Millions of Flowers of Resistance

The Beginning of May Day

Chicago labor unions have worked for generations to preserve and honor May Day: May 1st-International Workers’ Day. As Chicago Federation of Labor President Bob Reiter likes to say, Chicago is the hometown of the American labor movement because of our robust, and sometimes tragic history of labor organizing. The most important moment of that history is the “Haymarket Affair”, which happened on May 1st, 1886, in Chicago.

The first May Day began with the growing national movement for an 8-hour work day which summoned a crowd of 80,000 which marched on Michigan Avenue.

From the Illinois Labor History Society:

“The Haymarket Affair occurred during a later rally which was wrapping up, with around 200 people remaining [at the location of what is now Randolph Des Plaines Streets on May 1st]. The small crowd was then attacked by 176 policemen carrying Winchester repeater rifles. Then someone, unknown to this day, threw the first dynamite bomb ever used in peacetime history of the United States. The police panicked, and in the darkness many shot at their own men…Four workers and seven police officers were killed and many more injured. “

“The next day martial law was declared, not just in Chicago but throughout the nation. Anti-labor governments around the world used the Chicago incident to crush local union movements.”

Without evidence, eight immigrant, anarchist and socialist labor organizers were convicted of throwing the bomb and inciting the violence.

“Adolph Fischer, George Engel, Albert Parsons and August Spies were hanged on November 11, 1887. In June of 1893, Governor John P. Altgeld pardoned the 3 men still alive and condemned the entire judicial system that had allowed this injustice.”

The martyrdom of the innocent men inspired the world (but not the U.S.) to establish May 1st as International Workers’ Day. 

The Evolution of May Day in the U.S.

On March 10th, 2006, a massive march of over 100,000 people was organized by immigrant rights advocates in Chicago, in reaction to the hostile “Sensenbrenner Bill” which imposed restrictions on undocumented immigrants. This mobilization inspired a national day of action on May Day 2006.

Less than two months later, honoring the origins of May Day which was organized under the leadership of immigrant workers, Chicago organizers in the immigrant rights movement joined with allied organizations around the country to stage a “Day Without Immigrants.” The mass demonstrations made visible the power, value and dignity of the immigrant community-with or without documentation. Millions marched in cities across the U.S. Students stayed out of school and industries reliant on immigrant labor slowed or shut down.  

Chicago labor unions, community organizations and immigrant rights groups have coalesced to mount May Day mobilizations in the 20 years since. Since 2006, Chicago May Day mobilizations have highlighted the ever-increasing deportations, detentions, and border militarization under the Bush and Obama administrations. The truth is that the level of deportations and border militarization has been as aggressive, if not more so, with Democratic Congresses and Presidents. It has been a decades-long bi-partisan assault on vulnerable communities. Today, the attacks continue, with added inflammatory racist rhetoric, flashy optics, gestapo-like nakedly fascist brutality under Trump, which has awoken previously complacent people of conscience.

May Day Now

This year, on May 1st, once again, organizations around the country have come together to mount mass mobilizations- this time to reject the perpetual corporate fascist agenda of the billionaire class. The main slogan is “Workers Over Billionaires.” The mobilizations across the U.S. are articulating more comprehensive demands, including guaranteed universal health care. 

Comprehensive demands are well-placed in May Day organizing. The immigrant organizers and throngs of workers in 1886 were a testament to the importance and leadership of immigrant workers in the U.S. Their demand on that day was the 8-hour work day, underscoring an important point: the needs of immigrants are the needs of all workers and are not limited to ending policing, detention and deportations.  Justice for working people necessitates that the consistent agenda of the 1% is repelled and their class privileges, corruption and unchecked power are dismantled. Unifying people of conscience around an acute understanding of this fundamental fact is the only possible means by which we can prevail. We cannot merely march, however. We must confront capital and the machinery of the state directly, and shut it down. As the gears lock, the projection of power wanes. To abolish ICE, we must disrupt ICE. New energy and organizing has grown in that direction under Trump, and on this May Day, we can only hope to inspire millions of flowers of ongoing resistance to bloom.

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Susan Hurley is the Executive Director of the Illinois Single Payer Coalition and the former Executive of Chicago Jobs with Justice where she led labor and community organizing for annual May Day events between 2009 and 2022.