Great Railroad Strike of 1877 begins in Baltimore

Background. By 1877, ten percent wage cuts, distrust of capitalists, and poor working conditions had led workers to conduct numerous railroad strikes that prevented trains from moving, with spiraling effects in other parts of the economy. The Baltimore and Ohio Railroad had cut wages for the third time in a year, though the B&O article describes a second reduction announced in 1877. The strike began on July 14, 1877, in Martinsburg, West Virginia, where strikers refused to let freight trains pass.

Spread of the Strike. The strike spread to Baltimore, Maryland, on July 16. The violence highlighted the ineffectiveness of the National Guard, which sometimes sided with strikers and rioters. This prompted calls for modernizing the National Guard to aid civil officers in suppressing riots.

Federal Intervention. In his first year in office, President Rutherford B. Hayes was faced with the United States' largest labor uprising to date, the Great Railroad Strike of 1877. One of the defining events of his presidency, Hayes resolved the strike by calling in the U.S. armed forces. The use of federal troops prompted bipartisan support for the 1878 Posse Comitatus Act, limiting the power of the president to use federal troops for domestic law enforcement.