On January 25, the Organization for Black Struggle will celebrate its 40th anniversary. The group, which rose to national prominence during the Ferguson uprising, was founded in 1980 by a group of students, veteran activists, and union organizers, among others, who believed that the needs of the black working class in St. Louis were not being adequately addressed. They came together shortly after the FBI’s counterintelligence program, known as COINTELPRO, had effectively decimated the leadership of black radical organizations across the country, undermining their programs and assassinating their leaders.
Jamala Rogers, the group’s current executive director and one of its founders, said the group has lasted much longer than many other grassroots organizations due to its shared values and emphasis on promoting democratic structures both inside and outside of OBS.
“The founding members came at a time when we took this freedom struggle very seriously, because that was what our elders had told us and we believed it,” Rogers said.
“We were very young. But we really did take it seriously, and a number of us had been involved in predecessor groups. So, for example, at least three of the founding members were also part of the Congress of African Peoples, which was founded in 1970.”
That work was then able to inform and ground OBS.
“I think the shared vision, the shared values really help,” Rogers said. “You need to have as clear a path to democracy even within your organizations as possible, because your organization is a reflection of what you’re fighting for in the broader society. So if you have no democracy there, if you have no fairness there, then people really don’t learn how to do that in the broader society.”
OBS works on many campaigns related to its primary founding principle: the idea that black working-class people should have full human rights according to the United Nations definition, which many in St. Louis still do not. The group works primarily towards dismantling the prison-industrial complex, advocating for workers’ rights, and supporting the needs of women and youth.
Since the 1980s, OBS has played a role in a wide array of struggles: everything from the movement against apartheid governance in South Africa to the 1998/99 Black Radical Congress to the more recent Show Me $15 movement and the Coalition Against Police Crime and Repression (CAPCR). It worked to elect the first African-American prosecutors in both the St. Louis and St. Louis County, as well as bringing local control back to the city police.
This year, OBS will organize young people as the 2020 census approaches. Census population reports are important in determining how much money is allocated to different wards and municipalities by the federal government, and young black people are often among the most under-counted.
Janis Mensah, Youth Empowerment organizer with OBS, explained the importance of the census to OBS’ mission. “This 2020 census will be the first time a lot of millennials are going to have the chance to fill out the census for themselves,” Mensah said.
According to an October Pew survey, young black people are among the least likely to fill out the census, which can determine how federal funding – including Section 8 housing funds, grants to educational institutions, and infrastructure grants for roads and highways – are distributed.
“Especially in the black community, there’s a general distrust of the government and of intrusive questions,” Mensah said. “So we’re really showing people that, yeah, these are intrusive questions, but it really helps a lot with your community, and it affects you for the next 10 years.”
Rogers and the rest of the OBS hope that their upcoming gala will be an opportunity to strengthen and connect their community – along with being a party.
“We realized that 40 years is a mighty long time for an organization like this to be around,” Rogers said. “And not just around, but in our estimation and the opinion of our community, impactful. So we wanted to do something a little bit different.”
As such, the gala will not have a keynote speaker, but will instead include presentations about each aspect of the work of OBS, as well as an extended amount of time for attendees to socialize and network.
“I would say that for the work that we’ve done we’ve seen the electorate become more educated, a little bit bolder, a little bit more assertive,” Rogers said.
“So I’ve seen changes in the way people vote, who they vote for. So we want to contribute to that change. Because as long as Trump is in the White House and he has the ability to change courts, he has the ability to change funding, then we’re going to be on this little treadmill, always fighting for more crumbs.”
OBS will celebrate its 40th Anniversary at 6 p.m. Saturday, January 25 at the Machinist Hall District 9, 12365 St. Charles Rock Road. For more information and to buy tickets, call 314.367.5959 or visit www.obs-stl.org.
