Civil Rights Leader A. Philip Randolph Confronts FDR in the White House — Wins EEO Order
Civil rights leader A. Philip Randolph on this day confronted President Franklin D. Roosevelt in the White House on the issue of equal employment opportunity for African Americans in the defense industry. Roosevelt demanded that Randolph cancel his planned March on Washington. Randolph refused, and FDR gave in and agreed to sign an equal employment opportunity order.
Randolph had announced his planned March on Washington on January 14, 1941. The Depression had ended and full employment had returned because of the war in Europe. The planned march caused President Roosevelt to panic, because he did not want to be pressured by anyone, much less by thousands of African-Americans. He was also dependent on the votes of Southern segregationists for defense-related programs, and did not want to alienate them.
When the pleas of the president’s allies did not persuade Randolph to cancel the march, Roosevelt invited him to the White House for a meeting, hoping that his personal charm would work. It didn’t. Randolph refused to budge, and Roosevelt finally backed down and agreed to sign what became Executive Order 8802, issued on June 25, 1941. Randolph in return cancelled the march.
In short, Randolph’s “march” was the most famous — and productive march– that never occurred.
Randolph’s dream of a civil rights march on Washington came true 22 years later, on August 28, 1963.
Randolph had an extraordinary career in confronting presidents in the White House. He had previously confronted Roosevelt, on September 27, 1940, over racial segregation in the military. He confronted President Harry Truman over segregation in a proposed military draft law, on March 22, 1948. And finally, on June 22, 1963, he dismissed, to his face, President John F. Kennedy’s plea to cancel the proposed March on Washington scheduled for that August.
Read the latest biography: David Welky, Marching Across the Color Line: A. Philip Randolph and Civil Rights in the World War II Era (2014)
Read the historic EEO 8802: http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/index.php?pid=16134
Learn more about the planned march: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zrTd_bXsZVM
Read about the proposed march: Herbert Garfinkel, When Negroes March (1959)
Learn more: Andrew Kersten, A. Philip Randolph: A Life in the Vanguard (2007)
Read an oral history interview with Randolph: http://www.lbjlibrary.net/collections/oral-histories/randolph-philip-a.html
Visit the National Museum of African American History and Culture here