Asa Philip Randolph, labor leader, and civil-rights leader, was born in Crescent City, FL, on this date April 15, 1889.
Randolph who was an influential figure in the struggle for justice and equality for African Americans. He was the organizer of the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters, and began organizing that group of Black workers. At a time when half the affiliates of the American Federation of Labor (AFL) barred Blacks from membership, Asa Phillip Randolph took his union into the AFL.
Despite opposition, he built the first successful Black trade union; the brotherhood won its first major contract with the Pullman Company in 1937.
He warned Pres. Franklin D. Roosevelt that he would lead thousands of Blacks in a protest march on Washington, D.C.; Roosevelt, on June 25, 1941, issued Executive Order 8802, barring discrimination in defense industries and federal bureaus and creating the Fair Employment Practices Committee.
“Our journey is not complete until our Gay Brothers and Sisters are treated like anyone else under the law. For if we are truly created equal then surely the love we commit to one another must be equal as well.”
Some would say that one should be honored to serve their county as a juror in a court of law.
If that is how I should feel, then shouldn’t every court, in this great nation or ours, recognize and honor my right to marry an adult, whom I love, and whose love is reciprocated, regardless of their gender or gender identification or sexual orientation?”
An Air Force spokesman confirmed today that the secretary of the Air Force approved a discharge under the military’s “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy on April 29 of this year. The discharge, according to a Pentagon spokeswoman, is the only such discharge since the Pentagon on Oct. 21, 2010, directed that DADT discharges would require the approval of the service branch secretary.
At a January news conference, Undersecretary of Defense for Personnel and Readiness Clifford Stanley said that no DADT-related discharges had occurred under the new procedure requiring the approval of the service branch secretary, Stanley and Defense Department general counsel for discharges. Prior to October 2010, a one-star general or the equivalent could sign off on a discharge.
