ALEC and DC Voting Rights

In recent weeks, one of the strongest (and yet least known about) pillars of the conservative business lobby infrastructure, the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) has suddenly been thrust into the light. In the wake of the Trayvon Martin murder and the subsequent scrutiny of the "Stand Your Ground" law under which George Zimmerman claims to have acted, progressive activists turned their attentions to ALEC, which has played a key role in pushing such legislation nationwide. In taking on ALEC, groups such as Colorofchange (an online civil rights group that has spearheaded this work) began targeting corporations who pay dues as part of a membership to ALEC. The effort continues to move forward, having succeeded in winning the exit from ALEC of major companies such as Pepsi, Coca Cola, Kraft and McDonalds.

This is not the first time progressives have turned their eyes towards ALEC. During the fight in Wisconsin in early 2011 activists raised ALEC's profile and were joined in this effort by eminent UW-Madison historian William Cronon who wrote an excellent piece - and one that got him into a fair bit of trouble - that included some historical background on ALEC. Yet, there remains very little about the organization's past compared with other mainstays of the conservative movement such as the Heritage Foundation.

In investigating this, I went through the Washington Post's archives, along with a long historical paper from DC Vote and found that, at least in their pages, ALEC first major national foray came in the late 1970s, when it took the lead in fighting to prevent Washington, D.C. from gaining national legislative representation. In 1978 the U.S. House and Senate (flush with Democrats at the time) passed overwhelmingly an amendment to the constitution, the D.C. Voting Rights Amendment, which would have given D.C. the status of a state with two senators and one house member.

The rising conservative movement of the 1970s soon sprang into action, with ALEC at the head. ALEC quickly produced a fourteen page report for state legislators outlining its opposition and then spent roughly $30,000 (in 1978 dollars) to mail the booklet to every state legislator in the country. In late 1978 ALEC expended another $15,000 to bring fifty state legislators to D.C. to strategize on defeating the amendment.

The right-wing critique of the D.C. Voting Rights Amendment rode along two main thrusts. Some of the critique came wrapped in traditional constitutional arguments, stating that the law simply countermanded the intention of the Constitution that D.C. not possess the same political rights as a state. At the same time, ALEC and conservatives responded to the strong civil rights messaging of the pro-amendment side (who argued that lack of voting rights for D.C. was a civil rights issue, considering the city was majority African-American). Using rhetoric that has increasingly become a mainstay for conservatives (including famously used by figures such as George Wallace), opponents of D.C. voting rights accused supporters of employing reverse racism. ALEC head and Arizona state representative Donna Carlson stated that amendment backers were employing "the basest, indeed racist, tactics in order to railroad the amendment," further adding that critics of the amendment were "being branded as redneck racists and enemies of black Americans."

ALEC members also devised a key aspect of the legislative strategy for defeating the amendment. It called upon conservative legislators in states that did not ratify the amendment to send to the federal government "formal resolutions of disapproval" which ALEC stated "could not be rescinded, and thus would bind a state permanently against the amendment." ALEC's plan was put into motion first in Arizona (where its head was a state representative). In doing so, ALEC also took a firm stance in the ongoing conflict between moderates and the right within the Republican Party. Many Republicans backed D.C. voting rights, including Senators Robert Dole and Barry Goldwater. Meanwhile, New Right figures such as Senator Orrin Hatch and conservative intellectual Michael Novack, along with the Heritage Foundation and ALEC actively opposed.

It is important to note ALEC alone did not kill D.C. voting rights. The campaign in favor was often poorly run and the civil rights messaging proved less powerful in the states than the national level. The racial politics cut in varying ways, with United Latin American Citizens, the main Mexican-American civil rights group opposing based on fears the new (almost certainly) black representatives would "give blacks a disproportionate in lobbying for federal jobs and programs over Hispanics." Still, much of the general opposition was turned into actionable steps in good part by ALEC's efforts. By 1985 the amendment had only passed in sixteen states and the time frame for its passage had expired.

As the campaign against ALEC moves forward, it is helpful to illuminate how, for decades, the new conservative infrastructure built particularly in the 1970s has and continues to profoundly shape our politics.

Mike Daisey's English Abolitionist Predecessor

The controversy over the fabrications storyteller Mike Daisey incorporated in his tale of abuses in factories in China making Apple products has exploded over the past few days. While nothing fundamental about the criticisms of Apple is affected by Daisey's lies, it is still a surprising and tough revelation to grapple with. My fear is that his stories will become like the "Climategate e-mails"; a rhetorical foil that opponents to improving labor conditions at Apple's suppliers will use against all opponents, essentially saying "well, Mike Daisey told some lies so how can we believe anything we hear about Apple?"

Figures such as Daisey, great storytellers who have (or may have in the case of our subject for today) lied about parts of their stories to make them more impactful in a social justice fight have precedents. One of them is the man above, Olaudah Equiano, one of the great heroes of the anti-slavery movement in the United Kingdom which spanned roughly from the 1780s to the 1830s. Equiano appeared relatively early, a freed slave living in London who connected with white anti-slavery figures to aid the cause. This he did primarily through the release in 1789 of his autobiography, the Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano, which quickly became a bestseller among the English public. The book told of Equiano's youth, his capture by an opposing African nation and then his sale to European slave traders, followed by the horrors of the Middle Passage and slavery in North America.

The book galvanized the public and was a key piece of the larger organizing efforts made by anti-slavery activists in these years. Equiano himself was a brilliant organizer; among other tactics he offered discounts to anyone who bought more than six copies and he placed model petitions at the start of each copy.

Part of the success of the book emerged from how Equiano framed it; while stories of slavery’s horrors were prominent, much of the book detailed Equiano's life as the personal servant of a British naval captain through a series of Horatio Hornblower/Master and Commander-type adventures. As one example: Equiano recounts the story of how he went on an expedition surveying near the North Pole. While on land, he became separated from the rest of the crew and ran into a polar bear who he fought to the death, killing it with his own bare hands. His story also emphasized his conversion to Christianity, his education, and his love of England to build sympathy among his predominately white English readership.

Both at the time and since, questions have been raised about the veracity of Equiano's story. In particular, historian Vincent Carretta has argued based on baptism records that Equiano was born in South Carolina (here is a handy chart detailing both sides of the debate). Carretta has argued that Equiano likely relied on stories he heard from other slaves to fill-in the first part of the book to make himself and the case of African slaves more compelling. While we will likely never know for sure, Equiano's Narrative is still taught in many a college and he remains firmly in the pantheon of abolitionist icons. That is not to argue that he was right or that Mike Daisey's fabrications (which of course are proven) are unimportant. But to not grapple with the clear effectiveness of an Olauduh Equiano or Mike Daisey is to ignore tough, but needed conversations over the mechanics of social change.

"Business, always business": The Wire and the History of U.S. Capitalism

WARNING: SPOILERS AHEAD

The Wire is that rare cultural creation that is even better than the overwhelming praise would suggest. The show's explorations of urban inequalities, the failures of institutions, and the ambiguities of how people survive (and don't) are truly epic, yet manage to stay grounded in the experiences of its many and sharply drawn characters. Central to the show however is the emphasis David Simon, Ed Burns and co. place on the failures of the current economic model to provide opportunity and decent lives for so many people. One only need to watch the tragic story of Frank Sobotka, head of a local dockworkers’ union, to get a sense of Simon’s deep understanding of the way, particularly since the Reagan presidency, that the "profits before all" economic model has bred an increasingly unequal and in many ways dysfunctional society.

One of The Wire's main arguments centers on how deindustrialization and the failure (as of yet) for the transforming economy or our political system to ensure some matter of economic security for everyone (especially people of color in urban centers) contributes mightily to creating the array of issues associated with illegal drugs. Ironically (as the creators take delight in pointing out), although the drug trade exists outside many societal norms, it is at the same time as thoroughly capitalistic an enterprise as selling footwear or electronics. One can imagine a world in which, if they were legal, some of the despised drug kingpins might be hailed as innovative CEOs.

Building on the idea that the depictions of the drug gangs can teach us about business dynamics, I would like to suggest that watching The Wire contains lessons not only about the present, but also the past. As I plan to help show in a series of posts, watched at a metaphorical level,The Wire presents a solid introduction to the history of how organizational structures and the worldviews of U.S. business have transformed repeatedly over the past hundred years. That may sound a bit outlandish, but given that one of the leading scholars of the urban crisis in the United States, William Julius Wilson, is teaching an entire class based on the show, perhaps not. I'll have more to say about this, but for the moment, here's a sneak peak of what's to come:

1) "Games beyond the game": Avon, Stringer, and the Rise of the Corporation

2) "Making sense of this game": Prop Joe, Stringer, and the Post-War "Consensus"

3) "I ain't been one for meets no how": Marlo and the Robber Barons

4) "And of course, I'm not even Greek": The "Greeks" and the Multinational Corporation