Your Nov. 23 front-page article on Solidarity Harvest is a great illustration of people helping people during hard times and the holidays in Maine. Thank you for covering this wonderful community effort.

One important point was not made clear. The “solidarity” in Solidarity Harvest comes from union solidarity. The 8,000 people fed represent 1,200 union households. The many volunteers working so hard to provide the meals, and the people receiving them, are primarily union members or members of union families.

Solidarity Harvest embodies the ideal that being part of the labor movement is more than just having a voice at work about wages and conditions. It is also about being part of the union community.

Unions are considered fraternal organizations for a reason. We believe that by working together for the common good we are stronger and better able to serve the best interests of our members and fellow employees, our employers and our families.

Unions within all trades and professions share the continual struggle for better worker protection and justice in the workplace. They lead from the front of the fight to stop the continuing decline of the American middle class as well as the difficult job of rebuilding it again.

I am grateful that we still have the capacity to help some of our own along the way.

Douglas Born

President, Southern Maine Labor Council, AFL-CIO