Beltane, May Day, Law Day - May 1st has been reinvented many times.
The following are brief histories of each holiday.
Beltane:
Beltane was one of four Gaelic seasonal festivals: Samhain (~1 November), Imbolc (~1 February), Beltane (~1 May) and Lughnasadh (~1 August). Beltane marked the beginning of the pastoral summer season, when livestock were driven out to the summer pastures. Rituals were held at that time to protect them from harm, both natural and supernatural, and this mainly involved the "symbolic use of fire".There were also rituals to protect crops, dairy products and people, and to encourage growth. The sí (often described as 'the spirits' or 'the fairies') were thought to be especially active at Beltane (as at Samhain) and the goal of many Beltane rituals was to appease the sí. Beltaine was a "spring time festival of optimism" during which "fertility ritual again was important, perhaps connecting with the waxing power of the sun".
Beltane marks the passage into the growing season, the immediate rousing of the earth from her gently awakening slumber, a time when the pleasures of the earth and self are fully awakened. It signals a time when the bounty of the earth will once again be had. May is a time when flowers bloom, trees are green and life has again returned from the barren landscape of winter, to the hope of bountiful harvests, not too far away, and the lighthearted bliss that only summer can bring.
May Day:
Most people living in the United States know little about the International Workers' Day of May Day. For many others there is an assumption that it is a holiday celebrated in state communist countries like Cuba or the former Soviet Union. Most Americans don't realize that May Day has its origins here in this country and is as "American" as baseball and apple pie, and stemmed from the pre-Christian holiday of Beltane, a celebration of rebirth and fertility.
In the late nineteenth century, the working class was in constant struggle to gain the 8-hour work day. Working conditions were severe and it was quite common to work 10 to 16 hour days in unsafe conditions. Death and injury were commonplace at many work places and inspired such books as Upton Sinclair's The Jungle and Jack London's The Iron Heel. As early as the 1860's, working people agitated to shorten the workday without a cut in pay, but it wasn't until the late 1880's that organized labor was able to garner enough strength to declare the 8-hour workday. This proclamation was without consent of employers, yet demanded by many of the working class.
Law Day:
On this day in 1958, President Eisenhower proclaims Law Day to honor the role of law in the creation of the United States of America. Three years later, Congress followed suit by passing a joint resolution establishing May 1 as Law Day.
The idea of a Law Day had first been proposed by the American Bar Association in 1957. The desire to suppress the celebration of May 1, or May Day, as International Workers' Day aided in Law Day's creation. May Day had communist overtones in the minds of many Americans, because of its celebration of working people as a governing class in the Soviet Union and elsewhere.
The American Bar Association defines Law Day as: "A national day set aside to celebrate the rule of law. Law Day underscores how law and the legal process have contributed to the freedoms that all Americans share." The language of the statute ordaining May 1 calls it "a special day of celebration by the American people in appreciation of their liberties and? rededication to the ideals of equality and justice under law."
On a day that, in many parts of the world, inspires devotion to the rights of the working classes to participate in government, Law Day asks Americans to focus upon every American's rights as laid out in the fundamental documents of American democracy: the Declaration of Independence and the federal Constitution. The declaration insists that Americans "find these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal," and guarantees the rights to "life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness." The Bill of Rights amended to the Constitution codifies the rights of free speech, free press and fair trial.
Law Day celebrates the legal construct for the determination of rights that the revolutionary leaders of the 1770s, hoping to prevent the sort of class warfare that went on to rack Europe from 1789 to 1917, were so eager to create.
The idea of a Law Day had first been proposed by the American Bar Association in 1957. The desire to suppress the celebration of May 1, or May Day, as International Workers' Day aided in Law Day's creation. May Day had communist overtones in the minds of many Americans, because of its celebration of working people as a governing class in the Soviet Union and elsewhere.
The American Bar Association defines Law Day as: "A national day set aside to celebrate the rule of law. Law Day underscores how law and the legal process have contributed to the freedoms that all Americans share." The language of the statute ordaining May 1 calls it "a special day of celebration by the American people in appreciation of their liberties and? rededication to the ideals of equality and justice under law."
On a day that, in many parts of the world, inspires devotion to the rights of the working classes to participate in government, Law Day asks Americans to focus upon every American's rights as laid out in the fundamental documents of American democracy: the Declaration of Independence and the federal Constitution. The declaration insists that Americans "find these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal," and guarantees the rights to "life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness." The Bill of Rights amended to the Constitution codifies the rights of free speech, free press and fair trial.
Law Day celebrates the legal construct for the determination of rights that the revolutionary leaders of the 1770s, hoping to prevent the sort of class warfare that went on to rack Europe from 1789 to 1917, were so eager to create.
