'The Hope for White and Black'? Race, Labour and the State in South Africa and the United States, 1924-1956

Literature › Works

Alex Lichtenstein (2004). 'The Hope for White and Black'? Race, Labour and the State in South Africa and the United States, 1924-1956. Journal of Southern African Studies, Vol. 30, No. 1 (Special Issue: Race and Class in South Africa and the United States). Taylor & Francis (Carfax Publishing).

Type	journal article
Scope	Wider apartheid literature
Method	archival narrative
Period studied	1924–1956
Regions	South Africa, United States, US South
Themes	unions strikes, labour markets wages, origins segregation, politics ideology elections, comparative theory, resistance social movements
Citation key	lichtenstein2004

Argument

Lichtenstein compares South African and US labour relations between the 1930s and 1950s. Both countries saw left-led industrial unionism, independent black unions and some white openness to interracial cooperation, and in both this was defeated by an anti-communist purge, unfavourable labour law and the strengthening of right-wing union factions. He argues that the defeat of interracial unionism owed as much to state action and the legal context as to white working-class racism. In South Africa the state excluded Africans from recognised unionism and shielded white workers, which pushed black unionism into the liberation movement. In the US the racially liberal state later offered anti-discrimination litigation, and the civil rights movement lacked mass black worker participation. The argument is built from the Botha Commission record, SATLC and CIO documents, and secondary literature.

Evidence and method

Report of the Industrial Legislation Commission of Enquiry (Botha Commission, U.G. 62-1951); SATLC memoranda, minutes and conference reports (Hepple Archive, Carter-Karis Collection); Lucy Mason/Operation Dixie correspondence; Cayton and Mitchell's 1939 fieldwork study; Negro Year Book; Horrell's SAIRR reports; newspapers; extensive secondary literature on the CIO, the GWU and the Suppression of Communism Act.

Place in the debates

• Interracial unionism: possibility or apparatus of white supremacy (see Black trade unions: growth, wage effects, Wiehahn and strategy). Rejects the view (Herbert Hill, Nelson and others in the US; sceptics in South Africa) that unions were simply instruments of white supremacy. He argues the CIO and the SATLC left made real, if limited, efforts at interracialism that the state and anti-communism undercut.
• White working-class racism vs state action as the cause of failed interracial unionism (see Black trade unions: growth, wage effects, Wiehahn and strategy). Grants white racism a role but holds that the political and legal context, set as much by the state as by the unions, was equally significant.
• Parallel unions: control device or protective strategy (see Black trade unions: growth, wage effects, Wiehahn and strategy). Accepts the critique (Witz, Berger) that parallel branches were subordinating, but says the later attack on parallelism was too quick to impugn the motives of every SATLC element before 1954.

Findings

• Wartime manufacturing growth sharply increased the African and coloured industrial workforce. (p. 6)

  the number of African workers in this sector increased from 161,765 to 307,597.

• Lack of legal recognition and the migrant character of the workforce left African unions weak after 1945. (p. 6)

  By the time the Botha Commission convened in 1949, it could identify only 21,000 African union members

• The Botha Commission rejected equal union rights for Africans because they would threaten racial inequality and imply political enfranchisement. (p. 8)

  might be regarded as a precursor for the enfranchisement of natives

• The legal barriers to African unionism had no US counterpart, since US bars were voluntary rather than state-mandated. (p. 5)

  the legal barriers to African trade unionism had no counterpart in the United States, where bars to interracial unionism remained voluntary rather than state-mandated

• The Suppression of Communism Act removed many of the unionists most committed to interracial unity. (p. 15)

  By 1956, fifty-six trade union leaders had been forced to resign under its terms

• The SATLC shrank and dissolved in 1954, producing TUCSA, which excluded unregistered African unions, and the left formed SACTU. (p. 18)

  in 1954, with its total membership having dwindled to 80,000, and in the face of the impending Industrial Conciliation Act, the SATLC was dissolved.

• The 1953 Native Labour Act denied Africans employee status and banned their strikes, with the minister expecting unions to die out. (p. 19)

  'Natives will have no interest in trade unions, and trade unions will probably die a natural death', proclaimed the Minister of Labour, Ben Schoeman.

• The 1956 Industrial Conciliation Act turned parallel unions into powerless auxiliaries and ended mixed unions. (p. 20)

  because the 1956 Act barred Non-Europeans from sitting on union executive committees, it effectively transformed parallel unions into powerless auxiliaries

• Despite the 1953 and 1956 laws, African workers kept striking illegally and some strikes won wage increases. (p. 19)

  there were still 113 strikes involving over 6,000 African workers.

• The divergent outcomes made black unionism integral to the South African liberation movement, while in the US black workers turned to litigation. (p. 22)

  This placed the struggle for the rights of South African black workers in direct opposition to state policy, making black trade unionism an integral part of the liberation movement

Evidence ledger

Sources used

Source	Kind	Period	How used
Report of the Industrial Legislation Commission of Enquiry (Botha Commission), U.G. 62-1951, incl. Table 23A	commission or official report	1949-1951	Supplies manufacturing employment figures by race, counts and classification of African unions, SATLC affiliate membership, and the Commission's reasoning for rejecting mixed unions.
SATLC, 'Memorandum Presented to the Industrial Legislation Commission', Alex Hepple Archive (microfilm), Center for Research Libraries	union or movement records	c. 1949-1951	Used for SATLC's position on African unions and its affiliate membership breakdown by race.
SATLC, Industrial Legislation Commission: Recommendations, Comments, Evidence (microfilm, reel 4), LAS-NWU, incl. testimony of Makabeni, Maobo, Makoba, Rutherford, Downes	commission or official report	1949-1952	Testimony of African unionists and SATLC representatives shows demands for equal recognition and paternalist or limited-autonomy positions.
Carter-Karis Collection (LAS-NWU), Box 16-17: SATLC minutes of inaugural meeting 1949, annual conference reports 1950 and 1951, SACTU policy statement, 1955 conference address	union or movement records	1949-1955	Documents internal SATLC debates over barring or paralleling African unions and the left-right split.
Muriel Horrell, Racialism and the Trade Unions (SAIRR, 1959) and SAIRR Survey of Race Relations for 1952-53	official statistical series	1949-1959	Source for African union membership, Native Labour Board disputes, strike prosecutions, and the state of union disunity after 1956.
Negro Year Book: A Review of Events Affecting Negro Life, 1941-1946 (Tuskegee, 1947)	secondary literature compilation	1941-1946	Provides figures on black union membership, ILA, AFL and CIO enrolments, and USWA black membership.
Cayton and Mitchell, Black Workers and the New Unions (1939) – fieldwork study of steel workers	secondary literature compilation	1930s	Relied on for its fieldwork interviews and observations about black steelworkers' views and mixed unionism in the CIO.
Lucy Mason/Operation Dixie papers, Duke University (microfilm reel 63): letters from CIO Regional Directors (Haigler, Sandefur, Altall, Payton), 1945	union or movement records	May-June 1945	Shows the varied racial practices in southern CIO locals.
Industrial Union of Marine and Shipbuilding Workers of America papers, Local 32 Correspondence, University of Maryland Library	union or movement records	1943	Cited in support of the claim that black officers' responsibility mattered more than titular office in CIO locals.
FEPC Records, microfilm roll 85, Field Records Region VII (CRL)	state archives	1945	Evidence on race relations in wartime shipyards.
Newspapers and periodicals: Guardian (1948), Inkululeko (1948), Workers' Unity (1979), Miami Tribune (1937), The Crisis (1942), New Statesman and Nation (1951), Opportunity (1944), A Monthly Summary of Events and Trends in Race Relations	newspapers periodicals	1937-1979	Used for contemporary statements by unionists and observers (Wolfson, Davidson, Weaver, Townsend) and for the Miami ILA strike.
Witz, 'Servant of the Workers' (MA thesis, 1984) used for GWU membership figures; Sachs, Garment Workers in Action (1957)	secondary literature compilation	1928-1952	Source of GWU membership figures and the structure and operation of the parallel branches.
US legislation and court decisions: Wagner Act 1935, Taft-Hartley 1947, Title VII 1964, Steele v. Louisville & Nashville Railroad (1944), James v. Marinship Corp. (1944)	legislation gazette	1935-1964	Establishes the legal framework that shaped US unionism and black workers' recourse.
South African labour legislation: Industrial Conciliation Acts 1924, 1937, 1956; Native Labour (Settlement of Disputes) Act 1953; Suppression of Communism Act 1950	legislation gazette	1924-1956	Statutes defining African exclusion from 'employee' status, mixed-union bans and suppression of left union leaders.

Inference

Quantification: Illustrative figures.

Comparative historical narrative of South African and US labour relations, built from official commission evidence, archival union records and secondary studies. The central causal claim is that state action rather than white working-class racism explains the defeat of interracial unionism.

Key claims

Claim	Basis	Strength
World War II manufacturing growth sharply increased African and coloured industrial employment while barring Africans from union recognition, leaving African unions weak. (p. 137)	ILCE Table 23A for employment figures; ILCE and Horrell for union membership counts.	Partial data
The Botha Commission deliberately rejected equal union rights for Africans because enfranchisement in unions could precede political enfranchisement. (p. 139)	Quotations from the ILCE report's recommendations and findings.	Partial data
The SATLC was internally divided over African affiliation, and the left's non-racial vision lost out to defections and the Suppression of Communism Act. (p. 148)	SATLC conference reports and minutes in the Carter-Karis Collection, Hepple Archive memoranda, and press statements.	Partial data
The 1953 and 1956 legislation did not destroy African unions but ended interracial unionism and turned parallel unions into powerless auxiliaries. (p. 151)	Horrell's SAIRR report on disputes, strikes and union numbers, plus the statutes.	Partial data
In the US, CIO unions incorporated black workers on varied terms in the South, with practice ranging from fully mixed to segregated locals. (p. 143)	Cayton and Mitchell's fieldwork, Negro Year Book membership figures, and Lucy Mason's 1945 correspondence with CIO regional directors.	Illustrative or anecdotal
The defeat of interracial unionism in both countries owed as much to state action and the political-legal context as to working-class racism. (p. 152)	Synthesis of the legal and archival evidence above and secondary literature; not tested against alternative explanations.	Asserted

The author's caveats

The author notes that the Commission found it difficult to uncover information about the African unions and had to subpoena their leaders. He also notes that Davidson's membership claim was hyperbolic. Beyond these, he gives no systematic discussion of data limitations.

Gaps in the evidence

The argument that the state rather than white working-class racism was decisive is not tested against rank-and-file evidence such as union ballots, membership registers or white worker attitudes. Stronger tests would use systematic union membership and racial composition series, full Botha Commission testimony, and company or union records, much of which survives in archives. The US-South Africa comparison relies on selective anecdotes and secondary figures rather than comparable datasets.

Replicability: Data described but not public.