A fine May Day in Chicago

It would have been interesting to go downtown today and take part in the immigrant rally. But I've got meetings I couldn't get out of. My act of defiance will have to be limited to blogging on company time.

The Chicago demonstration begins at Union Park, and the march to the lakefront will go past what remains of Haymarket Square (a mile east of Union Park). I'm sure May 1 was chosen to coincide with International Workers' Day; the proximity to where it all started, 120 years ago, might be just an interesting coincidence.

There has been some criticism that the protesters ought to be at work or in school rather than out in the streets. The same was said of the civil rights marches in the '60s. But social justice doesn't wait for the end of the shift or for the school bell.

Looking at events outside of Chicago, tens of thousands of workers prostested today in Asia, as reported by Reuters. In Indonesia, they protested new laws that make it more difficult for workers to organize. In the Philippines, they protested for higher wages and against Philippine President Arroyo, who has recently enacted draconian measures to quell dissent. In Cambodia, police used force to break up what observers described as a peaceful rally.

One of the Reuters articles quotes a Bangladeshi man who explains why he was out protesting:

"We are not working today in memory of those brethren killed by authorities in Chicago, USA in 1886, as they campaigned for an eight-hour working day," Moinuddin Khan Badal, a workers' leader told Reuters.

Unfortunately, if you asked Chicagoans about the significance of May 1 to Chicago, I would bet that at least two out of three would have no clue. In the U.S., Labor Day was moved by four months so that it now falls in September and no longer commemorates the Haymarket Riot.

[02 May 2006 07:00:00] Update: I wrote the above before the throngs assembled in Chicago's Grant Park. According to the reports I heard, it was a very orderly demonstration, which is remarkable considering that an estimated 400,000 were gathered. I've often written laments about how our government has curtailed our civil liberties in recent years. But when I see so many people free to assemble and to speak their minds, it gives me hope.