What else you can do to further this effort to contact the presidential candidates
First and foremost, you multiply your effectiveness by using our Tell Your Friends web page set up to help you inform others about this important ACTION ALERT.
Further, if you happen to have any influence with your local natural food store, you can encourage them to participate in this ACTION ALERT by having form letters to the candidates available in their store. If possible, you could even offer to spend a few hours in their store each week in the "demo area" having customers sign the form letters on the spot while shopping. This is a quick way to get hundreds of letters into the candidates' offices in a hurry.
In addition to natural food stores, anywhere there is a concentrated amount of people you can have letters available for people to sign. Many venues have tables available or you may be able to bring a portable card table. You are only limited by your own creative imagination.
If you find that it is too difficult to deal with form letters to all the candidates, you may want to focus on the top four democratic and top four republican candidates. On the democratic side, that would be Clinton, Obama, Edwards and Richardson and on the republican side it would be Giuliani, Thompson, McCain and Romney.
Once you have collected the letters, you can mail them all at once to each candidate. Or if you have a lot of letters, you could spread the mailings out over a few days for impact. For example, if you collect 50 letters to go to Senator Clinton, you could mail all 50 letters in a single envelope or mail 10 letters in an envelope each day for five days. It will probably have more impact if you spread it out over a few days because each time the staff at the campaign headquarters opens the envelope, it will make a statement that this is an important issue and one the candidate needs to develop a policy position on.
The bottom line is that a single person like you has the potential to get dozens if not hundreds of letters into a campaign headquarters with just a few hours work. And if you team up with a few others, the results can be even greater.
Your efforts CAN make a difference!
Background Information
In July, The Campaign send out letters to all the Presidential candidates by U.S. Postal Service Express Mail.
The mailing consisted of a cover letter, a response letter and a return mail envelope.
Here is the text of the cover letter, in this case to Senator Hillary Clinton:
July 10, 2007
Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton
Hillary Clinton for President
4420 North Fairfax Drive
Arlington, VA 22203
Dear Senator Clinton,
On behalf of our thousands of members, and millions of concerned citizens in both the United States and worldwide, we are writing to ask your position on the issue of mandatory labeling of genetically engineered foods.
If you are elected to be President of the United States, will you support legislation to require the mandatory labeling of genetically engineered foods?
Your response to this question will be communicated to over 100 other environmental and health organizations such as the Sierra Club, Consumers Union, Greenpeace, Friends of the Earth, the Organic Consumers Association and many other non-profit organizations that all support mandatory labeling of genetically engineered foods.
A recent report funded by the USDA and conducted by Rutgers University found that 89% of the American public feel genetically engineered foods should be required to be labeled. Only 10% felt labeling should not be required. Therefore, your support of legislation to require the mandatory labeling of genetically engineered foods will only be doing what the vast majority of American citizens are requesting our government provide for these controversial foods.
Genetically engineered foods are required to be labeled in all the European Union countries, plus Japan, China, Australia, New Zealand and many other leading industrialized nations.
We encourage you to take this opportunity to go on the record in favor of consumers' right to know if their foods have been genetically engineered. Please respond by July 31, 2007.
For your convenience, enclosed with this letter is a response form to indicate your position and a stamped return envelope. Feel free to elaborate on your position if you desire. Thank you!
Sincerely,
Craig Winters
President
The Campaign
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Here is the text of the response letter:
Presidential Candidate Response Form
Hillary Clinton for President
4420 North Fairfax Drive
Arlington, VA 22203
Dear Senator Clinton,
Please indicate your response to the following question:
If you are elected to be President of the United States, will you support legislation to require the mandatory labeling of genetically engineered foods?
____ Yes ____ No
Please indicate the name of the contact person at your campaign in case we have questions about this response.
Contact person for your campaign: _______________________________
Contact person phone number: __________________________________
If you would like to elaborate on your position on this issue, please include your comments on a separate sheet.
Mail this response form to:
The Campaign
PO Box 55699
Seattle, WA 98155
We have enclosed a stamped return envelope for your convenience.
Please return this response form by July 31, 2007.
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To date, only Representative Dennis Kucinich has responded back. As we expected, Kucinich does support mandatory labeling since he has been the primary sponsor of the "Genetically Engineered Food Right to Know Act" in the U.S. House of Representatives for several years.
In the letter we make reference to a recent report funded by the USDA and conducted by Rutgers University found that 89% of the American public feel genetically engineered foods should be required to be labeled. Click here to read that report.
We have also created a four page excerpt of the report that can be used a literature when making your case to others. If you would like to read and print out that excerpt click here.
