CBTU Buffalo

The Struggle for freedom and equality have always seen unions as a fundamental instrument for achieving its goals, even though at times some unions discriminated against blacks. In the aftermath of a police attack on striking Memphis sanitation workers on February 23, 1968 - the strike that brought Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. to Memphis — black marchers began holding signs proclaiming, "I am a Man." That simple slogan carried the profound sentiment that was central to the civil-rights movement was the assertion of a basic humanity that had been denied to blacks in this country since the writing of the U.S. Constitution. The sanitation strike affirmed that in the context of the workplace, unionization was a central strategy for achieving dignity. Despite the myriad of changes that have taken place over the past 40 years, blacks still face tremendous challenges in the workplace. The black community faces a two-pronged job crisis: the crisis of unemployment and the crisis of low-wage jobs. Over the years Coalition of Black Trade Unionists (CBTU) has taken up the fight for social, political and economic justice inside and out of the labor movement.