The 1968 Memphis Sanitation Workers Strike Movement

8/20/2019 The 1968 Memphis Sanitation Workers Strike Movement

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The Memphis Sanitation Workers

Strike Movement 1968 .

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Jim Crow oppression in Memphis

Memphis from the 1940’s to the 1960’s grew massively in population. Yet, Jim Crow apartheid was

still in the city. After Reconstruction, white racists oppressed black people continuously. Black workerswere restricted heavily from joining skilled labor. Sanitation workers had very low pay. Black workers

were immediately fired for the most minor of reasons. The Mayor of Memphis Henry Loeb was a

reactionary and he worked in public works projects. He wanted to maintain the status quo of having

black sanitation workers to receive low wages, getting cheap equipment, and a refusal for the

establishment of a public union to represent the black sanitation workers. Loeb ran for mayor as early

as 1959. Back then, he was an open segregationist. By the early 1960’s, desegregation did exist in many

areas of Memphis, but the right for economic rights remained nonexistent. Black people in Memphis

struggled to have decent jobs with living wages and great working conditions. Black women also were

discriminated by race and gender. Many sanitation workers back then had to collect garbage with their

hands. Many white supervisors would call black sanitation workers derogatory names and racial slurs.The sanitation workers worked long hours without overtime pay. They had no paid vacations, no

grievance procedure, and no sick leave. According to Professor Honey, black sanitation workers were

just paid between 94 cents and $1.14 per hour (and during the following years, hourly wages were

never more than 5 center per hour above the minimum wage for laborers). These men worked every

day and they were mistreated by a racist system. In 1960, Thomas Oliver or T.O. Jones tried to

organize a local union. He worked with O.Z. Evers, who was a neighborhood civic activist. Evers signed

up sanitation workers as members of Teamsters Local 984. In Memphis, TN during the 1960’s, the

sanitation workers were in involved in two strikes.

The commissioner of Public Workers rejected Evers’ and Jones’ request. In fact, the Public Works

Department fired Jones and 32 other workers since they organized the request. In 1965, William Ingramwas the new mayor of Memphis. He relied heavily on the African American vote in order for him to be

mayor. Yet, Ingram was more moderate and was not standing up against the white racists who wanted

the status quo. Sisson or the Public Works Commissioner fired union officers including T. O. Jones

because of their fight for economic justice. Ingram reinstated token concessions like pay scales,

heaters in some of the old trucks, etc. Yet, Sisson refused to recognize a public employee union. The

first strike proposal was in August 1966 when Jones and other union organizers threatened to strike.


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The government threatened Jones with an injunction (or restrictions of free speech rights and the right

to protest) and Jones ended his plans for his strike. That would change in 1968. On January 1, 1968,

Henry Loeb was sworn in as mayor of Memphis once again. On Sunday, January 31, rain come about in

the city.

The Strike begins

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About 800 strikers took their message to the streets for the first time Feb. 13 marching more than three

miles to City Hall from the United Rubber Workers of America union hall on Firestone. The group was

so large it had to assemble in The Auditorium, a downtown concert hall, before it could be addressed by

the mayor and union leaders.

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Struggle and Police Brutality in Memphis

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This is Jerry Wurf or the President of AFSCME Union talking with Dr. King. Jerry Wurf was a big part

of the Memphis Sanitation Workers Strike and an adviser to Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.

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Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. wanted to ally the civil rights movement with the labor and anti-war

movements. Unification of all of these progressive movements and using an action plan of the PoorPeoples Campaign was a direct threat to the establishment (who wanted war, austerity, imperialism, and

the status quo).

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The picture to the left showed many leaders of the SCLC or the Southern Christian Leadership Council.

The image to the right shows Maxine Smith, who was one of the activists involved in the heroic 1968

Memphis sanitation strike.

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Dr. King's Assassination and the Strike Continues

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"...Now about injunctions: We have an injunction and we're going into court tomorrow morning to fight

this illegal, unconstitutional injunction. All we say to America is, "Be true to what you said on paper." If

I lived in China or even Russia, or any totalitarian country, maybe I could understand some of these

illegal injunctions. Maybe I could understand the denial of certain basic First Amendment privileges,because they hadn't committed themselves to that over there. But somewhere I read of the freedom of

assembly. Somewhere I read of the freedom of speech. Somewhere I read of the freedom of press.

Somewhere I read that the greatness of America is the right to protest for right. And so just as I say, we

aren't going to let dogs or water hoses turn us around, we aren't going to let any injunction turn

us around. We are going on...Well, I don't know what will happen now. We've got some difficult days

ahead. But it really doesn't matter with me now, because I've been to the mountaintop. And I don't mind.

Like anybody, I would like to live a long life. Longevity has its place. But I'm not concerned about

that now. I just want to do God's will. And He's allowed me to go up to the mountain. And I've

looked over. And I've seen the Promised Land. I may not get there with you. But I want you to

know tonight, that we, as a people, will get to the Promised Land!

And so I'm happy, tonight.

I'm not worried about anything.

I'm not fearing any man!

Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord!!”


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The Uprisings and Rebellions of April 1968

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As one source from Sister Keenaga-Yamahtta Taylor accurately states:

“…In fact, it was the widespread and continuous nature of the riots that turned them from episodic

outbreaks of discontent into a force that transformed U.S. politics. The issues that defined the urban

crisis--poor housing, police brutality, poor schools and unemployment, among others--went from being

politically peripheral to what President Lyndon Johnson termed "the nation's most urgent task."

Thus, the urban rebellions of the 1960s arguably constituted the most important political events of the

decade. Over the course of the 1960s, public spending on housing and other urban issues went from

$600 million at the beginning of the decade to more than $3 billion by the decade's end--and the

federal government created the Department of Housing and Urban Development… Rebellions, of

course, don't go on forever. They eventually run into the power of the state, and the rebels become

fatigued once the adrenaline of feeling politically alive subsides. To bring about the substantial changesneeded to really transform the lives of workers and the poor, something more is needed: strategies,

politics and organization…” (Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor’s “Urban rebellions and social change” from

August 12, 2011).


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Sister Dorothy Cotton (who was so involved in helping humanity in education, civil rights, and other

legitimate causes) is the person to the far left. She fought for justice then and now. The Brother to the far

right with tears in this eyes is Brother T. O. Jones, who was a stalwart leader of the movement in

Memphis.

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49 1968. .

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These are protesters on Main Street on November 12, 1969. The protests were centering primarily on

demands of the Memphis NAACP branch that blacks should have representation on the Memphis Board

of Education and a strike at St. Joseph Hospital by the AFSCME (AFL-CIO). (Robert Williams / The

Commercial Appeal).

The New Era of Memphis

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. Maxine Smith graduated from Booker T. Washington High School at the age of 15. Four years later, shegraduated from Spelman College in Atlanta. She earned her masters’ degree from Middlebury College, in

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The Memphis sanitation strike

An Important Part of the Civil Rights Movement

Parties to the event

• Sanitation workers

• American

Federation of State

County and

Municipal

Employees

(AFSCME)

• COME (Community

on the Move for

Equality)

• SCLC

• NAACP

• City of Memphis

Lead people in the situation• T.O. Jones

• Dr. Martin Luther

King Jr.

• Sanitation workers

• Mayor Henry Loeb

of Memphis

Information on Memphis, TennesseeToday

Mayor of Memphis: Jim Strickland (D)Total Area: 324 sq. milesPopulation (2010): 646,889

Flag

SealNicknames: The Blues City and th

Birthplace of Rock anRoll

County: Shelby


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The Brother’s name is Modibo Kadalie. He was one leader of the 1977 Atlanta strike. He toldhis story in Decatur, Georgia on October 6, 2013 (in an interview with Robert Sabatino and

Andrew Zonneveld).

The Atlanta Strike

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By Timothy

Black Lives Matter


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The 1968 Memphis Sanitation Workers Strike Movement

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Transcript of The 1968 Memphis Sanitation Workers Strike Movement