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Why Did Eugene Debs Appeal To Americans

736 Words3 Pages

Yang Lu
How did Eugene Debs appeal to Americans?

Although the era of the late 1800s to the 19 hundreds feared and rejected the ideas of communism, and socialism, Eugene Debs appealed to Americans through the unfairness of capitalism, the injustice of the espionage and sedition acts as well as the terrible working conditions of Americans. Eugene V. Debs was born on November 5th 1855. By age 14 Debs had left home to work for a railroad shops. After being in the railroad industry for a duration of time, Debs changed jobs and went from a railroad worker to a locomotive fireman. Although this job paid very low wages, it was still one of the most physically taxing, and requires a strong physical condition in order to perform. Soon after becoming …show more content…

He eventually temporarily succeeded in this ideal in 1893 when he became the president of the American Railway Union. A mere 2 years later, Debs started his ascension on to the national stage by organizing Chicago Pullman Car Company strike which would become one of his greatest successes, as well as a huge turning point of his life. The Pullman company as a response to the Great depression that was starting to occur at this time cut wages by 25 percent causing its workers to be unable to support their families. This caused the American Railway Union who possessed over 35 percent of the members of the Pullman Car Company to plan a strike. This strike managed to shut down 25 railroads due to the 125,000 workers boycotting the …show more content…

Debs was especially keen on this Idea due to the fact that he started feeling that capitalism would not be able to help the poor and lower class. The lower class were slowly starting to descend into greater and greater poverty Especially due to the beginnings of a depression preparing to rear its head at the country known as America.
Immediately after settling on this idea and after being released from jail, Debs started his road onto the political stage through running for president. He lead the establishment of the socialist party of America and became their candidate. On his first entrance onto the presidential stage, Debs only got a measly 96,000 votes. But during the next election he managed to increase that number to over

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