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Asa Philip Randolph (April 15, 1889 – May 16, 1979) was an American labor unionist and civil rights activist. In 1925, he organized and led the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters, the first successful African-American-led labor union. In the early Civil Rights Movement and the Labor Movement, Randolph was a prominent voice. His continuous agitation with the support of fellow labor rights activists against racist labor practices helped lead President Franklin D. Roosevelt to issue Executive Order 8802 in 1941, banning discrimination in the defense industries during World War II. The group then successfully maintained pressure, so that President Harry S. Truman proposed a new Civil Rights Act and issued Executive Orders 9980 and 9981 in 1948, promoting fair employment and anti-discrimination policies in federal government hiring, and ending racial segregation in the armed services. Randolph was born and raised in Florida. He attained a good education in his community at Cookman Institute, but did not see a future for himself in the discriminatory Jim Crow–era south, and moved to New York City just before the Great Migration. There he became convinced that overcoming racism required collective action and he was drawn to socialism and workers' rights. He unsuccessfully ran for state office on the socialist ticket in the early 1920s, but found more success in organizing for African American workers' rights. In 1963, Randolph was the head of the March on Washington, organized by Bayard Rustin, at which Reverend Martin Luther King Jr. delivered his "I Have A Dream" speech. Randolph inspired the "Freedom Budget", sometimes called the "Randolph Freedom budget", which aimed to deal with the economic problems facing the black community. It was published by the Randolph Institute in January 1967 as "A Freedom Budget for All Americans". Biography Early life and education Asa Philip Randolph was born April 15, 1889, in Crescent City, Florida, the second son of James William Randolph, a tailor and minister in an African Methodist Episcopal Church, and Elizabeth Robinson Randolph, a seamstress. In 1891, the family moved to Jacksonville, Florida, which had a thriving, well-established African-American community. From his father, Randolph learned that color was less important than a person's character and conduct. From his mother, he learned the importance of education and of defending oneself physically against those who tried to hurt one or one's family, if necessary. Randolph remembered vividly the night his mother sat in the front room of their house with a loaded shotgun across her lap, while his father tucked a pistol under his coat and went off to prevent a mob from lynching a man at the local county jail. Asa and his brother, James, were superior students. They attended the Cookman Institute in East Jacksonville, the only academic high school in Florida for African Americans. Asa excelled in literature, drama, and public speaking; he also starred on the school's baseball team, sang solos with the school choir, and was valedictorian of the 1907 graduating class. After graduation, Randolph worked odd jobs and devoted his time to singing, acting, and reading. Reading W. E. B. Du Bois's The Souls of Black Folk convinced him that the fight for social equality was most important. Barred by discrimination from all but manual jobs in the South, Randolph moved to New York City in 1911, where he worked odd jobs and took social sciences courses at City College. Marriage and family In 1913, Randolph courted and married Lucille Campbell Green, a widow, Howard University graduate, and entrepreneur who shared his socialist politics. She earned enough money to support them both. The couple had no children. Early career Shortly after Randolph's marriage, he helped organize the Shakespearean Society in Harlem. With them he played the roles of Hamlet, Othello, and Romeo, among others. Randolph aimed to become an actor but gave up after failing to win his parents' approval.In New York, Randolph became familiar with socialism and the ideologies espoused by the Industrial Workers of the World. He met Columbia University Law student Chandler Owen, and the two developed a synthesis of Marxist economics and the sociological ideas of Lester Frank Ward, arguing that people could be free only if not subject to economic deprivation. At this point, Randolph developed what became his distinctive form of civil rights activism, which emphasized the importance of collective action as a way for black people to gain legal and economic equality. To this end, he and Owen opened an employment office in Harlem to provide job training for southern migrants and encourage them to join trade unions. Like others in the labor movement, Randolph favored immigration restriction. He opposed African Americans' having to compete with people willing to work for low wages. But unlike other immigration restrictionists, he rejected the notions of racial hierarchy that became popular in the 1920s. In 1917, Randolph and Owen founded The Messenger with the help of the Socialist Party of America. It was a radical monthly magazine that campaigned against lynching, opposed U.S. participation in World War I, and urged African Americans to resist being drafted, fight for an integrated society, and join radical unions. The Department of Justice called The Messenger "the most able and the most dangerous of all the Negro publications." When it began publishing the work of black poets and authors, a critic called it "one of the most brilliantly edited magazines in the history of Negro journalism." Soon thereafter, the editorial staff of The Messenger became divided by three issues: the growing rift between West Indian and African Americans, support for the Bolshevik revolution, and support for Marcus Garvey's Back-to-Africa movement. In 1919, most West Indian radicals joined the new Communist Party, while African-American leftists—Randolph included—mostly supported the Socialist Party. The infighting left The Messenger short of financial support, and it went into decline. Randolph unsuccessfully ran on the Socialist Party ticket for New York State Comptroller in 1920 and for Secretary of State of New York in 1922. Union organizer Randolph's first experience with labor organization came in 1917, when he organized a union of elevator operators in New York City. In 1919 he became president of the National Brotherhood of Workers of America, a union that organized among African-American shipyard and dock workers in the Tidewater region of Virginia. The union dissolved in 1921 under pressure from the American Federation of Labor. Randolph's greatest success came with the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters (BSCP), which elected him president in 1925. This was the first serious effort to form a labor institution for employees of the Pullman Company, a major employer of African Americans. The railroads had dramatically expanded in the earl.... Discover the Andrew E Kersten popular books. Find the top 100 most popular Andrew E Kersten books.