Colored National Labor Union

Established in 1869, the Colored National Labor Union (CNLU) was formed by African Americans to organize their labor collectively on a national level. The CNLU, like other labor unions in the United States, had as its goal improving the working conditions and quality of life for its members.

African Americans were excluded from existing labor unions, such as when white workers formed the National Labor Union (NLU). William Sylvis, president of the NLU, made a speech in which he agreed that there should be "no distinction of race or nationality" within the ranks of his organization. In 1869 several black delegates were invited to the annual meeting of the NLU, among them Isaac Myers, a prominent organizer of African-American laborers. At the convention, he spoke eloquently for solidarity, saying that white and black workers ought to organize together for higher wages and a comfortable standard of living. However, the white unions refused to allow African Americans to join their ranks. In response to this, Myers met with other African-American laborers to form a national labor organization of their own, and in 1869 the Colored National Labor Union was formed with Myers as its first president.

The CNLU was established to help improve the harsh conditions facing black workers. Among the goals of the CNLU, which represented African-American laborers in 21 states, were the issuance of farmland to poor Southern African Americans, government aid for education, and new nondiscriminatory legislation that would help struggling black workers.

Following underrepresentaton within the predominately white National Labor Union, the National Colored Labor Convention met in 1869. This convention resulted in the formation of the Colored National Labor Union in the same year. The "Colored" National Labor Union was a post-civil war organization founded in December 1869 by an assembly of 214 African American mechanics, engineers, artisans, tradesmen and trades-women, and their supporters in Washington D.C. This organization was created in pursuit of equal representation for African Americans in the workforce. The labor union was organized by Isaac Myers, and elected its first president; civil rights activist Frederick Douglass was selected the president of the CNLU in 1872. Douglass' newspaper, The New Era was chosen as the official organ of this National Labor Union.

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