ASA PHILIP RANDOLPH - LABOR / CIVIL RIGHTS LEADER

ATHEIST - SOCIALIST - HOMOSEXUAL

"At the banquet table of nature there are no reserved seats.

You get what you can take, and you keep what you can hold.
If you can't take anything, you won't get anything; and if you can't hold anything, you won't keep anything.

And you can't take anything without organization."
[A. Philip Randolph]

The Harlem Renaissance of the 1920s marked a recultivation of literary acclaim for Black writers. Journalism, in particular, was invigorated in various Black communities. Newspapers such as Negro World, Chicago Defender, Pittsburgh Courier, and The Messenger were vehicles for the literary talents of these Atheists. Soapbox orators still spoke before the public, but the mass media offered a broader exposure. Oral expression gave way to written expression.

Asa Philip Randolph and Chandler Owen offered a special contribution to Black journalism. Randolph was born in March 1889 at Crescent City, Florida. He attended Bethune-Cookman College and City College of New York. Randolph showed an interest in the theater but developed his tastes for political science, history, and economics in New York City. Labor strikes by the Industrial Workers of the World in 1912-13 became a focal point for politically minded students like Randolph, who joined the Socialist school of thought. Owen was born in April 1889 at Warrenton, North Carolina. He graduated from Virginia Union University and by 1913 studied sociology and political science at Columbia University. Jervis Anderson's biography, A. Philip Randolph: A Biographical Portrait, gives this observation on the pre-Messenger days for Owen and Randolph:

When not attending their classes at City College and Columbia, the two spent their spare time together — chiefly at Randolph's apartment and at the New York Public Library — studying "the theory and history of socialism and working-class politics" and "their application to the racial problem in America." In the evenings, whenever radicals like Eugene Debs, August Claessens, Elizabeth Gurley Flynn, Abraham Shiplacoff, or Morris Hillquit were appearing in Socialist and labor forums downtown, Randolph and Owen went to hear them. And whenever Hubert H. Harrison, black [sic] Harlem's own Socialist spellbinder, was speaking at the corner of Lenox Avenue and 135th Street, the young men would be there.

Randolph and Owen themselves served terms as soapbox orators, Owen taking a more sarcastic tone, Randolph taking a more diplomatic one. In 1917, William White, president of the Headwaiters and Sidewaiters Society of Greater New York, hired Owen and Randolph to edit Hotel Messenger, the periodical for Black hotel employees. As editors, Randolph and Owen printed an expose on internal kickbacks for waiters' uniforms. The two were swiftly relieved of their duties, whereupon they set out to organize their own union and magazine. This new magazine, Messenger, allowed the two to articulate some noble, yet unpopular, values from the Black press. During Messenger's first year, the November 1917 issue expressed the following Atheistic values:

"Our aim is to appeal to reason, to lift our pens above the cringing demagogy of the times, and above the cheap peanut politics of the old reactionary Negro leaders. Patriotism has no appeal to us; justice has. Party has no weight with us; principle has. Loyalty is meaningless; it depends on what one is loyal to. Prayer is not one of our remedies; it depends on what one is praying for. We consider prayer as nothing more than a fervent wish; consequently the merit and worth of a prayer depend upon what the fervent wish is."

An avowedly Socialist magazine. Messenger protested American intervention into World War I and hailed the Bolshevik Revolution in the Soviet Union. Clearly, bootlicking to government policy was not a priority to the Messenger staff. Referring to Randolph and Owen, Messenger contributor Theophilus Lewis reported that "Attorney General Palmer said that the most dangerous Negroes in the United States were these two guys." Palmer clearly intended the remark about Randolph and Owen as an insult. After considering the source, Black folk in certain circles arrived at the opposite conclusion. So, a whole school of Black writers developed around the Messenger. In addition to Randolph and Owen, experience with Messenger furthered the careers of journalists such as George S. Schuyier, Joel A. Rogers, Theophilus Lewis, and Walter Everette Hawkins.

Both Randolph and Owen mellowed with age. With rioting and lynching in the Northern states in 1919, the phrase Red Summer was a good description of current events. The two were imprisoned in the 1920s, allegedly for violating the Espionage Act, but really for their activism and high profile. George Schuyler commented in his autobiography that Owen suffered disillusionment over the white Socialist unions. Owen's brother, a skilled tailor, was refused entry to the white union at the wage corresponding to his expertise. Owen did break with the Socialist party and in the mid-1920s became managing editor of the Chicago Bee. Schuyler noted Owen especially for his iconoclasm, yet Owen remained active in mainstream politics. He campaigned and wrote speeches for candidates including Wendell Willkie, Thomas Dewey, Dwight Eisenhower, and Lyndon Baines Johnson. In 1925, Randolph organized the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters, which was later chartered by the AFL. Randolph himself served as vice president of the AFL-CIO. At America's entry into World War II, he led the "March on Washington" demonstration. This march protested the awarding of government contracts to industries practicing segregation. With an established reputation as a civil rights activist, he was a pivotal figure in the 1963 "March on Washington" protest for enactment of a civil rights bill.

(Note: Hoover's FBI compiled a huge file on Randolph, as with all prominent civil rights figures. Hoover threatened to make public Randolph's homosexuality.)

"Salvation for a race, nation or class must come from within. Freedom is never granted; It is won. Justice is never given; It is exacted."
[A. Philip Randolph]

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