EA: From the start, Randolph made clear that the brotherhood was a civil rights organization, or a union that fought for dignity and economic emancipation. It worked with the NAACP [National Association for the Advancement of Colored People] on various issues, protested discrimination in the distribution of relief during the Depression, supported don’t-buy-where-you-can’t-work campaigns, and championed the right of all black workers to join unions.
In 1936, Randolph — and, by extension, the brotherhood — helped to found the National Negro Congress, a militant civil rights group that challenged the NAACP from the left. In 1941, Randolph — with porters’ blessing and engagement — created the March on Washington Movement to demand that the Roosevelt administration end discrimination in both the now-burgeoning defense industries and the armed forces.
The latter demand was refused. FDR did, however, issue Executive Order 8802, creating a Fair Employment Practice Committee [FEPC]. For the war’s duration, Randolph and porters protested persistent job discrimination and campaigned for a permanent FEPC.
In sum, Randolph and the porters put the notion of fair employment on the national agenda for the first time. And, with the rise of the modern Civil Rights Movement in the mid-1950s, porters were supportive and engaged. ED Nixon, an NAACP official and local BSCP leader, was instrumental in organizing the Montgomery Bus Boycott in 1955 and 1956. And Randolph was the force behind the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom in 1963.