Scott, Tyree, 1940-2003.

Seattle labor and civil rights leader.

Tyree Scott, a Texas-born electrician who served in the Marines during the Vietnam War, settled in Seattle in 1966. Discrimination against black workers in the construction trades led him to organize peaceful demonstrations, and in 1970 he co-founded the United Construction Workers Association with support from the American Friends Service Committee. The UCWA aimed to unite minority construction workers and racially integrate the unions. An early victory came in 1970, when Judge William J. Lindberg found that racial discrimination had been practiced in local unions (United States vs. Ironworkers Local 86, et al). Scott also served on the board of the Northwest Labor and Employment Law Office (LELO), which was begun in 1973 by the UCWA, the Alaska Cannery Workers Association, and the Washington State United Farm Workers to help workers pursue legal recourse in issues of labor discrimination.

From the description of Tyree Scott papers, circa 1970-1995. (Unknown). WorldCat record id: 53049675

Tyree Scott (1940-2003) was a labor leader and activist deeply involved in many minority workers’ and equal opportunity organizations.

Scott, an electrician, grew up in Texas, moved to Seattle in 1966 and became a leader in the Central Contractors Association. This organization of minority workers led many peaceful demonstrations against discriminatory hiring practices in Seattle’s construction industry in the summer and fall of 1969. Through the protests, the issue of discriminatory employment was noted by the American Friends Service Committee. After investigating the situation, the American Friends Service Committee approached Scott and the leadership of the Central Contractors Association and proposed a new community-based organization that would organize minority workers to fight discrimination in the unions and in the construction trades. The United Construction Workers Association was founded in 1970 with financial support from the American Friends Service Committee. Tyree Scott was a founding member and worked intensively within the Association, first as a paid staff member and then later as a director.

United Construction Workers Association combined community organization, peaceful demonstrations, and legal action to fight workplace discrimination. The Association saw an early victory in the class action suit United States vs. Ironworkers Local 86 et. al. – in which the United States Department of Justice sued five local unions and apprenticeship and training committees under Title VII of the 1964 Civil Rights Act. In 1970 Judge William J. Lindberg found that there had indeed been racial discrimination in the practices of all institutions named in this case. He ordered wide-ranging relief programs, including quotas for union membership, hiring, and apprenticeship classes and changes in hiring and dispatching procedures.

Judge Lindberg’s ruling also created the Court Order Advisory Committee – a private institution that would ensure the implementation of these relief measures. The Court Order Advisory Committee collected data and published reports on industry employment practices. The United Construction Workers Association had two members on Court Order Advisory Committee board of directors; Tyree Scott served as one of these representatives from 1972 to 1978. The Court Order Advisory Committee was reformed as the Vocational Exploration and Referral Service Center in December of 1978.

In 1972 United Construction Workers Association was also made party to the United States vs. Local 86 suit, which allowed them to participate officially in the enforcement of the court decrees. United Construction Workers Association collected reports of employment progress in local trades and continued to pursue legal action against companies defaulting on the requirements of the court settlement.

By court decree, United Construction Workers Association also became the point of entry for apprenticeship programs. United Construction Workers Association assisted workers with job application processes, offered extra training for apprenticeship classes, and served as a liaison between workers, unions and employers. The United Construction Workers Association also worked with civil and community institutions, including the United States Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, the Washington State Manpower and Planning Council, various Seattle city agencies, the Seattle Urban League and others.

After the landmark Lindberg decision, United Construction Workers Association also began to widen its focus beyond minority work in the local building trades to other areas of employment in Seattle and other cities across the nation. In 1973 a branch of United Construction Workers Association was established in Oakland, California.

United Construction Workers Association also initiated the Southwestern Workers Federation, based in Little Rock, Arkansas, in 1973. Two United Construction Workers Association staff members - Tyree Scott and Todd Hawkins - visited eight cities in Arkansas, Louisiana, Oklahoma and Texas under contract from the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission to help minority worker activists organize further and to help them draw together legal resources to file Title VII complaints.

In 1973 Michael Woo of the United Construction Workers Association worked among Asian and Alaska Native cannery workers who lived in Seattle but worked summers in the salmon processing plants in Alaska. From this work the Alaska Cannery Workers Association was formed to combat discrimination in worker housing, facilities, pay scales and hire status. The Alaska Cannery Workers Association filed Title VII lawsuits against the world’s largest fish companies, including the New England Fish Company and Wards Cove Packing Company.

In 1973 members of United Construction Workers Association, Alaska Cannery Workers Association, and the Northwest Chapter of United Farm Workers of America came together to found the Labor and Employment Law Office. Labor and Employment Law Office hired lawyers and served workers of color, helping them pursue legal recourse in issues of labor discrimination. Labor and Employment Law Office helped United Construction Workers Association, Alaska Cannery Workers Association, United Farm Workers of America, other worker’s organizations and individual workers win landmark civil rights cases, including Domingo vs. New England Fish Company, Carpenter vs. NEFCO-Fidalgo Packing Company and Yates vs. Local 7 Asbestos Workers, et al.

While Labor and Employment Law Office had always combined its legal work with participation in community organization, the focus was primarily on court action in the early years of its operation. However, in 1989 the Supreme Court’s decision in the long-contested Atonio vs. Ward’s Cove case constituted a major shift in the pursuit of discrimination cases and in Labor and Employment Law Office’s operations. Ever since the landmark civil rights suits of the early 1970s, the burden of proof in discrimination charges had rested on the employers. In the Wards Cove case, the Court’s decision was that the plaintiffs’ statistical demonstration of racial disparity between classes of workers did not make a prima facie case for violation of Title VII of the Civil Rights Act. This set a new precedent for the burden of proof in Civil Rights cases and vastly increased the difficulty of workers pursuing discrimination charges under Title VII.

As pursuing court action as an avenue for change became more difficult, Labor and Employment Law Office’s focus and activities opened to a broader spectrum. Labor and Employment Law Office shifted its emphasis to offering other types of assistance to low-income, minority and workers’ groups both locally and across the globe. Tyree Scott has served on the board of directors of Labor and Employment Law Office since its inception.

In the late 1970s Scott, Scott’s wife Beverly Sims and Michael Woo were members of the Seattle Workers Group, which in turn was associated with the Organizing Committee for an Ideological Center. The Center was an umbrella group that coordinated the activities of various Marxist workers organizations across the country. The purpose of the Center was both to support local Marxist groups in their effort to organize and educate workers locally, but also to bring together disparate groups across the nation into a more ideologically and structurally unified whole. The Center’s long-term goal was to build a national Labor/Workers Party. The organization disbanded about 1981.

Tyree Scott became less involved in the activities of the United Construction Workers Association in the late seventies, and the organization faded out of existence around 1981. Tyree Scott retired from the electrician’s trade and remained active as a board member for the Labor and Employment Law Office until his death in 2003.

From the guide to the Tyree Scott papers, circa 1970-1995, (University of Washington Libraries Special Collections)