All labor has dignity

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The Resource All labor has dignity

Statement of responsibility: Martin Luther King, Jr. ; edited with introductions by Michael K. Honey

Summary: King was in the midst of cultivating an alliance between the civil rights movement and labor unions when he was assassinated in 1968. He was in Memphis to support a strike by black sanitation workers and was planning the Poor People's Campaign, advocating for jobs, unionization, and dignity for all workers. Despite the sometimes prickly relationship between African Americans and unions with members eager to protect jobs by discrimination, King made substantial inroads with many union leaders. Honey, scholar and former civil rights organizer, offers a collection of 15 of King's speeches (12 previously unpublished) on workers' rights. Drawing on archival material from the King Center for Nonviolent Social Change, Honey reforms King's image from civil rights activist to labor activist. In speeches delivered in venues including a 1961 AFL-CIO convention in Miami and a meeting with Teamsters in New York in 1967, King's words put into perspective the labor movement since the 1930s and its links to the civil rights movement via such similar tactics as sit-ins, boycotts, and strikes. This important collection broadens our perception of King's vision of social justice