Summit County Labor News

NOW
WHAT DO WE DO ?
By RUTH TAYLOR

So we lost. The picture is just the same as it was before our
premature jubilation. We don't like it. But sitting down and be-
wailing our lot, crying "betrayal" and howling about "reaction-
aries" isn't going to get us anywhere. It just doesn't make sense.

Sitting on the sidelines until a crisis and then making a show of
our strength isn't the way to get what we want.

What can we do now? NOT sit still until just before another
big election. NOT wait until our particular pet aversions are up
for office. The slogan which has helped the labor movement grow
into the force it now is was twofold "Elect our friends and defeat
our enemies."

Notice two things about this phrase. First, it places the con-
structive act in the position of prime importance. Second, it is
plural-and it does not specify only national elections.

Strength is a force that wanes with disuse. If labor is to
prove effective at the next big election, each and every labor man
has to begin right now to get ready for that day.

Get into politics. No, I do not mean to plan for a labor party.
We are not set up on a caste system and there is no need for a
class party. But government is the job of Labor just as much as it
is of any group. It is the job of each workingman, just as much as
it is of the lawyer, the banker, the industrialist or the professional
politician. That is the latent strength of our democratic way of
life. We all have a part to play. We all have work to do.

But we have to learn our job. And the place to begin is in
local politics. Treat each local campaign with the seriousness and
interest of a national campaign. Let your local politicians know
your views-and that you are ready to work. Get in and fight for
the local issues that concern the workers. Then when the big fight
comes you will have experience and standing.

If you take your proper place in your local political set-up, if
you prove the strength of organized labor in local issues, then when
the time comes you will have a voice in the choice of candidates
and won't have to just take the lesser of two evils. The candidates
for whom you will fight, will be your candidates-your friends.

One thing more. Be a one-man-propaganda-team on the priv-
ilege of voting. Talk in your shop, in your local of the importance
of labor registering for all elections. You know, and I know, that
if labor men voted their convictions, there would be no anti-labor
legislation. So get them in the habit of voting.

Now is the time to start-so go to it!