At a gas station in Delafield off I-94, two female
clerks – one older, one younger – are arguing about the merits of the labor demonstrations
in Madison. It’s Saturday, Day 5 of the protests that have grabbed the nation’s
attention, and this time the Tea Party is supposed to show for a
counter-demonstration.
“I do respect the teachers.” the older woman retorts, as I
walk in. “But they don’t have to pay hardly anything for their benefits. A lot
of working people don’t even get health insurance or a pension. Besides, I
believe Wisconsin is rated as having the worst school system in the country. So
why should they get all that money when the schools are so bad?” (Actually,
Wisconsin is rated among the top in the nation in teaching white kids and among
the bottom in teaching black kids.)
I arrive in Madison about noon, park at the East Towne Mall
and join a crowd at a city bus stop. Fare is $2, exact change, I’m told. .” A
woman says she’s been waiting 45 minutes; she just missed the previous bus. Labor
is operating a free shuttle service elsewhere in the sprawling mall, but a man
informs us that the line for that service is “a mile long.”
An empty No. 6 arrives. We fill the bus. Almost as many are
standing as are sitting. The bus rolls down E. Washington Avenue without
stopping until about 10 blocks away from the Capitol, where it picks up a dozen
more passengers.
We deboard near the end of E. Washington. I pass a bank of
portable toilets, relieving my mind of one anxiety.
Crowds are streaming around the Capitol sporting picket
signs. The throng seems like Middle America with students mixed in. The young
people add energy, beating drums, blowing horns and whistles, and leading
chants, among them:
“It’s disgusting – union busting.”
“Hey, hey, ho, ho, Scott Walker’s got to go.”
“Kill the bill!”
“Down with Walker – up with the people.”
A West Allis man tells me he was surprised by Walker’s ploy
to take away the bargaining rights of public-sector employees. “I knew he was
anti-union,” he says. “But I didn’t know he was out to kill the unions.”
The man himself, who does not want his name used, is a union
member, but not a public employee. Echoing others, he adds, “If this was just
about pay and benefits, there wouldn’t be thousands of people here.” At issue,
he says, is the survival of public-employee unions.
Equainess Price of Racine quips that he came because his
job is to support teachers. He is ESP (educational support personnel) for
Gateway College in Racine.
“The bill wouldn’t kill me,” he says, “but I know it would
hurt many others.”
I look for the Tea Party. I find only isolated groups of
counter-demonstrators. Finally, I find their rally, which is breaking up. The
pro-Walker people number in the hundreds at best. The anti-Walker people number
in the tens of thousands.
There are long lines to enter the Capitol, which is living
up to its name as the people’s house. Madison is, of course, no stranger to
protests, which hit a crescendo in the 1960s. One difference between then and
now is the police. Then they were hostile; now they’re friendly. To prevent
overcrowding, police courteously let in only so many demonstrators at a time.
Legions participate in a continuous rally in the rotunda,
where speeches and applause echo. Protest signs and banners adorn walls and
railings.
On the fourth floor young people sit at a long table in an
office working on Macs. They overflow into the hallway. The Teacher Assistant
Association, a union consisting of University of Wisconsin grad students, runs this
operation, which is part of the protest infrastructure. The association picks
up trash inside and outside the Capitol, runs information booths, supplies
marshalls, feeds social networks such as Facebook and Twitter, produces flyers
(including a ubiquitous one here reminding participants, “This is a peaceful
protest”), helps coordinate activities and do sundry other chores.
A harried-looking Alex Hanna, a UW-Madison sociology grad student,
heads the 24-hour-a day operation, which he admits is “physically taxing.” He
says he broke away only once since Tuesday to go home and refresh himself and
he has fallen behind on his school work.
At a rally outside, Mahlon Mitchell, president of the
Professional Fire Fighters of Wisconsin tells the multitude: “Gov. Walker said
today on TV that he received 19,000 e-mails that were in support of his
legislation. Nineteen thousand. I think I have 19,000 behind me and 20,000 over
there, 20,000 over here … and that doesn’t include those who are in the Capitol
right now.”
The protesters hear promises that they will win and
expressions of love for the 14 Democratic senators who left the state to deny Walker
a quorum and thus delay action on his scheme to gut public-employee unions.
The rally breaks up. My son and grandson, who live in
Madison, pick me up and we grab a bite to eat.
