Hymie's Bull Allegory

In his short story “Hymie’s Bull”, Ralph Ellison uses the story of the bums living on the train as an allegory for racial tension and classism in the Great Depression Era of America. A white bum named Hymie murders a “bull” on the train, jumps off, and escapes. When the train stops, and the Bull is found dead on the side of the tracks, they line the black bums up outside the train. They are planning to put one of them to death for the murder, although none of them committed the crime. Ellison uses numerous moments in his narrative to depict a small-scale example of the effects racism and classism have on the lives of African Americans during the Great Depression.
Ellison never names the narrator in “Hymie’s Bull”. Because the narrator lacks

a name, and therefore a person to identify with, he acts as a way in which to generalize the treatment experienced by the bums on the train. The narrator is almost de-personified - he stands to act as an ideology more so than an actual figure. This is an effective strategy to make the narrator’s struggles more relatable to a wider audience. In much the same way giving a prisoner a number instead of a name removes their identity, never naming a person at all removes identity as well. However, the removal of identity in “Hymie’s Bull” acts more to generalize experience than dehumanize. Making the narrator more relatable is a powerful tool that Ellison uses to strengthen his argument in the narrative; It allows for the story to reach a wider audience more effectively.
Early in the story, the narrator climbs on top of the train car to watch the sunset. “I stood on top, feeling the wind pushing against my eyes and whipping my pants against my legs, and waved to Hymie. He had his legs locked around the open ventilator of a refrigerator car hooked next to ours” (85). In this moment, the narrator has just finished playing cards with the rest of the bums in the train car below. He climbs out on top and waves to Hymie who is sitting on the train car in front of the one of which he just climbed out. Hymie, a white man, sitting on the car in front of the rest of the black boys is incredibly symbolic. Even when placed outside of society, the bums are still separated, with the white man sitting in front of the black men. Not only does this example point out the racism embedded into society, but it also denotes the classism. Hierarchically and socioeconomically, white men are placed far ahead of black men; especially in the era this scene takes place.
Another strong message drawn from the symbolism of the train is that of “separate but equal.” When this short story was published, Plessey V Ferguson had been over turned, but Ellison chooses to set the story in a time where the ideology of “separate but equal” was very prevalent.

Having set the narrative in a time in which Plessy V Ferguson had not been overturned implies that Ellison believes that the world has not changed, even though the laws have. The narrator and Hymie are both literally and metaphorically separated – in one way by the literal distance between them, in the other the difference between their skins. Although both men are bums, Hymie does have a socioeconomic foothold the black bums do not, as a white man is much more likely to be chosen for a job than a black man during the Great Depression

Era.
When a bull realizes there is a bum on the train, their job is to confront that person and make sure they no longer remain on the train. It is no coincidence that these figures always approach the bum from the front of the train, working backwards. In the setting of the train, the hierarchy remains where being closer to the front gives you more power. This metaphor is used repeatedly throughout the story. The bums are closest to the front: they have the most power, the most privilege. Then follows Hymie, who is a bum but it also white, and therefore holds more power in hierarchy. Next are the black bums, who hold the least amount of privilege possible.
The climax of narration is the moment in which Hymie kills the Bull who is beating him for riding the train illegally. In this moment, the two characters are fighting and the narrator says, “Hymie fought the bull the best he could, but he fumbled in his pocket at the same time” (86). Hymie was fumbling in his pocket for a switchblade knife. Hymie succeeds in freeing his knife from his pocket and then uses the blade to attack and kill the Bull. “The bull had rolled from the cinders into the vines which lined the tracks, and lay there all bloody among the flowers that looked like lilies” (87).
While the bums are on the train, they seemingly live outside of Jim Crow’s reach. However, once back in society, De Jure Racism returns. “The next day about dusk we were pulling into the yards at Montgomery, Alabama, miles down the line, and got the scare of our lives” (87). It is no coincidence that Ellison chose Montgomery, Alabama as the location to reintroduce the bums back into society. Montgomery is infamous for the anti-civil rights campaign, and Jim Crow was very much so alive and well in Alabama during the Great Depression. This location acts to remind readers of the parallelism between civil rights struggles and the struggle Ellison speaks on between the Black bums, Hymie, and the Bulls on the train.
At the end of the short story, the train stops as it pulls into Montgomery.

The narrator says, “we knew Hymie’s bull had been found and some black boy had to go” (88). The black bums on the train understood that even though none of them had committed the crime, one of them would become a scapegoat. The bulls on the train don’t care who murdered the other bull; they just need to prove a point that they hold the power over the bums. One has to wonder, if Hymie had stayed on the train, would he be standing in line next to all the other bums? Or, would the institution of racism prevail and it still be presumed a black man committed the murder? I believe the later would hold to be true. In finality, the other bums on the train end up getting a pass – “But luck must’ve been with us this time because just then the storm broke and the freight started to pull out of the yard”

(88).
In “Hymie’s Bull”, Ellison provides a look into the lives of bums living on trains in the Great Depression Era. Ralph Ellison is known for his narration on racial identity, and this short story serves that purpose, as well as acting as an insight into the hierarchy that exists within society of socioeconomic classes. The story shows that the black bums on the train realize that even though they may live “outside” of Jim Crow and De Facto racism, their racial identity is still working against. In a society where race determines many aspects of everyday life, the bums face many challenges despite living on the fringes of said society. This allegory is also used in a modern context in the 2013 movie Snowpiercer, directed by Joon-ho Bong. In the movie, the world has been swept into an ice age, and the only living people on earth live on a train that circles the global annually. The wealthiest people on the train live closest to the front, with socioeconomic standing diminishing the farther back one is on the train. The story is also a commentary on the hierarchy that exists in society between the classes, although to a much more extreme extent. “Hymie’s Bull” was set in the 1930’s and yet stories today still have similar content. The fact that the two stories share a common theme proves that the narrative holds a place not only contemporarily, but also modernly.