05/01/2022
“The power of workers’ solidarity is the unstoppable wave that creates a change in any country. Workers rule every nation.”
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Did you know that it took over a decade of protesting, striking, and unionizing for the US government to acknowledge the 8 hour work day on May 1, 1886?
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On that day, many employers refused to comply, instigating more than 300,000 people from over 13,000 businesses across the country to strike. Eyes focused on Chicago where, after three days and with over 100,000 protesters in attendance, tensions gave way to violence, and martial law was enacted in a struggle now known as the Haymarket Riot. Across the country anti-labor governments used Haymarket to suppress labor movements-- for example, the support of co-ops suffered as wholesalers, railroad companies, and manufacturers refused to work with them.
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Did you know that Labor Day as we know it was established in September by President Grover Cleveland to divest it from May Day and the Haymarket Riot?..not shocking as Cleveland was a civil war c*p, Anti-Asian lawmaker, and the person who refused to enact the 15th amendment that allowed Black Americans the right to vote.
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"Acknowledging this country’s history of divisiveness, it is possible to better understand the ways that economic justice is intrinsically tied to racial justice, immigration reform, and the right to food. At these intersections it becomes clear that race was constructed as a tool intended to disrupt solidarity along class lines. When landowners were able to convince poor whites that their skin color made them superior to enslaved Black men and women, they were able to distract them from the power held by the wealthy few." -- Toward Economic Justice: Understanding the History of May Day in the United States by