This Labor Day, I am thinking about the thousands and thousands of men, women and children who were forced to work twelve to sixteen hour days, usually in the intense heat and humidity of brutal Southern summers, without any wages or any say in the work they were doing, and without the ability to choose their line of work or employer. I am talking, of course, about the long-lived institution of American slavery.

On Labor Day, we like to “celebrate the American worker” – ironic because most American workers these days are feeling behind the wheel. But in addition to labor unions, tradespeople, assembly line workers and more, let’s remember our history. Not just the fight for the 8-hour day, or equal pay for equal work. But let’s recall all those who labored under force and duress, who were kidnapped and brought to this country for the very reason that they would be forced to labor without being paid, that their enslavers might grow rich and profit from not just the crops they raised and the goods they produced, but from the very fact that these people from Africa were bought and sold as chattel.

Let us not forget that in the midst of this brutal system, the enslaved found ways to resist and exert agency. Whether by breaking tools, working slowly, feigning ignorance, or other methods of exerting power against their enslavers, the enslaved repeatedly insisted on exerting their humanity and will. They refused to have their spirits broken, though their bodies usually paid the price.

This Labor Day, let’s remember all laborers who have come before us. Not just the rallies, parades, and union drives, or the bitter strikes, like at Haymarket or Pullman, but also, in the more distant past, those who labored in the fields.