The different perceptions of who was to blame for the aftermath of the Homestead Steel Mill Strike of 1892 are evident in Emma Goldman and Henry Clay Frick’s accounts on the case. On one hand, political activist Goldman informs her readers that the incident involved protests that ended with the “slaughter of steel-workers by Pinkertons” after the latter group, to control the former, “opened fire, without warning” (Doc A par.5). In his book, “Give Me Liberty!” Eric Foner explains that the mentioned Pinkertons were “300 private policemen” that the Homestead Steel Mill officials hired from the “Pinkerton Detective Agency” to stop the strike (635). On the other hand, the Homestead Steel Mill’s local supervisor, Henry Frick, asserts that the Pinkertons were there to protect company property and only returned fire after the striking workers wounded “three of [their] guards” (Doc B par. 5). This paper argues that Emma Goldman’s account is more believable because of the social, political, and economic conditions that propelled the workers to strike.
About the strike, there existed a considerable tension between the management of Andrew Carnegie’s steel mills in Homestead and the Amalgamated Association that represented unionized workers. In Henry Clay Frick’s explanation, the man mentions a “sliding scale” that ensured a rise in each person’s earnings when there was an increase in the price of steel and vice versa (Doc B par.2). Now, the lowest limit was “$25 per ton of steel produced” but Carnegie sought to implement a decrease that would make it “$23” (Frick Doc B par.2). In Goldman’s words, such an arrangement was double-edged: it “[abolished] the sliding scale” and challenged union representation in the industries (Doc A par.5). By that logic, Carnegie was to record profits regardless of the input and output levels while the workers’ pay continued to rely on the prices of steel.
Extensively, to understand the conditions under which the Homestead Steel Mill employees abandoned their posts and took to barricading the factory, one has to consider the effects of the industrial revolution. The American Civil War, in which the Union triumphed over the Confederacy, redefined the United States’ societies. Initially, an invisible color line existed and as per its terms, Caucasians were the superior race and any other skin color assumed an inferior status. The abolition of slavery changed everything. Foremost, the agrarian economy collapsed as the lack of slave labor destroyed the plantation system. Next, “factory production, mining, and railroad construction” encouraged a new working system, changed the monetary standards in the nation, and opened up new lands for settlement respectively (Foner 590-591). Subsequently, an industrial-based financial system swept across the country and paved the way for capitalism as factory owners thrived at the expense of their overworked employees.
With the given facts in mind, it is safe to assert that Henry Frick was ready to use all means possible to end the strike. After all, Frick hired guards “to assist the sheriff” and had them arrive in Homestead “at an hour of the night” (Doc B par. 3-4). The idea of helping the law to perform its duties and having said assistance arrive in the dark fails to satisfy the concept of an employer seeking to reach an agreement with his or her employees. Goldman perfectly captures the given claim where she writes that the company had no intentions of making any “more agreements with the Amalgamated Association” (Doc A par.3). Additionally, she informs her readers that the Pinkertons’ antics ended up killing some "Homestead men on the shore, among them a little boy” (Doc A par.5). The validity of her claim lies in the fact that child labor was common during the Gilded Age and as a result, children must have made up part of the striking masses (Foner 629). Finally, the idea of trained guards receiving fire for “twenty-five minutes” without retaliating also discredits Frick’s text (Doc B par.5). In other words, no matter their numbers, the odds were against the steel workers who lacked proper weaponry in the confrontation: only three guards died as opposed to seven employees (Foner 635).
In conclusion, Emma Goldman’s account is more believable because her text does not defy the documented facts that surround the American societies of the Gilded Age. Wealthy factory owners gained more riches while the poor made up an underpaid workforce.
Works Cited
Foner, Eric. Give Me Liberty!: An American History. 4th. Vol. II. New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 2013. Print.
Frick, Henry. Document B. 1892. Print.
Goldman, Emma. Document A. 1931. Print.
