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CAMPAIGN BOOT CAMP

Berrett-Koehler Publishers, Inc.

Contents

List of Sideboxes...................................ixIntroduction........................................11 Identify Your Call to Service.....................72 Know Your Community...............................343 Build Your Leadership Teams.......................594 Define Your Message...............................855 Connect with People...............................1166 Raise the Money...................................1467 Mobilize to Win...................................167Afterword...........................................223Acknowledgments.....................................225Notes...............................................227Index...............................................233About the Author....................................242

Chapter One

There are two kinds of people who enter public life: those who want to do something and those who want to be something. — Political proverb

Our democracy requires a binding commitment between people, a commitment that begins with the earliest actions in family, school, worship, and community. It is a commitment that develops over time and experience, based on a call to service—the vision, ideas, and values that motivate each public servant.

Each of us has a personal call to service that motivates and inspires our actions in family, community, and public life. Whether your public service involves helping a nonprofit agency achieve its mission, voting or volunteering in an election, mastering the skills of running for public office, studying political science and civics, or networking with your peers in a community improvement project, everything you do to engage in democracy begins with your call to service. Your call to service is your vision for the future, your ideas and values, and your commitment to achieving the vision by working in community with others. Whether your household is grounded in social responsibility or politics or workers' rights or civil rights or military service, your call begins at home with a family ethic, manifests itself in community work, and provides a touchstone for all you do, inspiring you on the good days and strengthening you on the bad days.

America's Founders articulated a national call to service in the Preamble to the United States Constitution.

We the people of the United States, in order to form a more perfect union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.

The Founders' call to service echoes through the years as a challenge for each generation of Americans to achieve the vision. Indeed, the first official act for every public officer in America is an oath to protect and defend the Constitution. Your call to service tells you who you are, why you serve the public, and how you will fulfill your vision and that of our Founders as set forth in our Constitution. Your actions derive from that call to service.

In assessing your own participation in our democracy, the first essential question is, what is your personal call to service?

ARTICULATE YOUR VISION FOR THE FUTURE

If you had the power to change the world, what would the future be like? A safer America? A freer people? A stronger community? A better-educated workforce? A healthier society? A fairer economy? A national culture of service? First and foremost, you must identify the touchstone of your service: a vision so compelling to you that you would give of your time, energy, resources, and reputation to achieve the vision and to ask others to give of themselves to do the same. Consider the actions you have taken in your community—with nonprofits, local organizations, and/or political campaigns. What kind of future are you trying to build for future generations?

COMMUNICATE THE IDEAS THAT WILL ACHIEVE YOUR VISION

Our Constitution was a bold stroke—a fusion of ideas, imagination, and intellect that shaped our Founders' vision of the future.

What are the ideas you propose to achieve your vision of the future? How a safer America builds allies and protects us from adversaries? How free people balance security with freedom of speech, worship, and assembly? How a stronger community treats police officers, victims, and criminals? How a better-educated workforce receives lifelong learning opportunities? Who pays for medical treatments in a healthier society? How a fairer economy pays its workers and prepares them to compete in the global economy? Whether building a national culture of service means a draft or incentivized service with subsidized college or graduate education or health care?

"Ideas have consequences," says columnist George F. Will, "large and lasting consequences." What are the consequences of your idea? Anticipate the ideological, logistical, and budgetary consequences of your idea, such as the policy lines you would draw, how you would get your idea accomplished, and how you would pay for it and with whose money.

Assume that your vision is a safer America and your idea is to provide for the common defense through a strong military that will protect us from all enemies. Who is required or recruited or allowed to serve? How do you maintain force readiness and care for troops, military families, and veterans? How much of the federal budget do you spend in relation to all the other needs of the country? Do you raise taxes, and, if so, whose?

Most important are the practical consequences: when and how do you propose to deploy the strong military to go to war and to protect us here at home?

WHAT ARE THE CORE VALUES THAT SHAPE YOUR VISION AND IDEAS?

Just as integral to your vision of the future and your big ideas are the core values, such as equality, responsibility, and justice, that inspire you to achieve the vision. If your vision is of a safer America, and if your idea is to provide for the common defense through a strong military, your values will shape your treatment of the military servicemen and servicewomen. Equality shapes whom you call to serve: a draft or voluntary force; people from certain segments of society, or all people, regardless of race, gender, class, or sexual orientation. Responsibility shapes how you prepare them for missions against the real and immediate threats against our country and when you deploy them in harm's way at home or overseas. Justice guides whether you keep promises to military families and properly provide for veterans upon their return home.

TEST YOUR VISION, IDEAS, AND VALUES TO SEE THE DIFFERENCE THEY MAKE IN PEOPLE'S LIVES

So far we've been dealing with the imagination; your vision becomes real when you make choices in civic and political life that make a difference in people's lives.

On a personal level, you might achieve your vision for a safer America; your idea of a strong military; and your values of equality, responsibility, and justice by enlisting in the military or by...