Introduction to DSA Action Network
by Chris Riddiough, Dec 1, 1997
In 1996 the Campaign for Economic Justice was launched by the Democratic Socialists of America. Since then we have been active in efforts to promote a more economically sound and just budget, we have participated in successful coalition efforts to stop the balanced budget amendment and we are working with labor and social justice groups to ensure that workfare proposals harm neither the rights of welfare recipients nor those in the workplace.
We encourage to join the DSA Action Network. Your involvement in the DSA Action Network would commit you, over the course of the next year, to get involved at least once in our Campaign for Economic Justice. It might be contacting your Congress member regarding a specific vote or to co-sponsor a particular bill, or writing a letter to the editor on a specific issue; or calling other DSA members in your community to get them involved; or circulating a petition opposing the Multilateral Agreement on Investment.
While our action alerts will generally be short, this longer introduction includes some background information about the issues and legislation we're working on. We've included a summary of the Campaign goals and strategy and a copy of the Pledge for Economic Justice (which we invite you to sign and share with friends).
We've also included a DSA Action Network report form. When you take action, let us know about it! Send us a report on letters you've written to the press (and copies of the letters that are printed), responses from members of Congress and other information that you think might help our efforts.
In solidarity,
Christine Riddiough
Political Director
Campaign for Economic Justice Overview
The Democratic Socialists of America has launched the Campaign for Economic Justice to advance a new American politics, a politics with a powerful progressive voice.
Today more and more Americans understand that disparities in income and wealth are increasing. They feel insecure about their future economic status and that of their children. Divisions in America based on race and gender sunder our society, encouraged by attacks from the right on affirmative action, welfare, reproductive rights and gay and lesbian rights. These attacks have often been successful in increasing American fears and focusing American anger and insecurity on people of color, feminists and gays and lesbians, rather than on corporate and ruling class America.
A new American politics must both appeal to the hopes and dreams of Americans for economic security and justice and heal divisions based on race and gender. It must acknowledge the threats globalization of the economy and the rise of transnational corporations pose for the rights and well-being of American workers, but it cannot excite xenophobic and isolationist fears.
The Campaign for Economic Justice has three central tenets:
- economic justice and security require first, that corporations and the wealthy pay their fair share, and second, that every American deserves a living wage and benefits for the work s/he does;
- all Americans - men and women of all races, ages, sexual orientations and beliefs - must receive just and adequate rewards for their work;
- Americans must work with others around the world to ensure that everyone receives a living wage and to guarantee that corporations do not exploit people or the planet.
What is DSA
The Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) was formed in 1982 to unite those in the US who want to work for a society based on justice and peace. We believe that there is something fundamentally wrong with an America that promises equality of opportunity and democracy but doesn't provide either of these to most Americans. We build on the strength and traditions of American radicalism and populism, of feminist and civil rights movements, of community, labor and gay and lesbian organizations. We are working to build a new American left that embraces radical democratic reforms.
Our vision of society includes at its very core a change in social relations and full equality between women and men. Our concept of socialism is forthrightly anti-racist. The civil rights movement renewed the struggle against the consequences of racism, bringing to the left in America a new moral vision.
Campaign for Economic Justice
Legislative Summary
The Campaign for Economic Justice will include a focus on support for specific legislative/anti-corporate initiatives and opposition to efforts to weaken economic equity and security. In particular we will work for:
- two bills that address the underpinnings of economic insecurity - the Corporate Responsibility Act and the Living Wage Act;
- the Fair Pay Act which specifically connects economic insecurity and civil rights;
- the Stop the Sweatshops bill that relates global capitalism to economic insecurity and immigrant rights; and
- the Clearinghouse on Responsible Corporate Practices which addresses international labor and human rights and economic insecurity.
We will also monitor key measures that relate to economic insecurity:
- welfare 'reform,' including efforts to modify the new law at the federal level and support for work at the local and state levels, and attacks on other entitlements;
- affirmative action, especially in the aftermath of the passage of the anti-affirmative action measure in California;
- balanced budget proposals;
- health care, particularly focusing on efforts to increase people's access to quality health care;
- campaign finance reform;
- the multilateral agreement on investment.
The following paragraphs provide a summary of these measures as they now stand. As the bills are introduced in the next Congress, additional information including bill numbers, committee assignments and co-sponsors will be sent out.
Corporate Responsibility Act
The Corporate Responsibility Act was introduced by Representative Bernard Sanders (I-VT).This act pinpoints more than $700 billion in corporate wealthfare in the form of tax breaks, subsidies and preferential financing provided to corporations. These tax breaks and subsidies include Export-Import Bank loans, uranium enrichment subsidies and government purchases for the Strategic Petroleum Reserve. Under the act these tax loopholes would be eliminated.
In a letter to Speaker Newt Gingrich, Progressive Caucus members called on him to schedule floor action on these measures. In the letter they stated, "special interest loopholes riddle the federal tax code, selectively enrich comparatively few individuals and organizations, drive up the federal deficit, and shift more of the federal tax burden to ordinary Americans."
The Corporate Responsibility Act is an important step in the direction of ensuring that corporate interests and wealthy individuals receive economic justice. As Representative Sanders has said, "At a time when the poor, the children, the elderly and veterans are being asked to make sacrifices to help balance the federal budget, those who are most able to be self-sufficient should be the first in line. America can no longer afford to provide tens of billions of dollars in wealthfare to augment the quite adequate resources of corporations and wealthy individuals."
Living Wage, Jobs for All Act
The Living Wage, Jobs for All Act was introduced by DSA Vice Chair, Representative Ron Dellums (D-CA). Its purpose is to establish a living wage, jobs for all policy for the United States in order to reduce poverty, inequality and undue concentration of wealth and power in the United States. It also provides for federal policy to ensure that the United States works with people of other countries on action aimed at reducing poverty and eliminating undue concentrations of income, wealth and power. Specific provisions of the bill call for corporations registered with the Securities and Exchange Commission to submit annual reports on employment and investment, protect employees right to organize and prohibit the Federal Reserve and other federal agencies from promoting recession, stagnation or unemployment as a means of reducing wages and salaries. The bill also reinforces and extends the 1944 Bill of Economic Rights.
In its new version, this bill includes many of the provisions called for by the Pledge for Economic Justice. It focuses on wage and employment, but effectively makes the connection to globalization of the economy and income inequality.
Fair Pay Act
The Fair Pay Act was introduced by Delegate Eleanor Holmes Norton (D-DC) in the House of Representatives and Senator Tom Harkin in the Senate. It would expand the Equal Pay Act's protections against sex-based discrimination to cover wage discrimination based on race or national origin. It also extends the Equal Pay Act's guarantee of equal pay for equal work to equal pay for work in equivalent jobs. The act makes it easier to file class action law suits and makes it unlawful to discriminate against anyone who has participated in a discrimination charge under the Act. In introducing the bill in the House, Delegate Norton said, "the decline in men's wages has made work a necessity even in husband-wife families. Yet, even with two parents working, the American standard of living is lower today than it was when the average woman was a homemaker." Susan Bianchi-Sand, executive director of the National Committee on Pay Equity noted that "the Fair Pay Act... will give women and people of color the information they need to negotiate fair pay directly with their employers."
The Fair Pay Act is an example of legislation that addresses the link between economic insecurity and economic inequity.
Stop the Sweatshops Act
The Stop the Sweatshops Act was introduced by Senator Edward M. Kennedy (D-MA). Its aim is to crack down on the exploitation of garment workers by unscrupulous clothing manufacturers. It amends the Fair Labor Standards Act to make manufacturers in the garment industry liable, along with contractors, for violations of labor law. They will also be liable for back pay owed to employees. The Stop the Sweatshops Act authorizes the Secretary of Labor to assess civil penalties in certain cases.
In introducing the bill Senator Kennedy noted that "sweatshops have a long and sordid history in this country. In 1911, in a tragic fire at the Triangle Shirtwaist Company on Manhatten's Lower East Side, 146 immigrant women suffocated or burned to death because the exits were locked or blocked. Eighty-five years later, conditions too often have not improved." This Act makes the connection between the struggles of working people in the United States with those elsewhere and exposes the ways in which employers use anti-immigrant hysteria to exploit workers.
Clearinghouse on Responsible Corporate Practices
The Clearinghouse on Responsible Corporate Practices was introduced by Representative Lane Evans (D-IL). In a letter to other members of the House of Representatives, Evans calls for the creation within the Commerce Department of a Clearinghouse on CorporatePractices for US businesses with operations abroad. As Evans notes in his letter, the Commerce Department currently provides businesses with market information, services and trade missions and he calls on the department to also disseminate information on corporate ethical practices.
This measure and others like it provide one way for the US government and citizens to have some impact on corporations that are based in the United States but do business around the world. Since there are as yet, few, if any, ways for the global community to regulate business, this clearinghouse is necessary to insure some form of regulation.
Health Care
The failure to pass health care reform in 1993 has undercut efforts to establish single-payer health care in the United States. Jim McDermott (D-WA) continues to introduce a single-payer measure in Congress. Health care activists are currently reviewing other mechanisms for putting health back on the US political agenda. These may include measures that would guarantee health care coverage for children and/or measures to regulate the health care industry. As specific measures are developed, we will update activists.
Campaign Finance Reform
Political activists of all persuasions continue to call for campaign finance reform. Publicity during the 1996 campaign on the AFL-CIO's involvement in the campaign particularly led conservatives to seek measures that would restrict labor from financially supporting candidates. The forgotten story of the campaign is the tremendous amount of money (at least $200 million compared to labor's $35 million) contributed by corporate interests. Specific reform measures will need to be carefully reviewed to insure that they do not unfairly hamstring labor and other progressive groups from supporting candidates while leaving business to weigh in as freely as before.
Welfare 'Reform' and Entitlements
In 1996 the Congress passed and President Clinton signed an onerous welfare 'reform' law that is now going into effect. This law abolished Aid to Families with Dependent Children as an entitlement and tied cash relief for poor families and their children to workfare. It drastically cut the number of programs that immigrants, including documented workers, were eligible for. The law is likely to have a disproportionate impact on women and communities of color.
Some progressive members of Congress may try to repeal some parts of the welfare law and President Clinton has indicated that he will ask for measures to ameliorate some of the more draconian impacts of the law. We will monitor these efforts and send out alerts. In addition, much of the money previously in programs like AFDC has been block granted to the states. Thus action is likely at the state level as governors and legislators attempt to come to grips with the impact of the law. Furthermore, efforts to weaken entitlements such as Social Security and Medicare may be acted on in the next Congress. We will monitor these issues and provide updates.
Affirmative Action
The passage of the California Civil Rights Initiative, an anti-affirmative action proposal on the November ballot, may lead to other attempts at the federal and state level to end affirmative action programs. A measure comparable to CCRI was introduced in the last Congress by Senator Robert Dole (R-KS) and may be reintroduced in the next Congress. Efforts to repeal affirmative action laws in other states may also be initiated. As specific proposals develop we will provide information and action guides on this issue.
Balanced Budget
An amendment to the US Constitution requiring that the federal budget be balanced is likely to be reintroduced in the next Congress. This measure would result in even further cutbacks in social programs and entitlements. Materials discussing the budget will be made available to local activists. These will include information on the debt and deficit and on the Progressive Caucus's alternative budget.
Pledge for Economic Justice
Our economy is going through rapid changes that have brought success to a few and despair to many. In these times of uncertainty I pledge to guide my actions by the principles outlined below. I urge you to do the same, both in your private life and in your legislative actions.
I pledge to:
- Work for a living wage for all.
- Demand that corporations behave responsibly in paying their fair share of taxes.
- Work to ensure that all trade agreements adopt enforceable fair labor standards. I further pledge to put pressure on corporations selling products made in substandard conditions.
- Work to give employees and communities greater rights in the corporations they work for or live near and to ensure that women and people of color receive just and equal treatment in the economy and
society.
- Not blame immigrants to this country for the problems created by an unaccountable international corporate market.
- Fight to make children a priority and a concern for all of society
- Initiate and continue a dialogue to ease racial and ethnic tensions both at home and abroad.
- Work for health care for all.
- Work for welfare reform that preserves the social safety net and provides people with the skills and resources they need to effectively enter the work force.
- Work to ensure that our schools prepare our children for a more uncertain economic future and make them better citizens.
- Work to make government more accountable and accessible to the people it serves.
- Work for an economy that is environmentally sustainable and socially just.
- Reform campaign finances to make our elected officials responsible to voters and not big-money interests.
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DSA Action Network Report Form
By filling out this form you will provide valuable information that we will use in our ongoing action efforts. Please send in a report related to each action you undertake. Try to be as detailed as possible in your responses. Thanks.
Your Name:
Date:
Type of action (Lobby Congress, Letter to the Editor, etc.):
Who you contacted (name of newspaper, representative):
What issues/legislation did you address in your action?
What response did you get to your message?
Do you have any other comments or suggestions for future actions?
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