Labor & Employment Law

Whose House? Our House!

By admin

This is a crosspost from the Wisconsin State AFL-CIO.

This evening the court of law ruled that the Wisconsin State Capitol MUST remain open to its people. The Capitol is going to resume business hours and protesters will be asked to leave every night.

However, the Capitol doors will re-open at 8:00 am each and every morning so that Wisconsin residents can exercise their first amendment rights without undue interference from their Governor.

This ruling is a huge victory for Wisconsin and an enormous defeat for Gov. Scott Walker and his unconstitutional power grab. Despite Scott Walker’s draconian attempts to take his ‘baseball bat’ to the First Amendment rights of those who disagree with his extreme agenda, he has failed yet again to silence the voices of the 74% of Wisconsinites who oppose his budget repair bill.

This ruling also reflects extremely poorly on Scott Walker’s character. Despite Walker and his DOA’s best efforts to demean, discredit, and dissolve the group gathered in opposition to him, Judge Albert in issuing his decision noted specifically that during this “unprecedented” event in Wisconsin’s history, “thousands of people peacefully protested for two weeks and no injuries or damage to personal or government property occurred.”

Workers in Wisconsin have already made every single concession asked for by Gov. Walker in the fight over this horrendous bill, but Scott Walker won’t take yes for an answer. This bill has nothing to do with the budget, and everything to do with Scott Walker’s desire to take his ‘baseball bat’ to our rights as workers. It’s time for Gov. Walker to finally come to the table and sit down to negotiate a deal that gets Wisconsin moving forward.

This evening there was a peaceful, non-violent exit of the Capitol by the brave members of society who have occupied the Capitol for 19 days. The last members of Capitol city left the building on their own terms to thunderous cheers from hundreds. “Thank you” and “we’ll be back tomorrow” were all that could be heard for miles.

Earlier in the evening thousands of Wisconsinites marched down State St. to the Capitol and rallied to “kill the whole bill.”

“We are here and we are stronger than ever” said Shannon Maier, president of AFSCME Local 720. “The labor movement is energized and we are standing together in solidarity. We are proud. We are strong. And we will stay until we win.”

Full post as published by AFL-CIO NOW BLOG on March 04, 2011 (boomark / email).