OPINION
WSLC’s Johnson on Labor Day: We can rebuild American Dream
By JEFF JOHNSON
On behalf of the officers and staff of the Washington State Labor Council, AFL-CIO, I want to wish you a great Labor Day.
This the 100th anniversary of Ralph Chaplin’s “Solidarity Forever.” And I do believe that, “When the union’s inspiration through the workers’ blood shall run…” we can do great things together.
We have never been under attack as much as we are today by corporate oligarchs and right-wing zealots and yet we are beginning to win. Working people are rising up to say no low wages and benefits, no to corporate trade deals, and no to politicians who only understand transactional politics and not transformational change.
Labor and community are coming together with shared visions and values to take on the corporate culture that has created gross inequality while wrecking our environment in the name of short-run profits.
We can and we must build a new economy that creates a new American Dream, one where everyone can share in the prosperity that workers create. An economy that provides family-wage work and a sustainable environment for our children and grandchildren.
Only workers can do this. We built the American Dream once. Now we have to rebuild it even better.
In Solidarity we can do this. We can do hard things.
Jeff Johnson is President of the Washington State Labor Council, AFL-CIO, the largest labor organization in the Evergreen State, representing the interests of more than 500 local unions and 400,000 rank-and-file union members.