Constitution week
By RUBY PANTALONE
The National Society Daughters of the American Revolution urges Americans to reflect on the United States Constitution during this month’s annual observance in honor this foundational document of national governance.
The DAR initiated the observance in 1955, when the service organization petitioned the U.S. Congress to dedicate September 17–23 of each year to the commemoration of Constitution Week.
The celebration’s goals are threefold: to encourage the study of the historical events that led to the framing of the Constitution in September 1787; to remind the public that the Constitution is the basis of America’s great heritage and the foundation for its way of life; and to emphasize U.S. citizens’ responsibility to protect, defend and preserve the U.S. Constitution.
“We are so proud DAR led the way in making Constitution Week an official commemoration and our members enthusiastically promote the celebration annually in communities across the country by erecting community displays, sponsoring municipal proclamations, ringing bells and staging programs to raise awareness of the Constitution’s tenets and importance,” said DAR President General Pamela Rouse Wright. “We encourage all citizens to join us in celebrating this powerful document that is so important to American history and to reflect on the impact the Constitution has had on the lives of American citizens past and present.”
DAR has been the foremost advocate for the awareness, promotion and celebration of Constitution Week. The annual observance provides innumerable opportunities for educational initiatives and community outreach, two mission areas of crucial importance to the National Society. By fostering knowledge of, and appreciation for, the Constitution and the inalienable rights it affords to all Americans, DAR helps to keep alive the memory of the men and women who secured our nation’s foundational liberties.
One of the largest patriotic women’s organizations in the world, DAR has 190,000 members in approximately 3,000 chapters across the country and several foreign countries. DAR members promote historic preservation, education and patriotism via commemorative events, scholarships and educational initiatives, citizenship programs, service to veterans, meaningful community service and more. For additional information about DAR and its relevant mission, visit www.dar.org.
The Anna Maria Pittman Chapter in Keizer wants you to celebrate Constitution Week with us.
(Ruby Pantalone lives in Keizer.)
Trump on abortion
By GENE H. MCINTYRE
A transactional politician is one who looks for deals and exchanges to achieve his goals: he trades favors for political support and other benefits. This style, for example, contrasts with more ideological politicians who stick strictly to their beliefs and policies. I’d argue that former President Donald J. Trump falls into the transactional category.
Trump has become famous for using a strategy where he announces whatever he thinks and has been successful in doing so. Mainly, he has traded what he apparently believes true to interested persons and constituencies that thereby helped him win the White House by the 2016 election. He rewarded these factions by acting as president on their agenda to outlaw abortion, restrict contraception, and limit the scope of reproductive health care. During his four years in office, he assisted U.S. employers of religious or moral objections to not cover birth control for their employees, appointed anti-abortion leaders to leadership positions in the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, and nominated justices to the nation’s Supreme Court who then overturned Roe v. Wade, ending 50 years of the constitutional right to an abortion. These actions have been Trump-recognized accomplishments of his presidency.
However, developments nationwide leading up to the 2024 election have revealed for some time now that the end of Roe v. Wade is very unpopular among many U.S. voters. Trump himself recognizes this widespread negative attitude as factually true. He in turn has been trying of late to distance himself from this negative consequence of sentiment opposing abortion and diminishing women’s right in America to decide for themselves whether to have a baby and other health matters related to their bodies. All this controversy and its impact on prospects for a successful election of Trump as president has left him flummoxed to say the least.
In his effort to recover from the rather serious decline in voter approval numbers and regain a projected majority vote to win in November, Trump has had his running mate, U.S. Senator J. D. Vance of Ohio, tell reporters that he, Trump, would veto a national abortion ban as president. Vance has done so by saying, “Donald Trump can absolutely commit to that (veto)”! Further, “Donald Trump’s view is that we want the individual states and their individual cultures and their unique political sensibilities to make these decisions because we don’t want to have a nonstop federal conflict over this issue.”
More neutral commentators on this subject wonder if going into some kind of compromise situation by each state having the full authority to rule in favor of or against abortions would run into 50 nonstop conflicts over this matter. Hence, for example, if one state makes abortions illegal with criminal sanctions for those who obtain the procedure then what happens when a resident of that state travels to another U.S. state to have an abortion? What, then, also, if authorities in the free-to-choose-state refuse to cooperate? There are other imagined cases that promise big problems, inviting intra-state disunity, dissolution of rule by law, and outright civil warring!
During the last several days, due to the increase in criticism from anti-abortion activists and fearful of demobilizing anti-abortion voters, Trump reversed his position on the Florida referendum, saying he’ll vote no on it. This switch has enabled the Harris campaign to argue effectively that Trump as president will lead a federal assault on all women’s rights. By this writing here, Trump has not found a path to a resolution that would put his critics to rest and smooth the stormy waters of controversy that the Trump-Vance team has wrought to their presidential campaign.
Trump has been able to avoid consequences for some actions he took during his presidency and thereafter, including the insurrection he fomented at the capitol and many other efforts he has had underway to try to thwart the traditional U.S. transition from one president, himself, to the next, Joe Biden. The proudly-held tradition that has underscored our democracy here in these United States of America for well over 200 years. Whatever the outcome, it has become clear that Donald Trump does not know how to deal effectively with the abortion controversy, where using double talk and taking both sides of a controversy in the same breath formerly worked for him, it has failed him now.
(Gene H. McIntyre shares his opinion regularly in the Keizertimes.)
Standards board could raise the tide for all workers
By KATHY LARA
Of the Oregon Capital Chronicle
When an industry sees three-quarters of its workers leave their employers in a single year, something is seriously wrong. And that’s what Oregon witnessed in 2022 among home care workers — those who feed, bathe and otherwise care for seniors and people with disabilities so that they can continue living in their homes.
The high turnover rate among home care workers is no great mystery. It’s what happens when a difficult job comes with low pay, poor benefits and tough working conditions.
Home care workers and the broader category of direct care workers are a crucial part of the workforce, and their importance will only grow in the years to come, as Oregon’s population ages.
So what can Oregon do to make direct care more appealing? It could consider establishing a workforce standards board.
A workforce standards board is a public body that would be created by the Legislature to help set minimum wages and working conditions for an entire industry. These boards usually consist of workers, employers and public officials or members of the public.
Some boards have the power to set the rules in an industry, while others make recommendations to the Legislature. Either way, workforce standards boards have proven to be effective ways to improve pay and working conditions across an industry, bypassing the usual challenges that arise when seeking to organize one workplace at a time.
The benefits of a workforce standards board can be seen in Nevada. Much like in Oregon, Nevada’s home care workers were quitting in droves, with one in two leaving after just one year on the job. Then the COVID pandemic struck, exposing the homecare industry’s inadequate training and other shortcomings.
So Nevada’s workers demanded the creation of a workforce standards board, and the Legislature agreed. Subsequently, the recommendations of the Nevada Home Care Workforce Board helped persuade lawmakers to raise the minimum wage for home care workers. In an industry where the average wage had languished around $11 an hour, workers gained a wage floor of $16 per hour.
Workforce standards boards are not just good for workers and their families; they can be good for businesses too. By setting better pay and working conditions, standards boards can lead to a more stable, productive workforce less prone to turnover. Also, setting and raising workforce standards helps responsible businesses. For example, it eliminates the incentive for businesses to misclassify workers as independent contractors — a practice that can undercut honest employers by reducing labor costs.
Some in the labor movement may worry whether, in delivering tangible gains for workers, workforce standards boards lessen the urgency for workers to unionize. But the evidence does not bear out that understandable concern.
By requiring all companies in an industry to abide by the same minimum wages and working conditions, standards boards reduce the opportunity of nonunion firms to undercut unionized firms. Thus, there is less incentive for employers to push back against union drives.
Also, the formation of a workforce standards board would create the need to inform workers about the board’s work and help them participate in the process, such as testifying before the board — a need which unions are in the best position to fill. Thus, the creation of the board itself can be a catalyst for organizing.
Research shows that countries with industry-level standard setting have higher union membership than countries with only workplace-level bargaining. That’s the case in Sweden, Britain and other countries with higher union density than the U.S.
In 2023, the Oregon Legislature considered a bill to create a board to address the high turnover in the long-term care industry, a situation reflecting the industry’s low pay and poor working conditions. Although the bill died that session, the idea remains very much alive.
Workforce standards boards can lift the tide for all workers in an industry. It’s a proven strategy that state lawmakers should employ to improve the economic security of Oregonians.
(Kathy Lara is a policy analystwith the Oregon Center for Public Policy.)
Oregon Capital Chronicle focuses on deep and useful reporting on Oregon state government, politics and policy. We help readers understand how those in government are using their power, what’s happening to taxpayer dollars, and how citizens can stake a bigger role in big decisions.