Labor Day: How it came
about and what it means
“Labor Day differs in every essential way
from the other holidays of the year in any coun-
try,” said Samuel Gompers, founder and longtime
president of the American Federation of Labor
(AFL). “All other holidays are in a more or less
degree connected with conflicts and battles of
man’s prowess over man, of strife and discord for
greed and power, of glories achieved by one na-
tion over another. Labor Day ... is devoted to no
man, living or dead, to no sect, race, or nation.”
Labor Day, the first Monday in September, is
a creation of the American labor movement and is
dedicated to the social and economic achieve-
ments of workers. It constitutes a yearly national
tribute to the contributions workers have made to
the strength, prosperity, and well-being of our
country.
As unemployment remains
stubbornly high, people con-
tinue to watch their spending.
But don’t be penny-wise and
pound foolish. If and when
you buy anything, look for
union-made in the USA.
It’s the patriotic thing to do.
F OUNDER OF L ABOR D AY
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PAGE 2
More than 100 years after the first Labor Day
observance, there is still some doubt as to who
first proposed the holiday for workers.
Some records show that Peter J. McGuire,
general secretary of the Brotherhood of Carpen-
ters and Joiners and a co-founder of the AFL, was
first in suggesting a day to honor those “who from
rude nature have delved and carved all the
grandeur we behold.”
But Peter McGuire’s place in Labor Day his-
tory has not gone unchallenged. Many believe
that Matthew Maguire, a machinist, not Peter
McGuire, founded the holiday. Research seems
to support the contention that Matthew Maguire,
later the secretary of Local 344 of the Interna-
tional Association of Machinists in Paterson, N.J.,
proposed the holiday in 1882 while serving as
secretary of the Central Labor Union in New
NORTHWEST LABOR PRESS
York. What is clear is that the Central Labor
Union adopted a Labor Day proposal and ap-
pointed a committee to plan a demonstration and
picnic.
T HE F IRST L ABOR D AY
The first Labor Day holiday was celebrated on
Tuesday, Sept. 5, 1882, in New York City, in ac-
cordance with the plans of the Central Labor
Union. The Central Labor Union held its second
Labor Day holiday just a year later, on Sept. 5,
1883.
In 1884, the first Monday in September was
selected as the holiday, as originally proposed,
and the Central Labor Union urged similar or-
ganizations in other cities to follow the example
of New York and celebrate a “workingmen’s hol-
iday” on that date. The idea spread with the
growth of labor organizations, and in 1885 Labor
Day was celebrated in many industrial centers of
the country.
L ABOR D AY L EGISLATION
Through the years, the nation gave increasing
emphasis to Labor Day. The first governmental
recognition came through municipal ordinances
passed during 1885 and 1886. From them devel-
oped the movement to secure state legislation.
The first state bill was introduced into the New
York Legislature, but the first to become law was
passed by Oregon on Feb. 21, 1887. During the
year four more states — Colorado, Massachu-
setts, New Jersey, and New York — created the
Labor Day holiday by legislative enactment. By
the end of the decade, Connecticut, Nebraska,
and Pennsylvania had followed suit. By 1894, 23
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AUGUST 15, 2014