Dear John,

Happy Labor Day! Today is a day to honor the people who have built this country with their minds, hands, and hearts. And it is a day we traditionally come together as a union family to celebrate our decades of victories for working people: victories like ending child labor, ensuring health and safety standards on the job, creating the weekend, and establishing a minimum wage. A day to enjoy the fruits of our labor and enjoy the end of summer.

But this year, it feels more difficult to strike a tone of celebration. The COVID-19 pandemic has threatened our lives and our livelihoods. Our unions have been threatened by an unfriendly presidential administration and a Supreme Court that seems intent on slowly chipping away at our hard-won rights. And the wounds of systemic racism have been opened anew, bringing a fresh urgency to our fight for civil rights and racial justice.  

But even in these times, we have come together to prevent major cuts to our schools and fought for safe communities; we are continuing the fight to tax the corporations and billionaires – who make their ultra-weath off of our sweat – through Prop. 15 and other wealth tax measures we are fighting for; and we are communicating more than ever about how we can help one another. In this most non-traditional year, when educators and school employees have reinvented what school looks like and worked so hard to provide quality education while keeping our students and coworkers safe, we must take the time to rest and prepare for the challenges that lie ahead.

So while it is difficult to celebrate this year and the pressures of the moment lay bare our deepest anxieties – anxieties that are only heightened because we can’t be together – we can still unite in thought, in spirit, and in our actions to recommit to our fight for labor justice, for racial justice, and for social justice. Our work is not finished, and we have much to be grateful for and much to strive for so that one day we can live in the society that FDR envisioned so long ago: one with freedom of speech, freedom of worship, freedom from want, and freedom from fear.

May your Labor Day be a day to remember what we have won and what we still have to fight for. Please stay safe.

In Solidarity,

Jeffery Freitas
CFT President

Sent via ActionNetwork.org. To update your email address, change your name or address, or to stop receiving emails from California Federation of Teachers, please click here.