Newsletter of the Socialist Party of Canada and World Socialist Party (US) No. 604
THE THEFT OF MAY DAY USA
May Day has its roots as a working
peoples’ celebration going back more than
a thousand years with connections to
ancient Roman rituals. It was a festive
holiday in pagan Europe celebrating the
spring planting. In the 1700’s the churches
banned pagan rituals just as bosses today
suppress traditions of solidarity and
workers rights. Church and state were the
butt of many jokes at May Day
celebrations.
May 1st has, for over a century, been
celebrated around the globe as Labor Day
with rallies and speeches, picnics and
celebrations, demonstrations and riots;
everywhere except in the United States
where the tradition began. These May
Day events have been a primary occasion
for workers, especially in Europe, to
collectively express their unity, solidarity,
and commitment to social change. Today,
the United States stands virtually alone
among the industrialized nations in
officially ignoring the historical and
political significance of May Day for the
Labor movement. Few Americans realize
that May Day celebrations in Europe, in
Russia, Brazil, and Ireland since 1891,
China since 1920, and India since1927,
actually commemorate historical events
here in the United States.
On May 1st, 1886, the American
Federation of Labor declared a national
strike to demand an eight-hour work day,
the culmination of a concerted struggle.
350,000 workers across the country
responded. During this period, corporate
power was growing rapidly. American
workers were dealing with a political and
legal system that didn’t recognize even
the most basic rights of workplace safety,
community sanitation, and child
protection, much less the right to organize
and strike.
The strikes virtually paralyzed the city of
Chicago. Railroads, stockyards, and other
businesses were forced to close. Two
days later, four strikers were killed and
many injured when police fired into
crowds of fleeing strikers.
The next day, when police attempted to
disperse a peaceful rally in Haymarket
Square, a bomb detonated in their midst,
killing eight of them. The police fired into
the crowd wounding another 200 citizens
and killing many. Police arrested eight
revolutionary labor leaders, seven of
which had not even been present in
Haymarket at the time of the riot. There
was no evidence linking them to the
bomb, so the “Chicago Eight” were tried
solely on the basis of their political
beliefs, convicted and sentenced to death.
News of the trial spread rapidly sparking
protests around the world. In 1889, the
Socialist International declared May 1st a
day of demonstrations. Since 1890 these
have been held annually by labor
movements worldwide, eventually forcing
official recognition of the holiday. Labor
advocates in the United States pressed for
an official national holiday recognizing
workers. By the 1890s, May 1st was
already being celebrated as Labor Day in
some states, early September in others. To
the delight of business and government
leaders opposed to labor militancy, the
first Monday in September received
official recognition as it filled the long gap
between the Fourth of July and
Thanksgiving holidays as far away as
possible from the “subversive” May Day.
May Day rallies continued unabated and
the simple displacement of Labor Day was
no longer deemed a sufficient tactic, so
conservatives renamed May Day itself in
an effort to finally erase its unsettling
symbolism from the American
consciousness. In 1947, the U.S. Veterans
of Foreign Wars renamed May 1st
“Loyalty Day” and a joint session of
Congress made it official. Loyalty Day
was a weapon leveled against leftist labor
tendencies, and specifically the American
Communist Party. The right of American
citizens to join a legal political party of
their own choosing without harassment
was apparently not to be celebrated on
this holiday.
Loyalty Day flourished at the expense of
traditional May Day events throughout
the 1950’s. The Loyalty Day parades were
designed to lure citizens away from the
long-standing labor rallies. Ten years later,
however, the association of such parades
with support for the Vietnam war led to a
drastic decline in public participation.
Despite this waning interest, the strategy
of renaming May Day had succeeded.
Loyalty Day is all but forgotten, but so
too is the historic significance of May
Day.
Ironically this historic memorial to
American labor continues to inspire
workers abroad, but has been largely
forgotten by workers at home. The theft
of this powerful symbol of the historic
struggle by average working Americans
for freedom and democracy is testament to
the need for a truly socialist world in
which people are no longer forced to work
for the enrichment of the wealthy few just
in order to live.
--PF
