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MAY DAY – the Facts the History of May Day, Internationally and in Australia, Is Interlinked with the History of the Anarchist Movement

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MAY DAY – the Facts the History of May Day, Internationally and in Australia, Is Interlinked with the History of the Anarchist Movement ANARCHIST MEDIA INSTITUTE An Anarchist Society is a voluntary non-hierarchical society based on the creation of social and political structures which allow all people equal decision making power and equal access to society’s wealth. W www.anarchistmedia.org E [email protected] A PO Box 20, Parkville VIC 3052 M 0439 395 489 Anarchist World This Week Podcast: www.3cr.org.au/anarchistworld MAY DAY – The Facts The history of May Day, internationally and in Australia, is interlinked with the history of the Anarchist movement. In 1884 at a conference of the Federated Trades and Labour Unions of the United States and Canada, in the United States, the conference decided to launch an intensive campaign for an eight hour working day that would "culminate in widespread struggles on the 1st May 1886". Demonstrations were held across the United States and Canada on the 1st May 1886. In Chicago over 30,000 workers went on strike and over 80,000 took part in demonstrations to mark the struggle for the eight hour day. Two days later on the 3rd May striking workers met outside the McCormick Harvesting Machine Company. Chicago police fired on the workers, killing four and wounding many others. Chicago anarchists organised a protest meeting at Haymarket Square for the next evening. The rally was non-violent, as the rally was breaking up police charged the demonstrators. Someone threw a bomb at the police lines, killing one police officer. The police panicked firing indiscriminately into the crowd and at each other. Seven police and four demonstrators were killed and over one hundred police and demonstrators were wounded. Eight prominent anarchists were rounded up and charged with "conspiracy to commit murder" although only three, Albert Parsons, August Spies and Samuel Fielden had spoken at the rally. All eight - Albert Parsons, August Spies, Samuel Fielden, Michael Schwab, Oscar Neebe, George Engel, Adolph Fischer and Louis Lingg - were found guilty, seven sentenced to death and one, Oscar Neebe, to 15 years imprisonment. August Spies, George Engel, Adolph Fisher, and Albert Parsons were hanged on the 11th November 1887. Louis Lingg committed suicide the night before and Fielden's and Schwab's sentences were commuted to life in prison. All eight men were victims of the widespread hysteria whipped up by the Chicago media. It was later proven all eight men had nothing to do with the bombing and those executed and those imprisoned, received a full pardon. In Australia on the 1st May 1886 brothers David and William Andrade, heeding the call of the Federated Trades and Labour Unions of the United States and Canada, launched the Melbourne Anarchist Club, Australia's first anarchist organisation. Three years later, on the 14th July 1889, the International Labor Conference (the Second International) decided to make the 1st May "a great day of international demonstration". An Australian delegate, John Norton from Sydney, attended the conference on behalf of the Australian movement. The members of the Melbourne Anarchist Club celebrated the 1st May 1887 and 1888 with a number of public meetings and lectures. May Day was celebrated in Victoria in the offices of Dr. William Maloney (who later became the radical member for the Federal seat of Melbourne) in 1890 and 1891. The first Australian May Day celebration and demonstrations were held in Barcaldine and Ipswich at the height of the Shearers' strike in 1891. Over 1,000 people took part, 600 shearers were mounted on horseback. The procession was led by four strike leaders wearing blue sashes. The Oddfellows band was followed by the banner of the Australian Labor Federation. The Eureka flag was carried by some participants during the first May Day march in Barcaldine. In 1893 moves were made in Queensland to have the eight hour day celebrated on the 1st May instead of March. In 1892 a public celebration was held at the Yarra bank in Melbourne to mark May Day. The meeting was chaired by well known Melbourne anarchist Chummy Fleming. The meeting was preceded by a march which began at the Burke and Wills Monument which was led by men carrying two huge Red Flags. In 1893 Chummy Fleming called a meeting of radical delegates from across Melbourne to organise future May Day celebrations. Chummy Fleming was involved in every May Day celebration, in Melbourne, until his death in 1950. His ashes were scattered on the Yarra bank on May Day the following year. The history of anarchism and May Day in Melbourne is intrinsically interlinked. .
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