The Story of Steele v. Louisville & Nashville Railroad: White Unions, Black Unions, and the Struggle for Racial Justice on the Rails
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Description
By the time William Bestor Steele became a railroad fireman on the Louisville & Nashville Railroad (the “L & N”) in February 1910, the unions representing firemen, engineers, brakemen and other operational railroad workers (often referred to as the “Big Four” unions) were already among the oldest and strongest labor organizations in the country. Organized on a craft basis, they had successfully negotiated collective bargaining agreements since the 1880's. By World War I, they “had virtually complete control of their respective crafts throughout the country.” Among them was the Brotherhood of Locomotive Firemen and Engineers (the “BLFE” or the “Brotherhood”), established in 1873. Within the troubled history of labor unionism in the South, the railroad brotherhoods were uniquely successful in organizing workers. The success was, in part, because railroads were regulated by the federal government, which itself had recognized early that stable collective bargaining had benefits for labor peace on the rails. But one suspects that another cause for their success in the South was the role of race on the Southern railroads. The fact that Steele v. Louisville and Nashville Railroad Co. is not simply a labor law case, but also an employment discrimination case, is obvious on the surface of the Supreme Court's opinion. What is less obvious is that Steele is not simply a dispute between a labor union and unorganized black railroad employees, nor simply a dispute between private parties, nor simply a case raising questions of domestic race policy. The Steele case arose in the infancy of American labor law, at a time when the roles of courts and agencies were not yet well defined. It arose before federal employment discrimination law was even imaginable. And it arose on the eve of America's entry into World War II, a time when America's war against racism in Europe drew unfriendly foreign attention to America's racist practices at home. Against this background of uncertain law, the case illustrates the heroic, and in this case, successful efforts of black workers to use the collective strength of their own unions to seek legal redress. It also illuminates the often-futile efforts of the administration of Franklin D. Roosevelt and his chosen Supreme Court to ensure that the New Deal, which often bypassed minority workers, would at least defend the rights of the small minority among them with contractual rights worth defending.
Source Publication
Labor Law Stories
Source Editors/Authors
Laura J. Cooper, Catherine L. Fisk
Publication Date
2005
Recommended Citation
Malamud, Deborah C., "The Story of Steele v. Louisville & Nashville Railroad: White Unions, Black Unions, and the Struggle for Racial Justice on the Rails" (2005). Faculty Chapters. 1300.
https://gretchen.law.nyu.edu/fac-chapt/1300
