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anti-racism. Although numbers are unavailable, a fair number of Black trade
unionists and leaders were present; two African American workers were elected as
vice-presidents. A resolution against Jim Crow in the unions and in industry was
passed overwhelmingly, as were several having to do especially with Black workers,
such as one in solidarity with the Comfort Springs strike and one advocating the
extension of Social Security coverage to domestic and agricultural workers.
Moreover, during a break in the convention, when Jesse Smith of the NMU and
Arthur Murphy of SWOC were refused lunch at the Moose Hall cafeteria, white
and Black CIO delegates swiftly organized a boycott of the cafeteria that lasted for
the rest of the conference. °

Hence, despite the fact that both the CIO and the AFL in the Baltimore
region benefited from the strike wave of 1937, by the end of the year, the contrasts
between the two movements could hardly have been greater.

One year later, on December 7, 1938, John T. Jones, president of the
MDCIUC, made his report to the organization's second annual convention. He
began his report by remarking:

We have just passed through the first year of our history. ... In November,
1937, in Baltimore when we met to form this organization, the economic
recession, a general nation wide business depression had begun to make
itself felt. The recession continued on through most of the year and only in
recent months have there been some slight indication of recovery trends.
Despite this obstacle, we have gone forward. We have laid the basis for a
solid united labor movement concerning itself day in and day with every
single problem of interest to the working man and woman.

As in the country as a whole, the "Roosevelt recession" of 1937-38 had
reversed most of the employment gains made in Baltimore since the economic
trough of 1933. And as in many locales, Blacks again suffered disproportionately
from the decline: by February 1938 the Afro estimated that 2,000 of the 4,000 Black
workers at the Sparrows Point steel plant had already been laid off. An economic