Guide to the Philip Levy civil rights collection, 1948-1953 Philip Levy civil rights C0121


Descriptive Summary
Repository	George Mason University. Special Collections Research Center.
Creator	Philip Levy
Title	Philip Levy civil rights collection
Date	1948-1953
Physical Characteristics	1 linear feet
Abstract	This collection contains meeting minutes and grant proposals from the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) as well as correspondence on civil rights and race relations between senators and NAACP members. Many of the materials deal with the Fair Employment Practices Commission (FEPC), issued by Franklin Roosevelt in 1941 as executive order 8802.
Collection number	C0121
Language	English

Biographical Information

Philip Levy was a government official in several capacities, serving on the legal staff of the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) and as counsel to Senator Robert F. Wagner, and practiced private law in Washington, D.C., during a career that spanned 1934-1970. He was directly involved with the development of national labor policy in the United States in the 1930s and 1940s, and maintained a continued interest in labor policy throughout his long career.

Return to the Table of Contents

Scope and Content

This collection contains meeting minutes and grant proposals from the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) as well as correspondence on civil rights and race relations between senators and NAACP members. Many of the materials deal with the Fair Employment Practices Commission (FEPC), issued by Franklin Roosevelt in 1941 as executive order 8802 partly in response to protests organized by A. Philip Randolph. The bill was blocked from federal legislation by the conservative coalition in Congress, but five states passed their own FEPC bills: New York, New Jersey, Massachusetts, Connecticut and Washington. Several documents represented in this collection come from Connecticut.

The materials in this collection include a 1948 letter on civil rights from President Harry Truman to the Congress; a 1949 statement of Irving M. Engel on behalf of the American Jewish Committee to the House Committee on Labor and the Education Subcommittee on Discrimination in Employment; correspondence of Senator William Benton to Philip Levy, Walter White, and an op-ed to the New York Times; a 70 page "Program for Progress in Race Relations" submitted in 1951 by William H. Hastie, Arthur B. Spingarn, and Walter White on behalf of the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, Inc.; pamphlets from 1949 criticizing the Fair Employment Practices Commission on the bases of reverse discrimination and biological inequality between and among races; statements of Senator Herbert H. Lehman regarding civil rights, including an address to a Dinner of the American Civil Liberties Union; 1951 meeting minutes of the NAACP; and letters from the NAACP's Legal Defense and Education Fund to the Ford Foundation's Program Planning Division requesting support for research on unequal opportunities and world opinion on racial discrimination in the United States.

Return to the Table of Contents