“What’s
the matter with Kansas?” Or any of those other states where politicians
have been winning votes from working families while advancing policies that
decimate their jobs and paychecks?
The answer may well be, “They don’t have Working America.”
Working America
is a new community union of the AFL-CIO. Working America came to Oregon
last week, and I am hopeful that it will help to transform our union movement
here and throughout both the blue and red United States.
The question about Kansas, now the title of a book by Thomas Frank on the
diversionary culture wars of American politics, was haunting our union movement
even before last year’s election. Now, it’s front and center
in the debate over values voters and the need for a more compelling economic
agenda to bridge the divide over issues like gay marriage, guns and abortion.
How can we hope to protect good jobs and make all jobs better when we can’t
unite working family voters to defeat a president whose job creation record
was the worst since Herbert Hoover, whose cabinet officials defended outsourcing
more jobs overseas and whose Department. of Labor repealed overtime pay
for 6 million workers?
In trying to answer that question, we’re being drawn into debates
over chickens and eggs. Must we organize more workers to rebuild our political
strength, or should we first rebuild our political strength to enable us
to organize more workers? And should we work harder to turn out the vote
for “lesser evil” candidates or make sure we have better candidates
to vote for?
Working America says the answers can be found by talking to America’s
working families.
I have written in past columns about the opportunity we have to reach unorganized
workers, when polls tell us that more than 40 million of them would vote
for a union tomorrow if they had the chance to do so. They may not have
that chance any time soon. But they’re ripe for conversations about
what’s squeezing family incomes and why we can’t seem to get
ahead in an economy that produces far more wealth than it did a generation
ago.
Working America has developed a program to reach these workers in massive
numbers. Its canvassers contact workers where they live, on their doorsteps.
They engage them on issues of common concern like Social Security and overtime
pay. And they sign them up as community members who then become part of
our union movement.
Working America signed up 800,000 members in four states last year. Now
it has come to Oregon, where it will be partnering with our state federation
to add another 50,000 members over the next 12 months here. Think of that.
Our unions now have 180,000 traditional members in Oregon. With aggressive
organizing, we may add another 5,000 or so members to our bargaining units
in the next year. Working America will bring in 10 times that number.
I will be the first to admit that Working America’s members are no
substitute for traditional members. They don’t have access to collective
bargaining, nor do they have an organization to defend them in their workplaces.
But when workers without unions join Working America, they become part of
an organization with the collective resources needed to keep them informed
on the issues that affect their jobs and their families’ well-being.
And, once they hear the truth about the political decisions that are making
it harder to work for a decent living, they start to vote like union members.
Working America’s members in red states like Missouri, Ohio and Florida
voted by better than a two-to-one margin for John Kerry, even in “born
again” households and in other demographic categories that post-election
polls say went overwhelmingly for George W. Bush.
This is where the answer to Frank’s question about Kansas starts to
emerge. And if you want to find the answer to the question about lesser-evil
candidates, how about joining a Working America canvass in a district where
a Democratic lawmaker is thinking about voting to roll back the minimum
wage or waffling on whether he’ll support another job-destroying trade
deal? That act alone might do more to make our political system more accountable
to working families than any number of endorsements and contributions by
our political committees.
If you have friends who are not union members but are interested in
our movement, direct them to www.workingamerica.org. If you yourself want
to get involved with Working America, look for announcements of upcoming
phone banks and canvasses at www.oraflcio.org.
Tim Nesbitt is president of the Oregon AFL-CIO. For more information,
check out the Oregon AFL-CIO online at oraflcio.unions-america.com
