Just as spring break was starting, the largest protest in Wisconsin’s history was taking place March 12 on Capitol Square. One of the speakers there was a member of the farmer’s union who had come to talk about the importance of staying involved in government.

He reminded protesters that making democracy function takes hard work. That if we choose to sit idly by and let others do that work, these were the results to be expected. He reminded us that democracy requires ordinary people to step outside their comfort zones, whether by coming to a march, sending letters, taking the stage to speak out or running for office. If we’d all been this passionate and engaged last fall, he suggested, perhaps there wouldn’t have been a need for a rally.

Just how disengaged were Wisconsinites last fall? Only one of every two eligible Wisconsin voters came to the polls in November. Walker won the election with 52.3 percent of the vote. Despite his claims of a strong voter mandate, Walker was elected by only slightly more than one quarter of Wisconsinites.

That’s all it has taken – 26 percent of Wisconsin voters – to remake, virtually overnight, the tenor and aspirations of our state’s government. In a few short months that small minority of Wisconsinites has allowed the wealth of a few to replace opportunity and welfare for the many as our leaders’ chief concerns.

What can we do about it? It’s hard not to feel more than a little powerless; Progressives in Wisconsin have thrown everything into the battle to stop the budget repair bill, and it still passed. The proposed 2011-13 budget will likely pass in some form with resultant cuts to spending on education and health care, weakened protection for family farms and looser environmental regulations.

But the success or failure of the protests and the efforts of the tens of thousands who have come to the Capitol week after week should not be measured by the fate of the budget repair bill. Nor by the legislative victories or defeats of this administration and Legislature. Success, rather, would be the reinvigoration of our sense of civic responsibility and commitment to participation in government. Failure would be a return to the apathy and disengagement that allowed 26 percent of Wisconsinites to rechart the course of our state.

If we want to reclaim Wisconsin’s progressive tradition, the only solution, as the speaker on Saturday suggested, is increased participation in the political process. Not just protesting, but sustainable and long term involvement. Sometimes that can be boring and tedious; other times it requires stepping outside one’s comfort zone. It’s not always easy or fun, but in the end the government we get is the result of the work that we put into it.

Voting is the most basic – and the most vital – way of being involved. While protests, letters and polls can influence the decisions of our leaders, it’s a lot easier to pick the right leaders to begin with. Voting may seem ineffectual – what’s one voice among five million – but really the only meaningless vote is that which is not cast.

But just showing up at the polls once or twice a year to cast a ballot is not enough. Keeping Progressivism alive in Wisconsin for the next several years will require more work than that. We need to find other ways to be involved, whether by going to testify at legislative hearings, writing to legislators or working with activist groups and political parties. Just keeping up to date with the news and discussing it with friends and family is an important way of staying engaged.

The budget repair bill has passed, and there is only more anti-progressive legislation waiting to take its place. The test for us will be dealing with that after the appetite and enthusiasm for massive protests and rallies has worn off. Can we be successful in creating a new and enduring movement of rekindled civic engagement that can reclaim Wisconsin’s progressive ideals, or will we return to the apathy that allowed this to happen in the first place?

Geoff Jara-Almonte ([email protected]) is a fourth-year medical student going into emergency medicine.