Remembering the March for Jobs and Freedom
The 1963 March on Washington shows us the way forward
No Kings Day was a stunning success: 7,000,000 people (and frogs) demonstrating at 2600 events in all 50 states. A huge shout out to Indivisible and the other groups that led the way in making this grassroots outpouring happen. This sent a very loud message that the pro-democracy movement is not backing down.
The fact that Trump (a) sent out that ultra-creepy shit dropping video, and (b) fired missiles over I-5 in Los Angeles is irrefutable evidence that the size and spirit of the No Kings demonstration shook him to his core. In spurned narcissist fashion, he continued to act out this week by desecrating the White House, only further underscoring that he does in fact believe he can do whatever he wants without consulting anyone… like a king. But Trump pushes the limits because he has to distract from the Epstein files and from his chaotic administration that is destroying the economy – he knows he’s in trouble.
The question for the pro-democracy movement is what is next.
The first thing we have to do is win elections, and luckily there are five major, critically important ones happening soon – on November 4 – along with the hundreds of local elections happening across the country. These elections have major policy importance, but also will tell us whether the anti-Trump movement can win:
The VA governor and state House races
The NJ governor elections
The three PA state Supreme Court races
Prop 50 in CA
The NYC mayoral election.
In small turnout, off-year elections with Trump’s approval ratings so low, we have a structural advantage, and these races are all in very winnable territory. If Democrats win all of them, it will be proof positive that the Trump regime is in real danger. If we lose some of them, it will frankly be a setback.
The other thing the pro-democracy needs to do is become more than an anti-Trump, more than a pro-democracy movement. For this, I think we need to look toward Martin Luther King, Jr and the other planners of the 1963 March on Washington.
They called that day the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom. They didn’t just call it a civil rights march, although that is what many people now remember it as. MLK, John Lewis, A. Phillip Randolph, and the other leaders of the march knew that it wasn’t enough to organize for new civil rights laws and an end to Jim Crow, or even the broader concept of freedom. They knew that to enlist Blacks in the South, Blacks in the North, and the working-class Whites, they would need to win policy and political victories. They had to make this cause about basic economics as well as civil rights, jobs as well as freedom.
Our movement today needs to learn the same thing. Our fight is not just with Trump and his authoritarian ways; our fight is for making working folks’ lives better. Our fight is for jobs that pay a living wage and health care that is affordable. Our fight is for dignity and power for workers on the job, and affordable housing, groceries, and utilities. Our fight is to rein in corporate power so that monopolies can’t price gouge, screw their workers, and crush small businesses.
Our message next time needs to be broader than No Kings, as unifying as that has been to our movement. Maybe it’s No Kings or Oligarchs. Maybe it’s No to Kings and Yes to Health Care, or Yes to Dignity. We can debate what that slogan should be, but in order to bring more poor and working-class people into our movement and our electoral coalition, we need to show those folks we give a damn about their struggles and dreams for a better life.