Seven Oaks Magazine.

In the second installment of our three-part series on May Day, Seven Oaks will address the international significance of the workers’ holiday. Born out of events in the United States, but enshrined by the International Working People’s Association, May Day has been a symbol of an International working class consciousness since the late 19th century. Author Dale McCartney considers the extent to which May Day has served to unite local and international resistance, and the possibility that it supplies a ready tool to social movements working to unite working class resistance with resistance working on other axes of oppression.

From its inception, May Day was an international phenomenon. In arguing for its international recognition, American radicals made a presentation to a French meeting of the Second International, on the one-hundredth anniversary of the fall of the Bastille. Just as the Haymarket massacre represented the culmination of a variety of radical currents in American society, coupled with several serious demands made by American labour, so was May Day formed to represent the confluence of a variety of international types of resistance. By the next year it was being celebrated all over Europe, North America and Australia. During the twentieth century, its prominence has only increased the world over as a workers’ holiday. For radicals hunting for a global symbol to rally resistance to capitalism, and for trade unionists concerned with making connections with other unionists in other countries, May Day is a celebration with considerable pedigree throughout the world.

May Day’s international prominence began in Europe. Due in part to the repression of anarchists in America, in 1890 Polish workers led the world in protest, with 10,000 meeting in Warsaw to oppose their treatment at the hands of the Tsarist regime. As workers in more than thirty countries marched with them in spirit, the Polish protestors were set upon by police forces, and the organizers were arrested and jailed. The violent repression of Polish workers’ protests was repeated on May Day 1899 and 1905.

After a short interregnum, May Day was once again the centre of worldwide protest after the First World War. In what has since been called the “red year,” May Day was the start of a variety of near revolutions in 1919. 600 members of the German resistance were killed with the crushing of “Red Bavaria.” On the same day, Vladimir Lenin told his Soviet supporters – while celebrating the first secure May Day after the revolution – that “we can say with certainty that not only in Red Moscow, in Red Petrograd and in Budapest, but in all large proletarian centres, the workers, who have come out into the streets today not merely to take the air but to demonstrate their strength, are talking about the significance of Soviet power and of the early triumph of the proletariat.”

May Day 1919 is also Canada’s most famous May Day. On May 1, phone operators led thousands of workers out of their shops to begin the Winnipeg General Strike. The strike lasted six weeks, and marks the high point of the use of the general strike in Canada. May Day’s historical position is undeniably tied to these sorts of events, thereby representing the most militant sort of working class political action for many participants and observers.

In the (many) intervening years, May Day has become ensconced in international workers’ movements. May Day protests played a significant role in the early events in France, 1968, and served as a rallying point for the student radicals who led the revolt. In Brazil in the late 1970s, May Day became a symbol of the burgeoning working class movement, led by Lula’s steelworkers unions. In the context of these protests, gay rights activists united their cause with working class emancipation. May Day became a symbol by which different interests of working class people could be celebrated and supported. Political action on gay rights dovetailed with working class activism, all under the rubric of May Day.

It is this sort of connected, concerted action that makes the workers’ holiday so appealing. Trade unions and social justice activists are coming to recognize that they face forces working against them on a global scale. In this context, May Day is a symbol that holds considerable potential power. It is recognized internationally, it has an amazing historical resonance, and it is based on unifying and moving working people, the most powerful movers behind significant social change.

In 2004, May Day is rebuilding some of its prominence here in North America. In the United States, it is doing it with an international flair. The American labor coalition, US Labor Against the War, is planning May 1 as a day of action. This year’s key issue is immigrant rights, as the treatment of immigrants in the US gets worse with each budget increase for the department of Homeland Security. Similar issues will be tackled here in Vancouver, where Mayworks 2004 promises workshops and actions on issues as diverse as “bus riders & students fighting for their class interests right through to war and resistance to imperialism across the planet.” Organizers recognize the potential of May Day as a day of celebration, education, and protest on a variety of issues important to working people. Uniting these issues under one concept, and containing them in one weekend, means significant connections can be made between movements and people. Although its popularity has suffered in recent years in North America, May Day’s continuing international popularity makes it the true workers’ holiday.

Next week, Seven Oaks’ three part series will conclude with an article about the Canadian labour movement’s revived interest in May Day, as they officially sanction actions this year throughout the country.