As we wake in our homes made safe by the building code, in our planned communities, sipping a well regulated glass of water, assured by the nearness of universal and excellent hospital care, let us recall those who went before in the cause of a healthy happy community respectful of the workers’ role as a cornerstone in our economic happiness:
- The US Department of Labor has an excellent history of Labor Day on its website
- The US Library of the Congress has an excellent exhibit on the Haymarket Affair from 1886 when workers fought for the eight hour day, a blessing to us all.
- The Woody Guthrie Foundation and Archives is a good place to start getting a bit riled up about it all.
- The British TUC celebrates the right of political dissent crystallized in the anti-WWI movement led not even by the Trade Union leaders but by the shop stewards – guess who sat at lunch with the lads being sent to the industrialized warfare of the trenches?
- In Canada, the jewel in our socialist crown is medicare and the people’s broadcaster, the CBC, shares the history of the fight for free health care for all here.
Grannie would be proud. The story goes that she was given the job by the municipal council in her role as Bailee (a deputy mayor of some sort) to plan the flag distribution throughout the City for a holiday. Down near the shipyards it was all red banners flapping as the shift ended and the workers filled the streets. Cheers, comradery and, ok, perhaps a small riot…but it was the Clyde in the 50’s and it really didn’t take much to get a good riot going.
So raise the red flag high today, look to that free vaccine mark on your should brought to you by public health served up in the free schools and thank them.