State Capitol Rally in Support of Wisconsin Workers

A second rally in one week in Support of Wisconsin workers was held in front of the Oregon State Capitol today. The rally was very well attended with 1000 plus people present. Most folks attending were union members with both private and public sector unions well represented.

This was a good event! Solidarity and fight back were in the air in a way I haven't felt in a long time. The crowd was very interactive. Public sector workers from AFSCME, SEIU and teachers unions were demonstrating and engaging with Teamsters, Laborers, and Electrical Workers. I personally talked to members from SEIU, the Carpenters' Union, Teamsters and OEA. Across the board, all these union members reflected the idea that the attack on Wisconsin's public sector workers is an attack on all of us.

This was a class conscious event as well. The event's speakers spoke to the reality that workers, their livelihood and rights are about to be abolished by the Koch brothers, Rupert Murdoch, Wall Street, and their bankrolled politicians such as Scott Walker. Instead of "doom and gloom" however, there was a strong sense of fight-back and optimism; optimism in the sense that if people are united they can win, even against the power of Wall Street and America's corporate culture.

Who Wasn't There and How It Helped

Strangely, in spite of this event being very much a union event, there was a decided absence of speakers and attendance from Oregon's official labor leadership. Indeed, the impetus for today's rally came not from the AFL-CIO or the Oregon AFL-CIO State Fed, but instead through an e-mail recruitment drive run by the local Move-On chapter and shop floor recruitment through a number of local area unions.

As such, the rank and file composition gave today's event a somewhat unfocused feel and a small host of unpolished speakers. All the same, if the official labor leadership had shown there would have been a much stronger attention to political/legislative "speak" that might have seriously blunted the raw outrage and willingness to fight back that was so clearly present at today's rally.

What Next?

A key question in my mind and the minds of many of those in attendance is, Will workers continue to take action and do more as the fight with the "big boys" intensifies? Here time will tell. For the present I'm inclined to trust that people will carry forward as long as each is able to identify the struggle as their own struggle.

The second question in my mind is whether labor's class consciousness will grow as events intensify. One speaker, the dynamic Marilyn Sanchez, posed the question of whether labor is willing to fight to include those workers who by law are barred from organizing. Here sister Sanchez referred to agricultural and domestic workers, who as workers of color have been excluded from the economic rights given to white workers. The question here is whether unions and organized workers see themselves as a social and political movement, or merely as collective bargaining agents.

Stay tuned as events continue...