I personally believe that I have a very good litmus test for all Democratic candidates in next year's election: do you support FDR's Second (Social and Economic) Bill of Rights? President Roosevelt's proposal, made in his January 11, 1944 State of the Union Address, provided for constitutional guarantees "under which a new basis for security and prosperity can be established for all--regardless of station, race or creed."
These rights include, but are not limited to the following:
-
useful and remunerative employment, together with the potential to find an avocation and not simply a job;
-
wages that provide adequate food, clothing, opportunity for recreation, and decent shelter for themselves and their families;
-
adequate medical care and the opportunity to achieve and enjoy good health;
-
protection from unfair competition and monopolistic practices at home and abroad, for every business in America, large and small;
-
the ability of farmers and ranchers to raise and sell the the bounty of their lands at a return which will give themselves and their families a decent living;
-
protections from the fears attendant to old age, sickness, accident, and unemployment;
-
a good, quality education, sufficient for the needs of our modern society; an education that is ongoing if needed or desired.
This will of course require the reestablishment of an actual progressive tax system, not the abomination that has shifted twenty percent of the nation's wealth to the top one percent of the population since 1981, as well as seen the majority of our manufacturing base shipped out of the country.
All of the other Western Democracies have adopted such guarantees, realizing, as FDR did, that you cannot guarantee the retention of basic political rights in our modern era without guaranteeing basic social and economic rights.
(Note: You can view every article as one long page if you sign up as an Advocate Member, or higher).
