Obama: When Workers Form Unions, ‘Workers Prosper, America Prospers’

[Omaha Steve]

http://blog.aflcio.org/2007/05/15/obama-when-workers-form-unions-workers-prosper-america-prospers/

Obama: When Workers Form Unions, ‘Workers Prosper, America Prospers’

by Payson Schwin, May 15, 2007

Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) told a raucous crowd of more than 700 working men and women that as president, he would fight for the freedom to form unions, creation of universal health care and an end to the Iraq war.

The hundreds of union members who crowded yesterday into the War Memorial theater in Trenton, N.J., showcased their union pride with such T-shirts as “American Made Steel,” Proud to Make America Work” and “Every Worker Deserves a Secure Pension.”


Watch video: http://cbs3.com/video/?id=[e-mail]


The event opened with a standing ovation for Obama, who responded to the applause with a humble, “You’re making me blush.”

In his opening statement, Obama spoke about Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s 1968 trip to Memphis, Tenn., to help sanitation workers organize.

They stood up for themselves. In this country, we should value the labor of every single American worker.



He said every worker deserves the freedom to form unions without intimidation, bargain in good faith and work in a safe environment. “Those rights are in jeopardy today,” Obama warned. When workers join unions, “not only do workers prosper, America prospers.”

Obama promised to “make the Employee Free Choice Act the law of the land” and to make universal health care coverage a reality.

We can have universal health care by the end of the next president’s first term, by the end of my first term.

FULL story at link.