This week in history

May 4

1919: Despite losing one of their ranks to police gunfire, wharfies expel scabs in Fremantle on Bloody Sunday.

May 5

1818: Karl Marx is born.

1981: IRA hunger striker Bobby Sands dies in jail.

1993: 70,000 people march in Melbourne against Victorian

Premier Jeff Kennett's budget cuts and attacks on workers.

May 6

1999: Tommy Sheridan becomes the first Scottish Socialist Party member to be elected to the Scottish Parliament.

May 7

1968: Workers' and students' revolt begins in Paris.

May 8

1890: The Shearers' Union wins a closed shop at Jondaryan station in Queensland after 8 weeks of strike action.

1970: More than 200,000 people participate in Vietnam Moratorium demonstrations across Australia.

May 9

1960: The US Food and Drug Agency approves the sale of the birth control pill.

May 10

2004: 8000 people rally at Melbourne's county court in defence of militant union leader Craig Johnston.

From Green Left Weekly, May 4, 2005.

Visit the Green Left Weekly home page.

From GLW issue 625