Deadly Street Car Strike of 1917
Photo credit: David H. Steinberg, 2013
On September 6, 1917, the Chattanooga Railway and Light Company union street car workers went on strike. The company hired strikebreakers so they could continue their service routes. Union supporters in other industries united with their street car brothers. Tempers flared across the city while organized labor, street car management, and the local government engaged in fruitless negotiations. Violence broke out, assaults were common, and finally, on September 24, one person was shot dead.​
Keep in mind that during the time of this strike, World War 1 was raging. The US War Department was managing the largest German internment prison in the country at Fort Oglethorpe, and in an effort to build up the US Army fighting force for the war effort, more than 30,000 soldiers were training on the open fields of the Chickamauga Battlefield. September of 1917 was, in the author's opinion, the pinnacle of activity at Fort Oglethorpe in its 42-year history.
Soldiers Mobilized from Fort Oglethorpe
​Four days after the strike began, the Chattanooga's Acting Mayor Pro Tem T. C. Betterton (Mayor Jesse Littleton was out of town), the sheriff, the Attorney General, and a judge sent a desperate and urgent telegram to the Secretary of War in Washington DC, Honorable Newton D. Baker, pleading with him to send regular Army troops from Fort Oglethorpe to prevent the city from falling into mob rule.​
Within one hour of the telegram being sent, about 1AM on Tuesday morning, September 11, 1917, two troops from the 11th Cavalry Regiment and one machine gun company (about 300 men) arrived in the city and headquartered themselves in the Armory at 4th and Market Streets. Chattanooga citizens woke up the next morning to regular Army troops patrolling the downtown streets around the street car barns (later the "Sports Barn" fitness club) with bayonets fixed to their rifles. A day later, Colonel Abner Pickering, Fort Oglethorpe post commander, sent four companies (about 800 men) from the 6th Infantry Regiment to relieve the cavalry. The 6th remained in the city till the strike's end about a month later. The military mission was to support the Chattanooga Police.
September 11, 1917, Chattanoogans wake up to US Army Soldiers deployed on their streets and to this headline
The Armory at 4th and Market Sts
Strike Violence Turns Fatal
Below are pictures of that fateful day September 24th when William Massengale was shot in the back. He died on the sidewalk in front of Loveman's Department Store. The remarkable set of photos below illustrate the incident of that day.
Note the man standing on the street car in what appears to be a uniform. It appears that people are looking/listening to him
The crowd is looking toward the left, so this photo may be further down the street from the man standing on the street car.
In the center of this picture appears to be a contingent of Army soldiers. They all have the familiar "doughboys" hat of WW1. If so, these would be members of the 6th Infantry Regiment from Fort Oglethorpe.
In this picture, you can see the crowd is being dispersed by the soldiers and the street cars are gone. On the other side of Market Street, soldiers appear to be forming a line against the crowd. One soldier on the right end of that group of soldiers appears to be holding a rifle in the upright position.
Photo credit: The definitive work on the history of public transportation in Chattanooga, specifically street car transportation, is Steinberg, David H., 2013, Chattanooga's Transportation Heritage (Images of America), Arcadia Publishing, Inc. These fours images were taken from his book. This author looked in both Chattanooga newspapers around the time of the strike but could not find these pictures. Steinberg does not reference where he got the pictures, so until a source emerges, this author is giving Steinberg the credit.
What does this history have to do with me today?
You might be asking the question, "Is it right to use the US Army regular troops against the citizens of this country? Is that even allowed by law?"
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The Street Car Strike of 1917 allows us to learn about two laws that are designed to protect Americans from Americans.
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The question to ask about the Chattanooga incident is, did the President of the United States authorize the use of the US Army regular troops?
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Let's take a look at the actual telegram that the Chattanooga officials sent to Washington DC in the late night of September 10, 1917 (click to enlarge the article). ​
What do you think?​
The Insurrection Act of 1807 and The Posse Comitatus Act of 1878
The Insurrection Act of 1807
(This author does not proclaim to be a legal expert, so please click on the links embedded below to read professional interpretations of these laws and decide for yourself.)​
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According to the Brennan Center for Justice, "The Insurrection Act authorizes the president to deploy military forces inside the United States to suppress rebellion or domestic violence or to enforce the law in certain situations. The statute implements Congress’s authority under the Constitution to “provide for calling forth the Militia to execute the Laws of the Union, suppress Insurrections and repel Invasions.” It is the primary exception to the Posse Comitatus Act, under which federal military forces are generally barred from participating in civilian law enforcement activities.
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Although it is often referred to as the “Insurrection Act of 1807,” the law is actually an amalgamation of different statutes enacted by Congress between 1792 and 1871. Today, these provisions occupy Sections 251 through 255 in Title 10 of the United States Code."​​
The Posse Comitatus Act of 1878
A Latin phrase pronounced posse ("pah-see") comitatus ("cah-mee-tah-toos"). Literal translation is "the power of the county," which was a widely accepted common law authorizing a county sheriff to organize a group of regular citizens to pursue law breakers.​
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According to the Brennan Center for Justice, "The Posse Comitatus Act bars federal troops from participating in civilian law enforcement except when expressly authorized by law. This 143-year-old law embodies an American tradition that sees military interference in civilian affairs as a threat to both democracy and personal liberty."
This Harvard Undergraduate Law Review article provides further explanation of these interesting yet vague laws.​​​
Did the President follow the laws?
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Both of these Acts cover the President's ability to call forth federal military power to quell civil unrest. However, this author does not see where President Woodrow Wilson was involved at all in the mobilization of federal troops from Fort Oglethorpe. It appears that the acting mayor of Chattanooga directly asked the Secretary of War Newton Baker for the troops at Fort Oglethorpe, and Secretary Baker acted alone in authorizing the mobilization of troops into the city. It is possible that Baker made a midnight phone call to President Wilson who may have given verbal authorization, but that's not recorded in any newspaper that this author can find.
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According to the Brennan Center for Justice, "The Posse Comitatus Act consists of just one sentence: 'Whoever, except in cases and under circumstances expressly authorized by the Constitution or Act of Congress, willfully uses any part of the Army or the Air Force as a posse comitatus or otherwise to execute the laws shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than two years, or both.'
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"In practice, this means that members of the military who are subject to the law may not participate in civilian law enforcement unless doing so is expressly authorized by a statute or the Constitution."
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There are exceptions to the Posse Comitatus law, but the exceptions appear to have been added later, since they deal with drug trafficking and transnational organized crime, nuclear materials, and weapons of mass destruction.
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Did Secretary of War Baker violate the Posse Comitatus Act? And should he have been fined or imprisoned?
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Another question the reader might ask is, where was the Tennessee National Guard during all this? Acting Mayor Betterton tells Secretary Baker that TN Gov. Rye has no troops. So why not? Where was the TN National Guard? The answer is that the entire National Guard of the United States was "drafted into U.S. Army service for World War I." Earlier that year, on April 12, 1917, the Tennessee National Guard became federalized as part of the 30th Division. After some months of stateside training and preparations, the TNG was deployed to the trenches in Europe where they contributed to major victories that helped end the war. Several TNG soldiers won the Medal of Honor. It appears that Gov. Rye had no troops to send to Chattanooga.