Loyalty Day (Argentina)
One of the most famous photos of the October 17 event.
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| Date | October 17, 1945 |
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| Location | Plaza de Mayo, Buenos Aires |
| Participants | Peronists |
| Outcome | Juan Perón was released from prison |
Loyalty Day (Spanish: Día de la lealtad) is a commemoration day in Argentina. It remembers October 17, 1945, when a massive labour demonstration at Plaza de Mayo demanded the liberation of Juan Domingo Perón, who was jailed in Martín García island. It is considered the foundation day of Peronism.
On June 4, 1943, nationalist military led by General Arturo Rawson removed through a coup President Ramón Castillo, the last president of the Infamous Decade, a line of corrupt governments that had imposed the so-called patriotic fraud since the military coup of 1930.
The labor movement was against the coup, initially perplexed and undecided about the position should be adopted. It was divided into the four main groups (CGT N º 1, CGT No. 2, USA and FORA). One of the first actions was to dissolve the government CGT No. 2 (led by the socialist Francisco Pérez Leirós), the Employees' Union of trade unions of Borlenghi and the communist-led unions (construction workers, meatpackers, etc.). It led to a number of unions that formed it to return to the CGT N º 1 (general secretary José Domenech). Shortly after the government passed a law on trade unions, who met some expectations but union, while allowing them to intervene by the State. Then the military government applied this law to the powerful rail unions involved and the heart of the CGT, the Union Railway and the Brotherhood. In October a series of strikes were answered with the arrest of dozens of labor leaders. It soon became apparent that the military government was composed of influential anti-union sectors.
Under these conditions some union socialists, trade unionists and some communist revolutionaries led by Ángel Borlenghi (a socialist and secretary general of the powerful General Confederation of Employees of Commerce in the dissolved socialist CGT No. 2), Francisco Pablo Capozzi (PFI), Juan Bramuglia (Railway Union), among others, agreed, albeit with reservations and distrust, to undertake a series of alliances with certain sectors of the military government which shared the union demands. Among young military colonels were Juan D. Perón and Domingo Mercante.
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Wikipedia