Bust of A. Phillip Randolph (1889 – 1979) in Union Station by Ed Dwight, 1990

Photo credit: Russell Smith

Location:

Union Station, Washington DC. 50 Massachusetts Avenue, NE, Washington DC. From 1990 to 2023., the statue was located in the Claytor Concourse, the passenger departure area near the Baggage Claim area, and adjacent to the train tracks, pointing towards the tracks as if overseeing the porters and rail workers whose rights Randolph guaranteed. The statue was moved several times within the concourse; its base was cracked and a vandal snapped off the eyeglasses at least twice. In late August 2024, the restored statue, with new eyeglasses and encased in a protective plexiglass covering and on a higher base, was installed in the Grand Concourse of Union Station, facing south in the direction of the US Capitol.

Visual Description

A bronze bust of the great African American labor activist and civil rights leader A. Phillip Randolph, his left hand extended as if for emphasis. His lowered right hand  holds a pair of spectacles. He wears a suit and tie, and his expression is perhaps a bit quizzical.

The metal plaque reads:

A. Phillip Randolph, 

April 15, 1889-May 16, 1979. 

Dedicated by the AFL-CIO to  A. Phillip Randolph, America’s foremost Black labor and civil rights leader. The founder of the Brotherhood of Sleeping Care Porters, he conceived and initiated the 1963 March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom.  

 “At the banquet table of nature there are no reserved seats. You get what you can take, and you keep what you can hold. If you can't take anything, you won’t get anything, if you can’t hold anything you won’t keep anything. And you can’t take anything without organization.”

A. Phillip Randolph. 

Ed Dwight, Sculptor

1990

Historical Background:

A. Phillip Randolph came of age in Jacksonville, Florida during the Jim Crow era and experienced first hand intensive racial discrimination. He was valedictorian in his graduating class at the Cookman Institute. He credits reading W.E.B.ED DuBois, the Souls of Black Folk in inspiring his political awakening. He moved to New York City in 1911 during the early years of the Great Migration in search of economic and educational opportunity.

In New York City Randolph was active in socialist politics and founded with Chandler Owen the important leftist monthly The Messenger. His political philosophy was grounded in a Marxist critique of class inequality, an insistence on empowerment through economic opportunity, a commitment to the dignity of labor, and a humanist anti- racism.

After a period of early union organizing, in 1925 Randolph was elected president of the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters, the first major predominantly Black labor union. The BSCP grew in size and influence after collective bargaining rights were protected by New Deal legislation under Franklin Delano Roosevelt.

As the US entered World War II, Randolph campaigned for civil rights protection for Black workers in Defense-related industries. He threatened a major Black march on Washington, which was cancelled after Roosevelt signed the Fair Employment Act. which banned discrimination in war industries, but not discrimination within the Armed Services itself, which continued through the 1940s. President Truman’s 1948 decision to end segregation within the Armed Forces is considered a direct result of Randolph’s postwar campaign urging young Black men to refuse to register for the peacetime draft.

Randolph emerged as a major architect of the modern Civil Rights movement and was a significant theoretician of non violent mass resistance. He co-founded the umbrella organization the National Conference on Civil Rights and was instrumental in training Martin Luther King Jr in the philosophy and practice of non violent mobilization. He is generally considered the key figure behind the National March for Peace and Freedom, of August 28, 1963 in Washington DC, now most remembered for Dr. King’s “I have a dream speech.” He is credited, along with Dr King and James Bevel, for leading the successful pressure campaign that culminated in the 1964 Civil Rights Act and the 1965 Voting Rights Act.

Sculptor Ed Dwight was commissioned by the AFL-CIO to create the statue of Randolph, which was placed in the departure concourse of Union Station in 1990. It was renovated and moved in August 2024 to a more prominent location in the Grand Concourse of the station.

Note on the artist: Ed Dwight, an Air Force pilot, was the first Black person selected for NASA’s astronaut training program. A. Phillip Randolph actively pressured Presiden Kennedy to ensure at least one African American was selected as an astronaut candidate). Dwight was subjected to racial harassment and discrimination while at NASA, and was forced out of the program. He later turned to sculpture and became one of the most prolific American sculptors. His other prominent works in Washington DC include the Frederick Douglass bust in the Frederick Douglass National Historic site in Anacostia, and the Mother of Africa Chapel in the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception

Interpretive Notes:

As originally conceived by the artist, the sculpture was more or less at eye level with passengers on the departure concourse of Union Station, and thus had an intimate relationship with passersby who viewed it. First hand accounts of Randolph note that he would often take off his glasses when speaking with people, and this sense of interactive openness is communicated by having his spectacles held in his right hand as his left hand gestures towards his interlocutors. The early placement of the statue in the busy departure concourse near the Baggage claim zone honored the long legacy of railway porters whose dignity Randolph long struggled to protect. The new positioning of the sculpture in the Grand Concourse of the station elevates the figure, and perhaps visually links him to the towering 48 sculpted Legionnaire plaster statues that ring the upper balcony of the Concourse.

Prompts for closer looking:

• What does the artist achieve by having Randolph holding his eyeglasses in one hand and extending his other arm outwards? What feelings of formality and informality are communicated by the overall composition?

  
  

• Many viewers sense that Randolph is somewhat amused by something? What might be amusing or bemusing him, to your mind?

  
  

• What was gained and lost through the repositioning of the statue in August 2024. From 1990 onwards, the figure was placed at more or less eye level, immediately facing departing passengers and working railway porters. Now, he is more elevated and encased in protective plexiglass, facing in the direction of the US Capitol (where important Civil Rights legislation he campaigned for was passed into law by Congress) and the National Mall, where the 1963 March on Washington, which he helped organize, took place. Is this advantageous or disadvantageous, to your mind?

  
  

• Although not initially intended by the artist, what effect is now achieved by having the Randolph sculpture beneath the 48 Legionnaires sculptures that protectively circle the upper balconies of the Grand Concourse. Is Randolph too now positioned as safeguarding all those who pass through the station embarking on their journeys?

  
  

• The artist Ed Dwight was conscious of Randolph’s role in campaigning for someone like him to become America’s first Black astronaut. In what sense can this artwork be understood as a personal act of homage to Randolph by Dwight?

  
  

Creative Response

Compose or perform a conversation that Randolph might have with a passing visitor, about civil rights, labor rights, or other important issues of the day. What might he consider most important on the national and international scene at the current moment?

Learning Resources

Wikipedia entry on A. Phillip Randolph: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A._Philip_Randolph

An intriguing discussion of the glasses in Randolph’s hand is found in Corey D McQuinn’s blogpost, “A. Philip Randolph has lost his glasses, Again”, 2016.    https://acomplicatedpast.wordpress.com/2016/04/18/a-philip-randolph-has-lost-his-glasses-again/

Artist’s website: www.eddwight.com