Work has always been central to the African American experience. Whether as slaves or freedmen, African Americans have had to struggle to gain economic opportunity even as they have struggled to defend the rights of citizenship established in the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments. From Emancipation to the present, on the farms and in the cities, and in the industrial and post-industrial economy, African American workers have demanded entry as equal citizens into the political economy.

For Jobs and Freedom: Race and Labor in America since 1865 analyzes the position of African American workers in the U.S. economy and social order over the past century and a half. It focuses on black workers' efforts to gain equal rights in the workplace and deals extensively with organized labor's complex and sometimes troubled relationship to African American workers. It highlights the problems and opportunities that have characterized efforts to build bi-racial unions and to forge a strong labor-civil rights political coalition. For Jobs and Freedom is an authoritative treatment of these issues and will be standard reading on the subject of race and labor in modern America for years to come.

Robert H. Zieger is Distinguished Professor of History at the University of Florida and the author of several books, including American Workers, American Unions; The CIO: 1935-1955 and John L. Lewis: Labor Leader.

Reviews:

"A synthesis of new literature on race and labor as well as original research in primary documents through the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, For Jobs and Freedom is an invaluable resource for the history of race and labor relations in the United States." --Tennessee Historical Commission

"Zieger's scholarship is always judicious, balanced, thorough, relentlessly intelligent, and beautifully crafted. A marvelous book."--Kevin Boyle, Ohio State University, author of Arc of Justice: A Saga of Race, Civil Rights, and Murder in the Jazz Age (winner of National Book Award for non-fiction and Pulitzer Prize finalist)

"A monumental achievement, broad in its scope, rich in its insights, judicious in its judgments. Informed by a lifetime's worth of research, reading, and thought by one of America's wisest and most accomplished historians, this book offers the best introduction now available to the long and difficult history of African Americans' struggle for opportunity and justice both in the workplace and the labor movement . In a narrative arc that stretches from emancipation to globalization, it tells a story that is at once sobering, enlightening, and inspiring."--Joseph A. McCartin, author of Labor's Great War: The Struggle for Industrial Democracy and the Origins of Modern American Labor Relations, 1912-1921

"A comprehensive, balanced, and meticulously detailed history of a contentious subject. It makes clear that race has been and is the most important fault line not just in the U.S. labor movement but in U.S. society as a whole. This book is destined to become the standard introduction in the field ."--Michael D. Yates, author of Why Unions Matter

"An admirable synthesis of the racial policies of the labor movement, the place and activities of black workers within it, and the promises and limits of union interracialism. Zieger brings to the task his depth of knowledge, sound judgment, and customary even-handedness and intellectual generosity. Promises to be the definitive treatment of these issues for a good while ."--Alex Lichtenstein, author of Twice the Work of Free Labor: The Political Economy of Convict Labor in the New South

"Robert Zieger explores one of the most contentious subjects in modern U.S. history in a subtle and dispassionate manner. Synthesizing an enormous body of recent scholarship with the best of the older studies about labor and race, Zieger dissects both the successes and the failures of the labor movement in its attempts to resolve racial tensions and conflicts among workers. He is equally sensitive to the factors that either influenced African American workers to turn to existing unions for assistance, to create their own exclusively black unions, or to disdain unions as a barrier to jobs and freedom. This is now the book to assign in courses that treat racial relations or the labor movement in modern U.S. history. It is far and away the one book that all readers interested in its subject should want to have on their shelves ."--Melvyn Dubofsky, author of The State and Labor in Modern America

"With energy and insight Robert Zieger puts the struggle of American-Americans for citizenship and dignity at the heart of our labor history. From the Civil War to the culture wars, Zieger offers us a complex but highly readable story of why and how organized labor, corporate capital, and the American state made the relationship between white and black workers such a vexing, yet sometimes an inspiring, part of the American narrative. A book from which both scholar and student can profit ."--Nelson Lichtenstein, author of State of the Union: A Century of American Labor

"In this accessible and broadranging account, distinguished historian Robert H. Zieger provides an overview of black workers' struggles since 1865. For Jobs and Freedom is well-balanced and navigates readers through a wealth of literature in a helpful and concise way. Zieger's work provides an excellent way for teachers to introduce labor issues to students of recent U.S. history. It should be recommended reading for students of post-1865 surveys and for any reader interested in understanding the historical roots of the contemporary struggle over affirmative action ."--Timothy J. Minchin, author of The Color of Work: The Struggle for Civil Rights in the Southern Paper Industry, 1945-1980

"A thoughtful, engaging and expansive survey of the problematic relationship between African Americans and organized labor."--Labor History

"An excellent job of pulling together a diverse historiography."--Southern Historian