Thursday, February 17, 2011

Thinking of Wisconsin

In 1992, I met Frank P. Zeidler at the Socialist Party National Convention at the Hotel Wisconsin in Milwaukee. Comrade Zeidler was the Socialist mayor of that great city from 1948 to 1960. I'll never forget the conversations we had, and the time he took to encourage me. I made a motion at that convention, and he seconded it. As the chair of the SP Health Care Work Group, and a young man out of his depth (I'm a terrible public speaker), I needed all the encouragement I could get.

Every year since then, up until 2005, he sent me a Christmas Card. He died in the summer of 2006. Frank was a kind, thoughtful, wonderful human being. The recent protests in Madison have me thinking of him.

If I could be in Wisconsin, I'd be singing this with my brothers and sisters with Frank in mind. Let us sing of solidarity!
When the union's inspiration through the workers' blood shall run,
There can be no power greater anywhere beneath the sun;
Yet what force on earth is weaker than the feeble strength of one,
But the union makes us strong.
CHORUS:
Solidarity forever,
Solidarity forever,
Solidarity forever,
For the union makes us strong.
Is there aught we hold in common with the greedy parasite,
Who would lash us into serfdom and would crush us with his might?
Is there anything left to us but to organize and fight?
For the union makes us strong.
Chorus
It is we who plowed the prairies; built the cities where they trade;
Dug the mines and built the workshops, endless miles of railroad laid;
Now we stand outcast and starving midst the wonders we have made;
But the union makes us strong.
Chorus
All the world that's owned by idle drones is ours and ours alone.
We have laid the wide foundations; built it skyward stone by stone.
It is ours, not to slave in, but to master and to own.
While the union makes us strong.
Chorus
They have taken untold millions that they never toiled to earn,
But without our brain and muscle not a single wheel can turn.
We can break their haughty power, gain our freedom when we learn
That the union makes us strong.
Chorus
In our hands is placed a power greater than their hoarded gold,
Greater than the might of armies, magnified a thousand-fold.
We can bring to birth a new world from the ashes of the old
For the union makes us strong.

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