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process of seizing control over the apprenticeship program and the union
64
apparatus.1™
The only really significant concentration of Black trade unionists in the
industrial proletariat — and the most important Black trade-union organization in
the area - was in transport, in the International that Longshoremen's Union. By
1930,69% of all longshoremen in Baltimore were Black, as were at least 60% of all
ILA members. There were 5 ILA locals in town, four of which had Black members
and one of which, composed of more highly skilled checkers and shipping clerks,
barred Blacks and immigrants. But the key to the role of Blacks in the ILA was the
largest local, Local No. 858, with a membership in the vicinity of one-thousand,
99% of whom were African American.
Prior to the Civil War, most longshoremen in Baltimore were Black. In the
antebellum period they were progressively replaced by white immigrants. In 1900,
white longshoremen, mainly ethnic Germans, struck, and Black longshoremen were
shipped in from Norfolk to replace them. Many of the Blacks remained after the
strike was settled. In 1912, the scenario repeated itself: the whites struck and more
Blacks were brought in from Norfolk. Immediately after the 1912 strike the ILA
moved in with a major effort to organize the white longshoremen, but found it was
necessary to organize the Black longshoremen as well. In 1914, ILA Local No. 829
was founded on an interracial basis, with whites in all the top positions of
leadership and Blacks in secondary posts.
Then, in 1916, most of the Black longshoremen in Local 829 split off to form
their own local with their own leadership because of "the questionable honesty of
certain white financial officers on the controlling board of the union. ' Despite
the opposition of white longshoremen in Baltimore, the international chartered the
new local, Local 858. Also in 1916, a number of Black longshoremen reportedly
became involved with the IWW as the organization attempted to duplicate in
Baltimore its successes among Black longshoremen in Philadelphia. This
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