Ardent citizens: African American Elks and the fight for equal employment opportunities

Abstract

The Improved Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks of the World (IBPOEW), an African American fraternal order established in 1897, is, like other fraternal groups, a benevolent association. However, black Elks express a large part of their fraternalism in political agitation. Routinely viewed merely as mutual aid societies, black fraternal organizations are not conceptualized as groups of labour activists. By examining the Elks' use of citizenship rights in the fight to expand employment opportunities, this article demonstrates that the IBPOEW, with its extraordinary departmental structure, consistently fought for African Americans' rights as workers. It suggests that African American fraternal organizations offer an additional domain in which we can find black workers engaged in labour struggles. Therefore, the article broadens labour studies historiography to include an analysis of black fraternal organizations as sites where workers develop solidarity and participate in labour activism with and without labour unions.