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Jeffrey B. Perry Blog

“Hubert Harrison: The Struggle for Equality, 1918-1927” (Columbia University Press) by Jeffrey B. Perry is Now Being Shipped!

"Hubert Harrison: The Struggle for Equality, 1918-1927" (Columbia University Press) by Jeffrey B. Perry is now (in November 2020) being shipped by the Ingram Book Publishing Company.

 

Copies of the book can be ordered at 20% discount from Columbia University Press by using code "CUP20". Order it HERE

 

To order volume 1 – "Hubert Harrison: The Voice of Harlem Radicalism, 1883-1927" at 20% discount using code "CUP20" click HERE

 

For information on Hubert Harrison see HERE

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Special Discounts on "Hubert Harrison: The Struggle for Equality, 1918-1927"

Special 38% off sale on "Hubert Harrison: The Struggle for Equality, 1918-1927" for $24.99 from Barnes and Noble for Nook Book (E Book) available for pre-order (available on 12/22/20) See HERE

 

 

This volume is also available at 22% off from Google Play at $31.99 for Web, Tablet, Phone, and eReader (publication listed as 12/22/20). See HERE

 

It is also available (on December 8) in hardcover, paperback, and E-book at 20% off from Columbia University Press (use coupon code "CUP20") See HERE

 

You will not be billed until book is released to you.

 

Please share this information. Great gift idea for family and friends.

 

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"Hubert Harrison: The Struggle for Equality, 1918-1927" Initial Blurbs from Brent Hayes Edwards, Herb Boyd, Charisse Burden-Stelly, Brian Jones, and Wilson J. Moses

The first blurbs for the forthcoming "Hubert Harrison: The Struggle for Equality, 1918-1927" (volume 2 of the Hubert Harrison biography) can be found HERE
Among the early blurb offerings are those from Brent Hayes Edwards, Herb Boyd, Charisse Burden-Stelly, Brian Jones, and Wilson J. Moses.

Each of the two volumes of the biography can be obtained from Columbia University Press at 20% off by using Code "CUP20" (you will not be charged for the second volume until it is shipped) — see
"Hubert Harrison: The Struggle for Equality, 1918-1927" HERE and see
"Hubert Harrison: The Voice of Harlem Radicalism, 1883-1918" HERE

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Ray Richardson Speaking in 1969 after one year of "Say Brother"

This striking 1969 video presentation is of Ray Richardson, grandson of Hubert Harrison and producer of "Say Brother" for Public Station WGBH TV (Boston) in 1968-1969.

 

On August 25, 2020 (August 27 in the print edition), the "New York Times" ran an article entitled "'Soul!' Brought Black Culture to TV in 1968. A New Doc Tells Its Story" that discusses the New York City public education tv show "Soul" that began on September 12, 1968 (after the April 4, 1968 assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr.). [The article is entitled "Black Culture Front and Center Back in the Day" in the print edition.]

 

Earlier that year (on July 18, 1968) Boston Public Television station WGBH began airing "Say Brother" an extraordinary hour-long show that, would air prime time (and be repeated later on the weekend). It was directed by Ray Richardson and directed by Stan Lathan. Richardson was the grandson of Hubert Harrison and he and Vashti Lowns would die under suspicious conditions in 1971 after the show was taken off the air and Richardson was fired in July 1970 in the wake of the show's coverage of New Bedford, Massachusetts protests.

 

For background on Ray Richardson and "Say Brother" see "The Radicalization of Ray Richardson: Suspicion Still Surround Death of Black Activist TV Producer," which was co-authored in 2013 by Charles Richardson (Harrison's grandson and Ray Richardson's brother) click HERE

 

Unfortunately, the links cited in the above article were moved. Two video clips from "Say Brother" are available Here

and HERE

 

To see "'Soul!' Brought Black Culture to TV in 1968. A New Doc Tells Its Story" online see HERE

 

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"Class Based Preference" is No Answer to Racial Discrimination by Theodore W. Allen

Theodore W. Allen, "'Class Based Preference' is No Answer to Racial Discrimination," Theodore W. Allen, Letter to The Nation, March 5, 2001 re Richard D. Kahlenberg and Ruy Teixeira "A Better Third Way"

 

 

 

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Let Us Not Forget! – Forty-two years ago, at midnight on July 20/21, 1978, nationl postal contracts expired

In the early morning hours of July 21 at the 1.8 million square foot New York Bulk & Foreign Mail Center in Jersey City, NJ the largest postal facility in the world at that time, an informational picket line went up.

 

Postal workers carried signs of "No Contract, No Work," a slogan endorsed by the three major postal unions (the American Postal Workers Union, the National Association of Letter Carriers, and the National Post Office Mail Handlers [division of LIUNA]) and a slogan that was the official position of their joint Labor Negotiating Committee. Conditions were oppressive, particularly at the Bulk, and pressing worker issues involved safety, wages, mandatory overtime, COLA, racial and gender discrimination, and the right to strike.

 

With conditions as bad as they were, and in the political climate that had been created around the contract, it didn't take much to close the 4,000-worker Bulk Mail facility by the time workers started arriving for the 6 a.m. day shift. Ninety percent of the day shift workers did not report to work and the temperatures that day (like today) went into the 90s. Afternoon and evening shifts also stayed out.

 

The wildcat strike grew and spread quickly to the San Francisco Bulk Mail Center (in Richmond, CA). There were also walkouts at the Kearny, NJ Mail Processing Center

the Washington, D.C. BMC, and in Philadelphia; and sporadic protests in Chicago, Allentown, Pennsylvania, Miami, and Los Angeles.

 

The wildcat strike was broken after five days. Postal management fired 125 workers, suspended 130, and issued letters of warning to 2,500. Among those striking postal workers were a number of valiant working class fighters who are no longer with us including Dave Cline, Clarence Fitch, Al Mancuso, Grady Fitzgerald, and Drake Waller (who is on the right in the photo). Worker consciousness was raised in the struggle, proposed contracts were rejected by union members, and an arbitrated settlement was ultimately imposed that retained the uncapped COLA that workers demanded and weakened no layoff protections as management wanted.

 

The 1978 wildcat strike was the largest federal employees strike since the 1970 walkout by 173,000 postal workers and it would not be surpassed until the August 1981 strike of 11,500 members of the Professional Air Traffic Controllers Organization (PATCO).

 

The postal wildcat strikers of 1978 were fired under the administration of Democrat Jimmy Carter. The PATCO workers were fired under the administration of Republican Ronald Reagan.

 

The full stories of the 1978 postal wildcat and related struggles are still to be told. People interested in more on the 1978 strike may want to look at:

The video "Signed Sealed and Delivered: Labor Struggle in the Post Office" (1980) by Tami Gold. Dan Gordon, and Erik Lewis

 

The book "There's Always Work at the Post Office: African American Postal Workers and the Fight for Jobs, Justice, and Equality" (University of North Carolina Press, 2010)

 

For a brief discussion of some of the work subsequently done by Mail Handlers from the Jersey City Bulk Mail Center at the branch, local, and national levels see "The Centrality of the Struggle Against White Supremacy -- THE MAIL HANDLERS UNION AND THE FIGHT AGAINST RACISM" at the Labor Notes Conference, Sunday May 21, 1989, Detroit, Michigan

 

Jeffrey B. Perry

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“The Developing Conjuncture and Some Insights from Hubert Harrison and Theodore W. Allen on the Centrality of the Fight Against White Supremacy”

"The Developing Conjuncture and Some Insights
from Hubert Harrison and Theodore W. Allen
on the Centrality of the Fight Against White Supremacy" ("Cultural Logic," July 2010)

Table of Contents
Epigraph
Introduction
Hubert Harrison
Theodore W. Allen
Harrison and Allen and the Centrality of the Struggle Against White-Supremacy
Some Class and Racial Aspects of The Conjuncture
Deepening Economic Crisis
U.S. Workers Faring Badly
White Supremacist Shaping
Wisconsin
Millions are Suffering and Conditions are Worsening
Insights from Hubert Harrison
Arrival in America, Contrast with St. Croix
Socialist Party Writings
"Southernism or Socialism – which?"
The Socialist Party Puts [the "White"] Race First and Class After
Class Consciousness, White Supremacy, and the "Duty to Champion the Cause of the Negro"
On "The Touchstone" and the Two-Fold Character of Democracy in America
Concentrated Race-Conscious Work in the Black Community
Capitalist Imperialism and the Need to Break Down Exclusion Walls of White Workers
The International Colored Unity League
Struggle Against White Supremacy is Central
Insights from Theodore W. Allen
Early Research and Writings and Pioneering Use of "White Skin Privilege" Concept
White Blindspot
Why No Socialism? . . . and The Main Retardant to Working Class Consciousness
The Role of White Supremacy in Three Previous Crises
The Great Depression . . . and the White Supremacist Response
Response to Four Arguments Against and Five "Artful Dodges"
Early 1970s Writings and Strategy
"The Invention of the White Race"
Other Important Contributions in Writings on the Colonial Period
Inventing the "White Race" and Fixing "a perpetual Brand upon Free Negros"
Political Economic Aspects of the Invention of the "White Race"
Racial Oppression and National Oppression
"Racial Slavery" and "Slavery"
Male Supremacy, Gender Oppression, and Laws Affecting the Family
Slavery as Capitalism, Slaveholders as Capitalists, Enslaved as Proletarians
Class-Conscious, Anti-White Supremacist Counter Narrative – Comments on Jordan and Morgan
Not Simply a Social Construct, But a Ruling Class Social Control Formation . . . and Comments on Roediger
The "White Race" and "White Race" Privilege
On the Bifurcation of "Labor History" and "Black History" and on the "National Question"
Later Writings . . . "Toward a Revolution in Labor History"
Strategy
The Struggle Ahead
Addendum [re "Daedalus"]

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“Hubert Harrison: The Struggle for Equality, 1918-1927” by Jeffrey B. Perry -- Save 20% with Columbia University Press Coupon Code “CUP20”

Save 20% with Columbia University Press Coupon Code "CUP20" Please share widely! Contact friends. Order now. Request that your school and public libraries obtain copies – "Hubert Harrison: The Struggle for Equality, 1918-1927" (Columbia University Press) by Jeffrey B. Perry from https://cup.columbia.edu/book/hubert-harrison/9780231182638 This is volume 2 of the Harrison biography. It is believed to be the first full-life, multi-volume biography of an Afro-Caribbean and only the fourth of an African American after those of Booker T. Washington, W.E.B Du Bois, and Langston Hughes!
See also p. 69 of the Fall Catalog for Columbia University Press at https://www.cupblog.org/2020/05/12/announcing-the-columbia-university-press-fall-2020-catalog/
This second volume traces the final decade of Harrison's life, from 1918 to 1927. It details Harrison's literary and political activities and his efforts against white supremacy and for racial consciousness and unity in struggles for equality and radical social change. The book explores Harrison's role in the militant New Negro Movement and the International Colored Unity League, as well as his prolific work as a writer, educator, and editor of the "New Negro" and the "Negro World."
It also discusses Harrison's interactions with major figures such as Garvey, Randolph, Du Bois, William Monroe Trotter, J. A. Rogers, Arthur Schomburg, Chandler Owen, D. Hamilton Jackson, Eugene O'Neill, Amy Ashwood Garvey, Augusta Savage, Richard B. Moore, and other prominent individuals and organizations as he agitated, educated, orated, and organized for democracy, equality, and social change from a race-conscious, radical internationalist perspective.
This biography demonstrates how Harrison's life and work continue to offer profound insights on race, class, religion, immigration, war, democracy, and social change in America. It should be of interest to those interested in Black History, Caribbean History, Virgin Islands History, Africana Studies, Pan Africanism, U.S. History, Radical History, journalism, internationalism, book and theater reviews, poetry, Harlem history, and biography.

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“Notes on The Centrality of the Struggle Against White Supremacy” by Jeffrey B. Perry, “Labor Notes” Talk, Sunday, May 21, 1989, Detroit, Michigan

[This document written in 1989 (in the language of the day) discusses important work from the 1980s by union activists who viewed the struggle against white supremacy as central to workers' interests. It is hoped that readers will find that it offers some insights for use in struggles today.]


Introduction

Over the past five years at the 4000-workers New Jersey International Bulk Mail Center (in Jersey City, NJ) and over the past year-and-a-half at the national level, Postal Mail Handlers, desirous of a better life, have waged somewhat successful struggles in three broad areas: against contract givebacks and business unionism; against the organized crime dominated Laborers' International Union; and for an autonomous, class conscious, and democratic rank-and-file oriented union.

From the beginning, the struggle against racism has been central to these efforts. It has been central in two crucial ways. First, we have been able to take significant strides forward because, as we have consciously fought against racism, we have developed a solid human core on which to build. Second, by addressing each major issue and stage of our struggle in light of the question "How does racism affect this?" and by then seeking to combat such racism, we have had a political direction that has enabled us to move forward. We have not merely reacted to racism; rather we have sought to dictate the direction of anti-racist struggle.

Lessons We Have Learned

In the course of our struggle we have learned, at times very imperfectly and at times with great difficulty, some important lessons. These lessons are no catechism of accepted beliefs, rather, they are based on specific and concrete struggles and each one is backed up by concrete examples in the real world.

These lessons, as we understand them, are:

1. By identifying and exposing racist practices, patterns, and ideas, and then calling on people to fight against them, we have not weakened our efforts, but we have made our efforts stronger.

2. To the degree that we have regularized, routinized, and institutionalized our anti-racist work, particularly in our publications, job responsibilities, and leadership positions, to that degree have we been better able to counter racial efforts aimed at undermining our struggle. Regularized and consistent work, not spontaneous reflex actions are needed against racism.

3. In developing our publications we could effectively employ political, economic, and moral arguments against racism, and that once we got the moral upper-hand it was possible to employ disproportionately effective publicity against our opposition.

4. The core of our racist opposition was objectively sexist and that by exposing and struggling against this opposition on both grounds we were more effectively able to build our movement.

5. Our enemies, both in USPS management and in the LIUNA hierarchy, particularly at crucial stages in struggles, have consciously tried to make racist appeals and attacks to weaken us and to undermine our efforts.

6. Given the clearly racist positions taken by LIUNA, our struggles for "Autonomy" have been struggles which were objectively antiracist and which gave major impetus to our movement for democracy.

7. In our Black-led union, as opposed to our union under LIUNA's "white" appointed leadership, progressive ideas and causes were far more warmly received and promulgated and thus Black leadership at all levels has greatly aided the progressive development of our union.

8. In the course of our struggles, white workers who have united with us on anti-racist issues have played a particularly important role in either winning or neutralizing other "whites," thereby enabling our efforts to move forward.

9. And finally, we have found that by challenging "white race" appeals and so-called "white worker rights" and "white worker interests" we better prepared ourselves to counter the racist appeals of management and LIUNA.

Who We Are

The National Postal Mail Handlers Union represents 52,000 Mail Handlers nationwide. Approximately half of our 42,000 members are African American, Hispanic, or other peoples of color. About 15% of our members are women. Six out of seven members of our National Executive Board are Black and about two-thirds of our 37 Local Presidents are Black or Hispanic.

We are the third largest of the Postal Unions. The American Postal Workers Union and the National Association of Letter Carriers each have six to seven times our membership.

Mail Handlers perform the heaviest, dirtiest, lowest paying work of the principal postal crafts. We load and unload trucks and otherwise "move" mail within postal facilities.

Since 1968 Mail Handlers have been merged with and a Division of LIUNA—the Laborer's International Union of North America, AFL-CIO. LIUNA is an organized crime dominated construction union of some half million members. The majority of its members are Black and Hispanic and its leadership is, almost exclusively, "white." LIUNA is one of the pillars of conservative reaction in the AFL-CIO. Further, through the AFL-CIO's Building Trades Council, LIUNA President Angelo Fosco and LIUNA Attorney Robert Connerton wield inordinate power.

LIUNA believes that it ultimately holds all decision-making power over Mail Handlers -- particularly regarding our contract, constitution, and finances. LIUNA also apparently believes that it never has to answer to us. Over the past year-and-a half the NPMHU challenged LIUNA on all these counts.

We have had significant victories over LIUNA in two conventions, three national elections, in blocking a trusteeship, in gaining an injunction against their seizure of our money, and in passing a reform constitution highlighted by one-person-one-vote for national officers, democratic rights, and Mail Handler control, and shaped by the principled position articulated in our preamble, that "all members of society should challenge such pernicious evils as racism, sexism, and capital's domination of labor."

At the base level, workers at the 4,000-worker New Jersey International Bulk Mail Center in Jersey City, New Jersey have a history of struggle. Bulk workers participated in major wildcat strikes in 1974 and 1978, co-organized a several thousand persons strong New Jersey Anti-Apartheid Mobilization Committee March in 1986, were vociferous Mail Handler opponents of the sellout 1987 postal contract, and currently are in the 10th day of a 100% successful cafeteria boycott. (In the first wildcat strike amnesty was obtained, in the second over 100 workers were fired. These firings were for striking against the federal government and were forerunners to the PATCO firings.)

Some Examples of Struggle

At the Base

At the NJIBMC over the past 5 years Mail Handler union members put out a regular, hard-hitting, 2-to-4 pages weekly newsletter. The union has developed a well-trained stewards apparatus and a history of organized struggle.

Since 1984, campaigns have been waged for contract enforcement, particularly around: discipline attacks; safety violations; harassment of the ill, injured, and pregnant; bid posting violations; layoffs; restrictions on shop stewards functioning; opposition to split rest days; opposition to use of casual employees; opposition to improper holiday scheduling; for work clothing allowances; and against discrimination and favoritism in disciplines, details, overtime, promotions, and light duty assignments.

Struggles have also been waged on broader issues including the sellout 1987 postal contract; the right to distribute literature; asbestos removal; improper locker room searches; drug testing; cafeteria management; toxic waste removal; contra aid; a free Ireland; against mob control of our union; for a reform union constitution; and for a democratic one-person-one-vote union. When the union took up and co-organized the 1986 New Jersey State anti-apartheid march the work inside the plant was so productive that thousands of "Free South Africa" buttons were sold and worn by workers (of all races and nationalities) within the plant.

The First Struggle Set the Stage

At the NJIBMC, the first major struggle in this period set the stage for all future efforts and it was a decidedly anti-racist struggle.

After our new administration assumed office in 1984, on an anti-racist platform, it was quickly put to the test. Within a matter of weeks, we discerned a clearly racist pattern to management's treatment of our workers. It started out with light duty denials -- denials of work to people with off-the-job injuries whose doctors said they could perform work with certain limitations. The first eight cases of light duty denials, which we encountered, were cases involving Black workers -- one man with 5 children had been denied work for twenty-five months.

Other areas we examined had a similar racist shaping -- disciplines came down more frequently and more harshly against Black workers, promotions for Black workers were disproportionately few, as were assignment detail requests that were granted.

On further investigation we found that virtually every top level manager running our postal facility, as well as key high level officials in the other major facilities in North Jersey and New York, were white male members of the Columbia Association--an openly segregatory organization for Italian Americans only.

We found that this management dominated organization had utilized USPS-paid "free" mailings to solicit members and had incorporated in the State of New Jersey with its principal place of business at our postal facility.

We also found that its membership included high-level union people from our union, and reportedly from the other two major postal unions. The former head of the Mail Handlers Union at our facility was also the former President of the Columbia Association.

We openly challenged the existence of this racist/sexist organization, the power it wielded, and we opposed the patterns of discrimination it had established.

In the course of that struggle we were warned about how powerful the Columbians were, we were advised that we would alienate the "white" and the Italian workers, and we were advised to stick to more nuts and bolts union issues.

We, on the other hand, developed an effective media counter-offensive which helped us build our newsletter; we stressed how these issues directly affected all our workers; we emphasized that if we truly were a union which aimed to protect its workers that we had to make special efforts to counter special discrimination; and we emphasized that neither "white" workers' nor Italian workers' interests as workers were being served by this Columbia organization.

Once we gained the upper hand morally we used it to constantly hammer management on this issue and virtually every other issue that we touched. As long as the management dominated Columbia Association functioned we were relentless in our denunciations.

The Columbians did attempt a racist counter-offensive from within our union ranks, led by that former union leader who was also a former President of the Columbia Association, but this effort was quickly isolated, tied to management, and discredited.

The campaign against the Columbia Association was successful. The workers denied light duty assignments got the assignments and the man out 25 months got back pay.

The campaign effectively ousted the Columbia Association from our building and weakened management's power in relation to our union. The new union administration got off to a good start -- our efforts were viewed to be foursquare against racism and sexism, for the workers, and principled.

Over the next few years we tried to continue emphasizing this pro-worker, anti-racist perspective in developing our steward apparatus and grievance handling. We also sought to emphasize this pro-worker, anti-racist perspective in our newsletters. We found that we were best able to do this with a publication which was regular and frequent (we published weekly) and in which racism was seen as a central factor to be considered in all issues.


Fighting Racism at the National Level

At the National level we have been waging a major struggle for autonomy and democracy and we have increasingly tied this to a struggle for a better contract. In each stage of this struggle the fight against racism has been central. LIUNA has been accurately portrayed as racist, undemocratic, and ready to sell us out. The National Postal Mail Handlers' Union, in contrast, has consciously tried to oppose racism, build democracy, and oppose sellouts.

In late 1987, as 26 months of LIUNA trusteeship over our union was coming to an end, our union representatives at convention, and led by Black leaders, stood up in open rebellion and voted down every single one of LIUNA's proposed amendments to the Mail Handler constitution. Mail Handler delegates also elected a new progressive administration in which six out of seven Executive Board members were Black.

While there was a long history which went into the December 1987 Conference, it is important to realize that LIUNA supported a more conservative "white" candidate for top office and that the LIUNA trustee, in a widely reported statement, had sought to make a racist appeal to one of the white Local Presidents. That the racist appeal was exposed and criticized by "whites" helped to cement the necessary anti-racist, pro Mail Handler unity which was necessary to stand up to LIUNA and reject all their proposals in late 1987.

As the newly elected administration developed it openly challenged LIUNA rule on the grounds that it was autocratic, greedy, mob-tied, and racist, and therefore not working in the interest of Mail Handlers. This appeal, supported by facts and some exceptional legal work, enabled Mail Handlers to first march on LIUNA headquarters in protest, then block a LIUNA trusteeship, and then hold a remarkable constitutional convention.

The Constitutional Convention reshaped the union on the principles of one-person-one-vote direct election of national officers and Mail Handler control of contract and constitution matters. It also included important wording from the "Union Member's Bill of Rights."

The December 1988 Constitutional Convention also passed some remarkable Resolutions supporting freedom movements and workers efforts in the West Bank and Gaza, South Africa, and Nicaragua while opposing such domestic evils as two-tier wages, drug testing, organized crime involvement in our union, and the Hatch Act. Other resolutions also called for union democracy, organizing the unorganized, childcare, AIDS work, and taking the Postal Service off budget.

The Mail Handlers' Reform Constitution is an educational document that broadly proclaims the principles on which Mail Handlers have sought to build their new union. The Preamble declares:

"We believe that all members of society should challenge such pernicious evils as racism, sexism, and capital's domination of labor. We further believe that it is important for the working class to ever realize "in unity there is strength" and that "an injury to one is an injury to all."

The Constitution also, consciously aimed to protect free speech rights and to allow struggles against racism and sexism by removing wording from the old constitution which prohibited "criticism, reflection, argument, or debate touching on any member's race, religion, color, creed, sex, place of national origin . . . etc." The thought behind this was that if you can't name, identify, and describe the problem, you couldn't begin to solve it.

After we passed our constitution, which LIUNA is currently challenging, we entered a full-scale political struggle with LIUNA in the form of two, first-ever, one-person, one-vote, elections of national officers.

The LIUNA candidate for the top spot had money, resources, and a base of support centered around eight locals, six of which were "white"-led and conservative.

Literature supporting the LIUNA candidate was of two types. First, was material, which was misleading and sought to focus on narrow contract issues. Second, there was a series of "anonymous" "Willie Horton" type pieces that were simply vicious, racist literature -- and which were small time versions of the literature that appeared during the Bush campaign.

In contrast, the progressive African-American led "Team for Democracy" ran a campaign of broad appeal which had its core support in the South, the inner cities, and certain progressive locals. We centered our appeal on the newly franchised rank-and-file voters (who were all voting for the first time) and combined rank-and-file oriented literature and literature distribution with visits to facilities and in some places phone trees.

The "Team for Democracy" campaign took the higher ground, focused in-depth on contract issues, openly opposed racism, and tied the LIUNA candidate to our last sell-out contract and to selling us out to LIUNA.

The 1987 Postal Contract, signed by LIUNA while they had Mail Handlers under trusteeship, was broadly viewed as a back door deal between organized crime dominated LIUNA and Postmaster Preston Tisch. In that contract LIUNA undercut the other two postal unions by signing three weeks early and settling for a meager 1.6% wage increase (at a time when most of the media was predicting we would get anywhere from a 2.6 to a 3.2% increase).

In various literature which circulated it was also charged that the contract which LIUNA signed was tied to business deals between Tisch's CNA Insurance Company which underwrites and administers the Billion Dollar Mail Handler Benefit Plan (and several smaller union-related insurance plans) and LIUNA. LIUNA reportedly sought to gain control of signatory power over the lucrative Mail Handler Benefit Plan and wanted increased formal contract recognition from the United States Postal Service — recognition that it received when Tisch and Fosco agreed to replace Mail Handlers with LIUNA in certain key passages in the contract.

In that sell-out contract LIUNA also willingly gave up major EEO protections for our workers in the form of simultaneous dual filing rights. This was a racist concession which neither other postal union made and focus on this issue by the "Team for Democracy" greatly aided in the principled exposure of LIUNA.

The "Team for Democracy" election strategy worked. In the first round of the two-stage election procedures the "Team" swept five of seven National Executive Board spots. In the final runoff, the "Team" won the last two spots, including the crucial position of National President. In that final, head-to-head election, "Team for Democracy" candidates, running on an anti-racist anti-sellout, pro-democracy campaign won by almost a two-to-one margin.

In Sum

In sum, based on recent experiences in the Mail Handlers Union, the struggle against racism has been central to our struggles for a more democratic, class conscious, rank-and-file oriented union and to the degree that we have maintained that perspective and acted accordingly we have moved our struggle forward.

 


 

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April 27th Marks the 137th Anniversary of the Birth of Hubert Harrison

April 27th Marks the 137th Anniversary of the Birth of Hubert Harrison the "Father of Harlem Radicalism," Founder of the First Organization and First Newspaper of the Militant "New Negro Movement," and "Radical Internationalist." St Croix-born, Harlem-based Hubert H. Harrison (April 27, 1883-December 17, 1927) was a brilliant writer, orator, educator, critic, and radical political activist. Interest in his life and work continues to grow.

For comments from scholars and activists on "Hubert Harrison: The Voice of Harlem Radicalism, 1883-1918" (Columbia University Press) see HERE and see HERE

 

For information on "A Hubert Harrison Reader" (Wesleyan University Press) see HERE and to order the book see HERE

 

For information on the new, Diasporic Africa Press expanded edition of Hubert H. Harrison's "When Africa Awakes: The 'Inside Story' of the Stirrings and Strivings of the New Negro in the Western World" and to purchase the book see HERE

 

For a video of a Slide Presentation/Talk on Hubert Harrison see HERE

For articles, audios, and videos by and about Hubert Harrison see HERE 

For a link to the Hubert H. Harrison Papers Digital Collection online at Columbia University's Rare Book and Manuscript Library see HERE

For a Finding Aid to the Hubert Harrison Papers at Columbia University's Rare Book and Manuscript Library see HERE

For information on the forthcoming "Hubert Harrison: The Struggle for Equality, 1918-1927" that will be available later this year see HERE

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