Paul Booth (labor organizer)

{{Short description|Activist and labor organizer(1943 - 2018)}}

File:Paul Booth (17176404919) (cropped).jpg

Paul Booth (June 7, 1943 – January 17, 2018){{cite news|last1=Roberts|first1=Sam|title=Paul Booth, Antiwar Organizer and Union Stalwart, Dies at 74|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2018/01/18/obituaries/paul-booth-antiwar-organizer-and-union-stalwart-dies-at-74.html|access-date=27 January 2018|work=New York Times|date=January 18, 2018}} was an American activist, anti-war protester, and lifelong labor organizer.

Called "one of the labor movement's key strategists"{{cite web|last1=Meyerson|first1=Harold|title=Paul Booth, 1943–2018|url=http://prospect.org/article/paul-booth-1943-2018|website=The American Prospect|date=18 January 2018 |access-date=27 January 2018}} by Harold Meyerson and "an organizer's organizer" by American Federation of State County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME) President Lee Saunders,{{cite web|last1=Quinnell|first1=Kenneth|title=Union Organizer and Antiwar Activist Paul Booth Passes at 74|url=https://aflcio.org/2018/1/19/union-organizer-and-antiwar-activist-paul-booth-passes-74|website=AFL-CIO|date=19 January 2018 |access-date=27 January 2018}} he began his work in labor movement in 1966 as research director for the United Packinghouse Workers of America. He became an organizing director for AFSCME where he worked for four decades.{{cite web|title=Remembering Paul Booth|url=https://www.afscme.org/now/remembering-paul-booth|website=AFSCME Now|date=18 January 2018 |publisher=American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, AFL–CIO|access-date=27 January 2018}} Prior to that, he was a student organizer in the class of 1964, forming a chapter of the Students for a Democratic Society (SDS) at Swarthmore and was one of the drafters of the SDS Port Huron Statement.{{cite news|last1=Manners|first1=Jane|title=Joe Hill Goes to Harvard|url=http://www.hcs.harvard.edu/~pslm/livingwage/originalpage/07_02_tn.html|access-date=27 January 2018|work=The Nation|issue=July 2, 2001}}{{cite news|title=The Port Huron Statement: Still Radical at 50|url=http://inthesetimes.com/article/13053/the_port_huron_statement_still_radical_at_50|access-date=27 January 2018|work=In These Times|date=April 25, 2012|url-status=bot: unknown|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120504044250/http://inthesetimes.com/article/13053/the_port_huron_statement_still_radical_at_50|archive-date=4 May 2012}} He became the SDS national secretary for a year, moving to Chicago in 1965. He was one of the chief organizers of the April 1965 March on Washington to End the War in Vietnam as part of SDS's Peace Research and Education Project which he co-led with Todd Gitlin.{{cite web|title=The March on Washington|url=http://michiganintheworld.history.lsa.umich.edu/antivietnamwar/exhibits/show/exhibit/the_teach_ins/national_teach_in_1965|website=Resistance and Revolution: The Anti-Vietnam Movement at the University of Michigan 1965-1972|publisher=Michigan in the World|access-date=27 January 2018}} In 1971, Booth co-chaired the Citizens Action Program (CAP), a group which first investigated air pollution but soon switched to exposing fraudulent underassessment of property values for tax evasion purposes. CAP's investigations found that U.S. Steel had evaded billions of dollars in taxes through low assessment of its properties. Booth's organizational skills and the activities of CAP inspired other groups to launch further investigations into taxation—especially property taxation—throughout Illinois.{{cite journal |last1=Steffes |first1=Tracy L. |title=Assessment Matters: The Rise and Fall of the Illinois Resource Equalizer Formula |journal=History of Education Quarterly |date=February 2020 |volume=60 |issue=1 |pages=24–57 |doi=10.1017/heq.2020.7|s2cid=216496825 }}

He spoke at the first day of the Democratic National Convention in Philadelphia in 2016 after Hillary Clinton appointed him to serve on the Democratic Party's platform drafting committee. He retired from his position of executive assistant to AFSCME's President Saunders in 2017 and continued to write about political strategy for the 2018 election.{{cite web|last1=Booth|first1=Paul|title=Building an Enduring Democratic Majority|url=http://prospect.org/article/building-enduring-democratic-majority|website=The American Prospect|date=19 January 2018 |access-date=27 January 2018}} On his retirement early in 2017, Representative Jan Schakowsky inserted into the Congressional Record an appreciation of Paul Booth's "contributions to the progressive movement as an activist, organizer, mentor and leader," praising the "rich legacy and a lasting record of achievement" that he would leave behind.{{USCongRec |2017 |E51 |date=2017-01-11 }}