Purple Ballot: unions and 'shifting the tide' of labor; 'Black Folk' and the long history of collective action in the South

Due South

North Carolina State University historian Ajamu Dillahunt-Holloway joins co-host Leoneda Inge to talk labor movements in North Carolina and the South. He connects the past to the struggles—and accomplishments—of organizing today, and discusses the presidential campaigns efforts to court union voters.

Blair LM Kelley is a historian who knows the power of storytelling, weaving her own family's history into her award-winning book Black Folk: The Roots of the Black Working Class, which recently came out in paperback. Kelley recounts individual stories of Black workers, including her great-grandfather, in the post-war South who had no recourse when white landowners withheld their pay—and risked violence or death if they complained.

In a wide-ranging conversation with co-host Leoneda Inge, Kelley also explains how many disenfranchised Black workers — from washerwomen across the South to Pullman porters across the country — used the power of collective action, community connection, and eventually unions to improve conditions for themselves, and everyone.