Your Vote Does Count!

by James Knight, BMWE Director of Government Affairs

In March of 1999 BMWE President Mac A. Fleming issued the call to have every BMWE member registered to vote in the year 2000. In response, BMWE State Legislative Directors, System Officers and individual members enthusiastically embarked on the campaign and intensified their efforts over the last several months.

But despite all our efforts, we fell short of our goal. However, we did manage to substantially increase the number of BMWE households involved in this year's election process.

As we engaged in this process, we learned that a number of members had a lack of interest in voting because they believed that a small number of votes coming from their households would not make a significant contribution or have a significant impact on the election outcome.

It is our sincere hope that this belief is no longer held as a result of the recent election where oneSupreme Court vote effectively decided the outcome of the presidential election.

The following momentous elections were affected by a small number of votes:

In 1845, one vote brought Texas into the union.

In 1868, one vote saved President Andrew Johnson from impeachment.

In 1875, one vote won R.B. Hayes the presidency of the United States.

In 1923, one vote gave Adolf Hitler leadership of the Nazi party.

In 1941, one vote saved selective service (the draft) just weeks prior to the attack on Pearl Harbor.

In 1960, one vote per precinct nationally elected John F. Kennedy president.

As we watched events unfold in the 2000 United States presidential election, we saw that a handful of votes kept this nation on an electoral roller coaster. Only several hundred votes of those counted enabled George W. Bush to take the presidency. It was also a very small number of votes which determined who will hold a number of House, Senate, state and local elected positions.

We must always remember that a minuscule number of votes vested Bush with the power to determine not only who will be appointed to Supreme Court justice positions, but also who will serve as Secretary of Labor, Secretary of Transportation, the head of the Federal Railroad Administration, and who will sit on government-appointed panels that have jurisdiction over our contract negotiation process, possible Surface Transportation Board openings, and other governmental agencies that affect our day-to-day lives.

We are proud of the number of union households who did turn out for the national, state, and local elections; however, we must be ever mindful that the outcome of these elections would have been different had all union households turned out for the election. We would not be looking at a Republican House, Republican Senate, and Republican anti-union president in our immediate future.

We must press forward to ensure that every union household recognizes the importance of being involved in the election process. We must prepare ourselves for future elections and become more and more involved in electing a government that represents all Americans, not just those at the top of the food chain.