https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Labour_Day_(Canada)
History
Labour Day has been marked as a statutory public holiday in Canada on the first Monday in September since 1894. However, the origins of Labour Day in Canada can be traced back to numerous local demonstrations and celebrations in earlier decades.[2] Such events assumed political significance in 1872, when an April labour demonstration in Toronto, in support of striking printers, led directly to the enactment of the Trade Unions Act, a law that confirmed the legality of unions.[3]
A Labour Day parade in Toronto, Ontario, Canada in the early 1900s
Ten years later, on July 22, 1882, a huge labour celebration in Toronto attracted the attention of the American labour leader Peter J. McGuire, who organized a similar parade in New York City on September 5 that year. Unions associated with the Knights of Labor and the American Federation of Labor in both Canada and the United States subsequently promoted parades and festivals on the first Monday in September. In Canada during these years, local celebrations took place in Hamilton, Oshawa, St. Catharines, Ottawa, and London in Ontario, as well as Montreal, Quebec; Halifax, Nova Scotia; Vancouver, BC. Montreal declared a civic holiday in 1889. In Nova Scotia, coal miners had been holding picnics and parades since 1880 to celebrate the anniversary of their union, the Provincial Workmen’s Association, first organized in 1879.[3]
In 1889, the Royal Commission on the Relations of Labor and Capital in Canada recommended recognition of an official “labour day” by the federal government. In March and April 1894, unions lobbied Parliament to recognize Labour Day as a public holiday. Legislation was introduced in May by Prime Minister John Sparrow David Thompson and received royal assent in July 1894.[3]