For most in the progressive community, it’s enough to lay claim to one significant accomplishment. However, John Freeman is not most people, and certainly no flash-in-the-pan progressive. With a laundry list of career accomplishments that could span the lifetimes of several community organizers, Freeman has perhaps embarked on his toughest challenge yet; working to reform health care with newly-conceived organization Health Care for America Now.

For the record, Freeman credits growing up in a politically conscious household for his ongoing interest in political activism, and for allotting him the essential tools needed for success in the progressive community. “My parents were always very interested in the world. I had the sense that they were always plugged into what was happening politically. My mother was always a Democrat, and my father when I was growing up was always a Republican, so they used to debate politics all the time at the dinner table. My eldest sister grew up during the 60’s and was active during the anti-war movement and the women’s movement, so I got exposed to politics through them,” he says. “I ultimately chose, when I graduated from University of Michigan, to get a job with ACORN as a community organizer, where I spent six years working in cities around the country. That experience changed my life for the better, and firmed me in terms of my commitment to social justice-type work.”

Beginning as a young student with an avid interest in environmental policy – inspired from canoeing in high school, to asking why we “accept” pollution – Freeman soon moved on to social reform, seeking a position with ACORN that took him to urban neighborhoods in Dallas, Sioux Falls and Albuquerque, where he became exposed to the plight of low income individuals, begetting a pivotal interest in the area of health care reform. This interest propelled Freeman into a stint as a state representative in the Michigan legislature, followed thereafter by working at policy think-tank in Washington, DC, and then returned to Michigan, directing a groundbreaking campaign to organize ‘home healthcare workers.’ Freeman then lead the charge to raise Michigan’s minimum wage; chairing the ballot proposal committee that fought and won against special interests that sought to block Michigan residents who work hard and play by the rules from gaining an increase in wages. By successfully pushing through an increase to Michigan’s minimum wage, Freeman and allies in the progressive community overcame strong rightwing opposition during a period in which both the House and the Senate was Republican dominated: it was the kind of victory that few would dare attempt and even fewer would manage to achieve.

Later, Freeman served as Chair of the America Votes table, providing innovative leadership to Michigan’s progressive infrastructure, after which he spearheaded the campaign to put a health care reform initiative on Michigan’s November 2008 ballot; a campaign which ultimately failed to collect enough signatures to qualify for voter approval.

“The fact that we weren’t able to collect enough signatures to put it on the ballot is a failure of sorts,” says Freeman reflectively. “But it’s not a failure in the sense that a lot of benefit came out of it.”

Indeed, from the ashes of the ballot proposal, he joined Health Care for America Now, a national campaign of groups fighting to reform health care to ensure that people are not held at the mercy of insurance giants, an issue close to his heart. It’s an issue that, in Freeman’s own words, faces a number of serious challenges – the sort of which it would take a determined individual of Freeman’s experience and caliber to overcome.

“The huge challenge, of course, is that you have 45 million Americans without health care insurance, and you have another 25-30 million Americans who are underinsured. These are very large problems that speak to why the federal government must get involved; they have the power to tackle the entire system.

“Health care activists need to be reaching out to everyday people who are not focused on politics – and we need to engage them in this struggle to reform health care, by educating them as to how they can speak their political voice.”

Roadblocks aside, Freeman cries nonsense at the idea of throwing in the towel, and his commitment to social justice is far from reaching its zenith. Between him and his spouse, Amy Chapman, a political organizer who ran Barack Obama’s Michigan campaign, the two have a future to plan for their young son Jared; a flailing health care system to fix; and, some say, a potential governor’s race to prep for.

“Ten years from now I’ll be 61 years old. My son will be 18 and just starting college, so hopefully I’ll still be running, playing tennis and listening to Bruce Springsteen… My goal is to leave behind a body of work that I can be very proud of; that helped people, and that I can point to as having helped made our society a better place to live, work and raise a family.”

No doubt, the Boss would be proud.