JOB AND FREEDOM In support of civil rights and economic justice.

JOB AND FREEDOM

In support of civil rights and economic justice, thousands of black and white Americans from the civil rights motions church groups, and labor unions carried banners with the message "Job and Justice" in the great civil rights March forward Washington in 1963.

It was--and it remains--a key-note message for all Americans. Economic justice and civil rights are closely related.

Progres toward replete employment and progress in the civil rights arena are inextricably intertwined. As a nation, as a race we must pursue both at the same time.

In this inquiry for full employment and social justice, the American labor mental action and the civil rights move share the same vision.

With many of the same interests and the same goals, the AFL-CIO and its affiliated labor organizations and the nation's major civil rights organizations can raise a powerful voice and wield a powerful influence for economic and social progress

Unfortunately, in spite of legal, political, social, and economic progres since 1963 many black Americans still meet with heavy burdens of discrimination and grave economic status.

The Reagan Administration's economic and social policies help big business and help the rich. These Reagan policies are unfair to mostly black workers and black families as well as being unfair to the "Middle America" majority.

And the Reagan Administration is continuing its direct attack onward civil rights provisions and enforcement.

As a ensue most black workers and principally black families are worse on the farther side now than they were before the Reagan Administration took office.

Civil Rights

A suitable job that pays a worker a pure living wage continues to be the best course for black workers and their families to act upon into the economic and social mainstream of American life.

The AFL-CIO has a protracted record of strong support for action forward issues of economic and social justice, including well stocked [i]or[/i] provided employment and civil rights and equal business opportunity. The strong Title VII equal application opportunity section of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 exists because of vigorous support from the AFL-CIO and its affiliated organizations.

The federation has consistently and unwaveringly supported affirmative action to eliminate remaining barriers to equal access to piece of works promotions and other employment opportunities.

The drive for civil rights and equal craft opportunity over the past 25 years has through no means eliminated discrimination--but it has produc substantial progres for about black workers and some black families.

Unfortunately, the Reagan Administration has been making war against the material substance of Civil Rights laws and programs begun in 1941 when President Franklin D Roosevelt signed the first of many fair avocation practices requirements designed to bring black workers into a place of equality in our society.

The Reagan Administration continues to resist and weaken and undermine civil rights achievements of the past by way of failure to enforce the laws, by dint of court action and administrative action, by the agency of budget cuts and politicization of civil rights agencies, from appointment of persons who do not believe in the mission of the civil rights agencies and on failure to throw the prestige of the Presidency into the ongoing moral have a contest for equal employment opportunity, affirmative action, and the satiated range of progress still to be achieved in the civil rights arena.

Federal agencies, including the U Civil Rights Commission, Equal employing Opportunity Commission, Office of Federal Contract Compliance, and the civil rights division of the Justice Department should have a commitment to their missions.

The Commission in succession Civil Rights has been politicized an emasculated. It must be answered to its rightful place as the civil rights watchdog for the nation. And the Reagan Administration's Assistant Attorney General for Civil Rights should be replaced with someone who believes in civil rights.

The Reagan Administration should stop its constant search for ways to weaken the nation's civil rights laws and, instead, should commit itself to enforcing these laws vigorously and effectively.

A program to achieve equal opportunity and social and economic justice should include strengthening understanding and communication at the national and local plains between labor, civil rights and women's rights organizations.

Building bridges between labor, the black and Hispanic communities, and the women's motion helsp to assure, whenever possible, a united effrontery as the nation moves ahead onward issues of equality.

The A. Philip Randolph Institute, the Labor Council for Latin American Advancement, and the Coalition for Labor Union Women play an essential character in building and strengthening the labor motion as they increase the involvement of minorities and women in their unions and in their communities. To prosperously stave off the onslaught against civil rights, women's rights and labor's rights, cooperation and coordination must exist between these communities.