Two days before a merger vote that could create a single, giant teacher union, the head of the National Education Association portrayed the union as a political workhorse and agent of educational reform.
"We're not creating a new organization for ourselves," NEA President Bob Chase told nearly 10,000 delegates who will vote Sunday on a merger with the American Federation of Teachers. "We're creating it for our children."Vice President Al Gore, in a late-afternoon appearance, dropped his legendary stiffness to deliver a bellowing speech urging the crowd to fight back against the right wing's lobbying efforts, through a Republican Congress, to block federal support for public schools.