by Demetrius Williams, President, ILWU Local 10, and John William Templeton, California African-American Freedom Trail
The unique role of Juneteenth in San Francisco and labor history will be our revelation to many and a reminder to even more as ILWU Local 10 marks Juneteenth on Thursday, June 19, at our Labor Temple, 400 North Point St., beginning at 10 a.m.
As the new president of ILWU Local 10, it is important that our entire community understand how impactful our members have been for more than a century. Having produced the documentary on ILWU legend LeRoy King, I’ve been highlighting all year the ordinary people who achieved extraordinary feats through organized labor.
As this day approaches, all those gains are at risk, because the larger population has lost the memory of the working heroes who established collective bargaining and our civil rights breakthroughs.
There is a battle for the soul of working people that recalls the strikebreaking days of 1919, when white dockworkers were undermined by Black strikebreakers.
Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. is an honorary member of Local 10. When he was arrested in Birmingham in 1963, Local 10 shut down the waterfront for a day and collaborated with Black churches for a 20,000 person rally.
During the Montgomery bus boycott, Local 10 provided volunteers and financial support for the vehicles that moved thousands around. They would facilitate the relocation of King’s predecessor in the Montgomery Improvement Association, Rev. L. Roy Bennett, to San Francisco for safety
Local 10’s role in the strike of 1934 led to the passage of the National Labor Relations Act, facing its greatest attack currently.
For LeRoy King and other labor leaders such as Geraldine Johnson, Juneteenth was a way to organize the many who migrated from Texas to the Bay Area to work on the waterfront as longshore and ship building workers into a potent political force that opened doors across the globe.
A similar shutdown of the waterfront gave the spark for the end of apartheid in South Africa.
The same tired rhetoric that led to the Red Summers of the 1919-21 era has come back, powered by artificial intelligence and social media.
We not only want to inform the audience about the misinformation on Juneteenth, properly seen as the Union victory in the Civil War instead of Appomattox Court House, but also reconnect with the labor consciousness that we need even more today than ever.
As labor leaders are arrested in Los Angeles, and elected officials in various jurisdictions, we must remember that nothing moves without labor. Join us for food, music and a thrilling history that we must pass on to the next generation .
We see the goal of 10,000 new jobs, particularly union jobs, as the solution to the erosion of the Black community in San Francisco. The history of Local 10 must be the future for a prosperous San Francisco.
Demetrius Williams is the current President of ILWU Local 10, President of the San Francisco Hyper Local Building Trades Contractors Collective, better known as the SFHLBTCC – Community Contractors who meet to discuss contracting opportunities – District 10 advocate and owner of CIW AND SONS PLUMBING CO. John William Templeton is producer of “The King Behind King, Bridges, Chavez and Mandela.” Templeton is also the author of “The Black Encyclopedia” and “Our Roots Run Deep: the Black Experience in California, Vols. 1-4.” He chaired the Central Brooklyn Economic Development Corp. in New York City, was lead developer of the Sargent Johnson National Museum of African-American Art and heads the Golden Reunion Committee of the Class of ’75, Howard University. Both Williams and Templeton will speak during the ILWU Local 10 Juneteenth on June 19.
