Much is known about many aspects of the history of the Civil Rights Movement in America, however, the International Union, United Automobile, Aerospace, and Agricultural Implement Workers of America provided one of the least often heralded but most essential roles in the movement\u2019s success.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Better known as the United Automobile Workers or UAW, the union was responsible for, among other things, posting the cash bond needed to have the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. released from a Birmingham jail and later, called attention to apartheid in South Africa and the incarceration of freedom fighter Nelson Mandela.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cWe have never left the movement,\u201d said Ray Curry, UAW\u2019s international secretary-treasurer and member of the Daimler supervisory board, whose core functions include the control and monitoring of important corporate decisions for Daimler AG, the German multinational automotive corporation. \u201cAmong many archives of our building, there is a photo of our president, Walter Reuther with Dr. King during the March on Washington in August 1963. He was one of the few labor leaders on the podium to speak and be recognized.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Curry said King and Mandela had an extremely close relationship with the UAW.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cDr. King actually wrote his \u2018I Have a Dream\u2019 speech in Detroit in our offices and earlier that year, we were very instrumental in securing his release from a city jail and one of our former presidents, Owen Bieber, actually went to visit Nelson Mandela in prison and led a charge for his release. One of the first places Mandela spoke at following his release was at a UAW Local Union Hall in Michigan,\u201d Curry said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The backdrop that helped buoy the UAW is found in the fact that the union was formed to fight for and ensure worker\u2019s rights. Thus, it was a \u201cno-brainer for UAW to join the civil rights movement,\u201d Curry said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The UAW has remained vital because right-to-work initiatives and anti-worker legislation have often threatened to undermine labor unions\u2019 efforts to secure negotiation rights and contracts for workers in their workplaces.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cWe believe that labor is alive and well and we have been successful in organizing even in the South over the last four years where we have 12,000 new members in places like Tennessee, Kentucky, Texas and Oklahoma,\u201d Curry said. \u201cThe UAW now has over 430,000 members and each of the last nine years we\u2019ve had growth.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
A U.S. Army veteran, Curry began his manufacturing career at Daimler Trucks, in Mount Holly, N. C. and he served in numerous elected roles for UAW Local 5285 until his 2004 appointment to the UAW\u2019s International Staff and later, in 2010, as assistant regional director.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Curry won election as regional director in 2014 and, as a member of UAW\u2019s international executive board, he was responsible for Region 8, which consists of 12 U.S. states in the Mid-Atlantic and Southeast.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Earlier this year, Curry was elected UAW\u2019s secretary-treasurer.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
He said the importance of organized labor can also be realized in the voice of freedom fighters like Maryland Democratic Rep. Elijah Cummings, who has continued to speak in favor of unions, a message Cummings delivered during the recent Congressional Black Caucus Foundation\u2019s Annual Legislative Conference.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cIt makes it better for everyone when you have an elected leader\u2019s voice who has constituents that he talks to across the district every day and Congressman Cummings has a chance to hear the issues on a national level,\u201d Curry said. \u201cHe\u2019s been one of those champions that believes and advocates for working men and women.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
It\u2019s important that African-Americans and other minorities understand the significance of Curry\u2019s election to the Daimler Supervisory Board because labor representation has always been vital for all workers and with voices sought in numerous places, having diversity in the United States and in host countries could go a long way in securing the livelihoods of employees, Curry said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cThe board is a reflection of the corporation\u2019s global footprints and there\u2019s a commitment to diversity,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Despite its rich history of supporting civil rights and other causes that have allowed them to partner with numerous minority groups, the UAW plans to continue to strengthen its relationship with historically Black colleges and universities and the Black Press, Curry said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cWe believe African-American newspapers need to be amplified. We have utilized a number of papers in the past including the Jackson Advocate<\/em> and the Chronicle<\/em> in Detroit as media outlets in our member messaging and organizing efforts.\u201d he said. \u201cThe voice of tolerance and inclusion needs to be amplified and this is not always done in the national media. Whether its Rosa Parks then, or Dr. William Barber now, we\u2019ve got to have an outlet for that message. When you look back at 1965 and then today in 2018, I don\u2019t think the question would be if Dr. King and other leaders would be impressed with the technology of today as much as they would question the ability to message globally through new avenues of social media,\u201d said Curry. \u201cAnd we still face issues in this country that federal laws and other advocacy were to have addressed in the sixties.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Much is known about many aspects of the history of the Civil Rights Movement in America, however, the International Union, United Automobile, Aerospace, and Agricultural Implement Workers of America provided one of the least often heralded but most essential roles in the movement\u2019s success. Better known as the United Automobile Workers or UAW, the union […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"off","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[549,274,1580],"class_list":["post-2528","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news","tag-black-labor","tag-civil-rights","tag-uaw","et-doesnt-have-format-content","et_post_format-et-post-format-standard"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/apexsamplework.com\/insightnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2528","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/apexsamplework.com\/insightnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/apexsamplework.com\/insightnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/apexsamplework.com\/insightnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/apexsamplework.com\/insightnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2528"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/apexsamplework.com\/insightnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2528\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2529,"href":"https:\/\/apexsamplework.com\/insightnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2528\/revisions\/2529"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/apexsamplework.com\/insightnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2528"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/apexsamplework.com\/insightnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2528"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/apexsamplework.com\/insightnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2528"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}