Working Together: From Toronto to November 2008

 We left our 2007 CWA convention in Toronto even more unified and determined to build our union.

Action by the delegates to pass the Diversity Proposal (page 3), adding the voices of local leaders to the CWA Executive Board for the first time, was an important step as we continue to build a movement for change, working closely together at every level of our union.

Secretary-Treasurer Barbara Easterling did a great job in chairing the Committee on Executive Board Diversity, leading a dialogue throughout our ranks, and shaping the process that led to this historic action. This is just one of innumerable contributions she has made to building CWA over her remarkable 55-year career.

Barbara has announced that she will retire when her term up is up next year (page 4). When she does, her talents, her wisdom and her activism will be greatly missed not only throughout CWA but throughout the labor movement and the women's and human rights movements around the world.

Why does building our unity mean more now than at any time in our history? Because our movement, the future of our own union, and the collective bargaining process that built the American middle class, has never been so imperiled.

We can take hope from what we accomplished in the 2006 elections, winning the most working-families-oriented Congress in decades. We now have the first minimum wage increase in 10 years, and the Employee Free Choice Act (EFCA) — legislation to restore workers' organizing and bargaining rights — passed overwhelmingly in the House and won majority support in the Senate.

But we don't yet have enough of a pro-worker majority to break Senate filibusters that block the passage of EFCA and other major goals. Building our unity, building our Stewards Army, and leading a movement for change — that's what it will take to win national health care reform, to start creating jobs again instead of exporting them, and regain our rights and power in the workplace.

We're looking at a huge political challenge between now and November 2008, and also major bargaining challenges in the next year. The stories in this CWA News — the battles for our key issues, protecting our jobs, our health care, our retirement security and winning bargaining rights — are universal throughout our sectors.

I'm optimistic that we can build our movement for change and prevail. What we've accomplished so far is already inspiring. For the first time in decades, every Democratic presidential contender is openly talking about how the role of unions, and restoring worker bargaining power, are key to reversing the decline of the middle class.

We must elect a president who will lead the fight for American jobs, Employee Free Choice Act, and health care reform. It's up to us… to the army of stewards and activists in CWA and other unions who make the difference — community by community — when we negotiate, organize and build a political coalition for change. Nobody will do it for us.