The railroads around Chicago were in chaos.

Workers for the Pullman Palace car company had gone on strike after the company's owner

had cut their wages but not their rents.

In sympathy, other railway workers refused to handle any Pullman train cars.

Federal troops were sent to try and get the railways moving again.

But the striking workers rioted and the troops shot at the crowd, killing some of the strikers.

President Grover Cleveland, fearing a backlash from working-class voters, offered an olive branch.

Many states already had a holiday that celebrated working Americans.

He signed a bill creating a federal one and since 1894, Labor Day has both marked the

end of summer and the toil of the American working class.

Joe Biden is a more avowedly pro-worker president than most but like his predecessor Grover

Cleveland, he has a problem with working-class voters.

I'm John Prado and this is Chex and Balance from the Economist.

Each week we take one big theme shaping American politics and explore it in depth.

Today, can Democrats win back working-class voters?

Joe Biden likes to boast that he's the most pro-union president in American history.

His fondness for unions though has been tested by a wave of strikes.

In office, President Biden has regularly voiced support for workers in handed unions

more power.

But white working-class Americans, once his party's reliable base, now mostly vote Republican.

And Democrats ever solve their working-class problem.

With me this week to talk about unions and the Democratic party's relationship with the

...