It has now been 8 years since I first involved myself in COS as a brand new DC in Ohio. Back then, COS university did not yet exist. We knew what we wanted to accomplish, but did not have a specific plan to get us there.
At that time, we manually entered email addresses into our personal address books of our petition signers and volunteers in our district. We didn’t really have any action plans that we could invite volunteers to participate with.
We were Citizens For Self-Governance who were encouraged to pursue our passions and ideas to promote COS - provided that the idea was legal, moral and ethical. There were no funds available from the national COS organization. It was understood that if you felt strongly enough to try something, you should be willing to pay for it yourself.
Every once in a while we might receive the gift of 50 palm cards from state leadership to be used in our district!
We now have Citizen Builder for keeping in touch with volunteers and petition signers, text blasts, email blasts, the follow-up tools and communication with fellow leaders within the movement. We have Slack where any question we have can be quickly answered by fellow patriots. We have an amazing depth of leadership from the county level to house districts, regional leaders, state leaders and national leadership.
We have tri-fold pamphlets, palm cards for multiple occasions and audiences, COS buttons, apparel, banners, tablecloths, bumper stickers and other tools.
We have the tools and the people trained for the long slug-fest and the long haul in front of us. We have 19 major victories behind us and we are increasingly being well trained and equipped for the battles ahead.
Even as times and tools have changed, our mission to train a self-sustaining multi-generation army of grassroots activists who will restore proper principles of constitutional self-governance has not waned in the least. We are still Citizens for Self-governance pledging our lives, our fortunes and our sacred honor to each other. We are a “band of brothers and sisters” who share a bond greater with each other than many of our family ties.
As Mark Meckler recently reminded us, we can not give up or give in. Now is the time to re-double our commitment to each other and to sacrifice just a little more, give a little more, work just a little longer, make that extra call, write that next note and encourage the faint-hearted.
Together we press on toward the absolute victory of restoring our nation. This is my pledge to you.
