"Finance capital, concentrated in a few hands and exercising a virtual monopoly, exacts enormous and ever-increasing profits from the floating of companies, issue of stock, state loans, etc., strengthens the domination of the financial oligarchy and levies tribute upon the whole of society for the benefit of monopolists." - Imperialism, the Highest Stage of Capitalism by V.I Lenin.
A related video giving a more focused breakdown: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KO3-xkVACgE
I thought I'd share my reading list to kick-start a recommended reading list for this sub. I hope this will be helpful not just for baby leftists who don't know exactly where to start but also the old guard might find some utility from it. Most of the socialist theory by Marx, Engels, Lenin etc. is available for free on the internet. The rest I'm sure you can find elsewhere ☠️
Please feel free to comment any of your recommendations.
Level 1: Foundations & Core Concepts
Level 2: The Mechanics of Revolution & State Theory
Level 3: Advanced Strategy, Organization & Party Building
Level 4: Imperialism, Geopolitics & Historical Analysis
Level 5: Culture & Future Horizons
In 1889, the Second International declared May 1 as International Workers' Day to honor the Haymarket martyrs. It became a global holiday, except in the United States, where it is actively ignored. Why? In 1958, President Eisenhower officially declared May 1 as "Law Day" in the U.S. - a direct counter-programming effort to erase the labor origins of the date.
On May 1, 1886: 40,000 workers in Chicago went on strike demanding an eight-hour workday. The movement was massive and growing.
Three days later, on May 4, a protest rally near the Haymarket was drawing to a peaceful close when police arrived and demanded dispersal. Someone threw a bomb. Police opened fire. Chaos ensued.
What followed was not justice, but a textbook case of suppressed history.
Eight anarchist labor organizers were rounded up, though police never identified the bomb thrower. The jury was handpicked by a bailiff who publicly declared: "These fellows are going to be hanged as certain as death".
The judge, Joseph E. Gary, was openly biased. The prosecutors put not the bombing on trial, but anarchy itself. Attorney Grinnell told the jury: "Law is on trial. Anarchy is on trial. Convict these men, make examples of them, hang them and you save our institutions, our society".
On November 11, 1887, four men were hanged: Albert Parsons, August Spies, George Engel, and Adolph Fischer. A fifth, Louis Lingg, committed suicide in his cell the night before.
Before his execution, Spies spoke words that define suppressed history itself:
>"If you think that by hanging us you can stamp out the labor movement — the movement from which the downtrodden millions, the millions who toil and live in want and misery - the wage slaves - expect salvation - if this is your opinion, then hang us! Here you will tread upon a spark, but there, and there, and behind you and in front of you, and everywhere, flames will blaze up. It is a subterranean fire. You cannot put it out"
This is not obscure history. It is suppressed history. And it happened in America.
The executions turned the activists into "Martyrs." In 1889, the International Socialist Congress (Second International) declared May 1 as International Workers' Day to honor them and demand the 8-hour day .
Global annual protests built momentum. In the US, the fight took decades, but the groundwork led to:
In short: Haymarket didn't hand workers a law; it gave them dead martyrs. Their sacrifice catalyzed global protests (May Day) that eventually forced governments to legislate the 8-hour workday
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Altgeld, John P. Reasons for pardoning Fielden, Neebe & Schwab: the Haymarket anarchists. Chicago, Ill.: Published for the Illinois Labor History Society by the C.H. Kerr Pub. Co., 1893.
Chicago Historical Society. The Haymarket Affair Digital Collection. Chicago, Ill. Available at: https://resources.ials.sas.ac.uk/index.php/eagle-i/haymarket-affair-digital-collection
Chicago Historical Society. Chicago anarchists on trial [electronic resource]. Library of Congress, National Digital Library Program, 2001.
Eisenhower, Dwight D. "Proclamation 3221—Law Day, 1958." February 3, 1958. The American Presidency Project. Available at: https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/node/307595
Smithsonian Institution. "Haymarket Martyrs' Monument, (sculpture)." Smithsonian American Art Museum, Art Inventories Catalog. Available at: https://siris-artinventories.si.edu/ipac20/ipac.jsp?&profile=ariall&source=~!siartinventories&uri=full=3100001~!177964~!0
Spies, August. Gallows speech. Quoted on the Haymarket Martyrs' Monument, Waldheim Cemetery, Forest Park, Illinois. Erected 1893.