He is the author of Twice the Work of Free Labor, dealing with the history of prison labor in the U.S. South. His current research examines the interplay of the civil rights and labor movements in Florida during the 1940s, with a focus on the infamous "Red Pepper" senatorial campaign of 1950. In 2000 he went to South Africa on a Fulbright Fellowship, where he became interested in comparative history and began research on the history of black and "mixed" trade unions under apartheid.