History of the Holiday: Labor Day

In case it isn’t apparent to everyone yet, we recently had a three-day weekend thanks to a wonderful little holiday called Labor Day. It’s known as being the American tradition of celebrating working by not working, but what is the real significance behind Labor Day? Why do we get to have a day where we don’t go to work or go to school? Labor day is a holiday that has been around since 1885, and actually has a rich back story.

    According to the article on the history of Labor Day on dol.gov, municipal ordinances during 1885 and 1886 first gave recognition to the holiday at a government level. It wasn’t until 1887 that the first law for Labor Day was established in Oregon in late February, followed by Colorado, Massachusetts, New Jersey and New York in the same year. By 1894, 26 more states enacted laws to recognize Labor Day, and, by late June, Congress passed an act to make the first Monday in September Labor Day for the District of Columbia and all its territories. The first Labor Day celebration back in 1885 was held on a Tuesday, however, by the Central Labor Union in New York City.

    Not all of the history behind the holiday is peaceful. According to an article on History.com, in May of 1894, just before Labor Day became a national holiday, employees of the Pullman Palace Car Company in Chicago began going on strike due to wage cuts and union representatives being fired. The tipping point was when the American Railway Union called a boycott of all Pullman Railway cars, which halted railroad traffic across the nation. After the government dispatched troops to quell the boycott, riots ensued, which caused the deaths of over a dozen workers. It was after this that the federal government formally recognized Labor Day as a national holiday.

    But who founded Labor Day as a holiday? No one is certain. Peter J. McGuire, who co-founded the American Federation of Labor, was the first to suggest a holiday for workers; however, many believe it was Matthew Maguire, who was a machinist, not a carpenter like McGuire, who truly founded the holiday. He proposed it in 1882 while serving as the secretary of the Central Labor Union in New York.

    As far as not wearing white after Labor Day, as we’ve probably all been told, there has been some contention as to why the rule ever came into existence. Traditionally, back before people wore t-shirts and “revealing” clothing to beat the heat near the end of August and the beginning of September, people would wear white, which reflects the sun’s rays and keeps them cool. According to TIME’s web article on the subject, some historians believe that the tradition is merely symbolic of the end of summer, where people would begin wearing their darker clothes again after Labor Day in recognition of summer being formally over. There are still others who disagree with this explanation, so it is difficult to explain exactly why you “shouldn’t” wear white.

    In the end, Labor Day is about recognizing the struggles of the American worker, and how we had to fight to get the proper working conditions that many of us take for granted today.