Wisconsin State Journal’s History Timeline of Uprising
WISCONSIN STATE JOURNAL SPECIAL REPORT
Anatomy of a protest: From a simple march to a national fight
On Feb. 7, with Wisconsin united in the afterglow of a Green Bay Packers victory in the Super Bowl, brand-new Gov. Scott Walker convened a dinner meeting of his Cabinet at the Governor’s Mansion.
Walker held up a photo of President Ronald Reagan, who had famously fired striking air-traffic controllers, and said his plan to sweep away decades of protections for state public employees in a stop-gap budget bill represented “our time to change the course of history.”
“It was kind of the last hurrah before we dropped the bomb,” he said.
The budget-repair bill, which would strip most collective-bargaining rights from 175,000 public-sector workers while imposing immediate benefits concessions, went public four days later. Walker, a Republican, called for passage in the GOP-controlled Legislature within a week.
Word of the bill’s union provisions started to trickle out in press reports Thursday night, which for union chiefs