This article was originally written and published for MLK, Jr Day in 2018, and reposted from Medium. …
As CEOs and corporate politicians recite the accomplishments of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., it is especially important during this troubled time in our nation’s history to remember and remind others of MLK’s real legacy. King was a fierce and principled fighter. He was a brilliant strategist who exposed and confronted the brutality of racism and poverty. He was an outspoken critic of an economy that puts profits before people. And he carried forward a long, proud history of courageous men and women who have worked for racial, economic, and social justice in the United States and across the globe.
The Central Ohio Worker Center’s mission is to serve as an effective advocate for low-income and immigrant workers. Like MLK, COWC works with people who are struggling for dignity and equality. This mission compels us to prioritize building strong relationships with our friends in the labor movement. Speaking to a meeting of the AFL-CIO in 1961, King identified the “unity of purpose” between the movement for African American civil rights and the movement for economic justice lead by organized labor:
“This unity of purpose is not an historical coincidence. [We] are almost entirely a working people … Our needs are identical to labor’s needs: decent wages, fair working conditions, livable housing, old age security, health and welfare measure condition in which families can have education for their children and respect in the community. That is why [we] support labor’s demands and fight laws which curb labor. That is why the labor-hater and labor-baiter is virtually always a twin-headed creature spewing [racial] epithets from one mouth and anti-labor propaganda from the other mouth.” — MLK, Jr.
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