Chris Masullo
The Haymarket Affair
The Haymarket
affair refers to the bombing that occurred after a labor
demonstration on May 4th 1886 at Haymarket Square in
Chicago. The reason that this event is so significant in working
class history is because it would lead to the creation of “May
Day”, a day of celebration for the international labor movement. By
examining the history of The Haymarket Affair it can become much more
transparent how a simple protest turned in to a riot that left
several dead and over 100 injured and resulted in the execution of
four labor activists from the Chicago area.
Before the events
of The Haymarket Affair occurred on May 4th, a
demonstration was planned by Federation of Organized Trades and Labor
Unions in order for workers to protest for an eight hour work day,
instead of the ten hour work day that was in place. On May 1st
this demonstration took place and included unionized workers from New
York City, Milwaukee, Detroit, and Chicago. In addition to the
shortening of the work day to eight hours, the protesters wished to
still be paid for ten hours work while working for eight hours.
The next
development before the events of May 4th took place on May
3rd, when strikers in Chicago gathered near the McCormick
Harvesting Machine Company facility. The protestors may have chosen
the site because union laborers had been locked out for several
months and where now being replaced by strikebreakers.i
When the work day ended several striking workers attempted to
confront the strikebreakers who where working for McCormick, by
crashing the gates that surrounded the facility.ii
When they did this
however police officers opened fire and killed two striking workers,
the first act of violence in the strike. In response to this act of
violence against the striking workers a protest was planned for the
night of May 4th. Fliers where printed that called for a
meeting of local workers which originally stated “Workingmen arm
yourselves and appear in full force!”.iii
This was later edited out after the key speaker, August Spies,
refused to speak at the event if it was advertised with these
fliers.iv
However the flier that was then used to advertise the event to
workers stated “If you are men, if you are the sons of your
grandsires, who have shed their blood to free you, then you will rise
in your might Hercules, and destroy the hideous monster that seeks to
destroy you. To arms, we call you, to arms!”.v
While this may have been less provocative then the original
wording, the message was still the same.
The rally took
place with August Spies speaking to a crowd of workers at the mouth
of Crane’s alley while a small group of police officers watched on.
Around 10:30 p.m. a larger group of police officers numbering around
180 arrived and attempted to break the rally up by telling people to
leave and by insisting that Spies stopped speaking.vi
While the police were arriving on the scene to disperse the crowd a
man by the name of Samuel Fielden took Spies place as speaker at the
event and began to address the crowd and said to them “The law is
your enemy, we are rebels against it. The law is only framed for
those who are your enslavers.”vii
Hearing this remark the police took offense and began to break up the
crowd that had gathered, what ensued would be the riot at Haymarket
Square.
As police attempted
to break up the crowd a homemade metal bomb was thrown by an unknown
person at the police officers who where making their way towards the
crowd of demonstrators. It was at this point that the rally of
workers would go down in history as The Haymarket Affair. The bomb
that was thrown by an unknown person killed seven police officers and
ignited a riot between police and protesters. After the bomb was
thrown that killed seven police officers fighting and gunshots broke
out between the protestors and police officers. Reports from the
incident vary on whether the gun shots where solely from the police,
or if it was a mix of police and protesters who where firing at each
other.viii
In total seven police officers and four protesters lay dead when the
fighting stopped with over 100 injured between the two parties.ix
The events that
took place after The Haymarket Affair are equally important to
understanding the impact that this event had on the working class. In
the immediate aftermath of the riot a “Red Scare”
gripped the community and lead to great suspicion towards the
immigrant working community that was seen as largely responsible for
the events at Haymarket Square.x
Additionally an investigation by local police began in order to
determine who had thrown the bomb at the police officers and bring
them to justice.
On May 5th
police officers raided the printing offices of a local German paper
that was believed to have connections with the bombings. In the raid
police arrested August Spies, his brother, Michael Schwab and, Adolph
Fischer. During a search of the building the police discovered the
original poster that had been printed advocating the workers to be
violent and well armed.xi
This evidence would later be used to argue that the attack on the
police was a premeditated attack that had been organized by the
striking workers. An additional police raid occurred on May 7th
at the residence of Louis Lingg. During the search of Lingg’s
residence police officers found bomb making materials and already
assembled bombs.xii
This evidence would later be used as the main source of evidence in
the prosecution of the men who would stand trial.
When the police
raids had finished and the police had gathered their suspects a total
of eight men stood trial for the bombing that killed the police
officers. The main suspect in The Haymarket Affair was a man named
Rudolf Schnaubelt. All eight of the defendants that would stand trial
for the riot and the bombing where of foreign heritage. with five of
the suspects being German born immigrants. This may have played a
role in the trial that would follow as resentment towards immigrants
was common during this time period.
The trial that
followed began on June 21, 1886 and lasted until August 11 of the
same year. The trial however was neither fair nor balanced, with
obvious hatred towards the accused by both the judge and the jury.xiii
The main argument that the prosecution argued was that since none of
the men standing trial had discouraged or tried to stop the person
who threw the bomb from throwing the bomb they where all guilty as
conspirators to murder.xiv
The prosecution stated that evidence retrieved from the bodies of the
dead officers matched the same type of materials that where seized
from Lingg’s home.
The jury came back
with a verdict of guilty for all eight defendants that stood trial,
with seven of the defendants being sentenced to death by hanging and
another to fifteen years in jail. The sentence made the men into
martyrs for the workers movement cause and caused uproar among the
working class community. After the trial the defendants filed an
appeal to the Illinois Supreme Court, but it was ultimately rejected.
In June of 1893
then Governor John Altgeld pardoned the two remaining living
defendants Fielden and Schwab and issued a statement of reasons for
the pardons. He criticized the due process procedures of the trial
and the prejudice that Judge Gary exhibited at trial in particular.xv
Altgeld must have felt very strongly about either the injustice that
was commuted in the court room or the workers movement, because by
pardoning the two men he was putting his political life at risk.
To this day no
person has been identified as the person who threw the bomb that
ignited The Haymarket Affair of 1886. There are several theories
floating around that suggest the incident was framed by the police
department in order for them to be able to arrest the protesters, but
none of these theories have any evidence to back up their claims.
Out of the chaos
that was The Haymarket Affair something positive would emerge for the
working class the world over. The events of The Haymarket Affair
helped to establish the International Labor Day on May 1st
which is a date that would be used to honor the men who had lost
their lives as part of the riots and subsequent trials. It would also
be used as a rallying call for workers to protest for the
establishment of the eight hour work day in countries all over the
world. By becoming martyrs for the working class the men who stood
trial inspired one of the most important events in not just American
working class history, but for the working men and women all over the
world.
i
Francis X. Busch, “The Haymarket Riot and the Trial of the
Anarchists,” Journal of the Illinois State Historical Society,
Vol. 48, No. 3 (1908-1984): 249.
ii
Ibid.
iii
“People’s Exhibit 5,”
http://www.chicagohistory.org/hadc/transcript/exhibits/X000-050/X005000.htm.
iv
Busch, “The Haymarket Riot,” 250.
v
Ibid.
vi
Ibid., 251.
vii
Edward de Grazia. “The Haymarket Bomb,” Law and Literature, Vol.
18, No.3 (2006): 289
viii
Busch, “The Haymarket Riot,” 251.
ix
“Rioting and bloodshed in the streets of Chicago,” New York
Times, May 5, 1886, accessed May 1, 2013,
http://query.nytimes.com/mem/archivefree/pdf?res=F30F1EF83D5C10738DDDAC0894DD405B8684F0D3
x
“The Anarchists Cowed,” New York Times, May 8, 1886, accessed
May 1, 2013,
http://query.nytimes.com/mem/archivefree/pdf?res=9B02E4D71638E533A2575BC0A9639C94679FD7CF
xi
Busch, “The Haymarket Riot,” 250.
xii
Ibid., 257.
xiii
Ibid., 262.
xiv
Paul Avrich, The Haymarket Tragedy (Princeton University
Press: 1984), 271-272.
xv
Busch, “The Haymarket Riot,” 269.
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