Date: 2007-01-16
Speaker: GEORGE MILLER (democrat)
Chamber: H
State: California

Madam Speaker. I yield myself such time as I may conqume. Madam Speaker. yesterday on the occasion of his birthday people across this country took time to honor and celebrate the life of Dr. Martin Luther King. Many of us participated in acts of community service and community rallies or took time out to listen to the words of Martin Luther King and his speeches. We were reminded that the words and works of this great civil rights leader are still timely today. In his writings Dr. King often cited examples of how the simple but courageous acts of one or two people to fight racial discrimination had far reaching implications for the future of this country. He talked about the persistence. the relentless persistence of average individuals to fight against discrimination. to fight against injustice. and to fight against inequalities. In his cell from the Birmingham jail. he writes of James Meredith and Rosa Parks. and how the simple but selfless acts of just one person helped change the course of this country. As he saw it. these acts and the destiny of African Americans were tied up with the destiny of America. The resolution I bring forward today honors a group of men. the Mare Island 2lers. whose destiny was tied up when they bravely took action to end racial discrimination in naval shipyards in the San Francisco Bay Area in the early 1960s. The Mare Island 2lers were a group of 21 African American shipyard workers employed at Mate Island Naval Shipyard in Vallejo. California. At that time minorities were mostly working in unskilled positions at Mare Island. as sandblasters. laborers and cleaners. with efforts to keep them out of. certain positions. The discrimination was not restricted to withholding promotions and unfair hiring practices. according to one of the workers. they faced discrimination at every turn. Long time denied opportunity for advancement. these workers decided to organize. Under the leadership of Willie Long. a journeyman pipefitter from Shop 56 who was also a World War H veteran and a Pearl Harbor survivor. the group met in complete secrecy to protect their safety and their jobs. Not long after the group began to meet. President Kennedy issued his executive order establishing the Presidents Committee on Equal Employment Opportunities and reaffirming the prohibition against discrimination against any employee of or application for employment by the Federal Government because of race. color. religion. or national origin. The order issued in March of 1961 also created a discrimination complaint process for Federal workers. Learning of the Presidents executive order. the 2lers decided to file a complaint with the committee. The complaint covered deplorable conditions for African American workers at the shipyard. including the denial of promotions and access to the apprenticeship program. and general unfair treatment. In their report they cited that there was an established unwritten practice at the Mare Island Shipyard not to upgrade third step mechanics no matter what the qualifications of the employee are at any given time. As a result. there are Negro employees with 15 or 20 years of experience still in this category while white workers with much less experience and time have moved rapidly up the ladder of promotion. They also said that Negro employees are systemically barred from supervisorial positions although many are entitled to such positions by reason of seniority and experience. There are two Negro lead men and sandblasters and one Negro leading man laborer out of a force of hundreds of supervisors. and the statistics proved this discrimination. He also said that Negroes who take examinations for advancement for the most part are flunked out on later oral interviews even though they passed the previous examination. The board is made up of the top three supervisors within the shop. and so long as this situation exists. Negroes will never be able to advance through examination. Young Negro men are refused the opportunity of apprenticeship training for the most part in Shop 56. No Negro apprentices have been hired in at least 3 years. In over 20 years at Mare Island. no Negro mechanic has ever received a superior accomplishment award. to our knowledge. which included cash bonuses for those who got it. Then. in fact when the time came for apprenticeship programs. they were not given credit for the training related to their jobs and they take on their own orders in advance of themselves. In fact. Negroes are discouraged from taking any training. And. of course. when the fleet started to change in this country and we went to atomic submarines. there were no Negroes who had been selected for the training of this program. This was the kind of discrimination that this brave group of men who had to meet in secret. who had to be very careful that anybody at the workplace would not know that they were discussing this with their fellow workers when they met at home. they said. with all of the shades drawn. this is the discrimination that they were living under in the Naval Shipyard at that time and this is the discrimination that they cited to President Kennedys employment board. It was a complaint among many that were received by the Committee on Equal Employment in the early days of its existence. Finally. the Navy was forced to pay atteation to the long history of discrimination felt by the workers at Mare Island. In August of 1963. almost 2 years after the initial complaint was filed. the Navy put policies in place to affirmatively take action on behalf of minority workers. These heroic men included Willie Long. Boston Banks. Jr.. Matthew Barnes. Louis Greer. Jake Sloan. Charles Fluker. Clarence Williams. James Davis. Thomas King. Robert E. Borden. James 0. Hall. Matthew Luke. Herman Moore. Jimmy James. John L. McGhee. James J. Colbert. Virgil N. Herndon. Eddie Brady. Brodie Taylor. W.J. Price. Levi Jones. Herbert H. Lane. Kermit Day. and Charles Scales. The actions of the Mare Island 2lers resulted in new employment opportunities for African Americans at other naval bases all across the Nation. Despite these pioneering steps. .their early civil rights efforts remained in obscurity until recently. The groups surviving members still talk about the movement. but the full story was buried in the 1960s and only recently came to light as a result of a series in the newspaper articles by the Vallejo Times Herald reporter Matthias Gafni. Mr. Speaker. in tribute to these men and their fight to end racial discrimination in the workplace. it is proper for Congress. to formally recognize the Mare Island Original 2lers and thank them for their heroic actions and their gift to this Nation to end discrimination in the naval shipyards. Madam Speaker. I reserve the balance of my time.