writing to your mp/congressman. (1 Viewer)

[Red_Dave]

Ive been thinking of writing to my MP [Legislator/Representative] about the Zimbabwe issue so i would be intrested to hear if anyone had any experience of writing to there local equivilent. It would be good to hear if they had any success and if theres any tips. Whats concerning me most is how formal to be and how much to write.

 

[Obama08]

Ive been thinking of writing to my MP [Legislator/Representative] about the Zimbabwe issue so i would be intrested to hear if anyone had any experience of writing to there local equivilent. It would be good to hear if they had any success and if theres any tips. Whats concerning me most is how formal to be and how much to write.

What you should do (if possible) is try and round up huge amounts of people with the exact same suggestion, and everyone send their letters on the same day so the legislator’s office is bombarded with the same suggestion over and over again. This will usually get the topic mentioned to him/her and it can really get the point across.

 

[RightinNYC]

What you should do (if possible) is try and round up huge amounts of people with the exact same suggestion, and everyone send their letters on the same day so the legislator’s office is bombarded with the same suggestion over and over again. This will usually get the topic mentioned to him/her and it can really get the point across.

In my experience, this is not true at all, especially if you're talking about email. Of the 1500 emails or so we'd get each day, every one that had any element of a form letter was immediately deleted.

When it came to actual letters, every one from a constituent was read and responded to individually in the office I worked in, usually within a few days. However, if they were a bunch of form letters, they would get batched and all get a generic response.

If you're writing an actual letter about an issue that matters to you, be respectful, be brief, don't sound like you're parroting someone else's views, and make sure you actually ask the rep to do something. Odds are that your rep will never see your personal letter, but they'll most likely see the response that the office is sending out, so they'll know that the issue is being raised.

 

[Red_Dave]

What you should do (if possible) is try and round up huge amounts of people with the exact same suggestion, and everyone send their letters on the same day so the legislator’s office is bombarded with the same suggestion over and over again. This will usually get the topic mentioned to him/her and it can really get the point across.

Thats a good point. I would consider sending a petition round in favor of military intervention but im not certain thats the way ahead. The purpose behind the prospective letter would be to enquire what the governments currently doing to improve the situation* and encourage it to do more. Whilst at the same time surgesting options like arming the opossition or full scale intervention.

*This may be a point where the role of an MP differs from that of a senator in that they can grill the head of state on policy.