Happy Labor Day: How One Bomb and One Republican in Chicago Changed Workers’ Rights Forever

Happy Labor Day, even with its complicated history. What complicated history you ask?

See, during the 1880s, the number of labor protests around the country increased. Workers wanted to work less than 16 hours a day, as reported by PBS. and preferred doing so in places where they wouldn’t lose a limb or an eye.

So, employed Chicagoans began a peaceful strike on May 1, 1886. On May 3, 1886, Chicago police killed at least 2 protestors who had been advocating better working conditions and a shorter workday. The next day on May 4, the workers held another protest at the Haymarket, and they didn’t come unprepared.

So-called “anarchist” Albert Parsons had had enough, and some historians contend his rhetoric aided in escalating the violence. As the leader of American branch of International Working People’s Association (I.W.P.A.), Parsons’s words had power and reach. Many say Parsons was an enigma, since he had been a Confederate soldier, who became a radicalized Republican. By the end, he had married a former slave.

However, as a man who fought hard for the rights of workers, all workers, he would not let the deaths of the protesters at the hands of police go unpunished. Together with other labor organizations, Parsons organized a protest for the next day at the Chicago Haymarket.

At the protest, someone threw a bomb at police, killing 7 Chicago officers and at least 4 civilians. Dozens were wounded. This day would become known as May Day — or the Haymarket Affair — and be the spark that eventually led to the replacement of the 10 — 16-hour workday with the standard 8-hour workday. It also led to workplaces being safer but not without sacrifices.

In the aftermath of the bombing, eight men, including Parsons, were arrested and forced to stand trial. It took the jury just three hours to return the guilty verdicts. All but one of the men were sentenced to death by hanging.

Although the government was pleased with this verdict, the wives of the men were not. The judge wasn’t either and wrote to the governor on behalf of two men whose sentences were commuted to life in prison.

However, Parsons and three of the other men were not as lucky. On November 11, 1887, Parsons and the other men, their faces covered with black hoods, were escorted to the hangman’s platform. One of the men said, “The day will come when our silence will be more powerful than the voices you are throttling today.” Just then, the trapdoor opened. That man had been right. They all died martyrs.

As written by PBS, “In June 1893, a Haymarket monument was unveiled in Chicago’s Waldheim Cemetery. That same month Governor John Altgeld unconditionally pardoned Field, Neebe and Schwab because the trial and the conduct of the judge had been shamefully unjust. Even anarchists ‘were entitled to a fair trial,’ the governor declared, ‘and no greater damage could possibly threaten our institutions than to have the courts of justice run wild or to give way to popular clamor.’”

The strike in Chicago was part of a bigger national labor movement that had been gaining traction. Even with the May Day incident, it wouldn’t be until 1933 that President Roosevelt would sign the law standardizing the 8-hour workday.

If you didn’t know, this is how one bomb changed the course of American labor expectations forever.

That said, you faithfully punch that clock every morning, even when your eyes are bloodshot. You deserve flowers, a union and a living wage. Let this day be a reminder that we all work hard, and everyone deserves to make a living in the job they do. Spread the word.

This article was written by Jermaine Reed, MFA, the Editor-in-Chief of The Reeders Block.