Report of the Labor Secretary, January 25, 1947

In the first two weeks of February 1946, employment offices in 11 major cities received 9,000 discriminatory orders. Of these, 97% read “We don’t want colored.” These orders were 24% of all received during that period. In spite of this trend of discrimination, Congress let FEPC die, but the NAACP knows that with or without an FEPC we must keep up the fight for jobs. Today, this problem is worse. Placement figures for the whole country in September showed that in the Employment Service there was a 6% decline in jobs for colored workers as opposed to a 4% gain in jobs for white workers. Most of the employment for colored is in unskilled and domestic opportunities.¹

. . . We now have a Labor Department and three former members of the federal . . . FEPC are among the distinguished citizens who form our National Labor Committee.² Top AFL and CIO leaders have joined with us in helping to make this part of the work a success.

. . . NAACP branches are in the fight for jobs. They have won places for . . . telephone operators in California, New Jersey and other states. They have gotten sales girls in department stores in Pennsylvania. In North Carolina, South Carolina, and Georgia, they are fighting for a share of the 30,000 job openings in the cotton textile industry. In Maryland and other states, they are joining with trade unions to regain jobs for dismissed employees and they are organizing community support for strikers fighting for a decent wage. All over the country, they are seeking to have carpenters, bricklayers, plumbers, and electricians among the million workers who are on the job or being recruited to relieve the housing shortage. Not only do we want to live in better houses, but we also want to help build them.

. . . In a recent case, 17 government employees got jobs in a federal agency . . . because their union and the NAACP challenged discriminatory practices which would have kept them from being hired. The NAACP intends to knock discrimination out of federal employment. We are working for greater protection of all colored government employees through the establishment of firm regulations against discrimination and the enforcement of such regulations.

. . . There must be a permanent federal Fair Employment Practice Act and . . . We are doing our share to see that it is passed. We are also working with the AFL, CIO, and other groups for the passage of legislation in certain key industrial states.

. . . There are over a million and a half colored people in the AFL and . . . CIO. Therefore, the present efforts in Congress and state legislatures to pass anti-labor legislation is an attack on them and us.³ The NAACP is fighting beside labor to defeat such legislation which would take away the bargaining rights and other hard won gains of the employees in American industry. We want stronger unions and more colored wage earners in them.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *