About May Day
 why
we celebrate
MAY DAY!
the one internationally recognized day
to commemorate the struggles, strength, and solidarity of working people all
the world over
How It Began.
The tradition of May Day began in 1886 when a group of
American railworkers chose May 1st as the day to launch their strike for the
eight-hour workday. Their call-to-action spread rapidly ultimately
drawing hundreds of thousands of workers all across the U.S. out on strike.
On May 4th, police in Chicago attacked a workers'
demonstration sparking the infamous "Haymarket Riots" in which seven
policemen and dozens of working people were killed. Eight leaders of the
workers' movement were framed for inciting this Riot and on November 11th,
1887, four of them -- August Spies, Adolph Fischer, Louis Engel, and Albert
Parsons -- were hanged. These four working class heroes would come to be
known as "The Haymarket Martyrs."
After these harrowing incidents, May Day (May 1st) became
enshrined as a day to remember the struggles of working people and to
celebrate workers' power. While never an official American holiday, May
1st was often a day of demonstrations, parades, and strikes for all supporters
of the workers' movement.
How It Grew.
May Day quickly grew into an international
tradition uniting working people all over the world. After the Russian
Revolution, May Day became the Soviet Union's most important national holiday.
Over the years, May Day has been celebrated by those fighting in many of the
most crucial struggles of our time -- by Jewish resistance fighters in the
Warsaw Ghetto Uprising of 1943, by the North Vietnamese during their
liberation of Saigon in 1975, by demonstrators in Tienanmen Square in 1989,
and -- most recently -- by immigration rights activists in the U.S. in
2006.
May Day has blossomed into a worldwide movement celebrated
in almost every country on the Planet.
How We Lost Touch With Our Tradition.
In 1894, U.S. President Grover Cleveland declared
Labor Day (the first Monday in September) a National Holiday. This new
holiday served as a deliberate ploy to distract American workers away from the
more militant tradition of May Day.
During the Red Scare of the 1950s, the simple act of
marching in a May Day Parade was considered grounds for persecution and
blacklisting.
Today in America -- the very birthplace of May Day -- most
workers are completely unaware of this tradition. The U.S. is one of the
only countries in the World where May 1st is NOT a national holiday.
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