Editor’s note: This piece is reprinted from the Chicago Reporter, 25 May 2017, with the kind permission of Curtis Black. Bill was one of the Stansbury Forum’s “contributors”.

Bill Drew and his wife Gloria. Photo courtesy of the Drew family

My old friend Bill Drew died on May 14, and I’ve been reflecting on the impact he had on his community – in particular on the movement for political independence on the Southwest Side – as well as the impact he had on my life.

In many ways he reminded me of Milt Cohen, the political organizer who helped elect Harold Washington as mayor (and who also recruited me to journalism), whom I wrote about in my first column in this space. Both Bill and Milt were old radicals who immersed themselves in neighborhood issues. Both were white activists who devoted themselves to the empowerment of people of color. Both had a remarkable tenacity, both had constantly searching, questioning minds, and both dedicated themselves to energizing and inspiring people to get involved.

Bill left a record of his quest, a memoir he published online after he learned he had cancer shortly before his 66th birthday. It’s a testament to his rigorous self-honesty and realism, and it’s a redemption tale – the story of a pugnacious kid from an Irish Catholic family in Waukegan who got swept up in the anti-war movement at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, and who spent a decade in Milwaukee organizing support for factory strikers, victims of police brutality, and everyone from farmers to local Native Americans. He spent a year in prison after jumping a police lieutenant who had a young demonstrator in a chokehold.

Only after his memoir was published did I learn how Bill had first touched my life. As editor of a left-wing paper, he had learned about and publicized the campaign of the United League of Mississippi, which was boycotting businesses in Tupelo to protest police brutality and demand jobs for blacks. It was 1978, and I was a college student and joined a campus group that travelled to Tupelo for a solidarity march.

It was definitely educational. I still remember the huge church meeting that greeted us, the haunting melody sung by a contingent of striking poultry workers – “Walking that picket line a mighty long time, I’m not tired yet” – and the confrontation with a column of about 40 masked Ku Klux Klan members who tried (and failed) to force United League marchers off the road. And at a rally in front of city hall, I remember seeing Klansmen in full regalia stepping out of the police station to observe and menace.

Bill had moved to Chicago by then, and I met him around that time. He was a jovial, enthusiastic, salt-of-the-earth type guy. But after the movement that he’d thrown himself into began to falter in the 1980s, Bill descended into a downward spiral of drinking and drugs. His memoir gives an unsparing account of that descent, of hitting bottom and digging himself out. He taught himself computer programming and built a successful career. He married Gloria, a hospitality worker whose emergence as a leader of Chicago Public Schools lunchroom attendants he recounts with pride. He raised two excellent sons.

I heard from Bill again in 2009, when he began organizing support for a local art student who’d been charged with murder after he defended himself – with the Exacto knife he carried for the purpose of sharpening pencils – when he was jumped by a carload of kids. At Bill’s urging, I attended the student’s sentencing hearing, where his teacher and minister were joined by neighbors including a former cop and a Chicago Fire Department lieutenant speaking on his behalf. Bill also organized a block party to raise funds for the young man’s legal defense and promote positive activities for youth.
His memoir says this event represented “activist Bill reborn.” The next year, he was organizing precinct workers for the campaigns of Rudy Lozano Jr. for state representative and Jesus “Chuy” Garcia for Cook County Board. He put his computer skills to use building the database for the TIF Illumination Project. That project, which has schooled thousands of people across the city in how tax increment financing works, wouldn’t have been possible without Bill, according to Tom Tresser of Civic Lab.

A couple of years later, Bill was diagnosed with inoperative pancreatic cancer. He faced the news with incredible courage – he would tell me that he viewed it as an opportunity, a spur to double down on his political efforts and deepen his appreciation for his family. At a 66th birthday party after the news, scores of old comrades travelled from Milwaukee and elsewhere to pay him tribute.

He fought the cancer with the same determination he’d fought the powers that be over the years, and he won five additional years of a purposeful life. His main focus was on building the McKinley Park Progressive Alliance and expanding that into the 12th Ward Independent Political Organization. He was proud that in the 2015 election, that group had full contingents of volunteers staffing every polling place – and that, unlike many progressive campaigns, the volunteers were folks who lived there.

Here’s part of his clear-eyed assessment of the 2015 election, in which Garcia forced Rahm Emanuel into a runoff: “When all the votes were counted, we were not the kind of movement that could that could topple Rahm Emanuel’s coterie of global power brokers. We are a populace fragmented by the cunning of the One Percent. We rose up to fight back. We lost. And yet we gained a lot.”

Bill had a vision – and it is slowly coming to fruition – of a network of IPOs across the Southwest Side. The organizational form harks back to the small-d democratic political organizations that emerged to fight the Democratic machine in the 1970s, under independent aldermen on the North, West, and Southwest Sides. (The only IPO continuously operating since then is in Garcia’s 22nd Ward.) It was necessary to remain active between elections, he maintained, and his groups held educational forums year-round. One issue he highlighted was the questionable practices of the national charter school network run by the Turkish Gulen movement, whose Concept chain opened a school in McKinley Park in 2013.

That’s what was special about Bill Drew. He looked beyond the daily grind that bogs down progressive activists. He asked how we could take things to the next level – and he was a consummate master of figuring out the next step, and the step after that, and inspiring people to move forward together.
I am among many people who will miss him. But he left a strong legacy – and many people in place to continue his work.

1997: Farmworkers demonstrating, Salinas, CA. Photo: Robert Gumpert

The buzz about a Day without Immigrants on May 1, 2017 is growing. Spanish radio is already churning with calls for strikes, rallies and demonstrations on May 1. This movement recalls the giant mobilizations of May 1, 2006 that occurred in response to proposed draconian anti-immigrant federal legislation called the Sensenbrenner Immigration Bill.

May Day has its historic origins in the nineteenth century struggle for the eight-hour day. In many cities on May Day in 2006, the marches and rallies proved to be the largest in history. Industries that relied on immigrant labor were paralyzed as millions of workers responded to the call for a Day without Latinos (also called the Great American Boycott). Labor participated unevenly in these rallies and mostly in places where the membership in service unions was predominately Latino. This year, in the turmoil surrounding the Trump Presidency, May 1 could be a great opportunity for the labor movement to flex its muscles and build its future.

Labor’s participation is important to the future of American politics. For example, look at the history of politics in California. Turn back the clock 23 years to 1994 when then Republican Governor Pete Wilson faced a fierce re-election battle. He launched a “Trump-like” assault on “illegal” immigration replete with videos of masses of Mexicans streaming across the border and threatening California. It was a brazen racist ploy called Proposition 187, introduced to bolster his reelection bid. Union leaders in California faced a critical decision about whether to participate in the massive Los Angeles mobilization against Prop 187.

In a meeting of labor leadership, some union leaders argued that it was important not to participate in the Los Angeles’ May 1 march so as not to alienate “Encino Man” — the Reagan Democrats of the San Fernando Valley and elsewhere. In the midst of a heated discussion, AFL-CIO Regional Director David Sickler made a dramatic plea to Los Angeles’ trade unionists:

“If we don’t march with these Latin workers, we will lose the confidence and trust of whole generation of Latinos.”

Sickler’s argument won the day, and Los Angeles’ labor turned out for the march. That action, and many others, solidified the labor/Latino nexus. In one generation, California went from “Reagan-land” to solid Blue Democratic.

Again the same challenge faces labor, however now it’s on a national scale. And the opportunity for the labor movement is equally huge. Supporting the upcoming May 1 protests, strikes and other actions will clearly demonstrate that unions are ready to be a champion of the rising Latino demographic. Conversely, sitting on the sidelines will mark us as bystanders to racist repression.

Recently building trades labor leaders blindly and naively embraced Trump’s agenda by meeting with him at the White House just days after his inauguration and lauding his commitment to build infrastructure and oil pipelines — but with no commitment to pro-labor codes like prevailing wage or project labor agreements. AFL-CIO President Rich Trumka — usually a strong voice for racial justice — recently embraced Trump’s talk of immigration reform after his speech to a joint session of Congress. Again, a major labor leader is blindly and naively playing into Trump’s racist rhetoric. These actions by the building trades and the leader of the AFL-CIO undermine the U.S. labor movement’s need to squarely be on the side of immigrants battling Trump’s racist rhetoric, executive orders and travel bans.

There are many possible levels of participation for labor and unions on May 1. Each union must determine what’s the most appropriate way to participate based on its members needs and consciousness. In California, SEIU’s United Service Workers West, representing over 60,000 janitors, security guards and airport service workers has announced on Facebook its support for a May 1 strike. The United Food and Commercial Workers, representing supermarket workers in Southern California and the hotel workers union (UNITE HERE) are both assessing their actions in California. California is fertile ground for these protests with a sympathetic and supportive political infrastructure and a demographic tidal wave that means that Latinos are now the largest ethnic group in the state — out numbering Anglos 39 to 38 percent.

These calls for strikes may snowball. On the hastily organized February 17 “Day without Immigrants,” tens of thousands of mostly Latin service workers in many cities and towns stayed home (in many cases with the support of their employers). Earlier in February, Comcast employees at the company’s headquarters walked out to march and rally against Trump’s immigration policies. There is no reason not to expect similar dramatic actions on May Day. The social fervor is such that strikes in certain sectors and workplaces are very possible and possible with relative impunity.

With the prospect of large rallies and marches on May 1, some other unions are talking about participating in an organized way — even if it means after work or on off shifts. Just visibly marching with banners and signs in support of immigrant rights would be important and impactful to the thousands of immigrants who will brave deportation to hit the streets. Unions at the national and local level have an opportunity to speak with one voice in defense of immigrants. In specific locations like Los Angeles, these unions and others may hold joint press conferences and public events. Equally important will be actions in the “heartland” where immigrants may feel more politically and organizationally isolated than on the coasts.

Some unions have already begun “Know Your Rights” solidarity trainings to prepare workers for Immigration Control and Enforcement (ICE) raids that could take place in the community and the workplace. Union halls could become “Sanctuary Sites” for the undocumented. And now is a timely moment for always appreciated contributions of money, materials and office space to immigrant rights groups.

In addition to SEIU’s United Service Workers West, several national political and immigrants’ rights groups are organizing for the May 1 Day Without Immigrants including: Solid (an open-source project offered by Brandworkers), Strike Core, Cosecha, and the Beyond the Moment March.

May 1 is the traditional international day of working class solidarity, a holiday born of the U.S. struggle for the eight-hour day. It can be reclaimed with gusto this year as a focused attack on the anti-immigrant policies of Trump. But more than that, it is a day to cement the alliance between labor and the immigrant working class.