — McBride, Morgan, Mahon, Phil Penna, Patrick McBryde — blended Jefferson's republicanism, Jackson's fear of monopoly, and

Lincoln's faith in free labor to create a powerful critique of industrial capitalism. With their roots in antebellum political thought, the labor populists were willing to compromise with farmers, small businessmen, and even professional politicians. The Socialists, led by John Tobin and J. Mahlon Barnes, were schooled in various strands of European socialism and were less willing to compromise with other classes. SLP leader Daniel DeLeon saw socialism and Populism as fundamentally incompatible and disparaged the People's party as a bourgeois party of small f a r m e r s . 156

155 American Federation of Labor, Report of the Proceedings of the Annual Convention of the American Federation of Labor. 1894 (Bloomington, IL, 1905), 14. 156 On the S.L.P. and Populism see Howard H. Quint, The Forcing of American Socialism: Origins of the Modern Movement (Columbia: University of South Carolina Press, 1953), 210-47. 199 Gompers and his allies set out to defeat what they saw as the two most pernicious parts of the program — the call for collective ownership and the creation of a labor-based political party. Gompers used his power as chairman to limit debate, while his allies offered

amendments designed to prevent the passage of the program. Early in the debate the delegates decided to vote on the planks individually instead of the program as a whole. Adolph Strasser, a cigarmaker and long-time

ally of Gompers, attacked the preamble, which called for the Federation to emulate British trade unionists by creating an independent labor party. Strasser told the convention that the preamble misrepresented the actions of the British labor movement as there was no independent labor party in Britain. Strasser did not attack the idea of independent politics, but just the characterization of British action. By asserting that the preamble mischaracterized the British situation, Strasser gave delegates who opposed independent political action but represented unions on record as supporting the political program justification to vote down the preamble. Strasser's motion carried 1345 to 661, and the preamble was defeated. 157

The delegates approved the first nine planks of the program before turning to plank ten, which called for the "collective ownership by the people of all means of production and distribution." As soon as it was introduced, opponents rose to offer substitutes in the hope of diluting the amendment. In the end the opponents of plank ten were able to secure passage of a substitute that called for "the abolition of the monopoly system of land holding."

Debate around the preamble and plank ten proved to be so contentious that even supporters, including McBride's closest allies, feared that their passage could splinter the AFL N.R. Hysell, a UMWA

157 A Verbatum r sic.1 Report of the Discussion on the Political Programme, at the Denver Convention of the American Federation of Labor. December 14. 15. 1894 (New York: The Freytag Press), 4. 200 delegate, warned the convention, that if you adopt plank ten "you will break up the unions." Patrick McBryde, the secretary of the OMWA, told the convention that he intended to vote for plank ten, but hoped to see

it defeated. He feared that the opponents of plank ten would not be able to accept defeat as well as the supportera of plank ten could.

William Mahon, who headed of the street car employees's union and helped organize McBride's Ohio labor party, felt that transforming the

Federation into a political party would have precipitated a split in the

Federation just as it had in the Knights of Labor. He declared, "I have been in independent politics and never lost an opportunity to get on the stand and plead for independent political action . . . , but [I] don't intend to do anything that will destroy this great machine." 158

After the defeat of the original plank ten the convention turned its attention to the election of a president. McBride had challenged

Gompers in 1893 and lost 1314 to 1222. McBride had reason to hope that he would defeat Gompers in 1894. By endorsing the political program and a labor-populist alliance, McBride had differentiated himself from

Gompers. Moreover, many delegates criticized Gompers for his failure to aid Debs during the Pullman boycott. Other delegates viewed Gompers as too powerful and wanted to see new blood in the Federation. In the end

McBride defeated Gompers by a vote of 1170 to 976. Although delegates voted for McBride for a numbers of reasons, it is clear that the most vocal supporters of the political program supported McBride, while the most outspoken opponents of the program supported Gompers. Upon taking office McBride predicted, "I trust and expect to see a great union of

^58 Verbatum fsic.1 Report. 40, 44, 50-51. 201 labor men before another year, and believe that we shall place a

presidential candidate in the field." 159

All five delegates who argued for passage of the preamble voted for McBride. Only one of the seven delegates who spoke against the preamble voted for McBride. Of the eight delegates who spoke in favor of plank ten, seven voted for McBride. Only three of the sixteen delegates who spoke in opposition to plank ten voted for McBride. Of the twenty-three delegates who voted for both the passage of the preamble and the retention of the original plank ten, nineteen were for McBride. Nine of those nineteen delegates represented unions that voted for Gompers in 1893. Verbatum fsic.1 Report, passim; National Labor Tribune. 10 January 1895. 202 CHAPTER 5

THE PEOPLE'S PARTY AS A LABOR PARTY

Ohio's Populists began 1895 confident that they were on the verge

of transforming the state's and the nation's political system. The previous November the party had demonstrated that it could attract the

support of the state's industrial workers. Not only had the party polled well in the working class wards of the state's largest cities, but in medium-sized cities and the state's mining areas the party had done even better.

Unlike the party's early years when the state's farm organizations had refused to lend their formal support to the party, in 1895 the party enjoyed the support of voluntary organizations, most importantly the state's labor unions. The central labor bodies of the state's three largest cities and dozens of smaller cities had endorsed the party, as did the state's most powerful union, the United Mine Workers. Within the first week of 1895 the Populists picked up the support of the Ohio

State Trades and Labor Assembly, a statewide federation of labor unions.

The importance of the support of these organizations went beyond mere numbers. They provided the party with newspapers, organizers, and legitimacy.i

1 Cleveland Citizen. 5, 12 January 1895. Although the Ohio State Trades and Labor Assembly insisted on maintaining the fiction of non- partisanship and did not endorse the People's party by name, the state assembly ratified a platform that mirrored the Ohio Populist platform almost word-for-word and called on constituent unions to work with political parties who supported the platform in an "aggressive campaign." 203 Perhaps most importantly for the party's future, the party would

no longer have trouble recruiting a candidate for the top of the ticket.

The party had found a leader, Jacob Coxey, who had nationwide

recognition, a proven track record of attracting voters, the ability to

inspire followers, and the resources needed to mount a successful campaign. Additionally, Coxey's good-roads and non-interest bearing bond program, as well as the 1894 convention's qualified call for collective ownership, provided the party with a platform that was easy to differentiate from the Ohio Democratic platform, which championed two of the staples of the Populist platform, the free and unlimited coinage of silver and a lower tariff. Even the party's competitors recognized the party's potential. "He who takes Coxey for a fool is sadly mistaken

. . . , " the Cleveland Plain Dealer warned "The chances are by no means small that Mr. Coxey will be their nominee for president and he will wage a vigorous campaign.":

The Populists's optimism for 1895 and beyond proved to be misplaced. Unbeknownst to them, the party had reached it zenith the previous fall. Never again would the Populists poll as high statewide or do as well in the state's urban and industrial areas as they did in

November of 1894.

McBride and the AFL

McBride officially assumed the presidency of the American

Federation of Labor on January 1, 1895 expressing his intention to steer the Federation into partisan politics. He told reporters, "I trust and expect to see a great union of labor men before another year, and believe that we shall place a presidential candidate in the field." As he had done in the past, McBride borrowed his words from the Omaha

2 Cleveland Plain Dealer. 20 Jtmuary 1895. 204 platform. The phrase "union of labor men" clearly echoes the Omaha platforms call for a "union of labor forces."]

Despite of McBride's convictions, he announced a policy of moderation. Fearful of breaking up the fragile Federation, McBride was constrained by the convention's failure to pass the preamble and Plank

Ten. Aware that there had been "much speculation" and "great anxiety" concerning the direction that the Federation would take during his tenure, McBride assured followers, "I shall be guided by the constitutional provisions of the American Federation of Labor, and in all important cases not covered by constitutional provisions, will be governed by my own judgment and the directing advice of the Executive

Council." Contradicting fears that he was too radical, McBride told reporters that he was only a "limited socialist." He believed only that the "government should ... take charge of such productions as the people may elect to operate. That leaves the opening broad enough to admit or exclude anything." McBride worried that forcing the Federation into politics would be "very foolish and almost suicidal." But McBride never indicated that he had retreated from his earlier beliefs or abandoned his desire to take the Federation into politics.*

The composition of the AFL's Executive Council limited McBride's choices. Five of the six members of the Executive Council had supported

Gompers at the 1894 convention and were committed to economic rather than political action. Led by First Vice President P.J. McGuire,

Gompers's supporters kept a close eye on McBride to ensure that he did not overstep his authority. When McBride wrote an article supporting compulsory arbitration, McGuire and Gompers's supporters responded angrily. They noted that the Federation's 1893 convention had rejected

3 National Labor Tribune (Pittsburgh), 10 January 1895. 4 National Labor Tribune. 27 December 1894; Columbus Dispatch. 29 January 1895; McBride, "Our Official Policy" American Federationist. 1 (1895), 282. 205 compulsory arbitration. A concerted effort to move toward the

establishment of a political party surely would have provoked more than

an angry letter from McGuire.5

Early in his administration, McBride became embroiled in a

scandal. At the 1895 OMWA convention, the president of the Ohio miners,

A.A. Adams, charged McBride and the leaders of the UMWA of selling out the miners during the previous year's strike of 1894. Adams charged that McBride had exceeded his authority when he concluded the deal with the mine operators to end the strike. To these charges were added rumors of bribery and accusations that McBride had been too cozy with

Ohio mine operators. The convention appointed a committee to investigate Adams's charges. After a three-day investigation, the committee concluded that there was no evidence to substantiate the charges. But during the investigation, Mark Wild, an organizer for the

A.P.O. and the President of the Columbus Trades and Labor Assembly, levied new charges against McBride. Wild accused McBride of paying him off with $600 to settle the Booking Valley Railway Strike in the summer of 1894. Wild charged that McBride and the Booking Valley mine operators wanted to end the strike in order to resume the production of coal, which could not get to market without the railroad.®

McBride told the convention that he had given Wild the money, but that it had been collected after the strike had been settled. The money, about a year's salary, had come from the Hocking Valley coal operators, who knew that Wild was destitute yet had settled the strike knowing that he would be blacklisted. The operators felt that McBride,

5 P.J. McGuire to August McCraith, February 18, 1895 cited in Philip Taft, The AFL in the Time of Gompers. (New York: Harper & Bros., 1957), 127; AFL, A Verbatum Report of the Discussion on the Political Programme, at the Denver Convention of the American Federation of Labor. December 14. 15 1894 (New York: Freytag); American Non-Conformist (Indianapolis) 3 January 1895 ; Cleveland Citizen, 5 January 1895. 6 Columbus Dispatch. 14, 15 Februaury; 12 March; 10 May 1895; National Labor Tribune. 21 February 1895 Columbus Press. 13-16 February 1895. 206 a fellow labor leader and vocal strike supporter, would be the proper conduit for the money. The UMWA investigation committee concluded that there was no evidence that McBride had bribed Wild, but did not exonerate him. McBride was not pleased. Calling the decision a "Scotch verdict" — guilty, but not proven — McBride demanded that the committee continue its investigation so as to remove any suspicion of wrongdoing. The miners agreed and determined that McBride had done nothing improper.

After the UMWA convention vindicated McBride, Wild as president asked the Columbus Trades Assembly to investigate the charges. Wild insisted that the UMWA had in effect labeled him a bribe taker and wanted to be exonerated. After much debate the Trades Assembly opened an investigation. News of the charges circulated, and McBride's opponents within the Federation demanded an investigation. The AFL's executive council sent P.J. McGuire to Columbus to work with the Trades

Assembly's investigating committee. McBride was not cleared of the charges until December, when McGuire announced that he had found no evidence "that John McBride had betrayed the interests of organized labor, or been guilty of corrupt practices as alleged by Mark Wild or others."?

Not only did the charges cast a shadow over McBride's presidency, they also revealed divisions within Ohio Populism. All three of the principles, McBride, Adams, and Wild, were active in the Populist party.

Adams and Wild had both run for office on the People's party's ticket in the fall of 1894 and attended McBride's labor party convention.

After the UMWA's convention, McBride's health deteriorated. In

October 1894 McBride had been stricken with nicotine poisoning which had kept him off the campaign trail that fall and from attending the AFL's convention. Although he had recovered in time to take office, McBride

? AFL, "National Executive Council Minutes", 24 April; 9 December 1895. 207 suffered a relapse In the middle of February. Doctors ordered him to take a six-week cure at Hot Springs, Arkansas. In his absence McBride delegated his authority to James Duncan, the AFL's second Vice president. Bypassing the Federation's first vice president McGuire, a close associate of Gompers and the man dispatched to investigate the

Wild charges, Duncan's appointment provoked a controversy. In making the appointment McBride. Executive Council member John Lennon charged that McBride had exceeded his authority by appointing a replacement

"without the consent of the proper authority of the union.

When McBride recovered from his illness, he found that the AFL's finances were in trouble. In the first three months of 1895 the

Federation spent $5490.66 while taking in only $2406.44. Most of the

$3084.22 deficit was the result of "extra expenses," including lobbying for the Seamen's Bill, moving the Federation's offices from New York to

Indianapolis, a contribution to the Debs defense fund, and publication of the debate over the political program. August McGraith, the

Federation's secretary, concluded, "we have no money for special appropriations or anything of a costly nature." The Federation's financial straits kept McBride in Indianapolis and deprived him of the opportunity of using the presidency as a platform to spread his brand of unionism.9

Nonetheless, McBride began agitating for many of the reforms demanded by the labor Populists. In the August 1895 American

Federationist. McBride's editorial called for the restructuring of the

American financial system. He told the readers, "the remonetization of silver . . . would, under existing conditions, only act as a palliative

8 American Federationist II (March 1895); John Lennon to August McCraith, 27 February 1895; John Lennon to John McBride, 27 February, AFL Records, Microfilm edition, reel 143. 9 "National Executive Council Minutes," April 22-24, 1894; AFL, Report of the Proceedings of the Annual Convention of the American Federation of Labor. 1895 (Bloomington, IL: Pantagraph, 1905), 12. 208 and reduce rather than remove the defects in our system of finance from which labor suffers the most." Calling for the issuance of Greenbacks and the abolition of the nation's banking system, he concluded, "We must take from speculators, bankers and brokers the power to control our medium of exchange before interest can be reduced to a minimum, usury be wiped out, and business done upon a cash rather than a credit basis."lo

In the American Federationist's October issue McBride attacked the rising economic inequality. Using census figures, he argued that in

1850 American workers owned 62.5% of the nation's wealth, while the

"non-producers" controlled only 37.5% of the wealth. By 1890 workers controlled only 17% of the nation's wealth, while "non-producers" controlled 83%. He blamed the change on "governmental favoritism to capital and the indifference and neglect of wage workers to the system of robbery." McBride then documented the increasing of criminal activity from 1850-1890 and concluded, "Capitalism, pauperism and crime go hand in hand, and the history of the world evidences the fact that wherever the former increases the two latter spread and flourish."

Quoting Noah Webster, McBride warned, "An equal distribution of property is the foundation of the republic." "It is time the foundation was commenced," McBride continued. As a first step, he recommended the nationalization of railroads, telegraphs, telephones, and mines, and municipal ownership of street cars and gas, water, and electric plants.11

By fall the AFL's improved financial situation allowed McBride to launch a speaking tour of the Bast and New England to champion the

Federation's entry into partisan politics. In every speech, according to the Cleveland Citizen. McBride "spoke in favor of independent

10 McBride, "The Kind of Money Needed," American Federationist 2 (August 1895), 106-07. 11 McBride, "Producers vs. Non-Producers" American Federationist 2 (October 1895), 144-45. 209 political action along the lines of Populism." In Pittsburgh he

declared, "Corporate power must be dethroned and the people become the

owners of all public necessities." The way to achieve this was clear:

"If you want to restrict the privileges and abuses of capital you must

pursue a different course in your trade unions, and I say to you it has

come when labor must shake off partisan shackles and be free men. Be

patriots, not partisans .... If I had my way there would be a labor

party that would sweep all evils from the land." McBride concluded,

"You can't strike a blow by strike or shot — you can't repeal a law by

a boycott, but you can rout corporate power by intelligent use of the

ballot."12

The issue would be decided at the 1895 AFL convention. It would

be, the Chicago Tribune wrote, a "fight to the finish" between the

radical McBride and the conservative Gompers. "(U]pon the outcome of

the struggle will depend largely the future of organized labor in this

country," the paper predicted. Commentators expected a close race.

While McBride had the advantage of incumbency, Gompers had grounds to

hope he could recover the Federation's top office. McBride had

alienated a couple of unions that had supported him the year before.

McBride described the head of the Brewery Workers as having a "distorted

brain." He had written the head of the International Machinists' Union

that he had manifested "ignorance as an official" and had evidenced

"boorishness as a man." Gompers had spent a good part of 1895 traveling the nation on behalf of the garment workers. He made hundreds of

speeches, while illness and the Federation's financial straits kept

McBride from doing the same.13

12 Cleveland Citizen. 16 November 1895; National Labor Tribune. 31 October 1895. 13 New York Press. 21 July 1895; Chicago Dailv Tribune, undated clipping found in the AFL records; Cleveland Citizen. 9 November 1895. 210 Before the convention the coalition of Midwestern Populists and east coast Socialists that had put McBride into office showed signs of coming apart. Socialists, like J. Mahlon Barnes of the cigarmakers and

John Tobin of the shoemakers, were disappointed with McBride. His year in office had not produced the anticipated results. Not only was

McBride's administration beset by scandal, financial difficulties, and health problems, it was constrained by the fragility of the Federation and the 1894 convention's defeat of the preamble calling for the creation of a labor party. The socialists talked of nominating Tobin to run against McBride, but on the eve of the convention decided to back

McBride.14

Hoping to attract undecided delegates, McBride moderated his rhetoric at the convention. He continued to argue that only political action could alleviate labor's problems. "The self evident truth confronts us that wage workers cannot hope to be free in the shops, mines and factories while trudging in party slavery to the polls," he declared. Yet he retreated from his call for the creation of a labor party. McBride realized that AFL members did "not agree as to the scope of the political work needed" or "the methods employed in political reform work." Therefore he conceded, "At this time it is not independent party, but independent voting that will accomplish beneficial and speedy results."15

Despite McBride's retreat, on the afternoon of the convention's forth day, Bames introduced a resolution stating "[t]hat it is as clearly the duty of union workingmen to organize and maintain a political party devoted exclusively to their own interests as to organize in trade and labor unions. " As it did with all of the resolutions, the convention sent Barnes's resolution to the Resolutions

14 New York Times. 10-12 December 1995. 15 AFL Proceedings. 1895. 15-16. 211 Committee. Delegates would not vote on the resolution until the convention's eighth d a y . 16 Although Barnes's exact intention remains unknown, the passage of the resolution would have clearly given McBride the authority to move the Federation into partisan politics if elected to a second term. Barnes's original resolution can best be understood aa the second step in a process to provide McBride the constitutional justification to steer the AFL into partisan politics. The first step was the reelection of McBride.

The presidential election took place in the afternoon of the convention's sixth day. Gompers eked out a victory, 1041-1023. Press reports confirmed that the those favoring independent political action voted for McBride, while the dyed-in-the-wool trade unionists supported

Gompers. The vote was so close that the result turned on a number of smaller issues. The brewery workers had supported McBride in 1894 and still favored independent political action. Yet they cast sixty votes for Gompers in 1895. James Gelson, delegate of the Printing Pressmen's union, had planned to cast his twenty-five votes for McBride, but he became ill on the morning of the election and did not vote.l? Gompers's reelection thwarted the ambitions of those who wanted to transform the

Federation into a partisan organization. Gompers remained opposed to any sort of partisan political activity. As president he could effectively block the movement of the Federation into the political arena.

Two days after McBride's defeat the convention considered Barnes's resolution. But with Gompers' election the issue became meaningless.

Opponents of partisan politics rose and offered a substitute declaring

"party politics whether they be democratic, republican, socialistic, populistic, prohibition or emy other, should have no place in the

16 AFIi Proceedings. 1895. 53,77. 17 New York Herald. 15 December 1895. 212 conventions of the AFL" The Populists and their socialist allies put up almost no fight. Only Tobin voiced opposition to the substitute, accusing the traditional parties of "perpetuating the wage system." In the end the resolution passed by a lopsided margin, 1460 to 158.

Delegates representing close to 500 votes did not bother to cast ballots. Some delegates who had vocally supported political action, like Populists Phil Fenna and Patrick McBryde, voted for the resolution, perhaps out of a desire for unity. Other supporters of political action, like Tobin and Mahon, simply did not v o t e . 18

Historians have pointed to the lopsided passage of the resolution as the death of political unionism. This is not true. The real test of the strength of political unionism and producerism at the 1895 convention was the McBride-Gcmpers contest. Gompers alluded to this fact after the convention. In an editorial in the American

Federationist. Gompers agreed with those who considered "my election . .

. as squelching and annihilating a certain school of thought in the

American Federation of Labor." In a private letter he suggested that his election had been a referendum "upon the issue that party politics should have no place in our Federation." Gompers made no reference to the vote prohibiting partisan activity in the Federation. Clearly, in

Gompers' view, the contest with McBride was the decisive vote in the defeat of political unionists at the 1895 convention.19 If the test of the strength of political unionists at the 1895 convention was the

McBride-Gcmpers contest, then political unionists were stronger than historians have argued. Only the illness of the Printing Pressman's delegate secured victory for Gompers.

18 AFL Proceedings. 1895. 79-80. 19 American Federationist 2 (February 1896): 224-25; Gompers to W.H. M i l b u m (Denver), September 23, 1896, AFL Records. 213 Ohio Populists and the National People's Party

At first glance, the results of the election of 1894 suggested that the People's party's future had never looked so bright. The number of voters casting their ballots for the People's party increased 42% over the 1892 results with close to 1.5 million votes for Populist candidates. The gains were most dramatic in the urban and industrial areas of the Midwest. In 1894 Ohio Populists tripled their 1892 results with the largest increases in the industrial and mining areas. In

Milwaukee the vote jumped from about 1,296 (2.5%) in 1892 to 9,479 (19%) in 1894. In Chicago support for the People's party increased from about

2,000 (0.6%) voters in 1892 to close to 40,000 (12%) in 1894. In

Minneapolis the Populists garnered 35% of the vote, and in the Twin

Cities the party tallied almost as many votes in 1894 as the party received in the whole state in 1892. Since the creation of the party.

People's party leaders considered these areas essential to their plans to expand beyond the mostly agricultural West and the South and create a producer-based party which would unite the nation's farmers and urban workers .20

As in Ohio, the Populist party in these states were dominated by labor leaders who tended to be much more radical than the party's traditional followers. Men like Eugene Debs in Indiana, Henry Demorest

Lloyd and Thomas Morgan in Illinois, and Victor Berger in Wisconsin saw within the People's party and the Omaha platform the type of nascent socialism that they were convinced would attract urban workers and free them from the tyranny of late nineteenth century industrial capitalism.

These reformers insisted that the Omaha platform had been written primarily to attract farmers and sought to augment the platform with

20 Philip Foner, History of the Labor Movement in the United States Volume II ; From the Founding of the American Federation of Labor to the Emergence of American Imperialism. (New York: International Publishers, 1948), 325. 214 planks designed to attract urban and industrial workers. They wanted the party to extend the type of collectivism that they saw as inherent in the sub-treasury plan and the demand for government ownership of the railroads to areas which would aid urban workers by calling for the collective ownership of such means of production as the people may elect to operate. Or, as they would explain it, they wanted to democratize the nation's economic life by giving the people the power to control industries that threatened the commonwealth.

Despite the dramatic gains the People's party made in the Midwest among urban and industrial voters, the party's traditional leaders feared labor's growing influence in the Party. Led by Herman Taubeneck and James Weaver, these leaders were philosophically opposed to the demands of the labor-Populists. They saw labor's demands as a threat to the sanctity of property and suggested that they would undermine the nation's tradition of limited government. When Morgan tried in 1894 to convince the Illinois People's party to ratify a platform that was nearly identical to the one ratified by the Ohio People's party,

Taubeneck told him, "If this is what you came to the people's party for, we don't want you. Go back from where you came with your socialism."

Even leaders not as conservative as Taubeneck and Weaver were suspicious of the Midwesterners. When Coxey traveled throughout the South to g a m e r support for his good roads and non-interest bearing bonds plans, party leaders, including Tom Watson and Marion Butler, refused to meet or share the stage with him.21

As labor's influence within the party grew, the People's party's traditional leaders worried about the Populists' declining fortunes in the West. Throughout areas of traditional Populist strength, especially the Plains and the Rocky Mountain states, the People's party lost ground in 1894. In Kansas the Republicans swept every state office, took

21 Chester McArthur Destier, American Radicalism. 1865-1900 (Chicago: Quadrangle, 1966), 170; Bowson, 178-237. 215 control of the lower house of the legislature, and won all of the

Congressional seats except one. Kansas Populists were so demoralized that they held a mock funeral for the movement. In Nebraska the

Populists retained the governor's office, but little else. In Colorado,

Idaho, South Dakota, North Dakota, and Minnesota Republicans took control of the governors' offices and the legislatures. "We lost among the farmers," Ignatius Donnelly observed gloomily.22

The People's party's leaders attributed the losses in the West to a number of factors. In many states the Populists had achieved success by working with Democrats, but in 1894 the Populists had tried to campaign without their help. Throughout the West both Democrats and

Republicans embraced the free and unlimited coinage of silver at a ratio of 16 to 1 in an effort to win farmers' support. By latching onto what had been the Populists most useful campaign plank in 1892, the parties recaptured some of the silver enthusiasts that had defected. Once the

Democrats and the Republicans adopted free silver, the Populists had no clear program. Some candidates continued to emphasize issue, while others talked about the sub-treasury plan, the labor question, the railroads, or land ownership. Not only did this lead to confusion, but it also enabled voters to find something to dislike in the People's party. Party chairman Taubeneck reckoned that western Populists, especially Colorado Governor Davis Waite and Kansas Governor Lorenzo D.

Lewelling, had won office on the strength of the silver issue, but had been sidetracked in 1894 by issues that failed to attract voters. Waite had incurred the wrath of many Coloradans, including the powerful silver lobby, by siding with silver miners during their conflicts with mine

22 John D. Hicks, The Populist Revolt; A History of the Farmers' Alliance and the People's Party (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1931), 333; Martin Ridge, lonatius Donnellv; Portrait of a (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1962). 216 owners, while Lewelling's tenure as governor had been marked by intraparty conflict. 23

The Populists faced another, related problem. Most of the party's money for literature and speakers came from the American Bimetallic

League, a lobby dedicated to the free and unlimited coinage of silver and funded by silver mine owners. In early December 1894 the American

Bimetallic League suggested that it might form a political party dedicated only to the free and unlimited coinage of silver at 16 to 1.

The League reasoned that since both the Democrats and the Republicans were dominated by their Eastern wings, neither party would support the free coinage of silver in a national election and thus would alienate sizable constituencies, especially in the West and the South. However, these silver Republicans and Democrats would be hesitate to join the

People's party because of its radical planks, including the sub-treasury plan, abolition of alien land ownership, direct loans from the government, and the government ownership of railroads and telegraphs.

By forming a party devoted exclusively to silver, the League hope to capture silver Democrats and Republicans as well as Populists alienated by the radicals within the party.24

To solve these problems, Taubeneck and the party's National

Executive Committee argued that the People's party must reformulate its platform to emphasize the free coinage of silver. To this end, the party invited hundreds of People's party activists to a conference in

St. Louis at the end of December 1894. As Taubeneck told the press, the purpose of the party's conference was "to make known the fact that it has outgrown many of the 'isms' that characterized its birth and early growth." The Populists would now "take a stand on the financial question that will make it worthy of the support of those who looked

23 The People (New York), 9 December 1894 cited in Destler, 228. 24 Cleveland Citizen. 8 December 1894. 217 askance at the acts of Walt[e] and Lewelling, and have not cared to support the party on account of its wild theories." in particular

Taubeneck wanted to eliminate the planks calling for the sub-treasury plan, direct government loans to the people, the abolition of alien landownership, and government ownership of railroads and telegraphs. By emphasizing the free coinage of silver Taubeneck thought that he could preempt the formation of a silver paurty, attract free silver supporters alienated by the hard money policies of the traditional parties, undermine Midwesterners who wanted to expand the platform, and lead the party to victory in 1896.25

Ohio Populists opposed Taubeneck's attempt to limit the People's party's platform. The Citizen summed up the feelings of the state's unionists when it wrote:

The fact is becoming clearer each day that the silverites are not good Populists. . . . the mine-owners are as mean a set of labor crushers as the Carnegies and Pullmans ever dared to be. . . . While the miners injured their health and risked their lives in the bowels of the earth for treasures which the mine owners did not place there, and had no moral right to, the latter were rioting in luxury and playing the part of princes of wealth. The silver mine owners envy the Rothschild goldbugs, aspire to their fabulous riches, and would walk upon the neck of labor to reach the same goal. . . . Silver barons have nothing in common with organized labor; they are exploiters — nothing more, nothing less. They are unequivocally in conflict with that divine, masterly declaration in the Omaha platform which plainly says: "Wealth belongs to him who creates it, and every dollar taken from industry without an equivalent is robbery. 'If any shall not work neither shall he eat.'"

25 American Non-Conformist (Indianapolis), 3, 10 January 1895; Cleveland Citizen. 23, 30 December 1894, 5, 12 January 1895. 218 John McBride would later suggest that the free coinage of silver was a

mere "palliative" and called for the government to issue greenbacks and

national banking system.za

Taubeneck and the People's party purposely excluded labor leaders

and Midwestern Populists from the St. Louis conference in an attempt to,

in the words of Henry Demarest Lloyd, "throw the radicals in the

overboard." But Lloyd, Coxey, and a number of Midwestern "radicals"

attended anyway. Led by Lloyd, they prevented Taubeneck and the

Executive Committee from packing the conference convnittees and forced

the debate to the convention floor. On the floor those who opposed the

emphasis on the free coinage of silver and wanted the party to maintain

the "broad-gauged" Omaha platform clearly predominated. Not only did

the conference reaffirm the Omaha platform, the conference's final

address reflected the concerns of Midwestern labor-Populists. Written by former Illinois Senator Lyman Trumbull and brought to the floor by

Lloyd, the conference's address pledged to "rescue the government from the control of monopolists and concentrated wealth," support government ownership of monopolies "affecting the public interest," limit "the amount of property to be acquired by devise or inheritance," and work

for the free and unlimited coinage of silver at a ratio of 16 to 1.

Additionally, Coxey convinced the conference to endorse his good roads and non-interest bearing bond plans, which were especially offensive to bimetallists because they entailed the creation of paper money.27

After the St. Louis Conference Taubeneck and his allies railed that "socialists," led by Lloyd and Midwestern labor-Populists, had

"captured" the party. By labeling Lloyd and his allies "socialists,"

Taubeneck was trying to taint those who opposed the emphasis on silver

26 Cleveland Citizen. 5, 12 January 1895; McBride, "The Kind of Money Needed," 106-07. 27 "Judge Trumbull Writes a Populist Platform," Public Opinion 18 (1895), 30; American Non-Conformist. 3 Janueury 1895. 219 and drive a wedge between Midwestern labor-Populiste and the party's traditional supporters in the West and South. The National Watchman, the official paper of the Populist congressional delegation closely associated with Taubeneck, insisted that the emphasizing the silver issue was the only way to avoid "the destructive doctrines of the socialists." Shortly thereafter, Taubeneck and the Populists serving in the United States House of Representatives and the Senate, with the singular exception of Kansas Senator William Peffer, signed a manifesto insisting that the party focus its energy on the money question.28

The National Watchman declared, "The time for Populism and

Socialism to part has come." "Let us be conservative," the Watchman urged, "in order to secure the support of the business men, the professional men, and the well to do. These are elements we must use if ever success comes to our party. For every loud voiced socialist who declares war on us we will get a hundred of the conservative element in our society."29

Soon after the manifesto, the American Bimetallic League announced its intention to form a new party that had for "the principal planks of its platform the free and unlimited coinage of silver at a ratio of 16 to 1 and a demand that the money of the country shall be issued by the government itself." The league rejected the idea of fusion with the

Populists because it considered them too radical to attract free silverites from the two main parties. In the words of the new party,

"Republicans and Democrats could not unite with the Populists because the platform of that party contains declarations and the party advocates theories to which they cannot give their consent." The American

28 American Non-Conformist 21 February 1895; Cleveland Citizen 16 February 1895; Peffer, 109-14; National Watchman (Washington), 22 February 1895 reprinted in Frank L. McVey, "The Populist Movement," 1 Economic Studies (1896), 200-02. 29 Destler, American Radicalism. 170, 228-29; National Watchman. 22 February 1895. 220 Bimetallic League also suggested that Joseph Sllbey, a free silver

Democratic Congressman from Pennsylvania, would be the ideal silver candidate for president in 1896.30

Populist leaders understood the threat that a silver party posed to their party. Taubeneck tried to seize the initiative and declared,

"The People's party at its next national convention will declare in favor of making the money question the 'great central idea' with no other plank except those which add strength to this one. Those who desire to retard monetary reform by loading us down with other issues will, with the Socialists and Communists, go to the rear." Tom Watson predicted that "an understanding will be reached between the Populists, the American Bimetallic party, and the free silver elements of the

Democratic and Republican party." James Weaver suggested a similar sort of alliance.31

For the rest of the year and into 1896 Weaver and Taubeneck worked with silverites from both of the major parties and from the American

Bimetallic League as part of an effort to transform the People's party into a silver party.

Cleveland's Municipal Election of 1895

While most Ohio Populists were looking forward to Coxey ' s run for governor or fighting those who wanted the party to emphasize the free coinage of silver, Cleveland Populists were preparing for the spring's mayoral campaign. Cleveland Populists had reason to be hopeful. The party's 1893 candidate. General Myers received about 6,000 (16%) votes and that was before the events of 1894 led to the dramatic increase of support for the state's Populists. If Cleveland's Populists could

30 Peffer, 115-117; "The American Bimetallic Party: A New Political Organization" (Washington DC, 1895). 31 Peffer, 117-119. 221 double the 1893 vote as the Populists did statewide in 1894, the party could challenge the domination of the Republicans and Democrats.

Additionally, the city's Democratic administration had done much to alienate the city's Democratic party from its traditional working class constituency. Under the effective control of director of public works John Farley, the Democratic administration resembled the stereotypical urban machine. Essentially conservative in outlook,

Farley had grown wealthy through his control of the bidding process for city public projects and used this money and his ties to the Cleveland administration to secure patronage for his supporters. Perceived as simply a pawn of Farley, Mayor Robert Blee incurred the wrath of the city's working population for a series of decisions he made as mayor which were seen as benefiting city contractors. He ignored petition after petition sent by the unemployed and organized labor demanding public works projects and that the city, rather than contractors, hire the labor. When sewer line workers making eighty-seven cents a day struck a city contractor, Blee called out the militia to ensure that they did not congregate on Public Square or disrupt the hiring of replacement diggers. On May Day the city's police attacked with clubs a group of marchers demanding that the city employ the out-of-work. The chief of police reportedly instructed his officers to "strike with might." when a branch of Coxey's army, under the command of "General"

Jeffries, arrived in Cleveland to demand public employment of the unemployed, the police drove the marchers from Public Square. Under

Farley's direction the city council also refused to consider a Central

Labor Union request for a minimum wage on public projects and that only union labor be used by city contractors. 32

32 Peter Witt, "History of the Labor Movement in Cleveland," Cleveland Recorder 5 September 1897; Frederick C. Howe, Confessions of a Reformer; Cleveland Citizen. 8, 15, 22 December 1894. 222 Dissension within the local Democratic party and speculation of a

bolt if Blee was renominated also fueled the Populists' hope. Like many

local Democratic organizations, Cleveland Democrats were split between a

pro-Grover Cleveland wing, led by Farley and Blee, and self-described

"liberal" wing. Led by Charles Salen, Tom Johnson, when he was in the

city, and Martin Poran, the liberal wing occupied the opposite end of

the political spectrum on both local matters and national policy. The

group saw government as an instrument to improve the lives of the city's

citizens and sought a number of reforms that they thought would create a

better city, including, municipal control of public utilities, the end

of the contracting system for public works, and, most importantly, tax

reform. 33

The Populist-controlled Cleveland Central Labor Union thought that

reform forces had a real chance to capture city hall in the spring of

1895 and called on Populists, Socialists, Prohibitionists, Knights of

Labor, Trade Unionists, and reform clubs to unite into a single party.

The labor leaders maintained that divisions within reform forces had

allowed the Democrats and Republicans to monopolize power within the

city. As the Citizen declared, "So long as reform roosters continue planting their spurs into each others' bodies the cunning politicians

have nothing to fear." Not only would unity end the internecine

sniping, it would attract thousands of additional voters who had avoided

third parties for fear that they could not win, according to the

Citizen. 34

The leaders of the Central Labor Union understood that uniting the reform forces would be difficult, but it maintained that the differences could be bridged. To avoid thorny issues such as currency, tariff, and collective ownership, the Citizen insisted that the party create a

33 Cleveland Leader. 16, 17, 23, 25, 29, 31 March 1895. 34 Cleveland Citizen. 8, 15, 22 December 1894. 223 municipal platform and include only planks that enjoyed broad support.

Additionally, the paper suggested that the labor unions and political parties send their most open— minded representatives, men who were willing to conpromise rather than those who insisted on party doctrine. 35

The response to the Central Labor Onion's call was enthusiastic.

Fifty-six labor unions, reform clubs, and political parties sent over

150 delegates to the convention. Although most of the delegates were

Populists, both factions of the local Socialist Labor Party and a scattering of Prohibitionists attended. Additionally, a number of local unions which had traditionally avoided politics, sent delegates.

In spite of the Citizen's insistence that the individual parties send their most open minded representatives, the conference proved to be

"tempestuous" and was marked by squabbling over the platform's details.

As the Citizen remarked, many of the delegates "seemed to have become imbued with the notion that it was their duty to wrangle and split hairs over mere trifles." The most vocal and dogmatic delegates represented the relatively small "Baltimore faction" of the SLP. Believing that politics were merely a propaganda tool rather than the path toward reform, the delegates of the Baltimore faction insisted that the platform reflect their party's emphasis on the "class stjnaggle" and denounce the meddling of middle-class reformers. Since they had little faith in the electoral process, they were unwilling to compromise on the platform.

Even though the convention was marked by conflict, the Citizen was pleased with the results. Led by the CLD's Peter Witt and Robert

Bandlow, the Populists were able to defeat the Baltimore faction at every turn. Witt told the convention, "a class movement has never amounted to anything" and that the party should embrace those who wanted

35 Cleveland Citizen. 8 December 1894; 19 January 1895; 16 February 1895. 224 to free workers from the wage system. Even Bandlow, who was more sympathetic to the idea of "class struggle," insisted on the need to compromise with all reformers. In fact, the convention's nominee for mayor, Thomas Fitzsimmons, owned a factory to manufacture iron and steel shafting. As the Citizen insisted, "his standing in this community among workers and employers is of the very best."36

Not only did the Populists secure the nomination of Fitzsimmons for mayor, they were able to dictate the convention's platform. The platform called for municipal service divorced from politics, municipal ownership of public utilities, the eight hour day on public workers, the abolition of the subcontracting system for public work, weekly pay for city employees and equal pay for men and women, simplification of municipal laws, revision of public salaries, and the initiative and referendum. The convention defeated proposals to add a plank demanded by the socialists calling for the collective ownership of the means of production and a plank demanded by the Prohibitionists calling for the suppression of the liquor trade. 37

Two days after the labor convention, the Cuyahoga County People's party met to nominate a local ticket. Host assumed that they would simply endorse the actions of the labor convention, but a number of traditional Populists dissented. They thought that the national party should concentrate on the free coinage of silver. Led by E.D. Stark, the dissenters wanted to distance the party from the radicals who attended the labor convention. Overcoming the conservative opposition, the Populists nominated Fitzsimmons and the rest of the labor convention's slate and ratified a platform essentially identical. A handful of traditional populists left the peurty.38

36 Cleveland Citizen. 23 February 1895, 2 March 1895; Cleveland Plain Dealer. 21 February 1895. 37 Cleveland Citizen. 2 March 1895 38 Cleveland Citizen. 2 March 1895; Cleveland Plain Dealer. 23 February 1895 225 The Plain Dealer suggested that the People's party made a strategic blunder when it allied itself with the Socialists who attended the labor convention. The presence of "the kind that believe in throwing bombs and that everyman who employs another is an arch fiend" in the Independent Labor party would alienate voters from the other parties who would be inclined to vote for the Populists due to their monetary planks.39

During the campaign the Independent Labor Party concentrated on the Blee administration's failure to provide work for the city's unemployed. To publicize their plight Bandlow organized a march of

1,000 unemployed men to city hall. First, they visited the Department of Public Works to demand that the city spend the $2,000,000 set aside for public improvements. After being refused, they asked the Director of Charities to provide food for their families. After the Director of

Charities told them that they did not have the resources, the men demanded that they be put in jail. According to Bandlow, "Is it right that criminals have work and live, while honest men have not and starve."40

Other aspects of the campaign went poorly. The Democrats remained united. Farley worked out a deal with the party's liberal faction that kept the party together until the eve of the election. In return for the liberal support of Blee's renomination, Farley promised to use his influence with Ohio Democratic Senator Calvin Brice and President

Cleveland to secure the city's most lucrative patronage post, the city's postmastership, for Salen. Although this deal fell through on the eve of the election, it kept the Salen-Johnson-Foran faction from bolting and possibly supporting the Independent Labor candidate.41

39 Cleveland Plain Dealer. 22 March, 2 April 1895. 40 Cleveland Leader. 21 March 1895 41 Cleveland Leader. 16, 17, 23, 25, 29, 31 March 1895; Cleveland Plain Dealer. 2 April 1895 226 Like the Independent Labor party, the Republicans centered their campaign on the corruption of Farley's board of public works and the city's public utilities. The Republicans nominated Robert McKiason, a thirty-two-year-old mostly unknown city councilman, for Mayor.

Untarnished by any association to the local Republican organization,

McKiason ran as an outsider and a reformer. Railing against business's corruption the city's government, McKiason openly criticized the city's streetcar companies, called for increased spending on public works, and insisted that public projects be completed by city employees. Moreover,

McKiason demanded that the police department become a professional rather than a partisan organization and that the city reclaim public lands along the river and lake front being controlled by private corporations. McKisson attacked not only attack Farley and Blee, but his party's most prominent Clevelander, Marcus Hanna, as too greedy and indifferent to the suffering the city's workers. At times during the campaign it was difficult to differentiate between McKisson and

Fitzsimmons. They employed the same rhetoric and called for similar reforms. 42

Unable to differentiate himself and his message from the

Republican candidate, Fitzsimmons captured less than 6% of the vote, a far cry from the 16% that the party had captured just two years earlier.

Cleveland voters backed McKisson's reform campaign instead, electing him by a landslide, as the chart below shows.

42 Cleveland Leader 22, 26, 27 March 1895; Thomas F. Campbell, "Mounting Crisis and Reform: Cleveland's Political Development" in Campbell and Edward M. Miggins, The Birth of M o d e m Cleveland. 1865-1930 (Cleveland: Western Reserve Historical Society, 1988), 301-04; 227 Candidate (party) Votes Percentage

McKisson (Republican) 25,058 54.3 Blee (Democratic) 17,850 38.7 Pinney (Prohibitionist) 580 1.3 Fitzsimmons (Independent Labor/Populist) 2,653 5^ Total 46,133

Table 4.1: Results of Cleveland's 1895 Mayoral Election. Cleveland Leader. 6 April 1895.

Disappointed with the results of the election, the Cleveland Citizen

chided the city's workers for failing to support Fitzsimmons and the

labor ticket. However, the paper though insisted that it would continue

to pursue independent politics as it was the only hope for labor ' s

salvation. 43

Coluabus's Municipal Election

Despite the controversies and fights within the party, Cleveland

Populists were able to maintain unity. Columbus Populists were not as

fortunate. The party split in two during the municipal campaign, with

the "old line greenback element" on one side and the trade unionists of

the Columbus Trades and Labor Assembly on the other. The candidate of

the CTLA and the CTLA-dominated Central Populist Club won 11.6% of the vote.

Columbus's trade unionists did not feel at home in the local

People's party. The CTLA's alliance with the Populists was the direct result of the merger of McBride's IfLbor party with the People's party.

During the fall elections of 1894 the traditional populists had

43 Cleveland Citizen. 10 April 1895. 228 continued to control the party structure and insisted that the unions subordinate their trade union activities to the party's interest. The old timers felt that trade unions should simply be educational schools to convert members to the People's party.

When the Populists met in early March of 1895 to nominate a municipal slate, the party's first order of business was to draw up a municipal platform. There was little controversy over this. The platform insisted that the party adopt a "Middle of the Road" position and reaffirmed both the Omaha platform and the Ohio Populists' 1894 platform. Locally, the platform pushed for municipal ownership of the public utilities, abolition of the fee system for public officials, tax reform, economy in government, initiative and referendum, abolition of the contract system for public employees, 8-hour day on public works, and rigid enforcement of all laws.

The difficulty arose when the party tried to nominate a candidate for mayor. The old greenback element nominated George Twiss, a downtown merchant. Led by CTLA President Mark Wild, OSTLA official B.J. Bracken,

Max Weitzenecker of the chainmakers union, and ITO president Lloyd

Jenkins, the labor element accused Twiss of being hostile to labor. One trade unionist reported that Twiss had declared that the Homestead strikers were no better than anarchists and should be shot on the spot.

Jenkins also attacked Twiss's supporters on the executive committee for their indifference to trade union concerns. He said that the executive committee had repeatedly ignored his requests to use union printers for party material.

The trade unionists nominated D.E. Williams, a former Democrat who worked in the city's accounting department where he had exposed the misuse of funds by both Democrats and Republicans. However, Williams declined the nomination and the trade unionists were unable to prevail on anyone else to oppose Twiss. The inability of the trade unionists to

229 find a candidate enabled the "greenback element" to push through Twiss, but the trade unionists announced that they would not support the party's candidate.*a

Almost immediately after the Populist meeting, the city's trade unions distanced themselves from Twiss's nomination and the local

People's party. Jacob Stroezel, an ironworker and former secretary of the CTLA, announced that he would no longer be the party's candidate for

Justice of the Peace. Tim Shea, a former CTLA president who had the party's nominee for sheriff in 1894, announced his resignation from the party's executive committee and threatened to support the Democratic candidate. At its bi-weekly meeting, the CTLA voted down a motion to support both Twiss or the Populist slate and announced that none of the candidates were worth supporting.«s

The day after the CTLA voted to withhold support from Twiss's candidacy, D.E. Williams, who the trade unionists had pushed for the

Populists' mayoral nomination, announced that he would run for mayor as an independent. When Williams announced his candidacy he was joined on the podium by E.J. Bracken and J.W. Doherty. Bracken insisted that williams was the only candidate who could rally the city's trade unionists and rid the city of the corrupt influence of city contractors and utility owners. Other trade unionists, including Wild, Jenkins, and

John Gayton were quick to support his candidacy, and the CTLA's political committee promptly endorsed him.*6

Unlike Twiss, Williams appealed to a broader segment of the city.

Not only did he pick up the endorsement of the Prohibitionists, he garnered some support from the "liberal reform" wing of local Republican party. Led by the social gospel minister Washington Gladden, these

44 Columbus Post-Press. 3 March 1895; Columbus Dispatch. 4 March 1895. 45 Columbus Dispatch. 12, 24 March 1895; Columbus Post-Press. 12 March 1895. 46 Columbus Dispatch. 13, 25, 26 March 1895. 230 Republicans supported the municipal ownership of public utilities as well as the removal of party politics from municipal affairs. Much of the liberal Republicans's support for Williams can be attributed to their disdain for the regular Republican candidate, Evans, who they saw as a pawn of of Jerry Bliss, the corrupt director of the Board of Public

Works. More importantly, though, Williams picked up the support of the

Columbus Dispatch, a nominally Republican paper with close ties to

Gladden and the liberal wing of the local Republican party.

The Democrats nominated Cotton Allen, a wealthy businessman from the Cleveland-wing of the party. Allen enjoyed a good reputation with the city's labor community and was not associated with the party's machines, yet Allen did not champion the reforms demanded by the CTLA and the city's workers. Be simply insisted that he would run the city as a business and be a good steward of the taxpayer's money.

After Williams announced his candidacy, the CTLA worked to convince the People's party to force Twiss to withdraw in favor of

Williams. Most of the pressure came from the CTLA-dominated Central

Populist club. Led by CTLA officers Bracken, Mark Wild, John Gayton, and J.W. Doherty, the Central Populist Club argued that Twiss's continued candidacy both endangered l«d)or's support for the local

People's party and destroyed any chances to build the type of reform coalition needed to challenge the Democrats and Republicans for control of city hall. Moreover, the laborites complained that since the CTLA's decision to support the People's party in the late summer of 1894, that the traditional Populists had denied the CTLA a voice in People's party affairs and refused to compromise. The traditional Populists flooded the Central Populist Club meeting in order to support Twiss's candidacy and insisted that the party should support only those who were running on a platform supporting the Omaha platform as well as the 1894 Ohio

47 Columbus Post-Press. 11, 14 March 1895; Columbus Dispatch. 12-19 March 1895. 231 platform. They also labeled Williams' Populist supporters as fusionists

and likened them to those who would do away with the Omaha platform.

The meeting proved to be so contentious that the papers were amazed that

a fight did not erupt.«8

It is unclear if Twiss did withdraw from the race, but the Central

Populist club endorsed Williams. The loss of the Central Populists

Club's support so crippled Twiss's candidacy that the Columbus Dispatch

doubted that he could attract more than a handful of votes. The CTLA

continued to campaign for Williams suggesting that he was the true

Populist candidate for mayor. At campaign stops workers dominated the

crowd and applauded his call to end the corruption of city franchises,

reform the tax system so that assessments reflected the real value of property, and to aüsolish the contracting system for public projects. 49

On the eve of the election, Williams' supporters were hopeful that he could win the mayor's office. His crowds had been enthusiastic. He had the support of the CTLA, the Dispatch, and many of the city's most influential citizens, including Washington Gladden, but the odds were stacked against him. As the chart below indicates, the Democrats were able to hold onto the mayor's office, although the Populist/Independent candidate attracted over 11% of the popular vote.

48 Columbus Post-Press. 25 March 1895; Columbus Dispatch. 25 Maurch 1895. 49 Columbus Dispatch. 26, 27 March 1895. 232 Candidate (party) Votes Percentage

Allen (Democrat) 10,747 47.9 Evans (Republican) 8,968 40.0 Williams (Independent/CTLA Populist) 2,599 11.6 Twiss (People's) 117 0.5 Total 22431 100.0

Table 4.2: Results of Columbus' 1895 Mayoral Election. Columbus Dispatch. 6 April 1895.

The split in the People's party did not last long. The poor

showing of Twiss and the much better showing of Williams vindicated the position taken by the Populists associated with the CTLA. The following

summer, the CTLA Populists led the Franklin county delegation to the

state People's party convention and worked hard for gubernatorial nominee Jacob Coxey.

Coxey's Bid of Governor

Soon after 1894's fall election, political commentators of all stripes assumed that Coxey would be the Populist nominee for the governor. Coxey was a logical choice. He had proven the party's best vote getter receiving 22.8% of the vote in his bid for Congress including over 25% of the vote in both Akron and Canton. Moreover his famous or infamous reputation guaranteed large crowds wherever he appeared. Not only would these crowds attract thousands of potential voters for Coxey, they would provide an audience for the local Populists candidates who would be sharing the podium. Coxey's road program and his non-interest Leaning bond idea also gave the paurty a platform that would be easily distinguished from that of the Democrats. Most

233 importantly Coxey was a rich man who was willing to spend money on his

election. Gone were the days when the party would have to scrape

together two dollars a day so that a candidate could afford to run.

For the first time since its inception, the Ohio People's party had a

dynamic candidate with broad name recognition and the resources to mount

an effective campaign.

Coxey realized at the outset that his prospects of being elected

governor were slim, but he saw his candidacy as worthwhile nonetheless.

He hoped that his name on the Populist slate would attract enough votes

to ensure the election of Populist candidates to the Ohio General

Assembly, where they could hold the balance of power and ensure that the

state did not return Calvin Brice or any other "plutocrat" to the United

States Senate. Perhaps more importantly for Coxey, he hoped to use the election as a springboard to help him win the Populist nomination for president in 1896. A strong showing would make him attractive to the national party which would need to do well in Midwestern states like

Ohio if it was going to make an impression in 1896. Although he did not publicly admit until the summer of 1895 that he was "forced to consider myself a presidential possibility," Coxey's interest in the People's party's presidential nomination was unmistakable.so

Coxey's campaign began early in 1895. In March he established the

Coxey Non-Interest Bond Bureau to lobby and publicize his pet financial scheme. At the same time he established the Coxey Non-Interest Bond

Club. Designed to resemble Lincoln clubs or Jackson clubs, Coxey hoped that they would provide him with campaign workers. In June of 1895 he established a weekly newspaper, Sound Money, and recruited veteran

Populist journalist Henry Vincent to be the paper's editor. Although

Vincent got his start in Kansas where he had been instrumental in the

50 Cleveland Plain Dealer. 20 January 1895; Embry Bernard Howson, "Jacob Sechler Coxey : A Biography of a Monetary Reformer, 1854-1951" (Ph.D. dissertation, Ohio State University, 1973), 224, 258 234 creation of the Populist party, he had been editor of the Chicago

Searchlight from the early 1890s until the beginning of 1895 and was lose to Henry Demarest Lloyd and Thomas J. Morgan. Like both Coxey and the labor leaders who supported the Ohio People's party, Vincent was not afraid of socialism or collectivization: Be saw it as a way to defend traditional American ideals and provide economic opportunity, "it guarantees to every American citizen that right and privilege to produce, and a protection in the enjoyment of that production."si

while most people believed that Coxey would be the Populist candidate for governor, the nominations of the two major parties were far from settled. The state's Republican party held one of the earliest convention's in the party's history when it met in Zanesville in late

May. As it had been since the late 1880s the party was deeply divided.

The rivalry between the Hanna-McKinley-Sherman faction and the Foraker- led faction had not subsided. Both factions had worked hard in the spring to ensure that county Republican conventions sent sympathetic delegations to Zanesville, but Foraker's men controlled the convention floor from start to finish. Not only did the convention nominate a

Foraker man, Springfield industrialist Asa Bushnell, for governor, but the convention took the unprecedented step of declaring Foraker to be the party's choice to fill the United States Senate seat that would be elected by the incoming General Assembly. In order to secure party unity, the convention endorsed McKinley for the GOP presidential nomination in 1896 and praised the service of John Sherman in the

Senate.

As the rivalry between the two factions was more over matters of personalities and patronage than policy, there was little debate over the convention's platform. Just as they had since the early 1890s, the state's Republicans centered their platform on the issues of protection

51 Sound Money (Massillon), 25 July 1895. 235 and money. The platform declared that by "restoring American wages and

American products," the protective tariff would "serve the highest interests of American labor and American development." On the most talked eüjout issue of the day, the currency question, the party declared, "We favor bimetallism and demand the use of both gold and silver as standard money, either according to a ratio to be fixed by international agreement . . . or . . . as will secure the maintenance of the parity of value between the two metals." Lest people think that the Republican version of bimetallism was similar to the free and unlimited coinage of silver advocated by the American Bimetallic League,

John Sherman elaborated:

The policy now urged by the producers of silver, and by men who wish to pay their debts in money cheaper than they promised to pay, is the free coinage of silver. This means the single standard of silver and the demonetization of gold. . . . It confers no favor on producers of any kind, whether of the farm, the workshop or the mine, for if they get nominally more dollars for their productions, their additional dollars would have only one-half the purchasing power of the gold dollars.

Sherman and the Republicans maintained that the coinage of silver at the ratio of 16 to 1 would cause the hording of gold and a contraction in currency. 5 2

In formulating their platform the Republicans expected the state's Democrats to reaffirm their 1894 declaration that "silver should be restored to the position that it occupied as money prior to its demonetization by the Republican party, and to that end we favor the unlimited coinage of silver at the legal ratio of 16 to 1 with equal legal tender power." Given that the currency question was the most salient political issue of the day, the GOP was prepared amd anxious to fight the campaign on silver.

52 Public Opinion. 18 (1895), 626. 236 Even though the nomination of Coxey for governor was considered to be a forgone conclusion, the People's party's 1895 convention was far from harmonious. The main point of debate was the prominence of the free coinage of silver in the party's platform. Taubeneck's attempt to jettison the Omaha platform in favor of one emphasizing the free coinage of silver had polarized Populists in both Ohio and throughout the nation. In Ohio Populists from the more agricultural districts, most of whom had been with the party since its inception, tended to emphasize the free coinage of silver, while Populists from urban and industrial regions, many of whom had joined the party in 1893 and 1894, generally sought a more broad-based platform which included demands for greenbacks, government ownership of monopolies (if not all of the means of production), and direct legislation. Convention rules required a representative from each Congressional district to serve on each of the convention's committees. Since the People's party had received its highest vote totals in industrial and urban districts and did relatively poorly in most rural agricultural districts, these rules gave those wanting the emphasize the free coinage of silver a disproportionate amount of power in the convention's committees.53

Those wanting to emphasize the free coinage of silver, often called "one-plank men" or "trimmers," dominated the resolutions committee and forced through the committee a platform that clearly reflected their beliefs. The first plank of the proposed platform declared that the money issue was the most important political question of the day and pledged the party's support for the immediate free and unlimited coinage of silver at the ratio of sixteen to one. Only in the seventh plank did the resolutions committee declare their support for the Omaha platform, and Coxey's monetary plans were relegated to plank six. Gone were the more radical planks from the pairty's 1894 platform

53 Columbus Dispatch. 1, 2 August 1895; Columbus Post-Press. 1, 2 August 1895. 237 which had been written by McBride and the laboritea. These planks included the calls for the eight-hour day, government ownership of natural monopolies, the abolition of the contract system on public works, the end of prison labor, the prohibition of labor injunctions, and the collective ownership of such means of production and distribution as the people choose to operate.

As soon as the report of the resolutions committee was read,

Cleveland labor leader David Rankin charged that "an effort was being made to smother the logical principles of the People's party and subordinate them to the silver issue" and proposed that the platform's first plank state support for the Omaha platform. Labor leaders and

Coxeyites followed Rankin's lead in denouncing the proposed platform and offering amendments. Coxey's followers insisted that his financial plans be given a more conspicuous position in the platform. Max Hayes demanded the insertion planks calling for the eight-hour day and the government ownership of all monopolies. Cincinnati laborites insisted on the inclusion of demands for the eight-hour day and the abolition of the labor injunction. While opposed to the emphasis on the free and unlimited coinage of silver philosophically, the labor leaders and their allies also opposed it for strategic reasons. Like the Republicans, they expected the Democrats to reaffirm their 1894 declaration in favor of the free and unlimited coinage of silver. If both the Democrats and the Populists ran on the free coinage of silver, the labor leaders feared that the People's party would get lost. Instead they insisted that the party reaffirm the Omaha platform and fight for reform of the entire industrial system.

The one-plank men and the trimmers did not go quietly. Led by

E.D. Stark, a Cuyahoga county lawyer who was prominent in the American

Bimetallic League amd close to A.J. Warner, Stewaurt and Jones, the free silver forces charged that Coxey and the laborites were weighing the

238 platform down with so many "fads", "lama," and "whima" that the party'a mesaage waa getting loat. The one-plank men inaiated that theae planka would taint the party with "aocialiam" and drive away voters. Not only did Stark maintain that the free coinage of ailver would free the nation

from the graap of Britiah and Wall Street bankera and provide economic opportunity for the all Americana, he aaw it aa eaaential to the party'a electoral aucceas. Stark and hia alliea inaiated that the hard-money

Democrats, led by Brice and Federal officeholders beholden to Grover

Cleveland, would control the party's convention and that the party would nominate an "administration" candidate. By emphasizing the free coinage of ailver, he thought that the People's party would be able to attract free ailver Democrats and Republicans.s4

Stark and hia alliea, though, were no match for the Coxeyites and laborites. Aa the Citizen declared, "the report of that one-idea platform waa all that was necessary to drive the progressive reformers together." Led by Coxey and Cleveland-area labor leaders, those favoring a broad-gauged platform ignored the work of the resolutions committee and rewrote the entire platform on the convention's floor. At the top of the platform the convention endorsed the Omaha platform. It waa followed by planka supporting Coxey'a bond and good-roada bills and one demanding the "coinage out of paper of aa many dollars . . . aa will be sufficient to conduct the business of the country." In a blow to the

"one-plank men," the party relegated the plank calling for the free coinage of ailver to the fourth position on the platform. Other planka demanded the abolition of the national banking system, the release of

Eugene Debs, the initiative and referendum, the eight-hour day, and the nationalization of all monopolies. Although they clearly had the advantage and could muster the votes, the laborites did not insist that

54 Columbus Post-Press. 2 August 1895; Columbus Dispatch. 2 August 1895; Sound Money. 8 August 1895 239 the party reaffirm its support for the collective ownership of the means

of production.55

After the passage of the platform, the convention set about to

nominate a slate of candidates. To almost everyone's surprise, Coxey's

nomination faced opposition. The Richland county delegation, which was

dominated by Alliancemen and claimed to speak for the party's agrarian

supporters, charged that Coxey was too radical. They disliked his

financial planks and did not think that he held the free coinage of

silver in high enough regard. To challenge Coxey the Richland county

delegation nominated E.D. Stark for governor. Stark received support

from only seventy-four (12%) of the convention's 594 delegates, but this

support (58 of the 74 votes) was primarily from the heavily agricultural counties of west and northwest Ohio, se

After the "trimmers" attempted to write a one-plank platform and their challenge to Coxey, the "broad-gaugers" were in no mood to compromise concerning the rest of the slate. They controlled the floor and filled most of the remaining slots with laborites. John Crofton, the treasurer of the Cincinnati Central Labor Council and a member of the canvassers' union, easily defeated J.F. Lederer, a one-plank man belonging to "the conservative element of the party," for the party's nomination for Lieutenant Governor. Charles Bonsall, a veteran greenbacker who organized the Knights of Labor Cooper Assembly in Salem,

Ohio, before joining the town's AFL-affiliated Federal Labor Onion local, received the party's nomination for auditor. The party selected

William Gloyd, em officer in the Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers, to

55 Cleveland Citizen. 56 Sound Monev. 8 August, 3 October 1895. 240 run for the Board of Public Works.S7

Not long after the People's party nominated Coxey, the state's

Democrats met in their annual convention. Like the national Democratic

party, Ohio's Democrats were divided by the silver question. Led by

Columbus's Allen W. Thurman, Cleveland Plain Dealer editor L.E. Holden,

and Cincinnati Enquirer publisher John McLean, the free silver forces

had captured the party's 1894 convention and pushed through a platform

calling for the immediate free and unlimited coinage of silver at a

ratio of 16 to 1. Believing the passage of the 1894 platform as a

direct attack on him and the policies of President Cleveland, Ohio

Senator Calvin Brice sought to have Ohio's Democracy affirm the

president's monetary policies at its 1895 convention. Enlisting the aid

of the state's federal office holders and other supporters of the

Cleveland administration, Brice rallied the state's hard money men and

spent lavishly at county conventions to ensure that hard-money forces

would be in the majority at the state convention. In four counties

silver and anti-silver forces held separate conventions with each one

selecting an entire slate of delegates to the state convention.ss

Brice's efforts paid off, as he was able to control the convention

from its opening gavel until its adjournment. Not only did he have the

anti-silver delegations from the four contested counties seated, he was

able to dictate the party's platform. Most controversially, the

platform's currency plank read:

He hold to the use of both gold and silver as the standard money of the country, emd to coin both gold and silver without discrimination against each metal or charge for mintage, but the dollar unit of coinage of both metals must 57 Columbus Dispatch. 1, 2 August 1895; Sound Monev. 3 October 1895. Stark did receive the party's nomination for Supreme Court judge, but this was mostly because tradition dictated that the party nominate a lawyer and, as the laborites were proud to point out, there were no lawyers among the broad-gaugers. 58 Columbus Post-Press. 18-21 August 1895; Cleveland Plain Dealer. 17-21 August 1895. 241 be of intrinsic and exchangeable value, or be adjusted by international agreement, or by such safe legislation as shall insure the maintenance of parity of the two metals and the equal power of every dollar at all times in the payment of debts....

Although the language of the platform suggested the party's support for bimetallism, Brice admitted that conditions placed on the coinage of silver were so strict that they would never be met and that the platform essentially meant one word — "gold."59

Brice had little interest in the nomination of the candidate for governor as long as the nominee was not a vocal pro-silver supporter and could help elect the Democratic legislature essential to Brice's reelection to the Senate. In an effort to heal the party's wounds, the convention nominated former Governor James Campbell. Generally respected in the party and throughout the state, Campbell had been elected governor in 1889 and was considered to be the favorite for his party's 1892 presidential nomination until McKinley defeated him in

1891. Newspapers speculated that his election in 1895 would make him the logical choice for the Democrat's 1896 presidential nomination.so

During the campaign both Democratic and Republican campaigners avoided talking about the currency question. To do so would alienate silver supporters within the party and do little to attract new voters.

McKinley told the state's voters, as "both parties declare for the sound money . . . . [t]he real contest in Ohio is on the tariff question."

The Democrats were even more reluctant to discuss the currency issue.

Even though the party's convention voted overwhelmingly against the free and unlimited coinage of silver, free silver enjoyed widespread support among the party's rank and file.

59 Columbus Post-Press. 21 August 1895. 60 Cleveland Plain Dealer. 21, 22 August 1895; Cincinnati Enquirer. 21, 22 August 1895. 242 The failure of the Democrats to endorse the free and unlimited

coinage of silver and both major parties's unwillingness to talk about

what was arguably the most important political topic of the day changed

the Populists's campaign plans. The Populists could not ignore the

support for free silver among the state voters and recognized the

party's silver policy as a way to attract these voters. For the first

time since the party's inception in 1891, the Ohio People's party had a

platform plank with wide popular appeal which could attract voters from

the traditional parties and wasn't supported by either of the

traditional parties. Although Coxey opposed those who wanted the

People's party to emphasize the free coinage silver and asserted that

only the issuance of paper money would deliver the nation from the grasp

of British and Wall Street bankers, he could not deny the value of the

free coinage of silver as a campaign tool and were forced by

circumstances to wage the campaign mostly on the silver issue.

Coxey's Sound Monev increasingly portrayed him as the free silver

candidate. "We cannot understand why," an editorial asked, "able and

intelligent free silver men of both parties in Ohio do not throw aside

their part shackles and unite on Mr. Coxey, the only free silver man in

the field." Another editorial insisted, "We cannot see how our free

silver democrats and republicans all over Ohio can vote otherwise than

for [Coxey]." Still another asserted "that the removal of the

restriction now resting on silver and the immediate placing of it on an

equal footing with gold will destroy the monopoly of the monster gold

trust." The paper even began quoting approvingly the previously-hated

Taubeneck on the currency question: "Our silver plank will bring ten new

recruits to our ranks where the balance of our platform will bring but

one. Whenever we abandon the contest for free silver we are abandoning whatever hope of ever winning a victory."6i

61 Sound Monev. 11 July, 22, 29 August, 5, 12 September 1895. 243 other People's party speakers and writers emphasized the silver issue. Davis Waite insisted in Canton that "the People's party alone proposes to change the financial system, which has reduced the common people to pauperism." Party chairman Hugo Pryer told the state's farmers :

Both of the old parties have declared for gold money, of which there is not enough in the entire world to pay one third of the debts in the United States alone. By destroying the silver money of the country they have destroyed the value of your property and products by one half.«2

Coxey proved to be an enthusiastic campaigner. In the summer and fall he traveled the state making three or four speeches a day six or seven days a week. Between labor day and the election day Coxey made over 175 speeches and spoke in 84 of the state's 88 counties. Coxey was not the only Populist hitting the campaign trail in Ohio in the fall of

1895. Populists speakers, especially those who opposed Taubeneck's plan to emphasize the free coinage of silver, traveled the state stumping for

Coxey. The speakers included William Peffer, Davis Waite, Robert

Schilling, Annie L. Diggs, James Sovereign, and Ralph Beaumont.

While his paper and speeches continued to stress that the People's party was the only party supporting the free and unlimited coinage of silver, Coxey told labor circles that his non-interest bearing bond program would "settle socialism." It would do this he insisted "By having the State purchase the railroads, waterways, telegraphs and telephones; townships build their own highways, municipalities their own street railways, electric light and gas plants, water works, and making all public improvements, and fixing a legal rate of not less than $1.50 a day for an eight hour day." Although Coxey appealed to the socialists he resisted calling himself one because to do so would arouse "the

G2 Sound Monev. 12, 26 September 1895. 244 prejudice of the American people who shrink from the word socialism when

they actually do not know what the socialists want."«3

Throughout the campaign Coxey and the People's party received the

support of the state's most powerful trade unionists. In Cleveland

labor leaders were disappointed with Coxey's increasing emphasis on the

free coinage of silver and chided those who "have barked up the tree of

tariff and money," but continued to support the People's party. As Max

Hayes told the readers of the Cleveland Citizen. "The platform adopted

is a radical one. It files notice of war upon the money power all along

the line. . . . It proposes that the masses shall take control of the

public monopolies; that bank and bond robbery shall be destroyed; that

denial of trial by jury is treason, and declares for many of other

reforms." Cuyahoga county's local slate was dominated by trade

unionists. Two of the three nominees for state senate and three of the

nine nominees for the Ohio Bouse of Representatives were active trade

unionists.««

In Columbus the split among the city's Populists appeared to heal

as the city's trade unionists returned to the Populist fold. The trade

unionists used Labor Day celebrations to champion the People's party. A

jurisdictional dispute caused the city's labor movement to hold two

separate celebrations, but both heard what a local paper called "red hot

Populist" speeches by local labor leaders. The CTLA-dominated Central

Populist club took the lead in the campaign by making arrangements for

visits by Coxey and a number of other Populist stump speakers.«

When Coxey traveled throughout the state's coal mining regions, he

was greeted by enormous crowds composed mostly of miners who had been without steady work for over six months. His labor day speech in

63 Sound Monev. 11 July 1895. 64 Cleveland Citizen. 10 August 1895; Cleveland Plain Dealer. 3 September 1895. 65 Sound Monev. 17 October 1895. 245 Wellston, sponsored by Knights of Labor assemblies affiliated with the

United Mine Workers, attracted a crowd of 5,000-7,000 to the town of

3,000 people and a speech to the Nelsonville Trades and Labor Assembly attracted close to 4,000 miners. Local UMWA assemblies also paid for a number of Populist stump speakers, including Davis Waite, Henry Vincent, and Iowa Congressman E.H. Gillitte, to speak in the area. During the campaign former UNWA president McBride returned to the state for speaking engagements in Columbus, Cincinnati, Massillon, and the Hocking

Valley in his capacity as president of the AFL. At every stop, according to the Citizen, McBride "spoke in favor of independent political action along the lines of Populism."«e

Cincinnati's labor community lined up behind Coxey and the

People's party. Not only was John Crofton, the Central Labor Council's vice president, the party's nominee for Lieutenant Governor, the local slate was dominated by members of the CLC and its affiliated unions.

Two of the three candidates for the state senate and at least five of the ten candidates for the Ohio House of Representatives were active laborites. The party nominated Louis Benjamin, the CLC's secretary, for county auditor. Additionally, the executive committee of the Hamilton

County People's party included CLC President T.J. Donnelly, Chronicle editor Frank Rist, and longtime Knight of Labor official Hugh

Cavanaugh.

On the eve of the election the CLC turned the Chronicle into a

People'8 party campaign sheet. The biggest obstacle facing the People's party, the paper maintained, was the belief that voters would be throwing their votes away by voting for the People's party, but if workers started voting for the Populists, then the voters would see that

66 Jackson Standard Journal. 4 September 1895; Sound Monev. 4, 12 September, 10, 24 October 1895; Cleveland Citizen. 15 November 1895. 67 Cincinnati Enquirer. 8 September 1895; Cincinnati Tribune. 8 September 1895; Cincinnati Chronicle. 13 September, 25 October, 1 November 1895. 246 the party had a chance of winning. Although the Chronicle conceded that the People's party would not win the election, the paper insisted that voting for the Populists was the only option for self-respecting trade unionists and that those who voted for the traditional parties were doing worse than throwing away their votes. They were aiding the oppressors of labor. A vote for the Democrats, the paper maintained, was a vote for Brice who as a railroad owner had fought the American

Railway Union, and a vote for the Republicans was a vote for Foraker who as a corporation lawyer had represented the city's monopolists. The paper concluded that the People's party was "the only party in this country that offers permament relief for the present hard times, good wages for the working man, and freedom from monopoly." 68

The Chronicle was disappointed with the results of the election.

Coxey received 52,675 votes (6.3%), only a few hundred more than Martin had received the previous year. Despite the disappointment with the results of the elections, the state's labor unions remained undeterred in their support for the People's party. The Cincinnati Central Labor

Onion's Chronicle editorialized:

The Chronicle has always advocated the People's party, believing it better for the workers than the two old parties, and shall continue to advocate that which it considers best for organized labor, politically and industrially. He have members of organized labor in this city agree that the platform of the People's party was all right and the party should ride into power on it, but they say, "They have no show, and I don't want to throw my vote away." and they march right up and throw their vote away by voting one of the old party tickets. Yes, and worse than throwing their vote away — placing it where it counts against themselves. The advocates of political action by organized labor must not get discouraged, but keep the hammer agoing and in time there will be a solid phalanx

68 Cincinnati Chronicle. 13 September, 25 October, 1 November 1895. 247 of workers and the result will not then be in long doubt. Our advice to our fellow workers is — Vote the People's party ticket until some party offers you more.

Fusion

In the winter, spring, and summer of 1896 the nation's Populists turned their attention to the presidential election of 1896. Led by

Taubeneck and Weaver, the People's party's leaders continued their efforts to transform the party into a free silver party and to unite all supporters of silver under the Populist banner. Fearful of both the influence of socialists and laborites and the formation of an independent silver party, these leaders insisted that only by concentrating on the free coinage of silver could the party attract enough supporters to challenge the traditional parties. Moreover, the leaders were confident that neither of the traditional parties would endorse the free and unlimited coinage of silver. Although silver

Republicans dominated the party west of Mississippi, they were nowhere strong enough to challenge the eastern "sound money" men. Even though the silver issue enjoyed widespread support among Democrats, the

Populists leaders assumed that Grover Cleveland would use his influence and prerogatives as president to ensure that the Democrats would not endorse the issue in 1896 or nominate a silverite. After all, they reasoned, if Cleveland mobilized the federal office holders beholden to him through patronage, he could control the one-third of the delegates needed to exercise an effective veto over the convention's platform and presidential nomination. If the People's party concentrated on the silver issues and eliminated "radical" planka from the platform, the

248 party's leaders insisted, then disgruntled silver Republicans and

Democrats would vote for the People's party.

While the Populist leadership was planning a campaign based on ailver, they were in close contact with prominent free silver Democrats and Republicans who were intent on freeing their parties from the control of Wall Street bankers and "goldbugs." Led by former Nebraska

Congressman William Jennings Bryan and Missouri Congressman Richard

Bland, the free silver Democrats hoped to capitalize not only on the popularity of free silver, but also the western and southern animosity toward Cleveland. Many of these leaders, especially Bryan, threatened to leave the Democracy for a Populist-led silver party, if the Democrats failed to endorse the free coinage of silver. Bryan was in contact with most of the People's party's western leaders and convinced them to hold a late convention. Bryan reasoned that if both parties opposed the free and unlimited coinage of silver, bolting silverites would flock to the

People's party to form a united silver party. If, by some remote chance, either of the two major parties endorsed silver, the People's party could unite with them on a free silver ticket.

The free silver Republicans, led by Colorado Senator Henry Teller were less optimistic of their chances of changing GDP's monetary policies, but remained in the party to convert as many Republicans as possible to the free silver cause. The Populist leaders generally assumed that Teller and most western Republicans would bolt the paurty after the expected nomination of McKinley. Taubeneck, in fact, championed Teller for both the Democratic and the People's party nomination. If the Democrats did endorse the free coinage of silver and wanted the support of the Populists, he reasoned that the nomination of a former Republican like Teller would allow the People's party to retain its identity. If the Democrats refused to endorse the free coinage of

249 silver. Teller would be both prominent and moderate enough to attract free silver Democrats and Republicans to the Populist party.as

Although opposing the efforts to transform the party into a strictly silver party, Ohio's labor-Populists were divided on the issue of silver. A significant segment of Ohio laborites doubted that positive effects of the free coinage of silver on the nation's workers.

The Clevelanders, especially Robert Bandlow and Max Hayes, continued to insist the free and unlimited coinage of silver offered little to help the nation's workers. Not only were silver mine owners exploiters of labor who wanted to control the nation's currency just like the goldbugs of Wall Street, the free coinage of silver would do little to break the stranglehold of monopolists over the nation's workers, according to the

Citizen. UMWA President Phil Penna insisted that the problems facing the nation's workers were rooted in the Constitution which made it impossible for workers to strike or secure legislation to help the lives of workers. Rather than working for the free coinage of silver, Penna asserted that workers should organize to change the nation's

Constitution to allow the people to legislate against the monopoly of land, transportation, and money which had reduced the nation's workers to "the equivalent of serfs." Other Ohio labor-Populists were much more optimistic about the promise of the free and unlimited coinage of silver. Throughout the spring and summer of 1896 the Cincinnati Central

Labor Council's Chronicle ran articles championing the cause of silver.70

Most labor leaders, though, fell somewhere between these two extremes arguing that the free coinage of silver would improve the lives of worker, but that it failed to address the primary cause of workers's

Robert Durden, The Climax of Populism; The Election of 1896 (Lexington: University of Kentucky Press, 1965). 70 Columbus Post-Press. 26 June 1896; Cincinnati Chronicle 7, 10 July 1896. 250 distress. Cleveland's CLU President Peter Witt saw it as a necessary

"step" in the march toward a cooperative commonwealth. American Railway

Union General-Secretary Sylvester Keliher told the Columbus Trades and

Labor Assembly's Independence Day picnic that the free coinage of silver would promote "justice" by ending the deflation that robbed indebted farmers and workers and enriched "the privileged and moneyed classes" but, he continued, "I am more concerned in that greater and more important battle . . . to reassert and maintain the liberties and freedom bought by the blood of our forefathers in 1776."?i

While there was a diversity of opinion concerning silver, all of the state's labor unionists supported a "middle of the road" ticket and opposed those seeking fusion with silver forces. The Cincinnati

Chronicle insisted, "With Debs at the head of the ticket, the party would stand a very good show of winning in the present campaign." The

Ohio Populist, edited by two Columbus trade unionists, called for the nomination of Kansas's "middle of the road" Senator William Peffer for president and Debs for vice president. The Cleveland Citizen wanted the order reversed with Debs heading the ticket. Charles Martin, the

National Secretary of the OMWA-dominated International Order of the

Knights of Labor and the party's 1894 nominee for Secretary of State, declared that Debs "will do more to unite the labor vote than any man on earth. I believe that he can get 75% of the organized labor vote of the two old parties. He has the magnetism of Abraham Lincoln, and is certainly his equal as a speaker. If Debs gets into the St. Louis convention and makes a speech he will be the Populist candidate for

71 Columbus Post-Press. 6 July 1896; Witt, 10-11. 251 president. Nothing on earth can stop him. He can stampede any audience in the country in his favor."72

In the summer of 1896, Ohio's populists were almost unanimous in their opposition to fusion and the emphasis on the free and unlimited coinage of silver. Toledo's populists insisted that it was "unwise to sacrifice the principles of the Omaha platform for a single issue" and maintained that "government ownership of all monopolies is the only natural solution of the industrial problem." Akron's populists declared their opposition to fusion and support for "the principles enunciated in the Omaha platform." Dayton's populists argued that silverites were not true Populists and that only those who "stand by the Omaha platform" should be allowed to attend the party's national convention. Hugo

Preyer, the chairman of the Ohio People's party's executive committee, insisted that the party should concentrate "on more important issues" than the free coinage of silver.73

The Hocking Valley Populists, dominated by the United Mine

Workers, declared, "We fully endorse the Omaha platform" before endorsing both the free coinage of silver and the printing of

Greenbacks. In Cleveland the local People's party instructed its delegates to the national convention "to oppose by vote and voice.

72 Cleveland Citizen. 23 November 1895, 21 March, 13 June 1895; Cincinnati Chronicle. 5 June 1896; Sound Monev. 16 July 1896. In winter 1895 the OMWA, which had been affiliated with both the Knights of Labor and the American Federation of Labor, ended a long running dispute with the Sovereign- and DeLeon-led Knights of Labor by forming a rival Knights of Labor. Hoping to attract Knights of Labor outside of the mining industry who had alienated by DeLeon and Sovereign, the miners named Charles Martin, a longtime Knight of Labor from Tiffin, Ohio, and the People's party's 1894 candidate for Secretary of State, to run the organization. 73 Sound Monev. 22 May, 5, 16 1896. Although, the central labor bodies of Akron, Dayton, and Toledo avoided any direct endorsement of the People's Party, in each city the local Populist party enjoyed significant labor support. Central body officials openly identified themselves with the People's party emd ran for office as Populists. Additionally, the People' s party polled best in the working class wards emd neighborhoods. 252 first, last, and all the time any and all attempts to abridge the Omaha platform by leaving out any plank, or any arrangement of words that would have the effect of nullifying the purpose of the Omaha platform as at present construed." As the Citizen insisted "no straddling, jumping- jack, eleventh hour, one idea, old-party politician will be acceptable to the Populists of this state.

while Ohio's Populists were opposing the emphasis on the free and unlimited coinage of silver, the state's free silver Democrat's were seizing control of the Ohio Democratic party. Led by Allen W. Thurman,

A.J. Warner, and John McLean, the Ohio's free silver Democrats routed the party's bourbons at the state's Democratic convention. By a vote of

524 to 138, the convention ratified a platform declaring that "the money question is the vital and paramount question now before the people" and demanding "the restoration by the government, independent of other nations, of the unrestricted coinage of both gold and silver into standard money at the ratio of 16 to 1." Warner, the convention's chairman, predicted that the party's national convention would endorse free silver and called for the state's Populists to join with the

Democrats for the coming election. "As there is no room for but one party on the gold platform," he insisted, "so there will be room but for one platform on free silver. There must be no division of the silver forces on the eve of such a contest as we now enter."7S

Warner's prediction proved to be correct and the Democrats endorsed the free and unlimited coinage of silver at 16 to 1 "without waiting for the aid or consent of any other nation." Moreover, the party passed a number of other planks pleasing to the Populists, including a condemnation of Cleveland's bond program, a constitutional amendment to allow Congress to pass an income tax, a denunciation of the

74 Sound Monev, 20, 24 March, 21 April 1896; Cleveland Citizen. 21, 28 March, 16 May 1896. 75 Columbus Post-Press. 24 June 1896. 253 military's intervention in the Pullman strike, and the abolition of

"government by injunction." The passage of such a platform meant that the party would not be renominating Cleveland.

The nomination of Bryan placed the People's party in a bind. As

Henry Demarest Lloyd explained, "If we fuse, we are sunk. If we don't fuse, all the silver men will leave us for the more powerful Democrats."

Almost immediately prominent Populists, including Weaver, lined up behind the nomination of Bryan. Kansas Congressman Jerry Simpson suggested, "If this party should refuse to endorse Bryan the Populist party would not contain a corporal's guard in November."?a

After the Democrat's nomination of Bryan, Ohio's Populists conceded that his nomination by the Populists and some type of fusion with the Democrats were sure bets. Columbus's P.J. Fishback suggested that the state's People's party would find few allies in their opposition to Bryan's nomination. Coxey, who admitted that he would do almost anything to defeat McKinley, even proposed a plan whereby the

People's party could retain its own identity if it nominated Bryan. As the Citizen cynically observed, Tom Watson, Weaver, Taubeneck and other party leaders "will undoubtedly be found in the Democratic party before the chilly days of November arrive."??

While conceding Bryan's nomination to be a forgone conclusion,

Ohio's delegation to the 1896 People's party convention insisted that it would fight Bryan's nomination on principle. At an organizational meeting on the eve of the Convention, the delegation announced its intention to support the nomination of Debs, the candidacy of "middle of the roader" Ignatius Donnelly for convention chair, and ratification of the entire Omaha platform. According to the Columbus Press, no more than five delegates supported the nomination of Bryan and an alliance of

76 Caro Lloyd, Henrv Demarest Llovd. 1847-1903; A Biography (New York: G.P. Putnam's Sons, 1912) 259; Durden, 25. Sound Monev. 10, 16 July 1896; Cleveland Citizen. 30 May 1896. 254 free silver forces. To symbolize their opposition to fusion the Ohioans designed badges with a picture of scissors and the inscription "No trimming at St. Louia" and procured a "middle of the road" gavel to be given to the convention chairman.78

Throughout the convention the Ohio delegation voted with the

"middle of the readers." The election of a convention chairman was the first test of the relative strength of Bryanites and "middle of the readers." Bryanites supported Nebraska Senator Allen, while the middle of the readers sought the election of Maine's James Campion. When

Campion's name was placed in nomination, the Ohioans joined the delegations from Texas, Alabama, Tennessee, and Mississippi in a procession around the convention floor. The Ohioans voted overwhelmingly for Campion, who lost to Allen. In the second test of the "middle of the readers' strength, the Ohio delegates voted forty- eight to one to nominate the vice presidential candidate before the nomination of a presidential candidate. In this vote, the Ohioans were on the winning side. 79

Although Bryan's nomination was considered to be assured, when the

Nebraskans' name was placed in nomination the Ohio delegation joined

Texans and Missourians in refusing to allow their standards to be used in a celebratory parade. When the votes were counted, only twenty-one of the state's delegates voted for Bryan. The other twenty-eight split their votes between four "middle of the readers." The main middle of the road candidate, S.P. Norton, received seventeen votes. Debs garnered eight, Ignatius Donnelly collected two, and one delegate voted for

Coxey. 80

78 Columbus Post-Press. 20, 23 July 1896; Cincinnati Enquirer. 21, 22 July 1896. 79 Columbus Post-Preas. 24 July 1896; Cleveland Plain Dealer. 24 July 1896. 80 Columbus Post-Preas. 24 July 1896; Cleveland Plain Dealer. 24 July 1896. 255 Bryan's nomination signaled the end to the People's party in Ohio and much of the nation. It splintered the Ohio People's party as some

Populists would join the Bryan-led Democratic party, others would work with the Socialists, and still others would follow different political paths.

256 CHAPTER 6

POLITICS AFTER POPULISM

The Populists' decision to endorse Bryan presented the Ohio

People' party with a dilemma. Ohio Populists had opposed both the nomination of Bryan and the prospect of fusion before the St. Louis convention. But after the convention most Ohio Populists saw little benefit in maintaining their independence from the Democrats. The

People's party was crumbling throughout the nation. Bryan and the

Democrats had stolen the Populist's most popular plank. Fusion with the

Democrats offered some benefits — financial stability, a party apparatus with a proven track record, and, most importantly, improved chances of actually electing Populists to office, but the state's

Democratic party still contained a siz«d)le hard money faction. Fusion was still a bitter pill to swallow. Most Ohio Populists reluctantly joined the Democratic party because they saw in Bryan a dynamic, national figure who could unite the free silver forces, defeat McKinley, and help elect candidates who held Populist ideals. As Coxey insisted

Bryan was the only one who could win the "battle for bread against greed."I

While Ohio's People's party reluctantly supported fusion, the state's Democrats, especially the silver wing of the party, generally welcomed the Populists into the party. Not only did free silver

Democrats, like former party chairman Allan W. Thurman, support many

Populist ideals, they saw fusion as a way both to defeat the Cleveland

I Sound Monev (Massillon), 30 July, 3 September, 5 November 1896. 257 wing of the party and, more importantly, the Republicans. The

Democrats, who had not controlled the governor's office or the General

Assembly since the election of 1891, felt that the 6-7% of the vote won

by Ohio Populists in 1894 and 1895 would be enough to secure victory.

The city governments of both Cincinnati and Cleveland were controlled by

the Republicans, but the combined Populist and Democratic vote in both

greatly exceeded the Republican total. Fusion also promised inroads into

traditional Republican strongholds, like the coal fields of Southeastern

Ohio, the Akron-Canton area, and the Western Reserve, where the People's

party had done surprisingly well. The promise of victory over the

Republicans was so attractive that even Democrats such as Calvin Brice, who had opposed the nomination of Bryan and most of the Populist platform reluctantly supported fusion.

Ohio Populists took their first step toward fusion in August 1896 when party chairman Hugo Preyer called for all local People's parties to work with their Democratic counterparts to secure places for Populists on the Democratic slates. In nearly every county most Populists agreed to work with the Democratic party and were able to secure the nominations for Populists on Democratic tickets. Preyer and Coxey met with the state's Democratic leaders and worked out an arrangement in which the People's party would select five of the party's twenty-three presidential electors and fill two slots on the Democrats state ticket.

At its convention in late August the People's party voted by a narrow margin to endorse the arrangement and support Bryan. The delegates

selected perennial judicial candidate E.D. Stark to run for the Supreme

Court and T.J. Craeger, a Springfield labor leader, as the candidate for

258 Food and Dairy Commissioner on the Democratic ticket. The Populists also agreed not to run a separate slate of presidential electors.2

After the election of 1896 what was left of the Ohio People's party slowly crumbled. Many Populists who had supported joint

Democratic-Populist tickets in 1896 tried to maintain an independent

Populist party which would cooperate but not merge with the Democratic party. They continued to hold local and county meetings, arguing that a united Populist block within the Democratic party would carry more weight in party decisions. The plan proved unwork*ü3le and by the middle of 1897 faded away.

Cleveland

In Cleveland, the fusion of 1896 split the city's labor movement into two factions. From 1893 through early 1896 Cleveland's labor leaders had worked hard to unite reformers of all stripes under the

People's party's banner. Traditional populists, single taxers, socialists, Bellamy nationalists, and trade unionists aliened from the traditional parties worked together under a broad platform that was flexible enough to accomadate a wide variety of thought. This alliance, however, proved to be too tenuous to survive the party's narrowing of its platform to silver and the nomination of Bryan. The leurger of the two factions, led by Robert Bandlow, Max Hayes, and the leadership of the CLU called for reformers to join the Socialist Labor party, while the smaller faction, led by David Rankin, Edmund Vail, and Peter Witt, supported Bryan and worked with the Bryan-wing of the local Democratic party.

2 Sound Monev. 27 August, 3, 10 September 1896; Cleveland Citizen. 29 August 1896. In an effort to assert its independence from the Democratic party, the Ohio People's party's 1896 convention ratified a separate platform calling for the adoption of Coxey's monetary plans, the initiative and referendum, state control of the liquor trade, and public ownership of all municipal monopolies. 259 Although Hayes and Bandlow praised Bryan as a fighter for labor and predicted that he would easily defeat McKinley in the fall, they saw the People's party's nomination of Bryan as a betrayal of the "greatest political revolt that this country has every known" and blamed this betrayal on the middle-class "bosses" of the People's party who "had the smell of office in their nostrils." The free coinage of silver, they asserted, was simply another scheme to enrich bankers, speculators, mine owners, and the debt ridden-middle class who would keep all of the benefits accrued from an expanded currency and "not come forward with a raise of wages on a silver platter." Bryan's nomination was further evidence, they concluded, that only members of the working class could be trusted to work for true reform.

According to the Socialists, the disintegration of the People's party was a blessing. It would usher in a better political movement that would sweep away capitalism, the realcause of the nation's labor problems. An editorial in the Citizen declared:

The destruction of the present organization of the People's party is neither a loss or an end to a struggle. . . . The coming third party will draw the lines of class interests more clearly and the propaganda will be better understood because no attempt will be made to be all things to all men. It will be a great class conscious politico-labor movement that is world­ wide in its sweep and that no human power can successfully oppose. It is the child of Want and proposes to destroy the barbarous competitive system and substitute therefor a co­ operative commonwealth.

Realizing that refusing to back Bryan and demanding the creation of a "cooperative conmonwealth" was neither politically expedient nor practical in the short term, Bayes and Bandlow likened themselves to the abolitionists who refused to compromise with the peculiar institution.

"Chattel slavery was wrong; wage slavery is wrong," they said simply.

The nation's workers should not be sidetracked by the "'half-loaf',

260 'one-thing-at-a-time' hxanbuggery" of the Bryanites. The salvation of labor could only be achieved by "nationalizing the tools of production and distribution, and abolishing the element known as profit." While they considered socialism to be part of a world-wide movement, they blasted the notion that it was un-American or of "foreign importation. "

"Socialism is truly Americanism," they insisted. When they founded the government, the Revolutionaries of '76 "established a great cooperative enterprise — a socialistic institution — in which it was expected that all men would be free and equal." The independence and freedom promised by the Revolution, they continued, had been destroyed by the "hurry to grasp the empty shadow of riches."3

Peter Witt, Edmund Vail, David Rankin and the labor leaders who worked for the election of Bryan were much more pragmatic than Hayes,

Badlow, and those who followed them into the SLP. They too had opposed the emphasis on silver and fusion with the Democrats before the 1896

Populist convention, but after the convention they threw their support behind Bryan. Witt told the Plain Dealer. "I eon a Populist from the ground up. I preferred Debs, but I like Bryan. I will take my coat off and work night and day for his election." Labor leaders like Witt thought that the Democrats' Chicago platform's call for the free coinage of silver would break the hold of Wall Street bankers over the nation's financial system and provide greater economic opportunity by increasing the supply of money and credit. Although they would have preferred greenbacks to silver, they reasoned that the free coinage of silver was a good first step. Perhaps more important, they thought that working with the Democrats offered the best chance for accomplishing reform and destroying the "money power." Only Bryan could beat William McKinley

3 Cleveland Citizen. 18 July, 19, 26 September, 24 October 1896, 17 April 1897; Cleveland Plain Dealer. 11 July 20 September 1896. 261 who they saw as simply a pawn of Marcus Hanna. As David Rankin stated simply, the Democrats "can win and the socialists can't." *

The differences between the Bryanites and the Socialists were not limited to strategy. The Bryanites did not feel that the nation's econcxnic system was fundamentally flawed, just that it had been perverted by the concentration of the nation's wealth into the hands of a few who had corrupted the nation's political system. The Bryanites called for a series of reforms to free the nation's workers from the grasp of these corporationists and corrupt politicians. These reforms included the free coinage of silver and the expansion of the nation's currency, stricter laws to regulate trusts, an end to labor injunctions, the direct election of United States senators and the president, and tax reform. The Socialist Labor party, on the other hand, insisted on the complete overthrow of the capitalist system. The Cleveland Citizen argued that the main difference between the two factions was that the socialists were prepared "to fight the whole of capitalism instead of merely the money power."s

Within the Democratic party, the former Populists began working with the Bryan-wing of the party to unseat the pro-Grover Cleveland leadership. However, John Farley outmaneuvered them at every turn. His ties to ward politicians and the city's business community provided him with too much ammunition. In the spring of 1897, Cleveland's Democratic party nominated Farley for mayor. Angry former Populists bolted from the Democratic convention and resurrected the city's People's party.

With the aid of a number of Bryan Democrats, including Foran, the

Populists nominated a whole slate of candidates for office including Tom

Fitzsimmons for mayor. The platform included most of the traditional

Populist demands, such as municipal ownership of the public utilities.

♦ Cleveland Plain Dealer. 27 July, 27-29 September, 2 October 1896; Cleveland Citizen. 6 May 1897. 5 Cleveland Citizen. 15 May 1897. 262 the end of the contract system for public works, an eight hour day for public employees, and the use of fees to pay public officials. *

Even though it had supported the Populist demands for years and

expressed personal admiration for Fitzsimmons and the Populist leaders, the Citizen and the CLU refused to support Fitzsimmons and the Populist

slate. Citizen editors Hayes and Bandlow insisted the People's party was not class-conscious enough. Instead, the CLO supported Edward

Larsen, the SLP's candidate for mayor. The SLP "is the only [party] that favors the abolition of the capitalistic wage-system in all forms," the Citizen explained.?

Neither Fitzsimmons or Larsen were able to attract much support.

Fitzsimmons garnered slightly more than 3000 votes — 5.5% of the 55,000 votes cast. Larsen captured just under 2% of the vote or fewer than lOOO voters. Fitzsimmons's candidacy did, however, have a dramatic effect on the election. Republican incumbent Robert McKisson squeaked by with a narrow vote victory. As the Citizen observed, "McKisson can thank the fates that Fitzsimmons was the third candidate and prevented the radical silverites from going to the big boss." a

The 1897 municipal election proved to be the last appearance of the Populist party in Cleveland politics. Believing that the defection of the Populists and a handful of Bryan democrats in the spring had cost them the mayoral election. Democratic leaders worked to reunite the party by courting the former Populists and their allies. In the fall,

Cleveland's Democrats placed former Populists on the local slate, including labor leaders Edmund Vail and William Pate, who were nominated for the Ohio General Assembly. The Democrats were so solicitous of

6 Cleveland Citizen. 9 January, 10 April 1897. 7 Cleveland Citizen. 13 March 1897. 8 Cleveland Citizen. 10 April 1897; Cleveland Plain Dealer. 6 April 1897. 263 former Populist labor leaders that the Citizen wrote drily that the

city's Democratic party had been "populized."»

Arguing that the CLU could only support candidates who opposed the

capitalist system, the Citizen refused to endorse Vail and Pate

endorsing the Socialist Labor party slate instead. The CLO's decision

prompted the first challenge to the CLO's partisan activism in years.

Angry members of Iron Holders Local 218, which was the home of a number

of influential Populists-turned-Democrats including Peter Witt and Alex

Faulkner, charged that the CLO had become "the headquarters of the

Socialist Labor Party" and the Citizen "the storm center for propagation of that doctrine." The CLO had been established on the principle that partisan politics had no place in a trades assembly, the molders pointed out. The molders were not alone in criticizing the CLO for its relationship with the SLP. The machinists, other iron trades locals, and the sewer workers backed the molders' motion to keep the CLO out of politics. Bayes and Bandlow took the lead in defending the CLO, insisting that it and the Citizen had an obligation to work for the abolition of the capitalism. The SLP was the only party pledged to that goal. In the end, the delegates to the CLO supported Hayes, Bandlow, and an alliance with the SLP. lo

The Democratic party's nomination of former Populists in 1897 and again in 1898 did not ensure that the former Populists would stay in the fold. When Democratic party again nominated John Farley to run against

McKisson for mayor in the spring of 1899, Witt, Rankin, and many former

Populists refused to support him. But they were unwilling to resurrect the Populist party for another try. After briefly flirting with the idea of supporting McKisson or nominating Charles Salen on Bryan-

9 Cleveland Citizen. 11, 25 September, 23 October 1897. 10 Cleveland Citizen. 14 August, 2 October 1897. 264 Democratic ticket, the former Populists sat out the election. They seemed to be floundering.u

While the former Populists sat out the race, a number of prominent

Republicans, including Marcus Hanna, supported Farley's campaign.

McKisson had angered Banna by challenging him for the Republican Senate nomination at the 1898 state Republican convention. This support enabled Farley to squeak out a narrow victory.

As the historian Shelton Stromquist has argued, soon after

Farley's election two events dramatically changed the nature of labor politics in Cleveland. The first, a violent and disruptive streetcar strike lasting from June until well into the Fall, energized the city's working population and prompted them to challenge the existing economic order. The second, the fall's gubernatorial candidacy of Samuel Jones, channeled workers' discontent into politics.12

The events leading up to the strike began in the Spring when the

Cleveland Consolidated Street Railway Company, commonly called the Big

Consolidated, issued new work rules requiring motor men and conductors to work longer hours and to run faster routes. By April several pedestrians had been hit and killed by streetcars speeding to maintain the grueling schedule. The popular outcry against the company and its employees was swift and unprecedented. Newspaper editorials and politicians called upon the company and employees to operate the cars in a safe manner. On the streets crowds threatened to lynch speeding drivers. The Big Consolidated blamed the accidents on the carelessness of both individual motor men and pedestrians; the employees maintained that the speedup and changes in work rules forced them to operate the streetcars in am unsafe manner. While the company agreed to relax the

11 Cleveland Citizen. 8 Jamuary 1897. 12 Shelton Stromquist, "The Crucible of Class: Cleveland Politics and the Origins of Municipal Reform in the Progressive Era," Journal of Urban History 23 (January 1997), 192-220. 265 speedup and the accident rate declined, tensions between the company and the employees remained high as motor men and conductors were forced to work twelve to sixteen hours a day, six days a w e e k . 13

To redress their grievances 519 of the the company's 900-1000 employees organized a chapter of the Amalgamated Association of Street

Railway Employees of America. No longer would they be "treated as a portion of the machinery of the car which they operated," an observer noted The new chapter made no immediate demands but set about to organize the rest of the Big Consolidated's employees and prepared to fight for better conditions.i*

The management of the Big Consolidated prepared for a strike. Not only did the owner Henry Everett make arrangements for the importation of strikebreakers, he built special dormitories to house them so that they would not have to leave company property during a strike.

Confident of his preparations and unwilling to relinquish sole control over the operations of the line, Everett steadfastly refused to meet with the union.

Everett's refusal to negotiate union recognition and changes in work rules prompted the motor men and conductors to launch a strike on the morning ofJune 11. That afternoon two train cars full of strikebreakers arrived from Buffalo. When the strikebreakers began operating the streetcars, chaos ensued. Strikers and sympathizers attacked the cars with stones and bottles as the cars left the yard.

Crowds blocked street car lines by placing boulders, timber, or large boxes over the tracks. Newspapers blamed the strikers for the violence and conflict, but the public sided with the strikers. Throughout the city shop owners, workers, and others boycotted the Big Consolidated and

13 Cleveland Press, 1 April 1899; Cleveland Plain Dealer. 6, 8, 9 June 1899. 14 Labor Day Souvenir. 1901. (Cleveland: Cleveland Citizen, 1901), 23; Plain Dealer, 3 June 1899. 266 patronized smaller streetcar lines or rode wagons supplied by enterprising farmers and teamsters.is

In late June strikers and the Big Consolidated reached an agreanent. It required the Big Consolidated to hire back 80% of the strikers, segregate the strikebreakers who remained employed, and implement a less grueling work schedule. But after the strikers returned to work Everett refused to make any changes. "Mr. Everett has been a very busy man and has not had time to put the new schedules into effect and to carry out terms of the settlement," one of his subordinates explained. Additionally, the Big Consolidated began firing the union leaders who did return to work. Twenty-seven union members, including all of the leaders, were discharged. The conductors and motor men voted to resume the strike in mid July.is

The resumption of the strike brought a dramatic increase in the level of violence. The strikers enjoyed the support of a broad cross section of the city's population. Newspaper accounts suggest that

Clevelanders from every class and ethnic group supported the strike. In every section of the city, citizens and strikers attacked streetcars operated by non-union men. When a streetcar appeared at a major intersection hundreds, if not thousands, of protesters blocked the tracks, threw bottles and rocks at the streetcars, and assaulted non­ union drivers. Protesters dynamited cars and other company property, prompting Farley to ask the governor to send in the National Guard. The

London Spectator observed that the strike looked more like a civil war than a labor dispute.i?

15 Cleveland Plain Dealer. 11-25 June 1899. 15 Cleveland Plain Dealer. 25 June, 6 July 1899. 11 Cleveland Plain Dealer. 18-28 July 1899; George P. Edwards, "Clevelemd Strikes," Harper's Weekly (43) 4 August 1899; London Spectator cited in "The Cleveland Strike," Harper's Weekly (43) 19 August 1899. 267 The strikers tried to distance themselves from the roving crowds, the dynamite, and the attacks on strikebreakers, pointing proudly to the fact that only one of the hundreds arrested for rioting had been a striker. Instead, the strikers organized a highly effective community- wide boycott of the Big Consolidated. "Working men generally, and the merchants of all classes, joined in boycotting with little hesitancy," one observer noted. The strikers secured omnibuses and wagons to help the citizens stranded by the boycott. Ridership on the Big Consolidated fell to no more than a handful on its most traveled routes. A reporter observed that the "cars of the Big Consolidated's are running practically empty."is

Buoyed by their success, the strikers and sympathizers sought to stigmatize those who continued to patronize the Big Consolidated.

Spotters identified and followed them home. Boycott organizers circulated the names of those who refused to observe the boycott, and sympathetic merchants would deny their goods and services to the offenders. The boycott was so effective that an editorial in Hamer's

Weeklv declared, "Persons who ride on the boycotted cars find it difficult to buy the necessities of life. They are obliged to resort to subterfuge to obtain food and drink." Occasionally signs would be posted at the offenders home declaring "scabs live here."i@

Populists-turned-Democrats Peter Witt, David Rankin, and Edmund

Vail took the lead in organizing the boycott, protest rallies against the Big Consolidated, and picnics and fund raisers for the strikers. In their speeches Witt and Rankin rarely spoke in terms of class. Rather they characterized Everett and the Big Consolidated as threats to the whole community and solicited the aid of shopkeepers, workers.

18 Cleveland Plain Dealer. 18-28 July 1899; George P. Edwards, "The Boycott in Cleveland" Hamer's Weeklv (43) 12 August 1899; Cleveland Citizen 9, 30 September 1899 19 "The Cleveland Strike," 808 268 professionals, and even sympathetic factory owners. The CIiO and the

SIiP, on the other hand, did not take an active role in the strike,

except to tell people to "vote the Socialist Labor ticket and down with

capitalism and the old parties." Tellingly, the Citizen devoted

onlylimited space to discussions of the strike. The front page of the

August 12 issue devoted five times more front-page space to Cleveland

SLP's spat with Daniel DeLeon and the party's national office than it

did to the strike. Bayes, Bandlow and the socialists insisted that true

reform could only come by voting for the SLP. As Eugene Debs wrote in

the Citizen. "The key to the situation is in the ballot . . . Do you

suppose for one instant if Robert Bandlow were the governor of Ohio, Max

Hayes in the legislature, and Isaac Cowen mayor of Cleveland, you would

be in your present plight."zo

Despite the ability of the boycottera to cut the ridership of the

Big Consolidated dramatically, the strike failed. By the fall, Everett

had paidoff the owners of the omnibuses and wagon teams that had

provided alternative transportation forcing boycottera to walk to their

destinations. Cooler weather forced Clevelanders back onto the

streetcars. The strike, however, was not officially ended until May of

1900. Three-hundred workers returned to work on terms very favorable to

the Big Consolidated. Although the strike had petered out, it had mobilized Cleveland's workers who were increasingly unhappy with the

city's administrations and politicians.

One of the few politicians openly to side with the strikers was

Toledo mayor and independent candidate for governor Samuel "Golden Rule"

Jones. A Republican factory owner, Jones enjoyed the support of

Toledo's workers and spoke the language of producerism. It was a shame

"that the workers who produce all beautiful and useful things should have so little of the produce of their toil," he said. He called for

20 Cleveland Citizen. 12, 19 August, 2 September 1899. 269 reforma that would allow every citizen "the right to work and then to to enjoy the whole product of the toil of his hand." In late summer 1899

Jones launched an independent bid to become governor. His Cuyahoga

County campaign managers, Peter Witt and Thomas Fitzsimmons, who had helped the streetcar employees organized their boycott, arranged for him to speak at a picnic for the strikers. There he chastised the management of the Big Consolidated for "degradation of American citizens to the level of serfs" and Cleveland's government for allowing the city

"to be used for the profit of private corporations."21

In his campaign for governor Jones endorsed many of the reforms

Populists had demanded, including government ownership of monopolies and mines, the eight hour day, and a state program to provide work the state's unemployed. Employing Populist rhetoric, he also called for the "end of present social order known as competition" and the creation of a cooperative economic order. As he told one Cleveland-area labor leader, "I am trying, the best I know how, to lead the people into the great truth of Brotherhood, Socialism — for me they are synonymous terms. The cornerstone of Jones's campaign, though, was a call for an end to political parties and partisanship. For Jones, political parties undermined the "brotherhood of man," fostered corruption, and encouraged class strife.22

Jones' candidacy almost destroyed Cleveland's Democratic party.

Most of the silverites who had abandoned Parley in the spring supported the Jones campaign. Hanna's forces recaptured the state Republican party in the summer of 1899, and Hanna's followers in Cleveland returned to the Republican fold. By the fall of 1899 the Democratic party in

Cleveland was supported only by anti-Bryan men and party stalwarts. The chances of the Democratic gubernatorial nominee, Cincinnati Enquirer

2 1 Cleveland Citizen. 14, 21 January, 26 August 1899. 22 Samuel Jones (Toledo) to Robert Bandlow (Cleveland), 1 August 1899. Samuel L. Jones Papers, Toledo Public Library. 270 publisher John McLean, were so dismal in Cleveland that the party stopped holding public meetings and r a l l i e s .23

Nonetheless, Cleveland's Central Labor Union openly mocked the possibility of a Jones campaign, charging that it was part of a

Republican scheme to win the votes of the working class. The Citizen predicted that "if Jones runs he will hardly receive more votes than

Coxey received" in 1897. To counter Jones, Ohio's Socialist Labor

Party, which was dominated by the CLO, nominated Robert Bandlow for governor. The Citizen insisted that Bandlow was the only candidate to oppose the wage system and able to serve the needs of the state's workers. Later the paper declared, "All this talk of Jones carrying

Cuyahoga county is nonsense. We are positive that the SLP will beat him out in many precincts and wards, and quite likely in the city." The

Citizen could not have been more wrong. Not only did Jones out poll the

SLP in Cuyahoga County, he out polled the Republicans and Democrats combined. Jones captured a whooping 32,599 (55.8%) of the vote while

Robert Bandlow received 1085 votes.24

As Shelton Stromquist has argued, the street car strike and

Jones's electoral success in Cleveland led to a realignment of the city's Democratic party. Following the election, the city's leading

Democratic paper. The Plain Dealer, reported, "the great mass of people who voted for Jones are now aware of their power and will cause further trouble to leading political parties." The main casualties were John

Farley and the anti-Bryan wing of the Democratic party, while Tom

Johnson, a Bryanite, single taxer, industrialist, and former

Congressmen, was the big winner.25 Running for mayor in 1901 Johnson appealed to the city's working class, sounding much like his friend

Jones. He railed against the greed of corporations, especially the ones

23 Cleveland Citizen. 4 Novanber 1899. 24 Cleveland Citizen. 15 August, 16 September 1899. 25 stromquist, 209-215. 271 doing business with the city, and advocated the municipal ownership of

street railroads and other public utilities as well as Henry George's

single tax. While the CLU refused to support Johnson, a number of other

labor leaders including Peter Witt and Edmund Vail did. Witt and Vail canvassed working class and immigrant neighborhoods for Johnson as they had for Jones in 1899, providing crucial links to between Johnson and the city's workers. 26

Ironically, Johnson's triumph in 1901 and his long tenure in office removed the main challengers to the dominance of Hayes and

Bandlow within Cleveland's labor community and allowed the CLO to continue its alliance with the Socialist party. Witt and Vail, the most articulate challengers to the Socialists, took positions in the Johnson administration and removed themselves from CLO debates. Additionally,

Johnson's pro-labor policies allowed the CLO to disengage itself from municipal affairs and local partisan politics. Onlike labor organizations in other large cities, Cleveland's central body did not have to cut political deals and endorse candidates to ensure that city contractors hired union labor or that labor laws were enforced. This freed Hayes and Bandlow to continue their uncompromising advocacy of

Socialism.

Cincinnati

Like Cleveland's Central Labor Onion, Cincinnati's Central Labor

Council (CLC) had opposed transforming the People's party into a silver party and fusion with the Democrats in 1896. But unlike their Cleveland counterparts, the leaders of the CLC supported silver, Bryan, and fusion in the fall. Although the CLC's leaders conceded that the "free coinage of silver is not going to benefit the man who has nothing but his

26 Stromquist, 209-215; Hoyt Landon Warner, Prooressivism in Ohio;1897- 1917 (Columbus: Ohio State University Press, 1964), 56. 272 labor," they embraced it as the first step toward greater reform. The

paper insisted that silver would free the nation from "gold

monometallism," which was bringing "great injury to all classes of

citizens." The CLC's newspaper, the Chronicle also applauded Bryan and

the Democratic convention. The paper praised the party as being led by

men "who are in the front rank as reformers and the enemies of

corporations, trusts, monopolies and the bondholders" and for nominating

"a young and vigorous American for President, William Jennings Bryan."27

Following the advice of state People's party's executive

committee, Cincinnati's Populists met in the later summer of 1896 with

the local Democratic party to consider the nomination of a joint local

slate. Although Hamilton County's Democratic party was bitterly divided

between pro-silverites, hard money men, and even a few "Cox Democrats,"

the party was on the brink of disintegration and had no choice but to welcome the local Populists. The Democrats's 1894 mayoral nominee had

received just 20% of the vote in a three way race, while the candidate

endorsed by the People's party and the CLC had received over 34% of the

vote. The Populists entered negotiations with the Democrats with the

intent of securing the nominations for at least a half-dozen offices,

including one of the county's two Congressional seats, and threatened to nominate their own slate if their demands were not met. The

negotiations proved to be fairly easy as neither party could afford to

go it alone. In the end the Democrats reserved four slots for the

Populists on the local slate, including one of the Congressional ncxninations, which went to CLC president Thomas Donnelly.2 a

During the campaign the CLC and the Chronicle worked on behalf of the whole Democratic slate, but reserved most of its praise for the four

former Populists and Bryan. The paper called for trade unionists to

27 Cincinnati Chronicle. 28 Cincinnati Enquirer. 20, 23 September 1896; Cincinnati Chronicle. 22, 29 October 1896. 273 support the four former Populists who "are each and all well known for their loyalty to the cause of the people and "have all held positions of honor and trust in their respective labor organizations." On the eve the of the election the paper printed the whole Democratic slate and ran an article telling readers "to vote for Bryan of Nebraska for president of the United States."29

The election of 1896 did not go well for Bryan and the Democrats in Cincinnati. McKinley defeated Bryan in Hamilton County gaining 60% of the vote, and the CXC leaders running on the Democratic ticket met similar fates. The defeats were especially frustrating to the editors of the CLC's Chronicle who complained that "a big majority of workingmen evidently do not want of their number to be elected to office." The city's voters "would rather be represented in Congress by a willing tool of monopolies and corporations and a follower of a political boss than an honorable young workingman," 30

Reeling from the electoral defeats of 1896, the CLC distanced itself from the Democratic party and partisanship in general. The paper quoted Karl Marx: "All political parties, may they be what they will and without exception, can only passingly enthuse the workers for a time." Later editorials blasted the Democratic party for losing interest in labor reform, the Republicans for being the tools of monopolists, and the Socialists for dual unionism and trying to build

"wonderful structures of air," the editors lamented.31

The CLC's put its new political philosophy into effect in the municipal election of April 1897. as they had in 1894, middle class reformers and "good government" business leaders joined forces to challenge George Cox's Republican machine. In contrast to their course in 1894, the Democrats joined the 1897 coalition. Running under the

29 Cincinnati Chronicle. 21 August, 29 October 1896. 30 Cincinnati Chronicle. 6 November 1896. 31 Cincinnati Chroncile. 2 April, 25 June 1897; 2 June 1899. 274 banner of the Fusion ticket, the Democrats and the reformers nominated

Gustav Tafel for mayor in hopes of winning the labor vote. Tafel, who many trade unionists and Populists had supported for mayor in 1891, had

flirted with the Populist party since its beginnings.

Whereas the CLC and the Populists both supported the Citizen's party in 1894, during the 1897 campaign both groups refused to join the

Democratic-led Fusion party. Insisting that the Democrats were just as corrupt as the Republicans, the Chronicle warned.

Trade unionists have learned by the past if they have learned anything, that their only hope lies in themselves and that if they are ever to get the recognition they are by every right entitled to, they must have a sounder basis of support than a few ephemeral reformers, mugwumps, and disgruntled gangsters.

On the eve of election day the paper told its readers that the election of "a few self-styled reformers . . . is nothing to be enthusiastic about" and that "changing bosses" would not benefit the city's workers.

The remnants of the Hamilton County People's party — led by CLC leaders

Donnelly, Rist, and Heier — refused either to nominate a local slate or to endorse the Citizen's party slate. The Populists realized that the nomination of a slate might draw votes from the Citizen's ticket and throw the election to the "boodlers, corruptionists, and thieves" nominated by the Cox machine. But, like the CLC, the Populists were also uncomfortable with the Fusion party which contained a number of anti-labor business leaders.32

Much to the suirprise of Cox and the Republican party, Tafel won by a landslide, capturing over 55% of the popular vote. While business leaders and reformers rejoiced over the victoiry, the CLC distanced itself from the political scene. During the fall of 1897 the Chronicle was conspicuously silent. There was no mention of the governors' race or the local legislative contests other than a small blurb listing the

32 Cincinnati Chronicle. 26 March, 2 April 1897. 275 trade unionists who were seeking office. After the election the

Chronicle justified its new political strategy.

The X of L and the ARU are not the only wrecks that strew the sea of the past, but they show the folly of trade organizations' allowing themselves to be led into strange [political] paths by over-zealous officers . . . they [union leaders] must keep their organizations in tact or retard the final emancipation.33

Instead of concentrating on political action, the Chronicle told unionists to work toward goals that would improve the daily lives of workers and their families. It declared that trade unions, should

"Agitate for a shorter work day; insist upon the label and keep your organization's strength, that means men live to strive for better things. A stazrving man can never think or act." This new emphasis on improving the immediate material circumstances of its members rather than the promise of reform through political activity did not entail a change in goals as much as it did a change in methods. The paper kept telling its members that labor's agitation and educational programs would lead to their "final emancipation," the "new abolition" of wage slavery.

When Tafel came up for election in 1900, CLC again refused to support him and barely mentioned his campaign. A number of factors probably contributed to labor's non-partisan stance. First, the Tafel administration had accomplished little during its three years in office.

Labor had hoped that Tafel would fulfill his promises of a more efficient and honest government, but saw an increase in taxes and little regard for the condition workers employed by city contractors. Second, the anti-Cox Republicans who were partners in the fusion included some of the city's most anti-labor businessmen, including a "scab tobacco

33 Cleveland Citizen. 8 Januairy 1898; Cincinnati Chronicle. 22 October 1897. 276 manufacturer," a "rat printer," and a "scab teamster."34 The paper said that if these men controlled the local government "a sign would appear at the City Hall and the Courthouse declaring 'No Union Men Need

Apply." Third, the Republicans choose a candidate, Julius Fleischmann, who was friendly toward labor. Calling workmen "the very backbone of all cities and all governments," Fleischman campaigned.3s

During Fleischmann's first term Cox's Republican machine and the

Central Labor Council cemented an informal alliance. Fleischmann was liberal with his appointment of union members to city offices. For example, the mayor's five appointees to the building inspector's office all carried union cards. Two were plumbers, while the others belonged to the carpenters, plasterers, and the typographical unions. He also launched a number of bond-funded public improvements, including a new public hospital, public baths, playgrounds, and an expansion of the park system, that created construction jobs for the building trades without substantially raising taxes.36

Not only did the Fleisbmann administration provide jobs and other direct benefits to labor, it also pleased labor by launching a program to improve public education. For years the Cincinnati Central Labor

Council had been lobbying for a series of improvements in the city's public school system. Not only did the CLC see compulsory public education as a means to eliminate competition from cheap child labor, trade unionists saw free public education as essential to the American ideal. By providing opportunity education could mitigate distinctions in class and allow the children of workers to compete with the children of the upper crust. The mayor helped build new schools, introduced free

34 Cincinnati Chronicle. 2 June 1899. 35 Zeuie L. Miller, Boss Cox's Cincinnati; Urban Politics in the Progressive Era (New York: Oxford University Press, 1968), 36 Cincinnati Times Star. 26 March 1903; Miller, 178. 277 kindergarten, and lobbied for free text books for all public school students.

Perhaps more importantly for cementing labor's alliance with the

Cox machine, Fleischmann presided over a period of relative prosperity for the city's workers. The superintendent of the state's Free Public

Employment Bureau reported that during Fleishmann's first year in office the area finally emerged from the economic downturn that began in the late summer of 1893. Not only did the bureau have problems finding skilled workers, especially in the building trades, to fill employers requests for help, the number of unemployed unskilled workers decreased dramatically. The superintendent told the legislature that he was downright "cheerful" about the employment prospects in the city.37

Fleischmann was not the only Republican working to gain the support of the city's labor movement. None was more conspicuous than

Cox's top lieutenant, August Hermann. A former member of the printers' union, Hermann used his position on the board of the waterworks to help the cause of labor. In 1900 H e m a n and the Central Labor Council worked together to secure municipal ownership of the city's waterworks.38 in early 1903 he won the Central Labor Council and the Building Trades

Council's praise for ensuring that the expansion of the wateirworks would be performed by union labor. In the words of the Chronicle, "August

Hermann brought his influence to bear once more in favor of organized labor."

By the mayoral election of 1903 the Cincinnati's Central Labor

Council's support for Fleischnuum fuid the Cox's Republican machine was unmistakable. Like in 1900 middle-class reformers of both parties

37 Twenty-Fifth Annual Report of the Bureau of Labor Statistics to the 75th General Assembly of the State of Ohio for the Year 1901 (Columbus: Fred J. Heer, 1902), 814-15 38 Barbara L. Musselman, "The Quest for Collective Improvement: Cincinnati Workers, 1893-1920." (Ph.D. dissertation. University of Cincinnati, 1975), 156; Cincinnati Chronicle. 2 February, 3 August 1900; 17 March 1901; 21 February 1903. 278 organized the anti-Cox forces. Leading the way was the committee of 26,

a group of lawyers dedicated to ending corruption and boodle in the city

that Lincoln Steffens called the most corrupt in America. The committee

of 26 attracted the city's disorganized Democrats, independent

Republicans, and the ministers of the Evangelical alliance into the

Citizens' party to challenge the Cox machine.

The Citizen's party's platform called for "honest, efficient, and progressive government," and attacked Cox and the Republican incumbent

Flesichmann on two fronts — the corruption of Boss Cox's Cincinnati and the failure of the police force to enforce laws. The Citizen's party could not have picked a candidate more alienating to Cincinnati's labor movement and working class than it's candidate Melville E . Ingalls. A

New England-born Protestant who railed against the excesses of gambling and the saloon, Ingalls was a railroad executive who regarded Bryan as a blight on his party. Moreover, he had to fight the impression that he was anti-immigrant and the tool of Wall Street railroad interests.

Rumors persisted throughout the campaign that he had once declared that

$1.12 a day was enough for any workingman and that $1.50 a day would cause the workman to "make a fool of himself" by either gambling it away or spending it in a saloon.39

The rhetoric of the Citizen's party spoke a language of class. By calling for a government of experts and businessmen, the reformers were asserting that the prerogatives of government belong to the middle class. By portraying working class neighborhoods as hot beds of gambling, drinking, and assorted forms of vice, the Citizen's party suggested that the lower classes were cancers on the city. By campaigning against the saloon, an institution central to the lives of many workers, the reformers promised the replacement of working class culture with bourgeois values.

39 Miller, 180; Cincinnati Times-Star. 2 April 1903; Cincinnati Enquirer 18 March 1903. 279 Fleischmann countered with not only a defense of the prudence of

his administration, but also of the city and Cincinnatians. Be turned

the Citizen's party's and Ingall's attacks on his administration for its

lax enforcement of liquor, gambling, and vice laws into attacks on the

city itself. Fleischmann asserted that the city and its citizens were

not as corrupt and prone to vice as his opponents claimed and defended

the city's working and lower-class citizens as hardworking and honest.

By telling the Citizen's party that "politics and religion are two

entirely distinct institutions," Fleischmann defended the lower and

working classes from the imposition of middle-class, Protestant

values. 40

Like the Citizen's Party, Fleischman and his supporters spoke in a

language of class, but, unlike the fusionists, championed the poor and

laboring classes. Republican Nicholas Longworth compared the "beautiful

residence of the President of the Big Four Railroad" with the homes of most of the city's residents. Fleischman attacked the Citizen's party by telling workers, "It is the innate nature of the average 'reformer'

to desire to reap the benefit of the labor and brain of his neighbor."

Be also enumerated the anti-labor businessmen who supported Ingalls and the Citizen's ticket.41

In the days before the election the labor movement made its

support for Fleischmann and the Republican slate clear. The Chronicle told its readers that "Julius Fleischmann stands for fair wages and hours" and that under his administration Cincinnati's "citizens as a whole have had better times, less friction, and it has progressed faster than ever before." Ingalls and the Fusionists, the paper insisted, were

"long on theory and short in practice."

40 Cincinnati Times Star. 4, 16 March, 1 ^ r i l 1903; 41 Cincinnati Times Star. 4, 26 March 1903. Nicholas Longworth later represented the city in the United States Bouse of Representatives, but achieved his greatest fame as the husband of Theodore Roosevelt's daughter, Alice. 280 The paper also called for the reelection of the Board of Public

Service, which set the labor standards for most city projects. The

Chronicle, the president of the CLC, and Frank Rist, the CLC's past- president, praised the Cox-doninated Board of Public Service. The paper even suggested that the Board of Public Service contributed to the success of the city's labor movement.

Cincinnati is justly regarded by the national labor leaders as the best organized city of its class in the whole country. Chicago may be more militant, San Francisco more conscious, Cleveland more radical, but this city for harmony and effectiveness beats them all. Organized labor in this town gets there without any wire drawn theory or broken heads. One big reason for this is the attitude of the Board of Public Service. This city has been a good pacemaker in the matter of wages and hours. When a grievance arises this board has never been called in vain. They have always been open to free and full discussion of any point of controversy. They as a body have always been friendly to organized labor and have never refused to meet it halfway. What is more to the point, they have never cut the wages of women or manual laborers. In other words, the five present members have made it impossible to become a labor martyr. You don't have to die in this town or break heads or go into the newspapers — just talk it over with these five men and presto, it is all o v e r . "42

Additionally, the Chronicle ran brief, favorable profiles of thirty- seven candidates for municipal office. Of these candidate thirty-four were identified as Republican. The other three's party affiliation was not listed.42

Election results

As Zane Miller has noted, the reelection of Flesichmann signaled the completion of a realignment of Cincinnati municipal politics. Cox and the Republican party came to power in the late 1880s and early 1890s

42 Cincinnati Chronicle. 14, 21, 28, March; 4 April 1903; CLC President Hubert Marshall; Cincinnati Chronicle editor Frank Rist, and the business agent of the woodworkers union made similar state ments to the Cincinnati Times Star, 4 April 1903. 43 Cincinnati Chronicle. 28 March, 4 April 1903. 281 by polling heavily in the middle-class neighborhoods of the hills overlooking the central city. In these years the Democrats polled best in the lower and working class neighborhoods of the center city and the

West aide. By 1903 these formerly Democratic working and lower class wards were giving Pleishmann his greatest support, while Ingalls and the

Citizen's ticket did their best in the middle-class areas known as the

Hilltops. 44

Columbus

Like Cincinnati's Central Labor Council, the Populists associated with the Columbus Trades and Labor Assembly initially opposed fusion with the Democrats on the silver issue, but after the nomination of

Bryan, they worked with the local Democrats to defeat McKinley and elect the man who championed the cause of labor. In the fall of 1896 the leaders of the CTLA, including E.J. Bracken, Tim Shea, and Louis Bauman, led the local People's party and the CTLA into a de facto alliance with the city's Democrats. Although the Franklin County People's party continued to function as an independent political party through 1897, it never nominated an independent slate of candidates and endorsed the

Democrat's actions at every turn.45

Within the Democratic party the former Populists allied with the

Bryan wing of the party. Led by Allen W. Thurman, the son of the former

Senator, the Bryan wing of the party supported many of the same reforms that the Populists had supported, including the free and unlimited coinage of silver, the end of the labor injunction, the institution of a graduated income tax, and a number of laws to protect employees on the job. Following Bryan's defeat in the fall, Thurman and his allies focused their attention on the April 1897 municipal election and the

44 Miller, 175-185. 45 Columbus Press. 22-24 August 1896. 282 defeat of incumbent Democratic mayor Cotton Allen. Allen had alienated

the Bryan wing by refusing to campaign for Bryan and local free silver

Democrats during the previous fall's election. There were rumors that

Allen had actually voted for McKinley.«6

During the spring of 1897, free-silver Democrats and their

Populist allies used the threat of an independent Populist ticket in

that April's municipal election to wrest control of the party from Allen

and the anti-Bryan wing of the party. Free silver Democratic

Congressman John J. Lentz argued that the party must nominate a ticket that the Populists would support in the upcoming municipal race.

Likewise, the Jackson Club, which was controlled by Thurman, insisted that the nomination of a gold Democrat, especially Allen, would cause the city's Populists to nominate their own candidate and a good number of free silver Democrats to join them. The arguments of Lentz and the

Jackson club worked as the party purged all of the gold Democrats, including Allen, from the Spring's municipal slate and nominated a slate composed entirely of Bryanites. In an attempt to appease the Gold

Democrats and forestall a bolt, the Bryanites nominated Samuel Black for mayor. A moderate and recent convert to silver. Black still had the respect of both factions. The Bryanites were so successful in their takeover of the Franklin County Democratic party that the Ohio State

Journal sarcastically observed that it was the Populists who swallowed the Democrats.47

The efforts of the Bryanites worked. Not only did the Populists refuse to nominate their own slate of candidates, the citizens of

Columbus elected Black mayor, defeating the Republican nominee, Emmitt

Tompkins. Black garnered 12,383 (50.%) votes to Tompkins' 11,956

(48.6%). Black ran well in the working class wards of the South side and

4S Ohio State Journal (Columbus), 7, 12, 17, 18, 19 February 1897. 47 Ohio State Journal. 10, 17, 18, 19, 28 March 1897. 283 the near North side, while Tompkins polled well in the middle-class wards of the eastside and far north areas.«8

The Populist's alliance with Black and the city's Democratic party paid dividends to the city's workers and the labor movement. The Black and other Democratic officials appointed a number of former labor-

Populists-turned-Democrats to positions in the city government. The mayor named Tim Shea sanitation officer and Louis Bauman building

Inspector. The party selected E.J. Bracken, the former Populist gubernatorial candidate, to serve on a committee to help the city's unemployed. While not glamorous, these positions gave labor leaders a tremendous amount of power and influence. Building inspectors could make it difficult for non-union contractors, while sanitation officers had the power to shut down businesses on any number of pretexts.

Additionally, in the Fall of 1897 the Democratic party nominated

Bracken, the former Populist gubernatorial candidate, for a seat in the

Ohio General Assembly.o

Not only did the city's Democratic officials appoint labor-

Populists to official positions, they took actions demanded by the CTLA.

In the summer of 1897 the city launched a public works project designed to provide relief to the city's unemployed. City Council appropriated

$60,000 for the city's unemployed to work at $1.00 to $1.25 a day. The project was not designed to achieve long term reform, but simply to allow the city's unemployed to survive until the end of hard times. The creation of the public works project had the added benefit of boosting the daily wage for unskilled workers by establishing $1.00 a day as the going rate for day labor.so

The CTLA also found a friendly ear at city hall when it insisted that governmental agencies show a preference for union labor. At the

<8 Ohio State Journal. 6 April 1897. 49 Ohio State Journal. 2 July 1897. 50 Ohio State Journal. 16, 16, 29 June, 3 July 1897. 284 CTLA'8 behest City Council passed an ordinance requiring that contract

for city improvements go to union contractors and that eight hours a day

constituted a day's work. The School Board rejected a bid for school

desks on the grounds that the bidder had recently replaced his unionized

workers with newly arrived non-unionized immigrants. Instead the

contract went to a firm employing union labor. Local Democrats also

used their influence to ensure that work at a private auditorium, where

the state Democratic convention was to be held, would be performed by

union labor.si

During the Spring and Summer of 1897 the city's police force began

enforcing the state's LLewellyn Law which had been on the books since

1893 and prohibited the intimidation of union workers for the purpose of

convincing them to quit a union. The police chief ordered the arrest of

the superintendent of a bicycle factory after the CTLA secured

affadavits from a number of employees detailing threats made against

union workers.52

Given the increasingly friendly relationship between city hall and

the CTLA, it is little wonder that in the Fall of 1897 the local

People's party considered it "inexpedient to place an independent ticket

in the field for election this coming fall." Led by trade unionists

Bracken, Shea, Bauman, and Oscar Freer, the Franklin County People's party again endorsed fusion with the Democrats as "a valuable means of

the Populist party to get before the people." The party instructed its

delegates to the state Populist convention to fight against the

nomination of an independent Populist slate.53

Angered at the Franklin County People's pairty's endorsement of

fusion and the Democratic ticket, thirteen of the 100 delegates to the

51 Ohio State Journal. 24 February, 9 March 1897. 52 Ohio State Journal. 9 March 1897. 53 Ohio State Journal. 1 June, 11 July 1897; Columbus Post-Press. 10 July 1897. 285 convention bolted and held their own convention. Led by rural activists

and urban professionals, the middle-of-the-road convention denounced

fusion and elected a set of delegates to the upcoming Ohio Populist

convention. They were too few to field an independent ticket that

fall.54

Despite the obvious benefits the labor community received from the

Black administration, the CTLA and the Bryan wing were not enthusiastic

about renominating Black in 1899. Black had alienated voters in the

heavily German and working class wards of the south side by enforcing

city ordinances requiring saloons to close at midnight and on Sundays.

Additionally, the Jackson Club did not trust Black on the silver

question and feared that he would work against Bryan's nomination in

1900. Moreover, the Black administration failed to deliver on promised

city projects, including improvements to the levee protecting the near

west side and the construction of a new water storage reservoir.

The Republicans nominated Samuel Swartz, the city's police judge,

for mayor. Swartz was one of the few Republicans who had run well in

the working class wards of the south and near-north sides. Wanting to

become the first Republican mayor elected since 1885, Swartz courted the

city's labor community. Not only did he bring in a number of Republican

labor leaders, including John Jones, a former president of the Ohio

State Trades and Labor Council, and Tom Lewis of the United Mine

Workers, to campaign for him, he also rented the Trades Assembly Hall

for a number of campaign functions.

In the weeks leading up to the election, the Ohio State Journal

charged members of the Black administration with pocketing over $140,000 of the city's money. Rather them ignoring the charges which were typical for turn of the century municipal elections. Black provided city council with obviously doctored financial statements and escalated the

54 Ohio State Journal. 11 July 1897; Columbus Post-Press. 10 July 1897, 286 issue. The fraudulent documents fueled the fire allowing Schwarts to

become the first Republican elected mayor of Columbus in fourteen years.

Following Black's loss and the election of the labor-friendly

Swartz, the ties that bound the city's trade union movement to the

Democratic party started to erode. With the loss the Democrats could

not use the lure of public jobs and legislation to keep the support of

the city's labor movement and this freed the CTUV to pursue a more

radical course. CTLA leaders had not been entirely comfortable within

the Democratic party. The Assembly's platform contained a number of

planks, including the elimination of the contract system for public

improvements, the eight hour day for all public employees, and the

"municipal ownership of gas and electric light plants, telephones, and

all street railroads," that the local Democrats had refused to support.

Additionally, the CTLA's platform continued to call for the "collective

ownership of the means of production. "ss

Soon after the spring's municipal election, the CTLA showed its

independence from the city's Democratic party by jumping on the Sam

Jones bandwagon. Jones, the pro-labor Republican mayor of Toledo who won reelection in 1899 as an independent after his party refused to

renominate him, was toying with the idea of running for governor. The

Foraker-faction of the Republican party backed him in order to undermine

the rival McKinley-Hanna faction. But Hanna, who called Jones a

"crank," mobilized his backers to Jones' nomination as a Republican

impossible. In the late spring Jones let Ohioans know that he would be willing to make an independent bid for governor, if the people of the

state drafted him.se

55 Illustrated History of the Columbus Trades and Labor Assemblv. (Columbus: Berlin Printing Company, 1901), 271-72. 56 M a m i e Jones, Holv Toledo: Religion and Politics in the Life of "Golden Rule" Jones (Lexington: University Press of Kentucky, 1998), 159-62. 287 To convince Jones to run the CTLA organized a convention of Ohio

labor groups in June of 1899. Although most of the 4,000 delegates ware

from Columbus and Toledo, almost every section of the state was

represented. Before hearing from Jones the convention ratified a

platform which contained many of the labor-oriented demands that the

Ohio People's party had supported. The delegates insisted on the eight

hour day, government ownership of monopolies and utilities, compulsory

education, equal pay for equal work, abolition of the sweating system,

and the end of government by injunction. When Jones began speaiking the convention's delegates began chanting "the next Governor of Ohio, the next Governor of Ohio." Jones devoted most of his speech to the evils of partisanship and called for the state's workers to avoid all political parties, but he also called for the end of the "present social order know as competition" and the creation of a cooperative commonwealth. 57

Soon after the convention Jones formally committed to an independent bid for governor. In Columbus his campaign was coordinated by CTLA officials John McNamee and James Cannon, and Jones launched the unofficial start of the campaign season with a speech at the CTLA's

Labor Day picnic where he railed against peurtisanship and the abuses of the competitive system. Cannon and McNamee organized meetings and rallies on Jones's behalf and kept Jones informed of their activities in

Columbus.58

Although Jones did not do as well in Columbus as he did in

Cleveland or Toledo, where he won a majority of the votes, Jones polled well for a third-party candidate, winning the support of over 10% of the city's votes. But Jones left behind no party apparatus. He had

57 Columbus Press-Post. 14, 28 March, 1-3 June 1899. 58 Samuel Jones to James Cannon (Columbus) 1, 8, 11, August 9, 18 September, 16 October 1899, Samuel Jones Papers. Toledo Public Libreury; Ohio State Journal. 4, 5 Septanber 1899. 288 campaigned against partisanship and refused to allow his candidacy to be

used to coalesce labor and reform forces into a new political party.

Freed from its de facto alliance with the Democrats and energized

by Jones' candidacy, the CTLA and Columbus trade unionists faced a

crossroads. Would the CTLA and the city's trade unionists continue with

the type of anti-corporate, third-party activism that had been embodied

in both the People's party and the Jones campaign, or would they move

back into an alliance with the Democratic party. The laborites split.

The majority returned to the Democratic party, while a minority pursued

third-party action.

The city's Democratic party redoubled its efforts to convince CTLA

leaders to return to the fold. Local party chairman Thurman insisted

that the party had to appeal to the city's labor movement in order "to

hold Democratic workingmen in line with their party. " As such the party

recruited CTLA leaders including Cannon, McNamee, Bracken, and Oscar

Ameringer to run for the state legislature.s* But not all labor leaders chose to return to the Democratic fold. Led by longtime CTLA activists

and former Populists Oscar Freer and James Henzel, a small band of

Columbus trade unionists and reformers formed the Columbus section of the Socialist Labor party in late 1899 or early 1900. The Columbus

section, which would soon reform as a branch of the Socialist party, insisted that "organized labor acting in co-operation with the Socialist political body" could "establish an industrial commonwealth." so

Over the course of the first decade of the new century, many of the city's trade union leaders became increasingly dissatisfied with the

59 Jones, 159-64; Columbus Post-Press. 3 October 1903; Oscar Ameringer, If I Don't Weaken . . .; The Autobiography of Oscar Aroerinoer (New York: Henry Bolt, 1940), 253-75; Eric John Karolak, "The Socialist Party in a Midwestern Community: The Case of Columbus, Ohio," (M.A. Thesis: Ohio State University, 1988); Twentieth Century Official History of the Columbus Trades and Labor Assemblv and its Affiliated Organizations (Columbus, Oh.: Columbus Trades and Labor Assembly, 1901), 271, 347-51. 60 Ohio State Journal. 22 January 1900. 289 Democratic party and joined their fellow trade unionists in the

Socialist party. For instance, Oscar Ameringer became disillusioned

with the Democrats after they nominated him for the Ohio General

Assembly in 1903 and joined the Socialists. He felt that the party had

no intention of seriously supporting his candidacy or that of any other

CTLA leader and that they had been placed on the ticket merely to

appease the labor movement. By 1907 Socialist control of the CTLA was

so strong that several trade unionists upset with the political

direction of the CTLA left the Assembly to form a rival central body,

the Columbus Federation of Labor.

United Mine Workers of Ohio

During the spring and summer of 1896 the United Mine Workers of

America's (UMWA) leadership jumped on the free-silver bandwagon. OMWA

President Penna called the "financial jugglery" which destroyed greenbacks and demonetized silver the "crime of the century." Issue after issue of United Mine Workers' Journal contained articles signing the praises of the free coinage of silver and arguing that the gold standard was one of the tools that monopolists used to enslave the

American worker. An article reprinted in the Journal suggested that a

"conspiracy" of fourteen individuals, led by Grover Cleveland and doing the bidding of British bankers, had caused the panic of 1893 by demanding the repeal of the Sherman Silver Purchase Act. Another article blamed Ohio's Republican Senator John Sherman, the architect of both the "crime of '73" and the Silver Purchase Act, for the misery of the nation's workers. While the paper saw the free coinage of silver as the first step to solving the nation's economic woes, it insisted that

61 Ameringer, 270-75; Warren R. Van Tine, "A History of Labor in Columbus, Ohio, 1812-1992," Ohio State Universitv Center for Labor Research Working Papers Series 10 (1993) 33-34; Karolak, 207-32. 290 any long term aolution must entail the issuance of greenbacks and the abolition of the nation's banking system."

Although McBride, Penna, and other leaders of the OMWA had earlier opposed narrowing the People's party platform to the silver issue and fusing with the Democrats, after the Bryan's nomination the union's leadership had no choice but to support him. Since the formation of the first miners' unions before the Civil War, miners realized that the highly competitive and decentralized nature of the industry made it necessary for the union to look for political allies if it wanted to improve the lives of miners. If an individual operator agreed to install safety equipment, raise wages, or pay his workers in legal tender, he found himself at a ccxnpetitive disadvantage in the market place and facing financial ruin. But a state law requiring all operators to install safety equipment could improve the lives of workers without ruining the more benevolent operators. More importantly,

McBride and Penna had been arguing since 1894 that capital's corruption of the government was at the root of the miners' problems and that lasting solutions could only be found in the political arena. To fail to embrace fusion would have left Penna and McBride without a party and without the means to improve the lives of the nation's miners.

After the Populists nominated of Bryan, the Onited Mine Workers'

Journal insisted that if the supporters of the free coinage of silver joined together, they were certain to win in the fall. The paper warned silverites "not to pay any attention to the efforts that will be made by the gold monarchy to divide them" and suggested that middle-of-the- roaders were doing the bidding of the Republican party. While not endorsing Bryan by name, throughout the campaign the paper ran the

OMWA'8 declaration in favor of "the free coinage of silver at the ratio of sixteen to one independent of action of any other country, and the

62 United Mine Workers' Journal (Columbus), 16 April, 14, 28 May, 11, 18 June, 2, 9, 30 July, 6, 20, 27 August, 10 September, 1 October 1896. 291 issue of legal tender paper money by the government only" in the place

most papers reserved for the printing of their party's slate and

insisted that the currency issue was the only issue of the campaign.S3

During the fall of 1096 both McBride and Penna st-umped for Bryan

and the Democratic party. McBride was so active on Bryan's behalf among

the state's trade unionists that the Cleveland Citizen accused him of

being Bryan's biggest supporter in the state, while Penna traveled with

Eugene Debs to the mining towns of the Hocking Valley to campaign for

Bryan. 64

Realizing that the political strategy they had pursued with the

People's party and later Bryan had failed, McBride and Penna did not

seek election to leadership positions in the winter of 1896-97. In

November of 1896 Penna announced to the Onited Mine Workers that he would not seek another term as president. After McBride's loss to

Gompers at the 1895 AFL convention he had announced that he would never

again seek union office, but in the summer and fall of 1896 rumors circulated that McBride would again challenge Gompers for the presidency of the Federation. Nothing came of these rumors as McBride refused to allow his name to be presented to the convention.6s

When the United Mine Workers met in January 1897 for their annual convention, the delegates replaced the union's entire leadership with a more conservative group. Gone were McBride, Penna, Patrick McBryde,

John Nugent, and the leaders like them who had championed the union's alliance with the Populists. Led by Michael D. Ratchford, the new leaders of the union had refused to support the Populists and were generally associated with the traditional parties. Ratchford, Jerry

63 Onited Mine Workers' Journal. 30 July, 10, 17, 23 September 1896. 64 United Mine Workers' Journal. 23, 30 September 1896; Cleveland Citizen. 10 July 1897. 65 American Federation of Labor, Report of the Proceedings of the Annual Convention of the American Federation of Labor, 1896 (Bloomington, XL, 1905), 14. 292 Meade, and Tom Lewis had campaigned for Republicans in the previous election, while W.C. Pearce and Fred Dilcher had maintained their ties to the Democrats in the mid 1890s. 66

The election of Michael Ratchford and the new leaders represented a shift in the strategy and orientation of the United Mine Workers. In the wake of the 1894 strike Penna, McBride, and the union's leadership had become convinced that the problems facing the nation's miners required a political solution — the collective ownership of the nation's mines, banking and currency reform, and constitutional change.

The new leaders insisted that the problems facing the nation's miners were rooted not in the political arena, but in market forces — the abundance of coal in the nation, oversupply of miners and mines, and slack demand due to the panic of 1893. The new leaders thought that the primary way to improve the lives of the nation's miners rested in the creation of an industry-wide operator-labor agreement to insulate miners' wages from the pernicious effects of the market. To supplement this agreement, the new leaders called for miners to work with the traditional parties to secure legislation to facilitate the operation of the agreements. For example they called for laws banning the use of

Pinkertons or private armed guards during strikes. This would make it difficult for operators to stay outside of the agreement and easier for the union to discipline recalcitrant mine operators.6?

B o m in Ireland in 1860 and emmigrating to North Lawrence, Ohio, in 1872, Ratchford entered the Massillon coal fields at the age of thirteen and soon after joined the local miners' union. The Massillon fields were long dominated by Mark Hanna. Friendly to the miners' union, Hanna cultivated relationships with local union leaders which he would later use to his political and economic advantage. Through his

GG w.B. Wilson would go on to become the nation's first secretary of labor. 67 United Mine Workers' Journal. 25 March 1897. 293 mentor, John P. Jones, Ratchford developed close ties with Hanna and

became active in Republican politics. During the presidential campaign

of 1896 Ratchford campaigned for McKinley, whom he regarded as a

personal friend, w

When Ratchford took office he found the state's coal miners in a

miserable condition. The Ohio Bureau of Labor Statistics reported, "At

no time in the history of the trade have the earnings of mine employees

fallen to such a low figure." In Hocking County at the center of the

state's largest coal producing region miners earned an average of

$209.18 in 1896. An entire day in the mine would net the miner about

$1.51, but miners only worked an average of 138 days in the year. This

translated to $17.43 a month for the average Hocking County miner.

After paying an average of $6.00 for rent for company housing, mine

families were left with an average of $11.43 for month's worth of food

and clothing. While miners in other counties earned more, in no county

did miners average more than $285 for the year, a»

Not surprising given the miserable condition of the state's and

nation's miners, the UMWA was on the verge of collapse. Membership had declined to less than 10,000, of which about 7,500 were in Ohio. In other words, the union represented less that 5% of the nation's 200,000 coal miners. With a decline in dues paying members and the thousands of others in arrears, the union was barely solvent. The union only had about $600 on hand when Ratchford took office.

In order to establish an industry-wide agreement the miners needed to improve the welfare of the nation's miners and the union, Ratchford

launched an organizing drive. Organization gave the miners two weapons to be used against the market. First, a general suspension of mining

68 Roy, 348-49; Ohio State Journal. 17 January 1898. 69 Twentv-first Annual Report of the Bureau of Labor Statistics to the 72nd General Assemblv of the State of Ohio for the Year 1897 (Norwalk, Ohio: Laning, 1898), 112-117. 294 held the promise of creating a coal shortage which would increase both

the price of coal and the operators ability to pay higher wages,

Second, organization gave the miners power to discipline operators who

refused to pay miners the negotiated scale. By withholding labor from

low-wage operators, a well-organized union had the ability to protect

both miners and high wage operators from competition and unregulated

market forces. In anticipation of an eventual showdown with miner

owners, Ratchford secured union approval to create a strike fund.

Soon after Ratchford's election and before the organizing drive

had a chance to improve the union's condition, both the price of coal

and miners wages began to tumble. The immediate cause of the fall was

the price cutting of Pittsburgh-area operator William P. DeArmitt.

OeArmitt cut prices and wages in order to capture a greater share of the

"lake trade." In order to compete with the DeArmitt-controlled mines,

Pittsburgh operators cut the miners' scale from 69 cents per ton to 47

cents per ton. Unable to compete with Pittsburgh-area coal, Ohio

operators and later those in Indiana and Illinois asked the union to

reduce the scale. At first the UMWA and Ohio miners resisted any

attempt to reduce the scale, but reasoning that the relatively higher wages of Ohio miners would cause the state's mines to go idle, the Ohio miners agreed to lower wages. The earnings of Ohio miners fell from

sixty cents per ton in January to forty-five cents per ton in April and

May. A reduction in the number of hours worked also accompanied the reduction in the scale. The arrival of Spring and warm weather reduced the demand for coal, and large consumers opted for lower priced coal from the Pittsburgh-area and the non-union fields of West Virginia. An organizer in Ohio's Hocking Valley reported that most mines were working

295 ten to twelve hours a week and that the beat paid miner he had found had made just $1.88 in a two week period.7o

Despite the fact that neither Ratchford's strike fund nor his organizational efforts had had time to improve the condition of the union, in late June of 1897 the UMWA's leadership called for the nation's miners to suspend operations on July 4. The union's leaders argued that conditions were so bad that neither the union nor the miners had much to lose by going on strike and hoped that the nation's coal operators realized that an industry-wide agreement to alleviate competition would benefit all parties. The response to the strike call was tremendous. In Ohio, Indiana, Southern Illinois, and Western

Pennsylvania almost every mine was closed. Only the DeArmitt mines in

Western Pennsylvania and non-union mines in West Virginia and Virginia remained open.

Ohio operators welcomed the strike as an opportunity to reestablish an industry-wide scale and to end the rate cutting originating in Western Pennsylvania that had brought the whole industry to the verge of ruin. Many Ohio operators found work for the striking miners around the mines, contributed to the strikers' relief fund, and tried to convince DeArmitt and other recalcitrant operators that an agreement to stabilize wages was in their interests. One Ohio union official described the strike as not so much a contest between capital and labor as much as it was a fight between capital and capital.

Almost immediately the coal strike became mixed up in Ohio politics. The same week the strike began the Democratic party nominated

Horace Chapman, a Jackson County coal operator and president of the Ohio

Coal Operator's Association, for governor. On the Republican side.

70 Onited Mine Workers' Journal. 4 March 1897; The best account of the 1897 strike is K. Austin Kerr, "Labor-Management Cooperation: An 1897 Case," The Pennsylvania Magazine of History and Biography 49 (1975): 45- 71. 296 Governor Asa Bushnell believed that a strong showing on behalf of the coal miners would discourage Republican rivals from seeking the nomination and aid his standing among the state's workers, while Mark

Hanna's reelection to the United States Senate hinged on the election of a Republican general assembly in the fall.

During the strike the state's Republican politicians lent their implicit support to the miners's cause. President McKinley endorsed the miners's call for arbitration and offered to appoint a special arbitration board. Mark Hanna, who controlled mines in Ohio and Western

Pennsylvania, told his representatives to pressure other operators to reach an agreement acceptable to the United Mine Workers. Not only did

Governor Asa Bushnell dispatch the chief of the state's arbitration board to Pittsburgh to convince the operators to agree to arbitration, he organized a relief operation which provided strikers tons of food and clothing. These supplies, donated by the state's labor unions, citizens, and even boards of trade, allowed the miners to stay out on strike and not return to work for lack of food.^i

The record of Democratic gubernatorial nominee and mine operator

Horace L. Chapman was mixed. Chapman, like most Ohio operators, declared that he supported the miners and would meet the miners' demands if they could reestablish the scale differential with the Pittsburgh operators. Yet Chapman, unlike Hanna, brought little pressure to bear on operators during the negotiations and mostly remained quiet during the dispute. He let his friends in the labor movement, most notably

John McBride and N.R. Hysell, attest to his sympathy for the state's miners and workers, in general.72

By the beginning of September, close to 200,000 of the nation's

250,000 bituminous coal miners were on strike and the price of coal on

71 Ohio State Journal. 17 January, 13 July 1897. 72 Cleveland Citizen. 10 July 1897. 297 the open market began to rise. The operators in Western Pennsylvania agreed to pay miners 65 cents per ton and meet the following January with the union and operators from Ohio, Indiana, and Illinois in a conference to set the wage scale for the entire area. The agreement effectively ended the strike as other coal-producing areas used the

Western Pennsylvania scale as a guide to the formulation of local rates.

When the convention of miners and operators met in January 1898, they raised the scale by a nickel, agreed to an eight-hour day, and created the Central Cooperative Field (CCF)

The creation of the CCF revolutionized industrial relations in the coal industry and was, according to historian Daniel Nelson, "the most important union achievement of the century." Under the CCF, operators and the UMWA negotiated a wage scale for the entire region stretching from Western Pennsylvania through Iowa and Kansas. This scale brought stability to the union, its members, and the entire Industry by ensuring that operators within the region did not compete with each other by slashing wages.

The creation of the CCF and simultaneous end of the Panic of 1893-

97 led to increases in the income of miners in Ohio and throughout the region. In the first year alone the average Ohio miner saw his wages increase 26.5% from $192.05 to $242.97 even though the number of days worked remained the same. Two years later the CCF raised the wages of

Hocking Valley miners from $0.60 to $0.80 a ton. As wages rose, miners flocked to the union. Between 1898 and 1900 the number of Ohio miners belonging to the union doubled, and other states witnessed even greater increases.

73 Kerr, 68-71; Evans II, 464-509. 74 Daniel Nelson, Shifting Fortunes: The Rise and Decline of American T.ahnr. from the 1820s to the Present (Chicago: Ivan Dee, 1997), 37. 75 Michael D. Ratchford (Columbus, Ohio) to W.E. Sacket (Secretary Industrial Commission), 14 September 1900. George K. Nash Papers, Ohio Historical Society; Boryczka and Cary, 130; 298 The CCF was so successful at improving mining conditions that it

became the cornerstone of the union's strategy through the 1930s.

Although Ratchford left the union in 1899 after receiving appointments

from McKinley and Ohio governor George Nash, his strategy became

institutionalized. Subsequent OMWA presidents, from John Mitchell

through John L. Lewis, placed their faith in the CCF and enlisted the

aid of Republican politicians when needed.

American Federation of Labor

The American Federation of Labor met for its annual convention in

December of 1896, less than two months following the defeat of Bryan.

On the convention's third day a remarkable event happened. After Samuel

Gompers was nominated for president, John McBride asked that the convention's rules be suspended and that "the secretary be instructed to cast the entire vote of the convention for Delegate Gompers." McBride's motion carried, and Gompers was moved to tears. The man who had defeated him in 1894 and who had come within eighteen votes of being reelected in 1895 conceded defeat. This simple act marked the triumph of "pure and simple unionism" over its last and most significant challenge.

While McBride never announced why he called for the convention to elect Gompers by acclamation, it is easy to speculate. The movement that he had been leading had shattered following the fusion of 1896.

Trade unionists who had worked with the People's party were now divided and fragmented. Some embraced the Bryan-led Democratic party and others flocked to the Socialist Labor party. Still others called for trade unions to avoid partisan politics altogether. The fusion, thus, destroyed the alliance which had been formed around the People ' s party

76 Report of Proceedings of the Sixteenth Annual Convention of the American Federation of Labor. (Bloomington, IL: Pantagraph, 1905) 299 and had challenged Gompera and the "pure and simplere" for control of

the Federation.

The triumph of Gompers and pure and simple unionism occurred on

the eve of an extended period of national prosperity, which brought a

period of tremendous growth to the AFL. In 1897 the AFL's membership

stood at slightly more than 250,000 members. Seven years later membership would reach over 1,650,000. As the Federation grew stronger

so did Gompers'a hold on the organization. Although there were numerous challengers to Gompers and pure and simple unionism, none of these were

able to come as close as McBride and the Populists did from 1894 to early 1896.77

77 American Federation of Labor, History. Encyclopedia Reference Book (Washington, D.C,: Americaui Federation of Labor, 1919), 63 300 CHAPTER 7

CONCLOSION

Labor's courtship with the People's party in Ohio and the rest of

the industrial Midwest was brief. Most trade unions did not ally

themselves with the People's party until the late summer of 1894, after

the bitter national coal strike and the Pullman boycott. Less than two

years later the movement was dead. The nomination of Bryan and fusion

with the Democrats destroyed the coalition that Ohio trade unionists had

formed around the People's party.

Even during the two years of labor-Populist cooperation, the party

failed to make much of a mark on Ohio's political landscape. In the major urban centers the party generally garnered less than seven or

eight percent of the vote. In smaller industrial towns and coal mining

regions the party did somewhat better. But even in these areas the

Populists elected only a handful of minor officials.

Nonetheless, recognition of Ohio's labor-Populist alliance, and

similar ones in Indiana, Illinois, and Wisconsin, is crucial to

understanding producer politics during the Populist era. Historians of

Populism have lamented labor's failure to embrace the last significant movement to challenge the emergence of industrial capitalism. One

historian has even blamed organized leibor's indifference for the movement's downfall. This reasoning does not square with the experience

of Ohio's Populists. Rather than welcoming laborites into the party.

Populist leaders took steps, including the emphasis on the free coinage of silver, to rid the party of labor's radical influence.

301 Recognition of labor's support for the People's party also

suggests the need to reformulate interpretations of Populism. The three main interpreters of American populism, John Bicks, Richard Hofstadter, and Lawrence Goodwyn, all offer agrarian-centered definitions of the movement. While farmers might have been the biggest supporters of

Populism in the West and South, in Ohio and the rest of the industrial

Midwest trade unionists formed the backbone of the movement. A more inclusive definition of Populism is needed.

Labor's support for Populism also suggests the need to reexamine the history of the nation's labor movement. Labor historians have generally ignored the role of Populists within the American Federation of Labor (AFL) . They have assumed that by the mid-1890s that pure and simple unionism had become entrenched as the Federation's guiding philosophy. But this study suggests that John McBride and Ohio labor-

Populists led the last and most significant challenge to the Samuel

Gompers and pure and simple unionism within the AFL. In 1894 and 1895 the Populists with the help of the Socialists vied with Gompers and the pure and simplers for control of the Federation. Not only did the AFL elect McBride president in 1894, the Federation came close to enacting the Populist political program, which called for the collective ownership of the means of production and would have committed the

Federation to independent partisan politics. Only the fear that the pure and simplers would leave the AFL prevented passage of the program.

The Populists' nomination of Bryan and fusion with the Democrats, though, destroyed the labor-Populists, allowing the triumph of Gompers and the pure and simplers.

302 BIBLIOGRAPHY

Manuscript Collections

American Federation of Labor Papers, Microfilm Edition Cincinnati Central Labor Council Papers, University of Cincinnati Archives Jacob S. Coxey Papers, Massillon (Ohio) Museum Joseph Bensen Foraker Papers, Cincinnati Historical Society Max Hayes Papers, Ohio Historical Society Samuel Jones Papers, Toledo Public Library Charles L. Kurtz Papers, Ohio Historical Society William McKinley Letter Books, Ohio Historical Society George K. Nash Papers, Ohio Historical Society United Mine Workers of America, District Six Papers, Ohio Univeristy Archives Peter Witt Papers, Western Reserve Historical Society

Proceedings and Government Reports

Annual Report of the fOhiol Secretary of State Proceedings of the Convention of the United Mine Workers of America Proceedings of the Ohio State Grange of the Patrons of Husbandry Report of the Bureau of Labor Statistics Made to the General Assemblv of Ohio Report of the Proceedings of the Annual Convention of the American Federation of Labor newspapers

Akron Beacon American Grange Bulletin (Cincinnati) American Non-Conformist (Indianapolis) Athens Messenger Cincinnati Chronicle Cincinnati Commercial Gazette Cincinnati Enquirer Cincinnati Times-Star Cincinnati Tribune Cleveland Citizen

303 Cleveland Leader Cleveland Plain Dealer Cleveland Press Cleveland Recorder Columbua Catholic Colombian ColumbuB Dispatch Columbus Prees-Poet Columbus Record Davton Journal Jackson Standard Journal Journal of the Knights of Labor (Philadelphia) Marion Star National labor Tribune (Pittsburgh) New Lexington Daily Tribune New Nation (Boston) New York Times Ohio Farmer (Cleveland) Ohio State Journal (Columbus) Plow and Hammer (Tiffin) Pomeroy Weekly Tribune Telegraph Public Opinion Sandusky Daily Register Springfield Republic-Times Sound Money (Massillon) Toledo Blade United Mine Workers* Journal (Columbus) Warren Western Reserve Democrat Youngstown Vindicator

Contemporary Books, Articles, and Pamphlets

"The American Bimetallic Party: A New Political Organization." Washington, D.C.: American Bimetallic League, 1895.

American federation of Labor. A Verbatum Report of the Discussion on the Political Programme, at the Denver Convention of the American Federation of Labor. December 14. 15, 1894. New York: The Freytag Press, 1895.

Ameringer, Oscar. If You Don't Weaken. New York: Henry Holt & Co., 1940.

Baker, Ray Stannard. American Chronicle; The Autobiography of Rav Stannard Baker. New York: Charles Scribners Sons, 1945.

Basler, Roy P. et al, ed. The Collected Works of Abraham Lincoln. Volume Three. New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 1953.

Bemis, Edward W. "The Coal Miners' Strike." Outlook 49 (1894) 822- 23.

"The Cleveland Strike," Harper's Weekly 43 (1899).

304 CammonSr John R. et al, ed. Documentary History of Industrial America. New York: Russell and Russell, 1958.

"Constitution of the Ohio Farmers' Alliance." Des Moines, lA: The Iowa Homestead, 1890.

"Constitution of the Ohio State Farmers' Alliance." Mt. Gilead: Register Steam Printers, 1889.

"The Coxey 'Problem.'" The Nation 58 (1894).

Edwards, George P. "The Boycott in Cleveland" Harper's Weekly (43) 12 August 1899.

Edwards, George P. "Cleveland Strikes," Harper's Weekly (43) 4 August 1899.

Evans, Chris. History of the Onited Mine Workers of America. Indianapolis: Onited Mine Workers of America, 1918-1920.

"Farmers and Working Men of Ohio Read and Consider." n.d., n.p.

Foraker, Joseph Benson. Speeches of J.B. Foraker. n.p., n.d.

Foran, Martin A. The Other Side: A Social Studv Based on Fact. Washington, D.C.: Gray and Clarkson, 1886.

Gladden, Washington. "The Anti-Catholic Crusade." Century 47 (1894), 789-95.

______. "Cosmopolis City Club," Century 45 (1893), 395-406, 566-76, 780-92.

. Recollections. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1909.

Gompers, Samuel. Seventy Years of Life and Labor: An Autobiography. New York: B.P. Dutton & Co., 1925.

Green, John Patterson. Fact Stranger than Fiction; Seventy-five Years of a Busy Life with Reminisences. of Many Great Men and Women. Cleveland: Riehl, 1920.

History of Trade Onions in Columbus. Columbus: Columbus Trades and Labor Assembly, 1895.

Howe, C. Frederick. Confessions of a Reformer. New York, 1925.

Jelly, S.M. The Voice of Letbor. Philadelphia: B.J. Smith & Co., 1888.

Johnson, Tom L. Mv Storv. New York: B.W. Huebsch, 1911.

305 "Judge Trumbull Writes a Populist Platform." Public Opinion 18 (10 1895), 30.

Labor Dav Souvenir. 1901. Cleveland: Cleveland Citizen, 1901.

Labor: Its Rights and Wrongs: Statements and Commenta by the Leading Men of our Nation on the Labor Question To-dav. Westport, CT: Hyperion Press.

Lloyd, Henry Demarest. "The Pops at St. Louis." Review of Reviews 14 (1896), 303-05.

McBride, John. "The Best of All Yeti: Speech of Hon. John McBride, President of the State Miners' Onion, Delivered to the Miners at Nelsonville, October 4th. 1884." n.p.: n.d.

______. "The Democratic Party the Party of the Workingmen." n.p.: 1885.

_. "The Kind of Money Needed." American Federationist 2 (1895), 106-07.

_."Our Official Policy" American Federationist, 1 (February 1895) .

"Producers vs. Non-Producers" American Federationist 2 (1895), 144-45.

______with T.T. O'Malley. "Coal Miners" in George McNeill, ed. The Labor Movement; The Problem of To-Dav. Boston: Bridgeman & Co., 1887.

McVey, Frank L. "The Populist Movement" Economic Studies 1 (1896), 178- 204.

McKinley, William. Speeches and Addresses of William McKinlev; From His Election to Congress to the Present Time. New York: D. Appleton and Company, 1893.

"A Manifesto to the Citizens of Hamilton County in General, and the Labor and Reform Organizations in Particular." Cincinnati Central Labor Council: Cincinnati, 1894.

Myers, Allen O. Bosses and Boodle in Ohio Politics; Some Plain Truth for Honest People. Cincinnati: Lyceum, 1895.

Peffer, William A. Populism. Its Rise and Fall. Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, reprint 1992.

Powell, Th«nas B. The Danocratic Party of the State of Ohio. 2 vols. Columbus: Ohio Democratic Party, 1913.

306 Roy, Andrew. A History of Coal Miners in the Onited States. Columbus, Ohio Trauger, 1907.

______. The Practical Miners' Ccmpaniora; or Papers on Geology and Minina in the Ohio Coal Field. Columbus: Westbote, 1885.

Sherman, John. John Sherman's Recollections of Forty Years in the House, Senate and Cabinet: An Autobiography. Chicago: Werner, 1895. Skinner, Robert P. "The New President of the American Federation of Labor" Harper's Weekly 39 (1895), 4.

Smith, Joseph P. History of the Republican Party in Ohio. 2 yols. Chicago: Lewis Publishing, 1898.

Taubeneck, H.E. "The Philosophy of Political Parties" (Chicago: Schulte Publishing Company, 1896), 5.

Twentieth Century Official History of the Columbua Trades and Labor Assemblv and its Affiliated Organizations. Columbus, Oh.: Columbus Trades and Labor Assembly, 1901.

Twentv-Year History of District Assembly 47. Kniahts of Labor. Cleveland: Knights of Labor, 1902.

Thompson, W.O. "Taxation." Oxford, OH, 1894.

Warne, Frank Julian. The Coal Mine Workers. New York: Longman, Green and Company, 1905.

Published Secondary Sources

Argersinger, Peter. Populism and Politics: William Peffer and the People's Party. Lexington: University Press of Kentucky, 1970.

Blocker Jack S. Jr. Retreat from Reform; The Prohibition Moyement in the Onited States. 1890-1913. Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 1976.

Boryczka, Raymond and Lorin Lee Cary. No Strength Without Onion: An Illustrated History of Ohio Workers. 1803-1980. Columbus : Ohio Historical Society, 1982.

Brayerman, Harry. Labor and Monopoly Capital; The Degradation of Work in the Twentieth Century. New York: Monthly Review Press, 1974.

Campbell, Thomas F. "Mounting Crisis and Reform: Cleveland's Political Development" in Campbell and Edward M. Higgins, The Birth of Modern Cleveland. 1865-1930. Cleveland: Western Reserve Historical Society, 1988.

Commons, John R. et. al.. History of Labor in the United States. 4 vols. New York: Macmillan, 1936.

307 Croly, Herbert. Marcus Alonzo Hanna; His Life and Work. New York; Macmillan, 1923.

Destler, Cheater McArthur. American Radicalism, 1865-1900. Chicago: Quadrangle, 1966.

Dowler, John F. Centennial History; Ohio State Grange. Aahville, OH; Ohio State Grange, 1972.

Fink, Leon. Workingman's Democracy. Orbana; University of Illinois Press, 1983.

Foner, Philip. History of the Labor Movement in the United States Volume II; From the Founding of the American Federation of Labor to the Emergence of American Imperialism. New York; International Publishers, 1948.

Fones-Wolf, Elizabeth and Kenneth Fones-Wolf. "The War at Mingo Junction; The Autonomous Workman and the Decline of the Knights of Labor." Ohio History 92 (1983), 37-51.

Forbath, William E. Law and the Shaping of the American Labor Movement. Cambridge; Harvard University Press, 1991.

Goodwyn, Lawrence. The Democratic Promise; The Populist Moment in America. New York; Oxford University Press, 1976.

Goldschmidt, Eli, "Labor and Populism; New York City, 1891-1896." Labor History 13 (1972), 520-532.

Green, Julie. Pure and Simple Politics; The American Federation of Labor and Political Activism. 1881-1917. New York; Cambridge University Press, 1998.

Grob, Gerald. Workers and Utopia. Chicago; Quadrangle, 1961.

Gutman, Herbert G. "An Iron Workers' Strike in the Ohio Valley, 1873- 1874." Ohio Historical Quarterly 68 (1959), 353-70.

______. "The Labor Policies of the Large Corporation in the Gilded Age; The Case of the Standard Oil Company." in Gutman, Power and Culture; Essavs on the American Working Class. New York; The New Press, 1987, 214-17.

. "Reconstruction in Ohio; Negroes in the Hocking Valley Coal Mines in 1873 and 1874." Labor History 3 (1962), 243-64.

. "The Workers' Search for Power; Labor in the Gilded Age" in H. Wayne Morgan, ed. The Gilded Age a Reappraisal. Syracuse, NY: Syracuse University Press, 1963, 38-68.

308 Hartz, Louis. The Liberal Tradition in America. New York: Harcourt, Brace and World, 1955.

Hattam, Victoria C. Labor Visions and State Power; The Origins of Business Onionism in the Onited States. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1993.

Hicks, John D. The Populist Revolt; A History of the Farmers Alliance and the People's Party. Minneapolis; University of Minnesota Press, 1946.

Hofstadter, Richard. The Ace of Reform; From Brvan to F.D.R.. New York; Knopf, 1955.

______. The American Political Tradition and the Men Who Made It. New York: Alfred Knopf, 1948.

Hough, Leslie S. The Turbulent Spirit; Cleveland, Ohio and its Workers, 1877-1899. New York; Garland, 1991.

Hunker, Henry. The Industrial Evolution of Columbus, Ohio. Columbus; Ohio State University.

Hurt, R. Douglas. "The Ohio Grange, 1870-1900." Northwest Ohio Quarterly 53 (1981).

______. "The Farmers' Alliance and the People's Party in Ohio." The Old Northwest 10 (1984-85), 439-462.

Kazin, Michael. The Populist Persuasion; An American History. New York; Basic Books, 1995.

Jensen, Richard. The Winning of the Midwest; Social and Political Conflict. 1888-1896. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1971.

Jones, M a m i e . Holv Toledo: Religion and Politics in the Life of "Golden Rule" Jones. Lexington; University Press of Kentucky, 1998.

Kerr, K. Austin. "Lad>or-Management Cooperation; An 1897 Case." The Pennsylvania Magazine of History and Biography 49 (1975), 45-71.

Kleppner, Paul. The Cross of Culture; A Social Analysis of Midwestern Politics 1850-1900. New York; Free Press, 1970.

Klotsche, J. Martin. "The 'United Front' Populists." Wisconsin Magazine of History 20 (1937), 375-89.

Lloyd, Caro. Henrv Demarest Llovd. 1847-1903. A Biography. New York; G.P. Putnam's & Sons, 1912.

McGrane, R.C. "Ohio and the Greenback Movement." The Mississippi Vallev Historical Review 11 (1925), 526-42.

309 . William Allen; A Studv in Western Democracy. Columbus: Ohio State Archaeological and Historical Society, 1925.

McMath, Robert C. American Populism: A Social History. New York: Hill and Wang, 1993.

Miller, Ernest I. "The Farmers' Party" Bulletin of the Historical and Philosophical Society of Ohio 15 (1957), 49-65.

Miller, Zane L. Boss Cox's Cincinnati: Urban Politics in the Progressive Era. New York: Oxford University Press, 1968.

Mink, Gwendolyn. Old Labor and New Immigrants in American Political Development: Onion. Party, and State. 1875-1920. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1986.

Montgomery, David. Bevond Eoualitv: Labor and the Radical Republicans, 1862-1872. New York: Alfred Knopf, 1967.

______. Citizen Worker: The Experience of Workers in the United States with Democracy and the Free Market during the Nineteenth Century. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993.

. The Fall of the House of Letbor: The Workplace, the State, and American Labor Activism. 1865-1925. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1987.

Morgan, H. Wayne. William McKinlev and His America. Syracuse, NY: Syracuse University Press, 1963.

Morris, James M. "The Cincinnati Shoemakers' Lockout of 1888: A Case Study in the Demise of the Knights of Labor. " Labor History 13 (1972), 505-19.

Nelson, Daniel. Shifting Fortunes: The Rise and Decline of American Labor, from the 1820s to the Present. Chicago: Ivan Dee, 1997.

Nye, Russel B. A Baker's Dozen: Thirteen Unusual Americans. East Lansing: Michigan State University Press, 1956.

Orren, Karen. Belated Feudalism. Labor, the Law and Liberal Development in the United States. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991.

Osnes, Larry G. "The Birth of a Party: The Cincinnati Populist Convention of 1891." Great Plains Journal 10 (1970), 11-24.

Ostler, Jeffrey. Prairie Populism: The Fate of Agrarian Radicalism in Kansas. Nebraska, and Iowa. 1880-1892. Lawrence; University of Kansas Press, 1993.

______. "The Rhetoric of Conspiracy and the Formation of Kansas Populism." Agricultural History 69 (1995), 1-27

310 Perlman, Sellg. A Theory of the Labor Movement. Philadelphia: Porcupine Press, 1928.

Pierce, Michael. "The Populist President of the American Federation of Labor: The Career of John McBride, 1880-1895." Labor History, forthcoming.

Pollack, Norman. The Populist Response to Industrial America: Midwestern PopuIist Thought. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1962.

Quint, Howard H. The Forcing of American Socialism: Origins of the Modern Movement. Columbia: University of South Carolina Press, 1953.

Ridge, Martin. lonatius Donnellv: Portrait of a Politician. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1962.

Roseboom, Eugene H. The Civil War Era: 1850-1873. Columbus: Ohio State Archaeological and Historical Society, 1944.

Ross, Steven J. Workers on the Edge: Work Leisure, and Politics in Industrializing Cincinnati, 1788-1890. New York: Columbia University Press, 1985.

Shefter, Martin. Political Parties and the State: The American Historical Experience. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1994.

Stromquist, Shelton. "The Crucible of Class: Cleveland Politics and the Origins of Municipal Reform in the Progressive Era," Journal of Urban Historv 23 (1997), 192-220.

Taft, Philip. The A.F.L. in the Time of Gompers. New York: Harper & Bros., 1957.

Teaford, John C. Cities of the Heartland: The Rise and Fall of the Industrial Midwest. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1993.

Tussey, Jean Y. "An Introduction to the History of the Cleveland Leüaor Movement, 1865-1929." Cleveland: Greater Cleveland Labor History Society, 1996.

Van Tine, Warren R. "A History of Labor in Columbus, Ohio, 1812-1992." Ohio State Universitv Center for Labor Research Working Paper Series 10 (1992).

Voss, Kim. The Making of American Exceptionalism: The Knights of Labor and Class Formation in the Nineteenth Century. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1993.

311 Walters, Everett. Joseph Benson Forakert An ancompromislno Republican. Columbust Ohio State Archaeological and Historical Society, 1948.

Warner, Hoyt Landon. Proaressivism in Ohio. 1897-1917. Columbus: Ohio State University Press, 1964.

Wilentz, Sean. "Against Bxceptionalism: Class Consciousness and the American Working Class." International Labor and Working Class Historv 26 (1984), 1-24.

______. Chants Democratic: New York Citv and the Rise of the American Working Class. New York: Oxford University Press, 1984.

Woodward, C. Van. Tom Watson: Agrarian Rebel. New York: Macmillan, 1938.

Zornow, William F. "Bellamy Nationalism in Ohio 1891 to 1896" Ohio Historv 58 (1949), 152-170.

Unpublished Secondary Sources

Howson, Embry Bernard. "Jacob Sechler Coxey: A Biography of a Monetary Reformer, 1854-1951." Ph.D. dissertation, Ohio State University, 1973

Karolak, Eric John. "The Socialist Party in a Midwestern Community: The Case of Columbus, Ohio." M.A. Thesis: Ohio State University, 1988.

McCormick, Michael R. "A Comparative Study of Coal Mining Communities in Northern Illinois and Southeastern Ohio in the Late Nineteenth Century." Ph.D. dissertation, Ohio State University, 1978.

Morris, James Matthew. "The Road to Trade Unionism: Organized Labor in Cincinnati to 1893." Ph.D. dissertation. University of Cincinnati, 1969.

Musselman, Barbara L. "The Quest for Collective Improvement: Cincinnati Workers, 1893-1920." Ph.D. dissertation. University of Cincinnati, 1975.

Rose, Patricia Terpak. "Design and Efficiency: The Ohio State Federation of Labor as a Legislative Lobby, 1883-1935." Ph.D. dissertation, Ohio State University, 1975.

Unstad, Lyder L. "A Survey of the Industrial and Economic Development in Central Ohio with Special Reference to Columbus, 1797-1872." Ph.D. dissertation, Ohio State University, 1937.

Van Bolt, Roger Henry. "The Gubernatorial Campaign of 1891 in Ohio." M.A. thesis, Ohio State University, 1946.

312 Weasner, Clyde. "A History of the Labor Movement in Cleveland from 1890 to 1896." M.A. thesis, Ohio State University, 1933.

313