[1] Then he moved to Birmingham and worked as a steel-mill worker and a local union official while maintaining an active membership in the Communist Party,[2] which he joined after studying in New York City in the 1930s.
)[4] During the Red Scares of the post-World War II period, Hudson was expelled from the Birmingham Industrial Union Council.
In 1987, the historian Nell Irvin Painter co-authored a book about Hosea Hudson's life, often described as a collaborative autobiography.
[7] The Communist Party drew Hudson's attention after the conviction of the Scottsboro Boys and the attack of sharecroppers in Camp Hill.
During that first meeting, the points Murphy made convinced the eight men to sign up for the Communist Party and form a unit for Stockham workers.
When they successfully got the unit back together, the group "began to read again and understand more about the Party and the history of the working class.
"[15] Years later in Birmingham, during November 1933, Hudson and other Party members organized a meeting to work towards Union rights for Black industrial workers.
As a result of this meeting, the Negro Democratic Non-Partisan Voters League was formed and decided that Black people needed to work within their communities for the right to vote.
Then, on a Sunday in Birmingham, the Committee of Industrial Union (CIO) met with two potential candidates, but neglected to invite the only two Black men in the organization.
The Federal Bureau of Investigation noticed that Hudson was receiving attention and the FBI began to feel threatened.
[18] The goal of these gatherings was to draw attention to the use of unskilled workers to carry out skilled labor, specifically road construction, without appropriate wages.
Hudson was then elected a delegate to the second Southern Negro Youth Congress Convention in 1938, resulting in the loss of his job upon relocation to Birmingham, Alabama.
In the summer of 1938, an unemployed Hudson began collaborating with fellow Communist Party member Joe Gelders to form a club to encourage people to register to vote.
Through connections made from his work for the WPA, Hudson attended a meeting for the Local I Workers Alliance Union in September of that year.
[8] As vice president, Hudson discussed issues regarding workers’ projects and relief aid with the head of the WPA at a conference in Washington, D.C. in 1939.
The Birmingham Post identified him as a member of the Communist Party in October 1947, causing him to lose his job at the Jackson Foundry and to be discharged from the union.
The group decided they must see the Birmingham city commissioner and demand that the government pay Welfare workers in money, not grocery slips.
One hundred and fifty people marched to City Hall and planned to send six spokespersons (five men and one woman) to speak to Commissioner Jones.
At the convention, they "voted to characterize the Gillem [Board] report as 'Too little and too late,'" and discussed issues such as "the need for greater hospital, health and recreational facilities, low-cost price-controlled housing, state and federal FEPC laws; abolition of the poll tax and anti-lynching legislation."