Unmoved by solicitations from employees, from the Chicago Civic Federation, from Mayor Pingree of Detroit, indorsed by the mayors of over fifty other cities, the Pullman Company steadfastly refused to arbitrate or to entertain any communication from the union. "We have nothing to arbitrate" was the company's response to each appeal. A national convention of the A. R. U. unanimously voted that unless the Pullman Company sooner consented to arbitration the union should, on June 26th, everywhere cease handling Pullman cars. [Illustration: About one hundred tents in background, several hundred people in the foreground.] Camp of the U. S. troops on the lake front, Chicago. [Illustration: Hundreds of railroad cars, some burning.] Burned cars in the C., B. & Q. yards at Hawthorne, Chicago. [Illustration: Railroad crossing, houses in the background.] Overturned box cars at crossing of railroad tracks at 39th street, Chicago. [Illustration: Portrait.] Hazen S. Pingree. At this turn of affairs the A. R. U. found itself confronted with a new antagonist, the Association of General Managers of the twenty-four railroads centering in Chicago, controlling an aggregate mileage of over 40,000, a capitalization of considerably over $2,000,000,000, and a total workingmen force of 220,000 or more. The last-named workers had their own grievances arising from wage cuts and black-listing by the Managers' Association. Such of them as were union men were the objects of peculiar hostility, which they reciprocated. Thus the Pullman boycott, sympathetic in its incipience, swiftly became a gigantic trial of issues between the associated railroad corporations and the union. For a week law and order were preserved. On July 2d the Federal Court in Chicago issued an injunction forbidding A. R. U. men, among other things, to "induce" employees to strike. Next day federal troops appeared upon the scene. Thereupon, in contempt of the injunction, railroad laborers continued by fair means and foul to be persuaded from their work. Disregarding the union leaders' appeal and defying regular soldiers, State troops, deputy marshals, and police, rabble mobs fell to destroying cars and tracks, burning and looting. The mobs were in large part composed of Chicago's semi-criminal proletariat, a mass quite distinct from the body of strikers. The A. R. U. strike approached its climax about the 10th of July. Chicago and the Northwest were paralyzed. President Cleveland deemed it necessary to issue a riot proclamation. A week later Debs and his fellow-leaders were jailed for contempt of court, and soon after their following collapsed. Governor Altgeld, of Illinois, protested against the presence of federal troops, denying federal authority to send force except upon his gubernatorial request, inasmuch as maintaining order was a purely State province, and declaring his official ignorance of disorder warranting federal intervention. [Illustration: Portrait.] Gov. John P. Altgeld.