Memorandum on West Coast Shipbuilding Companies

[1] The Boilermakers Union cases could be divided into three categories: (a) those originating prior to and considered at the hearing in 11/43; (b) those originating prior to but not considered at the hearing; and (c) those arising since the hearing. These complaints, like those mentioned in Mitchell’s memorandum of 7/21/44, were apparently among the new posthearings cases. See the section on the Boilermakers in the headnote on the FEPC and Unions.

In a memorandum to Johnson, Frank Reeves noted that at least 64 percent of workers (slight variation from Johnson at 1/22/44, note 1) in the shipbuilding industry were engaged in skills that came under the jurisdiction of the International Boilermakers Union. As of November 1943, he said, 348,466 persons were engaged in the industry, 29,069 of whom were nonwhite. The records of the San Francisco office listed twenty-one cases involving individual and organizational complaints pending against seven shipbuilding companies and eight locals of the Boilermakers Union in northern California, Oregon, and Washington. Reeves said the problem in the San Francisco Bay area was especially complicated by court actions that had been taken independently by groups of shipyard workers seeking to enjoin the companies and union from worsening discrimination policies and practices that the Committee in its hearing had found to be in violation of EO 9346. He said the effect of the related uncertainties, as the regional office reported, was that:

The Boilermaker situation, ever since the public hearings held on the coast [11/15–20/43], has become more serious and aggravated. When the Negroes saw that the FEPC could not take direct action against the union, they employed the injunction method. However, injunctions have only resulted in firmer resistance by the local Boilermakers Unions so that even though Negroes cannot be discharged after an injunction has been placed against the union and the company, no prospective or new employees can be hired. The injunction clearly does not cover this situation. What has happened is that, the Boilermaker Council representing all the Boilermakers Locals in the Bay area has gotten together and decided not to accept into the auxiliary or refer new Negro hires. While we have no specific data as to how many Negroes have been turned down through this “conspiracy,” we have reasons to believe that the numbers are very high. We have been informed of a number of instances where Negroes with their families have moved into the area expecting to be employed in the shipyards and have had to return because they could receive no employment. Some very positive and definitive action is necessary before the situation grows out of hand.

See related materials in HqR5, Office Files of George M. Johnson. Frank Reeves.

The regional office reported, furthermore, that there was evidence that the union, pending the court’s ruling on the application for an injunction against its plan, would “pick-off” blacks who were eading the opposition to the auxiliaries. The regional office expressed its appreciation for the Committee’s efforts to obtain compliance with the directive it issued on 12/9/43 as a result of the hearings in Portland and Los Angeles. “However, the Regional office has been and is being subjected to constant pressure.”