We are some of the oldest Americans here, the descendant of Black slaves.

And so if we forget that, if we forget how fundamentally American we are, just by the

length of history, then something goes wrong.

It's impossible to imagine America without the fingerprints of a Black working class.

The collectivity, the connection, the ability to survive and remake a new theme begins

and enslavement which begins well before the founding of the nation.

For all its talk of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness,

America would be nowhere without the blood, sweat, and tears of Black labor.

It began with white colonizers, trafficking and enslaving Black bodies to power the economy

of a nascent country and continued after the Civil War as millions of freed people

became American citizens and in the decades to come for the very first time

started being paid for their hard work. A Black working class was born.

They continued to be a cornerstone of American society, raising America's children,

growing and harvesting America's food, and building the throughways that would connect one

corner of the country to another.

The definition of working class doesn't break down neatly along income lines,

but typically it includes people who do hourly work that doesn't require much education,

jobs in the service industry, domestic work, and construction.

While many of these jobs often keep people in or close to poverty,

others like manufacturing have historically helped launch workers into the middle class

with enough income to fund the trepings of middleing American success,

like cars, vacations, and college educations for their children. Privileges denied them just a generation

...