January 17, 2025

Remembering Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.’s Pro-Worker Legacy

As we celebrate the Martin Luther King, Jr. holiday – Monday, January 20 – it’s important to remember his work to connect the labor and the civil rights movements.

Dr. King understood that unions ensure that working people have a voice. He told the 1961 AFL-CIO Convention that “(t)he labor movement did not diminish the strength of the nation but
enlarged it. By raising the living standards of millions, labor miraculously created a market for industry and lifted the whole nation to undreamed of levels of production. Those who
today attack labor forget these simple truths, but history remembers them.”

Dr. King’s legacy was highlighted last week at the Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Civil and Human Rights Conference in Austin, Texas. Event speakers included AFL-CIO President Liz Shuler, AFL-CIO Secretary-Treasurer Fred Redmond, Rep. Jasmine Crockett (D-TX), and Rep. Greg Casar (D-TX). Members of the Texas Alliance attended and staffed an information booth.

“Dr. King’s work to intertwine civil rights with workers’ rights was invaluable,” said President Roach. “We must advance his work by continuing to preserve everyone’s right to join together in union and have a voice on the job.”