“This is not a moment. Brothers and sisters, this is a movement!”—Karen Lewis, president, Chicago Teachers Union

When Chicago teachers went on their one-day strike Friday, April 1, we saw something new in Chicago.

New at least for our generation.

A strike led by a union which was joined by thousands of supporters — other unions bringing out their members, community organizations, working families and their retirees and their un- and under-employed, college students, and, since the strike was by a teachers union, parents, students and their families.

It was truly massive — not just for the outpouring into the streets after the Thompson Center rally, but also because there were neighborhood actions throughout the city all day, by  CTU members but also by up to 50 community groups.

All photos: Considered Sources, Creative Commons CC-BY

A political strike
This represents something new also because the Chicago Teachers Union (CTU) was striking not just for workplace economic demands; this was a political strike, with political demands that were in the interest of all working families.  One of the printed union picket signs read,“Fight for Funding   Shut It Down April 1 2016  ON STRIKE  Tax the Rich to Fund the Schools.” Another read, “Fight for Funding SHUT DOWN WALL STREET.” The CTU has long called for funding the schools and social needs through a millionaire’s tax, a tax on financial transactions, and a progressive state income tax (Illinois has a flat tax which benefits the wealthy by disproportionately taxing the rest of us).

Social Justice Unionism
The union makes not only economic demands; it advances broad social justice program.   The union has a website  A Just Chicago, whose slogan is, “Fighting for the City our Students Deserve.” It not only details school problems but also focuses on  racism.

And the Black Freedom Movement
Do we see a new beginning of an alliance between labor and the black freedom movement? Movement groups in Black Lives Matter were there and mobilized their supporters. What we saw in the streets this time was not the white left but something broader and more hopeful.

Robert Starks’ Chicago Defender article on the strike explained the historic importance of  black-labor unity and pointed out that if Gov. Rauner succeeds in weakening or destroying public sector unions, this will disproportionately hurt black people.  “It is true that while Blacks have clear complaints against all unions, the concentration of Blacks in the service and government unions has helped in raising the living standards of the Black community.  It is clear that the bulk of the Black middle class today owes its ability to remain relatively stable economically to their employment in the service and government sectors.”

And the art 
Another sign this is a movement: a sea of union-printed signs, but also of magic marker and photoshop and pastel and paint on store-bought poster board.  They found and repurposed imagery from Star Wars, Lord of the Rings monster movies, the Grinch, Mr. Burns,  Monopoly, and photos from the corporate press, propaganda transformed into the truth-telling. Original poetry also. (One sign: “Eat your pheasant, drink your wine, your days are numbered, bourgeois swine.”) When people make their own signs and send their own messages, in social media and in the streets, the Masters of the Universe had better start paying attention.

Not the first time: Foreshadowings
Is this a movement, or a moment?  Because this was not Chicago’s first  moment of insurgency, we can be sure there will be more.

Nurses pitched a tent in Grant Park at the end of the Occupy march in 10/2012

First, a look at some recent history. We saw foreshadowings in Chicago in the large October 2011 Occupy Wall St march against the “banksters” and austerity, which brought out union members and even some union endorsements, but was mostly white. (An ironworker there told me, “We’ve been saying these things all along, now maybe finally people are listening.”)

Black Lives Matter march December 9 2015

Then the extraordinary Black Lives Matter disruptions, black-white actions which brought thousands into the streets stopping traffic, even blocking stores on Black Friday, with such wide support that the mayor held back the police.

Then the 2015 city elections, forcing the mayor and 19 aldermen into runoffs, another unprecedented challenge to the Democratic machine.

Then the #Bye Anita! campaign, which ousted the seemingly entrenched states attorney who had covered up the LaQuan McDonald shooting video (and was an enthusiast for mass incarceration).

Then the challenge to the Democratic Party establishment in the Sanders campaign that targeted the financial elites and “the rigged system.” And most recently the “yuge” antiracist protest that shut down the Trump rally at the UIC Pavillion.

Hope or fear?
We can be sure there will be more also because there are protests like these challenging ruling elites nation-wide and in fact globally, but this is both frightening and hopeful. We see the two faces of insurgency in our primaries, Trump and Sanders, and two sides of insurgency in Europe as well, where neo-nazis and fascists are empowered, riding a surge of  Islamophobia and fear of immigrants.

A young poet in the rain with prophetic utterance.

More than a moment, then, but movement in a time of both hope and fear.