Don't minimize your success!

This post is for all WV public employees who put themselves on the line in this struggle (which isn't over yet). I'm showing my age here, but this isn't the first big labor struggle I've seen, although it is one of the best. Here are a few thoughts from someone who has been in a few dozen fights:

1. First, give yourselves a pat on the back. Over a few weeks, you mobilized thousands of people of all ages to stand up for working people and actually get something out of it, even though it wasn't all we wanted. That used to happen here in decades past, but hasn't for a long time.Trust me on that one. Or ask any union worker.

2. I know a lot of folks out there may feel disappointed by where we are now. But one danger of social movements is that they often perceive failure when they've achieved considerable success. Think about where we stood even a month ago with PEIA premiums and Go365, not to mention raises.

3. Realize how bad things are for working people. I wish there was a nice way to say this but there isn't: the legislative majority is in the hands of enemies of working people. Period.  That's been the case for the last few years and it hasn't changed over the last few days. Other steps are needed to change that. To have gotten this far under these conditions is little short of amazing.

4. Our union brothers and sisters  have experienced agonizing defeats over the last two years while many of us weren't even paying attention. There are three kinds of unions: industrial, skilled trades (think construction); and public sector. Two out of three lost serious fights in the last few years. Industrial workers lost a huge one with the passage of so-called "right to work" legislation in 2016. Skilled trade workers lost another huge one with the repeal of prevailing wage for state construction projects. Public sector workers (teachers, school support workers and public employees) just won one, even though their legal status is weaker than other unions with the lack of collective bargaining.

5. Your actions helped kill or delay other bad legislation, including unproductive tax cuts and anti-worker bills, such as the "paycheck pilfering act."

6. The fight for justice is a marathon, not a sprint. Consider this: the first unfree African laborers were brought to what became the United States in 1619. The Emancipation Proclamation wasn't issued until 1863, the same year WV became a state. The Civil Rights Act wasn't passed until 1964. The Voting Rights Act wasn't passed until 1965. Lots of people died to get that far. Many other struggles, such as that for the right of women to vote, took decades to win. We did pretty good in less than a month.

7. No offense, but some people new to the struggle don't realize how badly the deck is stacked against working people and how much work in terms of education and organizing it will take to change that. We didn't lose this much ground overnight and won't gain it back that quickly either. Be proud to have gone as far as you did.

8. I suggest you resist the temptation to criticize your leaders. Let our enemies slander "union bosses" all they want, but the leaders of WVEA, WV-AFT and WVSSP are all former teachers and support workers. They have the hard and thankless job of trying to get the best they can for members in a bad situation. They could do a lot more if that situation changes, which will take mass mobilization by you.

9. It isn't over. The power you just used to shake the state to its foundation is always in your hands, provided we act together. People who have power don't own it; they only have it as long as people below cooperate with it. Withdraw that cooperation (strike!) and their power evaporates. 

10. Remember The Wizard of Oz. Dorothy thought she needed the wizard to get back home, but she had the power all along. That power is the power that comes when working people act together. Remember the last verse of the WV-inspired labor song "Solidarity Forever:"

"In our hands is placed a power greater than their hoarded gold

greater than the might of armies magnified a thousand fold

We can bring to birth a new world from the ashes of the old

while the union makes us strong."