A friend of the League of Coloured Peoples
Learie Constantine MBE 1901-1971
Cricketer, Captain of the West Indian cricket team, Employment welfare officer during the Second World. Represented Trinidad and Tobago as its High Commissioner to Britain. Broadcaster, Life peer
and member of the League of Coloured Peoples.
Learie Constantine was born in Trinidad in 1901. He came to Britain in 1923 to pursue his cricketing career. In 1928 he took 100 wickets and scored 1,000 runs in one season.
As well as being a phenomenal sportsman, he soon found himself in the role of spokesperson for the Black community in Britain. He became an active member of the League of Coloured Peoples, and contributed financial help to the League’s magazine “The Keys”. Learie Constantine was acutely aware of the racial discrimination that fellow his blacks suffered in Britain, especially in the northern regions of the country, which had small ethnic minority populations.
Although a famous sporting personality, this did not make him immune to discrimination.
In 1943, at the height of Second World War, Learie Constantine was given four days leave to Captain a West Indies cricket team against England at Lords. However, he had to sue the Imperial Hotel for breach of contract after the hotel had refused him and his family accommodation during the match
on the basis of his race.