AFSCME Local 77, Duke University
| Full name | AFSCME Local 77, Duke University |
|---|---|
| Founded | August 1965 |
| Predecessor | Duke Employees Benevolent Society |
| Affiliation | American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees |
| Office location | Duke University |
| Country | USA |
The Local 77 chapter of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees was a Duke University labor union established in August 1965. It initially began as the Duke Employees Benevolent Society in February 1965, led by Oliver Harvey. The formation of Local 77 was directed towards improving work conditions for the working class employees, most of whom were African-American. Members fought for minimum wage increases, improvements in working conditions, and medical benefits for employees. The union members of Local 77 demanded a systematic way of dealing with workplace complaints that were impartial to the Duke University administration. Because the majority of the union's members were African-American, several of the goals overlapped with the ideas of the Civil Rights Movement.
The first steps towards inclusion of black Durham residents in the work force occurred during World War II, when the federal government reluctantly allowed black workers to fill up open job positions in Durham, left by those who went to fight in the war. What seemed a promising step towards civil rights efforts faded as soldiers returned at the end of the war to reclaim their positions in society. Both black men and women lost their factory jobs at the shutdown of several major wartime plants that were no longer needed post-war. Oliver Harvey, who later led the organizational efforts of Local 77, was affected by the wartime demand for black employees.
Born in Franklinton, North Carolina, a small textile and tobacco town, Harvey grew up alongside his father who owned his own land, which was very uncommon for black farmers in the 1930s. When his tenants stole from his property, Harvey’s father lost his land. Refusing to join the sharecropping business, Harvey looked for work in Durham. In 1936, Harvey found a job at the American Tobacco Company where the segregated unions troubled him. In a journal article about his father, the younger Harvey wrote, “I got my hatred for segregation from my father. He was raised up in the house of a white couple, two liberal lawyers. He learned to always speak up for himself.” In 1943, Harvey worked at the Krueger Bottling Company in Durham where he successfully led efforts to integrate the segregated black and white unions. During the black union protest against the segregated pay scales, forty-four out of the forty-five whites in the plant joined the black union in their strike. Eight years later, Harvey began work as a nighttime janitor at Duke University where he encountered a discouraging atmosphere for social change. Duke was a segregated school at the time, as all Southern institutions were, and was not integrated until 1963. Even following integration, racial inequality still existed during the Civil Rights Movement. Black workers were to address students by “Mister” and “Miss,” though the reverse was not required of the students. Harvey’s confrontation with a student who objected to this rule led to the end of this practice. His insistence for more respect towards university workers suggested that the goals of the labor union extended beyond the need for fair wages, but also for independence, credibility, and authority, matching the goals of the Civil Rights Movement at the time.
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