Synopses & Reviews
Drawing on scores of interviews with black and white tobacco workers in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, Robert Korstad brings to life the forgotten heroes of Local 22 of the Food, Tobacco, Agricultural and Allied Workers of America-CIO. These workers confronted a system of racial capitalism that consigned African Americans to the basest jobs in the industry, perpetuated low wages for all southerners, and shored up white supremacy.
Galvanized by the emergence of the CIO, African Americans took the lead in a campaign that saw a strong labor movement and the reenfranchisement of the southern poor as keys to reforming the South--and a reformed South as central to the survival and expansion of the New Deal. In the window of opportunity opened by World War II, they blurred the boundaries between home and work as they linked civil rights and labor rights in a bid for justice at work and in the public sphere.
But civil rights unionism foundered in the maelstrom of the Cold War. Its defeat undermined later efforts by civil rights activists to raise issues of economic equality to the moral high ground occupied by the fight against legalized segregation and, Korstad contends, constrains the prospects for justice and democracy today.
Review
"Well-researched and well-written . . . A major contribution to the current scholarship on labor history."
-- American Communist History
Review
"The breadth of Korstad's work is impressive and so is his ability to incorporate the broader historical context into the narrative of the Local [22]. . . . One of the many significant aspects of Korstad's book is that he gives voice to the neglected history of African American women in the trade union movement."
-Left History
Synopsis
Recovering an important moment in early civil rights activism, Korstad chronicles the rise and fall of the union that represented thousands of African American tobacco factory workers in Winston-Salem, N.C., in the first half of the 20th century.
Synopsis
Includes bibliographical references (p. [421]-522) and index.