Jay Rubin – HTC President

Jay Rubin – HTC President

The following are highlights of the remarks made at the Local 6 Better Race Relations award meeting by Jay Rubin, President of the Hotel Trades Council.

I feel honored that our membership has voted to grant the award this year to the heroes of Little Rock. I'm especially glad that it was a trade union. I am more than glad that it was our Union that did it. The reason that I'm so proud is because I want not only you, but also the heroes of Little Rock, to know that it was the labor movement, the trade union movement of this country, that was always in the leadership of the fight for the rights of the people. It might have been the fight to abolish sweatshops, or to establish public schools, or to integrate the workers on the job. On these and many other issues the labor movement has always been ready to fight for the welfare of the people.

In our own Union we have carried on such a fight since our inception. I want these children from Little Rock to know that the Hotel Union is a Union of all people. There is not a nationality in the world that you will not find among the workers in the hotel industry.

I also want you youngsters to know that 20 years ago, before our Union was established, the hotel industry was a lily-white industry and African-Americans were not allowed to work in it. Nor were other minority groups. It took a fight of 20 years for us to be able to say today that in the majority of departments there are mixed groups at work, African-American and white. This integration on the job has worked out so successfully that nobody, viewing the results, can question the rightness of integration in schools or any other place.

But there are still lily-white hotels. There are still lily-white departments in some of the hotels. Our fight is not over yet in trying to see that the African-American workers in our industry are promoted to better jobs, to advanced jobs, so their earning power is increased. Our fight against discrimination is not only a fight for the African-American.

Another problem in our industry today is represented by the thousands of Puerto Ricans who are discriminated against and who in many instances are given the most menial jobs. We must fight also to eliminate this discrimination and establish the right for these Puerto Rican workers to be promoted exactly as anyone else.

I want to say to our young guests from Little Rock that their fight has been an inspiration to all of us. There are many people who have forgotten the fights in which others made great sacrifices so that we may enjoy our present benefits and our present standard of living. And some are so forgetful that they are submitting to backward attitudes. They say: "Why should we fight for integrated schools; let them have separate schools. Let's have separate locker rooms for the African-Americans. Let's have separate locker rooms for the Puerto Ricans."

Yes, there are some like that. And there are some - and even a few are too many - who say: "Why should we stick our necks out and speak up on this issue and other issues? Let's submit. Let's not stir up trouble. Let's go along with things the way they are." An attitude like that can only set our country back, and can only halt our progress.

The fight of these children - who didn't take the easy way - has inspired us and strengthened our feeling that we cannot just sit idly by. We cannot say, "Let George do it," that it doesn't affect us. It very much affects us. These children have inspired us to continue the fight and, let me emphasize, to continue it right here as well as supporting them in the South.

Let me also tell you children that even though you will see New York, you will see its brightest aspects. There is no question that in comparison with the atmosphere in Little Rock, New York is a haven. But there is discrimination in New York.

There is housing that minorities are not admitted to, and there are other places where discrimination is encountered. There are the private clubs, which the anti-discrimination law of the state of New York does not yet cover. These clubs have a legal right to discriminate against the African-Americans coming in to work! This is a campaign that we hare to carry on.

Our fight here will help you to carry through the fight in the South. Your inspiration will help us not to lay low, but to continue this fight. So we can't just always be satisfied and put ourselves on the back and say that everything is good.

We have a good governor but he has a Republican legislature. They stand in his way in efforts to advance the fight for equal rights. We say to the Governor: "You are on the right road. The people of New York are behind you. The establishment of equality is the basis for the foundation of democracy, for the organization of the workers."

Now let me say to you that the reason the enemies of equality are getting away with their policies is because the labor movement in the South is not organized. The reason they are successful is they have kept the workers divided, exactly as they kept us in the New York hotel industry divided, to prevent us from organization. The fight for equality and the fight for the right to organize and to bargain collectively with the employers most go hand in hand.

We tell these children, we pledge to them, that we will be behind them. Their inspiration will be a guide to us all. And you delegates in the hotels must be the ones to see to it that no hotel in this city shall remain lily-white.