[Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents Volume 31, Number 20 (Monday, May 22, 1995)]
[Pages 846-847]
[Online from the Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]

<R04>
Proclamation 6801--Labor History Month, 1995

May 17, 1995

By the President of the United States

of America

A Proclamation

    Among the most insistent themes in the history of American democracy 
has been the determination of our workers to find dignity in their work 
and meaning in their citizenship. The labor movement has long given 
voice to these aspirations. American trade unionists have fought for and 
achieved benefits for all of us by strengthening citizens' roles in the 
workplace and by expanding their participation in the political lives of 
their communities.
    Gone is the time when the average American worker made about ten 
dollars for a 60-hour week, and more than 2 million children worked 
similarly long hours for even less pay. The national labor movement has 
helped ensure safe working conditions, regular hours, decent living 
wages, and paid holidays and vacations. And in 1993 we moved a step 
further, affording hard-working Americans the right to emergency family 
leave.
    Workers have been leaders in the efforts to establish the 8-hour 
day, the 40-hour week, security in unemployment and old age, protection 
for the sick and injured and for children, equal employment opportunity, 
and health and safety standards. And the labor movement has strived to 
make public education available for every child. American workers have 
helped to make this progress possible, and our country is immeasurably 
stronger because of it.
    As we observe Labor History Month this year, we understand that our 
work is not yet finished. Today's global marketplace demands that we 
establish and strengthen partnerships between employers and unions, co- 

[[Page 847]]

operate to achieve safe, high-performance work environments, improve the 
skills of American workers and the competitiveness of American 
businesses, and further enhance human dignity in the workplace. The 
challenges we face are many, but the history of our accomplishments 
assures us that the future looks bright indeed.
    Now, Therefore, I, William J. Clinton, President of the United 
States of America, by virtue of the authority vested in me by the 
Constitution and laws of the United States, do hereby proclaim May 1995, 
as ``Labor History Month.'' I call upon the people of the United States 
to observe this period with appropriate programs, ceremonies, and 
activities.
    In Witness Whereof, I have hereunto set my hand this seventeenth day 
of May, in the year of our Lord nineteen hundred and ninety-five, and of 
the Independence of the United States of America the two hundred and 
nineteenth.
                                            William J. Clinton

[Filed with the Office of the Federal Register, 4:33 p.m., May 17, 1995]

Note: This proclamation was published in the Federal Register on May 19.