Turning Campaign Energy into Governing Energy

Alicia McBride
Director for Communications
Guest Blogger

On Election Day I stood in a line with my husband and 2-year-old daughter for nearly 90 minutes. The line snaked halfway around my local elementary school. The sight of all those people wanting to make their voice heard about the direction our country is headed was awe-inspiring. That experience makes me excited to come to work today, because FCNL helps sustain that kind of passion and activism past the election season and into the governing season. I hope that many of those people I stood in line with yesterday will keep making their voices heard and agitating for their vision for this country.

FCNL’s Annual Meeting, which starts next week, emphasizes a quote from Franklin Delano Roosevelt –"You’ve elected me, now organize a movement to make me do what you want." President-Elect Barack Obama will face many competing priorities and challenges when he takes office, as he acknowledged in his victory speech. His administration -- and Congress -- need to keep hearing from the people in this country, whether they voted for Obama or not, so that the president hears what the people want him to do now that he is in office.

(Shameless plug now for FCNL!) I’m lucky enough to work for an organization that has the tools to help people communicate with the administration and Congress – learning how to lobby (PDF), finding out how to communicate with Congress (PDF) , and contacting their elected officials directly – and push for what they are passionate about.

Why am I excited to come to work today? Because there’s more work to do to harness what this campaign has generated and turn it into a government that people can feel excited about.