13.12.2025, Aleksandrovskoye.
Crowds of workers march on and on, exhausted and hungry, but solemn and courageous. Thousands of banners wave, posters proclaim the great words that burn in each of our hearts… Isn’t it delightful to think that the state, which until now was our worst enemy, is now ours and celebrates May Day as its greatest holiday?
In the Russian Empire, May Day was first celebrated as a day of international solidarity in 1890 in Warsaw with a strike of 10,000 workers. Starting in 1897, May Day gatherings took on a political character and were accompanied by mass demonstrations. The May Day strikes and demonstrations of 1912–1914 saw over 400,000 workers participate. In 1917, after the February Revolution, May Day was celebrated openly for the first time: millions of workers took to the streets with slogans like “Down with the capitalist ministers!“, “All power to the Soviets!“, “Down with the imperialist war!” and so on.
After the October Revolution of 1917, the holiday transformed in nature, becoming the Day of the International. It was now the official holiday of an entirely new—socialist—state, and therefore had to be celebrated in a new way. Moreover, there was a pressing need for holidays and symbols to replace the church ones, but with equally passionate content.
The first official May Day was celebrated in 1918. The history of May Day as a state holiday should begin two weeks before its first occurrence. In mid-April 1918, special commissions began to be created, tasked with organizing the celebration of May 1. These commissions developed the general concept of the festivities and took the most direct part in implementing the plans. For example, in Petrograd, all organizational work was entrusted to the Petrograd Soviet, under which a Central Holiday Commission with ten specialized subcommissions was created. The Moscow May Day commission included representatives of the Central Executive Committee, the Moscow Soviet, the Moscow Committee of the RCP(b), Proletсult, and others. Subsequently, the model of forming special commissions to organize celebrations was implemented across the country.
Right before the celebration itself, on April 26, an “Appeal from the All-Russian Central Executive Committee to all provincial, district, and volost Soviets on taking measures to organize the May Day celebration and its slogans” was issued.
Telegram from Y. M. Sverdlov “From Moscow Kremlin // No. 116. Submitted 26/IV at 22:40 by radio. // To all Committees of the Russian Communist Party, Bolshevik factions at the Soviets“:
Long live Soviet power—the dictatorship of workers and peasants over the bourgeoisie.
Against the imperialist slaughter, for peace and the fraternal union of working people of all nations.
Against imperialist rapists, for the armed defense of socialism.
Defending the Soviet Republic with weapons in hand is the sacred duty of every worker and peasant.
He who does not work, neither shall he eat.
Long live the unbreakable union of workers, the rural poor, and the working Cossacks.
Down with the compromisers—traitors of the revolution. Communism—the banner of the world workers’ uprising.
Having defeated the capitalists, we must defeat our own disorganization—only in this lies salvation from hunger and unemployment.
Conscious workers will uphold labor order and revolutionary discipline with an iron hand.
Long live the Russian Communist Party.
It is evident to the naked eye that the May Day slogans of 1918 were primarily slogans of struggle. The subsequent evolution of May Day slogans reflected the ideological evolution occurring within the USSR leadership—see the table on page 6.
On May 1, 1918, the country celebrated the proletarian holiday, which was for the first time a state holiday, a fact that was particularly emphasized. The state status of the holiday was defined in official documents: “On this solemn day of May 1, the government will not act against the people, as in all other countries, but will march together with workers and peasants”; “State power—Soviet power—the power of the working masses, sees May 1 as its holiday.“
And observers could not fail to notice it. Here, for example, are very revealing memoirs by A. V. Lunacharsky, one of the organizers of the celebration in Petrograd, which convey well both the atmosphere and the scale of the holiday:
“May 1, 1918
…The Field of Mars, with its grey tribune in the background, with blocks of granite and clumps of greenery over the graves of the revolution’s victims, with beautiful banners on high poles, filled with people, lines of armored cars and individual automobiles from which representatives of the commune review the demonstration, under a clear spring sky where birds and airplanes circle—presents a majestic spectacle.
Crowds of workers keep coming, exhausted, hungry, but solemnly and courageously disposed. Thousands of banners wave, placards proclaim great words burning in each of our hearts.
There is much troops. Unexpectedly much. And how spirited! How the very rhythm of the soldier’s step has changed, how this entire armed mass has straightened up!.. These are not servants of aims alien to the working masses: these are knights and defenders of the highest ideals of humanity.
This thought I express in my speech to the comrades of the armored cars. A huge crowd gathers to listen and listens with penetrating attention, clearly approving my words.
I drive around to the rallies and concerts.
I share… impressions of our great holiday. It is easy to celebrate, I say, when everything goes well and fate strokes our heads. But the fact that we—hungry Petrograd, semi-besieged, with enemies lurking within it—we, bearing on our shoulders such a burden of unemployment and suffering, celebrate proudly and solemnly—this, in all honesty, is a true merit.
All the words I can find to characterize this ‘celebration at all costs,’ this bitter and majestic triumph of the great proletarian vanguard in its difficult hour—all find the warmest reception from this audience, where I see pale, emaciated women, laundresses, seamstresses, etc., laboring faces sometimes framed by grey beards, many soldiers’ greatcoats…
I go to the opening of Proletcult and speak there about proletarian culture, using our celebration and its experiences as an example…
I drive to the Neva, and here—a real magical fairy tale!..
Already by day, the fleet, decorated with thousands of flags, gave the magnificent Neva such a smart appearance that the heart, constricted by all adversities, could not but beat jubilantly. I think anyone who saw this spectacle—and half of Petrograd saw it—will agree that it was unforgettably beautiful and stirringly joyful.
In the evening, an amazing struggle between light and darkness began. Dozens of searchlights cast columns of light and slid through the air like white swords. Their bright beam fell on palaces, fortresses and ships, bridges, and wrested from the night now one, now another beauty of our enchanting Northern Rome. Rockets soared, multicolored stars fell. Fountains and plumes of smoke in the strange and pale play of rays created an entire poem, an entire symphony of fire and darkness in all the nuances of chiaroscuro and brought the impression to a kind of eerie grandeur.
Salutes thundered from the Peter and Paul Fortress.
Yes, the celebration of May Day was official. The state celebrated it. The might of the state was evident in many ways. But is not the very idea intoxicating that the state, hitherto our worst enemy, is now ours and celebrates May Day as its greatest holiday?..
But believe me, if this celebration had been only official—nothing but coldness and emptiness would have come of it. No, the popular masses, the Red Fleet, the Red Army—all the genuinely working people poured their strength into it. Therefore, we can say: ‘Never before has this holiday of labor been cast in such beautiful forms.’ And yet I saw only a small part of what marked this day in Petrograd.
Oh, we will celebrate it even better in 1919!.. Comrades, brothers, then—we firmly believe—we will already be victorious everywhere…”
In Moscow, the first official May Day was marked by a Red Army parade on Khodynka Field. The review of the country’s combat power and defense capability became a tradition that lasted until 1968. Here is an eyewitness account of the May Day celebration in Moscow in 1918 (K. von Bothmer): “Everywhere where government institutions work and workers of Moscow live, the city is decorated for May Day, which is to be celebrated in a special way… During the day, it is better to stay home if possible, to avoid possible troubles in connection with demonstrations, ‘enthusiasm,’ and the passionate infatuation of the masses with the celebrated idea of world revolution and universal brotherhood. How many Russians celebrate today the victory of socialism with sincere conviction and firm confidence that an era of happiness has arrived?… The day passed peacefully everywhere. During a walk, our eyes were presented with the picture of a ‘red’ city, the walls of the Kremlin half-disappeared under red cloth. Especially on Red Square, where those fallen in the revolutionary battles are buried and where the main festive events took place. The eye has nowhere to escape from the colors of blood.“
In May 1919, communist workers at the Moscow-Sortirovochnaya depot of the Kazan Railway decided “until the complete victory over Kolchak” to work overtime and for free once a week. V. I. Lenin called these subbotniks (voluntary unpaid workdays on Saturdays) a “Great Initiative,” seeing in them a substantial shift in the consciousness of the working people, having worldwide historical significance: “…This is the beginning of a revolution more difficult, more substantial, more radical, more decisive than the overthrow of the bourgeoisie, for it is a victory over our own inertia, laxity, petty-bourgeois egoism, over those habits which accursed capitalism bequeathed to the worker and peasant.
When this victory is complete, then and only then will new social discipline, socialist discipline, be created; then and only then will a return to capitalism become impossible, and communism will become truly invincible.“
In 1920, May Day—at the suggestion of the leader of the world proletariat—expanded into an All-Russian Subbotnik.
Simultaneously, the premiere of a mass spectacle titled “Mystery of Liberated Labor” took place. The number of participants was in the thousands, spectators in the tens of thousands.
The next logical step in forming May Day traditions was the public honoring of the best workers, Heroes of Labor. In 1921, songs were performed in their honor, concerts were organized, and sports performances were held. Initially, the names of outstanding workers were printed in newspapers and leaflets, and then, with the development of radio and television, they themselves were presented to the whole country during May Day broadcasts. Perhaps this May Day tradition can be called the most enduring.
In 1922, at the holiday of proletarian struggle and victory, the custom of administering the military oath to young Red Army soldiers was established. This custom lasted until the beginning of the Second World War. In 1939, the military oath was heard at the May Day celebration for the last time.
Starting in 1923, work collectives across the country marked May Day with production successes.
The May Day slogans of 1926 were significantly industrializing—”Through industrialization to socialism!“, “Let us multiply our strength tenfold for the complete victory of socialism!“, “We will strengthen our military might!” The 14th Congress of the All-Union Communist Party (Bolsheviks) in December 1925 resolved to transform the USSR “from a country importing machinery and equipment into a country producing machinery and equipment, so that the USSR, in an environment of capitalist encirclement, by no means could become an economic appendage of the capitalist world economy,” and the Soviet workers enthusiastically set about implementing the Party’s decisions.
In 1928, the Days of the International became two—May 1 and 2. On the second day, folk festivities and outings into nature were typically held.
Workers warmly responded to the adoption of the first five-year plan in 1929. A new way to mark May Day became the socialist competition proposed by the Leningrad plant “Red Vyborzhets,” which later spread to all enterprises in the country. Already on May 9, a decree of the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party (b) “On the Socialist Competition of Factories and Plants” was issued. Trade union, economic, and Komsomol organizations were instructed to deploy mass work to bring plan targets down to the shop, workshop, unit, and machine level so that a shock brigade, based on the industrial and financial plan tasks, could undertake a specific commitment to improve a specific parameter within an agreed timeframe.
The scale of nationwide socialist competition became clearly visible in 1930. Each May Day column carried placards and stands with the most important indicators of achievements in the socialist sector of the economy. And to the May Day slogans of the first five-year plan (“The five-year plan in four years!“, “Five in three!” etc.) were added slogans of the collectivization that began at the end of the previous year.
Moscow theaters, as part of socialist competition, brought two carnivals out onto the streets, supporting the combat-ready Red Army’s review of the revolutionary forces of the world proletariat.
Also in 1930, a characteristic feature of the celebration was the holding of physical culture parades.
The air parade—another important component of the May Day holiday. It appeared in 1933.
The approach of war could not but influence the nature of May Day events. Communists and anti-fascists were demonstrating all across Europe, and the Soviet Union was rapidly building up its military muscle before the inevitable clash with fascism.
Soviet workers in the pre-war years took to their holiday with calls to increase output in heavy and medium machine building, to develop the eastern regions of the country, to strengthen military-patriotic work, etc.
During the Great Patriotic War, May Day changed again. May Day parades, demonstrations, and mass festivities ceased for a time. May 1 and 2 were declared working days, but the spirit of the proletarian holiday did not disappear. On the contrary—workers in many industries on the eve of the solemn day undertook commitments to achieve record labor indicators. Production targets were often overfulfilled by 3–4 times or more.
Here is how Perm workers met May 1, 1942: “…The year was not an easy one. We rested rarely because the front demanded shells, airplanes, guns. And so on this day, our brigade worked from one in the morning until morning. At 8 a.m., when the night shift ended, foreman Dolgintsev came. Two more batches of parts were needed. And we stayed to work… We only had lunch at one in the afternoon. Work that normally required two shifts, we did in 4 hours…“
And on the initiative of enterprises in Kuibyshev, socialist competition for the creation of the Main Command Fund began on May 1, 1943. The funds of this fund were intended for preparing decisive blows by the Red Army against the German-fascist invaders. Soviet people spared nothing for Victory: “…during the war years, over 17 billion rubles in cash were contributed to the defense fund and the fund of the Red Army High Command by the population (for comparison: a worker’s salary then ranged from 500 to 1000 rubles), 13 kg of platinum, 131 kg of gold, 9,519 kg of silver, 4.5 billion rubles in state loan bonds. That is, over 118 billion rubles in total… This amount equaled the average annual expenditures on the needs of the entire Red Army. With this money, 2,500 aircraft, over 30,000 tanks and self-propelled artillery units, submarines, armored trains, and much other military equipment were built.“
Home front workers, inspired by the victory at Stalingrad, undertook new, increased commitments for the production of defense goods.
During the war, Soviet people held solemn meetings, rallies, and “flash meetings” at enterprises on the eve of May 1. The main May Day slogan was: “Everything for the front, everything for victory!“
A gift for May Day 1945 was the Victory Banner raised over the Reichstag on the last day of April. “All of us wanted to finish off the Berlin grouping by May 1,” wrote G. K. Zhukov in his memoirs.
After the war ended, May Day parades and demonstrations began again. The task of rapidly restoring the destroyed country, as well as strengthening the defense capability of the Soviet Union, was solved at an accelerated pace. Workers again greeted May 1 by overfulfilling plans, again intending to complete the five-year plan in four, or even three years. As “Zvezda” wrote in 1948, “The Soviet people, led by the Party of Lenin…, on May 1 not only conduct a review but also mobilize all their forces for solving new majestic tasks.“
The postwar mobilization sufficed for much. The country was restored from ruins. Military power was unprecedented. And already by the late 1940s, the USA ceased to be the sole possessor of atomic weapons. Along with this, the heat of the communist idea steadily declined.
In 1952, May Day in the “Calls of the CPSU” was designated for the first time as “the day of international solidarity of working people, the day of brotherhood of workers of all countries.” And just a year earlier, it was “the day of the review of the fighting forces of the working people of the World.” Feel the difference, as they say. Incidentally, it was by 1952 that the USSR had acquired means of delivering atomic charges capable of reaching the USA. What forced the change in official rhetoric—fatigue? The peacefulness of the strong? Shortsightedness?
Subsequently, the slow cooling of the Red Flame became increasingly evident. There were no innovations in the celebration of May Day, except for television broadcasts (since 1956), and the traditional forms of the holiday were gradually being lost. Thus, 1968 became the year of the last May Day military parade. And already in 1970, May Day received another official name—”The Day of International Solidarity of Working People.“
The creative fervor of the early Soviet period melted away. Words about the solidarity of working people, the struggle against imperialism for peace, democracy sounded more artificial year after year. New ballistic missiles went on combat duty, new tanks were sent to the troops to replace aging ones, and Marxism-Leninism, this “mighty ideological weapon of the working people,” remained exactly the same. The slogan, since 1966, glorifying Marxism-Leninism as an “eternally living, all-conquering revolutionary doctrine,” in an almost unchanged form held the third position in the “calls” until the beginning of the eighties.
What happens to a tank if it is kept outside for decades without proper maintenance? What becomes of its turret, tracks, shells? Will it start up during a combat alarm without falling apart? Something very similar happened to Lenin’s teaching.
The “European turn” of the ruling elite that finally took shape in the early 1980s was also reflected in official speeches. The main May Day demonstration of the country in 1983 promised to curb the arms race, eliminate the threat of war, uphold and deepen détente. And even declared directly: “For Europe—peace, security, and cooperation!“
The words of the last General Secretary about the need to restructure, spoken in May 1985, by May 1986 appeared in the festive rhetoric of officials. In the year of implementing the decisions of the 27th Congress of the CPSU, which declared a course for accelerating social progress, everyone was supposed to restructure the style and methods of their work, restructure their psychology.
And perestroika happened.
The content of May Day changed diametrically within a few years. If in former times participants of the holiday demonstrated their labor achievements and gave solemn promises, then in 1989 they were already discussing the political problems of the USSR, expressing dissatisfaction with the actions of the party apparatus, hoping for better with the onset of a market economy.
It is noteworthy that in the list of May Day calls for 1989 there was this one: “Long live and develop Marxist-Leninist teaching—the ideological basis for the revolutionary renewal of socialism!” It seems someone among the compilers possessed a peculiar sense of humor.
In 1990, the official celebration of the Day of International Solidarity of Working People took place for the last time. In fact, what happened on the main square of the country could hardly be called a celebration. Participants of the demonstration, or rather, a rally organized by trade unions, demanded salaries, price controls, clean air, etc. The rally took place at the tribune of the Mausoleum, from which trade union leaders and ordinary workers spoke. After adopting a resolution supporting reforms and demanding an exit from the economic crisis, the procession moved on.
A little later, an alternative procession with a rally took place, organized by the “Moscow Voters Association” with the support of the new Moscow Soviet. It was originally planned to be held at the Moscow Soviet building, but the Council of Ministers offered Red Square—allegedly striving not to divide but to unite various social currents. This demonstration gathered many informal associations with characteristic slogans—”For your and our freedom,” “Party, leave gracefully,” “Freedom for Lithuania,” etc. The result of an obvious provocation was logical—the country’s leadership left the tribune of the Mausoleum, and there were no more May Day demonstrations in the USSR.
And a year later, the state itself was gone.
Source: Rossa Primavera News Agency
