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CELEBRATING LABOR IN THE BIG APPLE
MLK’s legacy: Support of
labor union movement
COURTESY OF LOCAL 32BJ SEIU’S ALL LABOR HAS DIGNITY’ RALLY.
BY: NELSON KING
As American celebrated
the birthday
of slain civil rights
leader, the Rev. Dr. Martin
Luther King, Jr., it
is important to examine
King’s role in the labor
union movement.
While researching at
the Martin Luther King
Center in Atlanta, Ga in
1992, Michael Honey, a
Washington University
professor, found what the
Atlantic describes as “an
inconspicuous folder”
labeled “King’s Labor
Speeches.”
The publication said
Honey opened the folder
and found “a trove of
King’s addresses to labor
unions and workers’
rights coalitions, most
of which had never been
published.”
Honey subsequently
edited, and released by
Beacon Press, “All Labor
Has Dignity”: King’s
Speeches on Labor.
“The book shows an
eerily prescient Dr. King,
a clear-eyed visionary,
who speaks prophetically
about the host of issues
facing our nation today,”
said the Atlantic in
an article, written by Joe
Fassler, on Feb. 22, 2011.
“In the eloquent,
mythic language for
which he is famous, King
lambastes economic
forces growing the gap between
rich and poor, the
massive tax resources
used for war spending
while domestic programs
languished, and the kneejerk
demonizing of progressive
social reform
as ‘communist,’” said
Fassler, editor of “Light
the Dark: Writers on Creativity,
Inspiration and
the Artistic Process.”
Fassler, who also interviews
writers for The Atlantic’s
“By Heart” series,
said King even criticized
conservative senators,
calling them “Neanderthals,”
who “abused their
filibuster privilege to
block meaningful legislative
change.”
“The collection demonstrates
that historical considerations
of Dr. King’s
contributions have overlooked
his dogged dedication
to the organized labor
movement and his fight
on behalf of the working
poor across racial divides,”
said Fassler, who
spoke with Honey about
King’s work for workers’
rights, the historical context
of the speeches and
the relevance of King’s
conclusions to ongoing
21st-century American labor
disputes.
Honey said the book
contains 15 different
documents, from 1957 to
1968, which “present a
somewhat different side
of King that most people
don’t know about.
“Almost all of these
speeches are unknown
to the general public,”
he said. “Until recently,
King’s economic justice
platform and his relationship
with workers and
unions has been an almost
entirely neglected topic.”
Honey said the civil
rights movement was not
just about civil rights – it
was about human rights,
adding “that means labor
rights.”
He said the book is “really
about a period when
King was trying to use
the momentum of the civil
rights movement to help
the labor movement, the
cause of public employee
workers and people in the
service economy.
“And those are the areas
where unions have
grown tremendously in
the last 20 or 30 years – in
part because of Dr. King’s
sacrifice in Memphis
(TN),” he said.
Honey told Fassler
that Dr. King made these
speeches to the strong
unions, at that time, so
they could “donate money
to the civil rights movement,
which was an
emerging movement.”
He said King made an
interesting plea: “You
have a lot more power
than we do, but we have
the moral agenda and the
attention of the nation
that you’re losing.
“King wanted to convince
the unions that the
civil rights movement was
not only important on its
own but that its success
was crucial to the labor
movement’s success, too,”
Honey said.
In a 1968 speech, he
noted that King asked:
“What does it profit a man
to be able to eat at an integrated
lunch counter if
he doesn’t earn enough
money to buy a hamburger
and a cup of coffee?”
“He did say that the civil
rights that we’d attained
from Brown v. Board of
Education to the Civil
Rights and Voting Rights
Acts were a remarkable
change,” Honey said. “But,
after that, he really did emphasize
economic issues.”
The Washington University
professor said urban
areas were, at the
time, exploding all across
the country, with riots,
police brutality and National
Guard occupation
of black communities.
“The fact was, in the
urban areas, civil rights
didn’t do anything to
change the economic situation
for the mass of working
class people,” he said.
“Those were people
that should have had
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