Negro Labor Committee Records on Microfilm

The Negro Labor Committee was formed on July 20, 1935. This committee came about as a result of many years of labor movement to give workers equal consideration regardless of race, creed or color. In 1925, Frank R. Crosswaith and several more labor leaders formed the Trade Union Committee for Organizing Negro Workers, in hopes of encouraging blacks to unionize. In 1934, some of the same leaders, founded the Harlem Labor Committee to help the cause.

The First Negro Labor Conference was composed of elected delegates from both of these organizations. A committee of twenty-five members was elected at the conference and they in turn established the Negro Labor Committee. One purpose of the Negro Labor Committee was to come up with a plan of action to consider the economic plight of black workers and to aid them in securing better paying jobs. A second objective was to remove the serious threat that the unorganized black worker represented to the labor movement.

During the 1930s and 1940s the Negro Labor Committee played a key role in expanding organized black labor and in overcoming barriers within the labor movement.

At the peak of its existance the Committee represented over 250,000 black and white workers.