Cayton's weekly. [volume] (Seattle, Wash.) 1916-1921, 1919-07-05

American weekly, has any step been taken
toward the industrial freedom of the race
so important as that of the American Fed
GRAFTON Of Labor when it voted to open it's
doors Internationally to the Negro. This
MEANS as the New York Times points out,
that "all over the country the Negro worker
will have, as he has not had hitherto,
chance to enter all of the skilled, and there
fore better paid trades and in them to be
judged on his merits It wipes out ''the
part of the color-line which most impeded
the progress of the black race" says the
New York World, which reminds us that
colOred wage-earners now constitute about
one-seventh of our industrial population.
The New York Tribune interprets this vic
tory for the Negro as "a by-product of the
war"
One of the colored delegates to the Fed
GRAFTON Of Labor convention in Atlantic
City, pleading for the resolution which was
afterward adopted with only one opposing
vote, exclaimed: eff you can take in immi-
grants who can not speak the English Ian
guage, why can't you take in the Negro,
who has been loyal to you from Washing
ton to the battle-felds of Francee'' And
he went on to say:
We ask for the same chance to earn
bread for our families at the same salary
our white brothers are getting. The Negro
is ready to live for you and to die for you,
with all his dirty treatment in this country,
II you give us equal rights the same as you
have to earn bread for our families''
The connection between the federation s
action and war and reconstruction condi-
tions is emphasized by Mr. Fred R. Moore,
editor and publisher of the New York Age,
who is quoted by the New York Tribune
as saying:
''The exodus Of Italians and other
southern Europeans from the United States,
the imminent restriction Of immigration by
Congress- and the great need Of labor dur
ing the reconstruction period have combined
to bring about this action.
with the large influx Of cOlOred labor
into the Northern States during the last
three years there was danger to the Fedora
ton of Labor from colored strike breakers
This danger was recognized by the fedora
ton, and was one of the impelling causes
leading to the federations action. With
equal opportunity and equal wages and
membership in the federation, the colored
man will not lend himself to strike-break-
ing
In the editorial columns of his own paper
Mr.. Moore says that the action Of the con-
vention "was largely due to the progressive
'The real extent Of this forward move
ment on the part of organized labor can
only be gagged by the spirit in which it is
carried out. With good faith and fair deal
ing on both sides, the industrial progress
Of the race should now be assured.'
And in The Amsterdam News, another New
York Negro weekly, we read Of the fedora
ton s action
"It is one Of the most far-reaching adj
vantages that has come to Afro Americans
in recognition of their labors in essential in
dustries during the world-war No one
studied with closer interest the employment
Of Afro Americans in war and essential in
dustries than Mr.. Samuel Gompers and the
able men who surround him in the councils
of the American Federation of Labor; and
no one looked with more concern than they
upon the considerable migration Of large
masses Of Afro-American workers from the
Southern to the Northern and Western
labor vintag ground. This interest and
study convinced Mr. Gompers and his asso-