Musings on National Women’s Day

Before going international, National Women’s Day was celebrated in the United States on August 9 in the years 1908 and 1910, mainly focusing around activities in and around Chicago and New York City. August 9 was selected in recognition of a strike that year by the New York City garment workers protesting their working conditions, pay and work hours. 

As originally defined by its organizers, National Women’s Day was intended to give all Americans an opportunity to recognize and celebrate the many achievements of women within our society, to honor women’s strength and resilience in the face of many social challenges and to highlight women’s positive contributions to American family life and to other social and global communities.

Strong Roots

If National Women’s Day was initiated here by practical citizens for practical reasons, it also had some strong German roots particularly in the work of Clara Zetkin (1857-1933), a well-known feminist, activist and member of the German Social Democratic Party which had become prominent during the time of the Weimar Republic (1920-1933). 

It was Zetkin who had suggested to some of her American associates the idea of a National Women’s Day in the United States.

Zetkin herself was a hard-nosed, determined working-class woman who saw quickly that what women really needed was gender equality. 

She definitely wanted her work to benefit primarily working-class and lower middle-class women and to bring about concrete social change. Clara Zetkin, and an associate Luise Zietz, by 1910 had already determined on a policy to include equal rights for women, including the right to vote, in all the platforms they developed and/or supported.

A Shift of Focus

With the outbreak of World War I in 1914, the world’s focus turned sharply to international affairs. World War I was followed by World War II (1939-1945), the great depression of the 1930s, and the founding of the United Nations in 1945. By 1945, national leaders recognized the existence of a “women’s issue” in many corners of American life and began to consider steps to foster change.  

In 1978 the United Nation’s General Assembly adopted a resolution proclaiming a United Nation’s Day for Women’s Rights and International Peace. That document incorporated many of the hopes and commitments of the earlier National Women’s Day platforms.    

Henceforth the United States focused on International Women’s Day which is observed on March 8 as its principal mechanism for calling attention to women and their changing needs. However the United States has never moved to declare March 8 or any other date as a national holiday as some other countries have done.

Still Recognized

August 9 is still recognized as National Women’s Day in some counties of the world, particularly in South Africa. South Africa has had a long and difficult history and women there have had to fight hard for female freedoms. This was particularly true during the period of apartheid (mainly in the 1950s and 1960s) when discrimination particularly against black women was very intense.

Finally to some extent human beings often judge one another by his or her friends or associates. To some extent, this has been true in evaluating the women’s movement. 

Some of its earliest advocates, such as Clara Zetkin, were very active in a movement that eventually transformed Germany into a socialist state. This label drew many to the cause, but it also repelled many.

In the literature of the present day, one still detects charges of leftist thinking in explaining the women’s causes.