The Wages Of Victory
Roger Hickey
October 27, 2005
Roger Hickey is co-director of the* Campaign for America's Future.
Yesterday, the president was dealt another setback.* The White House was forced to reverse its outrageous decree gutting the prevailing wage in the reconstruction of New Orleans and the Gulf Coast.* In the face of moderate Republicans responding to citizen pressure and joining Democrats to support a bill to overturn the president?s decree, the president threw in the towel.* Katrina?s survivors now will be paid a decent wage in the work of rebuilding their homes and communities.
The president's decision to suspend the Davis-Bacon law amounted to a callous wage-cutting decree. Just when people in the Gulf region needed it most, Bush gave the green light to construction companies to pay lower-than-average wages to workers on federally funded projects in the areas devastated by Katrina.
President Bush?s reversal yesterday shows that he has bowed to citizen pressure mobilized by groups like the Campaign for America?s Future, America?s labor unions and Democratic members of Congress.
Much of the credit for this victory must go to Rep. George Miller, D-Calif. Miller crafted legislation to overturn the president?s decree?and then found an innovative way to force a vote on the bill in the House of Representatives.* But this is also a victory for the citizen groups who mobilized, first to convince all Democratic members of Congress to co-sponsor the legislation, and then to embarrass enough Republican members into deciding that they could not vote to sustain President Bush?s low-wage decree.
The Campaign for America?s Future, which just this week helped to bring 17 Katrina survivors to Capitol Hill, has repeatedly encouraged our online activist network, numbering several hundreds of thousands of people, to express their outrage to members of Congress about Bush?s edict depriving Gulf citizens of decent wages in federally funded reconstruction projects.*
We estimate that each time we sent an e-mail action alert on Davis-Bacon,*more than*20,000 CAF activists from all over the country sent an urgent communication to their member of Congress and senator?via fax or telephone or e-mail.*
Clearly, the White House understood that*Rep. Miller had found a way, under the little-used 1976 National Emergencies Act, to force a vote in Congress, and clearly the president understood that Congress would vote to overturn his misguided decree.
Coming on the heels of the acknowledged defeat of Bush?s Social Security privatization plan?and on the eve of a likely failure by the Republicans in Congress to push through draconian budget cuts to pay for wasteful tax cuts for the rich? this capitulation by the White House represents another victory for activist progressive action. It means a victory for democracy?and a victory for the people of the Gulf states.
Roger Hickey
October 27, 2005
Roger Hickey is co-director of the* Campaign for America's Future.
Yesterday, the president was dealt another setback.* The White House was forced to reverse its outrageous decree gutting the prevailing wage in the reconstruction of New Orleans and the Gulf Coast.* In the face of moderate Republicans responding to citizen pressure and joining Democrats to support a bill to overturn the president?s decree, the president threw in the towel.* Katrina?s survivors now will be paid a decent wage in the work of rebuilding their homes and communities.
The president's decision to suspend the Davis-Bacon law amounted to a callous wage-cutting decree. Just when people in the Gulf region needed it most, Bush gave the green light to construction companies to pay lower-than-average wages to workers on federally funded projects in the areas devastated by Katrina.
President Bush?s reversal yesterday shows that he has bowed to citizen pressure mobilized by groups like the Campaign for America?s Future, America?s labor unions and Democratic members of Congress.
Much of the credit for this victory must go to Rep. George Miller, D-Calif. Miller crafted legislation to overturn the president?s decree?and then found an innovative way to force a vote on the bill in the House of Representatives.* But this is also a victory for the citizen groups who mobilized, first to convince all Democratic members of Congress to co-sponsor the legislation, and then to embarrass enough Republican members into deciding that they could not vote to sustain President Bush?s low-wage decree.
The Campaign for America?s Future, which just this week helped to bring 17 Katrina survivors to Capitol Hill, has repeatedly encouraged our online activist network, numbering several hundreds of thousands of people, to express their outrage to members of Congress about Bush?s edict depriving Gulf citizens of decent wages in federally funded reconstruction projects.*
We estimate that each time we sent an e-mail action alert on Davis-Bacon,*more than*20,000 CAF activists from all over the country sent an urgent communication to their member of Congress and senator?via fax or telephone or e-mail.*
Clearly, the White House understood that*Rep. Miller had found a way, under the little-used 1976 National Emergencies Act, to force a vote in Congress, and clearly the president understood that Congress would vote to overturn his misguided decree.
Coming on the heels of the acknowledged defeat of Bush?s Social Security privatization plan?and on the eve of a likely failure by the Republicans in Congress to push through draconian budget cuts to pay for wasteful tax cuts for the rich? this capitulation by the White House represents another victory for activist progressive action. It means a victory for democracy?and a victory for the people of the Gulf states.
