The Black Worker’s Congress (BWC) was created in 1971 in response to a manifesto written by the League of Revolutionary Black Workers (League). The BWC would be a separate organization that would be used to expand the League across the United States. The BWC was also used to coordinate Revolutionary Union Movement and Black Workers caucuses.
The mission of the BWC: “Our objective: workers' control of their place of work, the factories, fields, offices, transportation services, and communications facilities, so that the exploitation of labor will cease and no person or corporation will get rich off the labor of another person. All people will work for the collective benefit of humanity.”(http://lists.village.virginia.edu/lists_archive/sixties-l/4167.html).
The BWC brought in 500 people at its first convention, but was not able to exceed that number as time went on. It accepted Hispanic, Asian, and Native American affiliates. While the BWC was getting a firm foundation, the League of Revolutionary Black Workers began to split apart. The culmination of this split was the BWC being composed of intellectuals while the League continued on with the workers. The BWC never achieved its goals and was never able to establish itself with membership or influence in the great society.
Famous quotes containing the words black, workers and/or congress:
“I could see the thing
with its black head
but there wasn’t a tear left
and the scar of my wound
was hard.”
—Hilda Doolittle (1886–1961)
“I suspect that American workers have come to lack a work ethic. They do not live by the sweat of their brow.”
—Kiichi Miyazawa (b. 1919)
“Such is the labor which the American Congress exists to protect,—honest, manly toil,—honest as the day is long,—that makes his bread taste sweet, and keeps society sweet,—which all men respect and have consecrated; one of the sacred band, doing the needful but irksome drudgery.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)