Q:

how to get the value from a CSS class object in javascript

I have to select an <a> element from the given class of objects.  when i click on the anchor tag in the showcase_URL class, i want the jquery function to get the value from <a> tag.  
How can this be done? 
I cannot make this an id as I am running a while loop to construct all the elements in php.  there would be multiple objects of this class.  there is no definite selector through which I can get the value of the anchor tag.  Help would be much appreciated. 
        echo '<div id="content">';  
        echo '<div class="showcase_data">';
        echo    '<div class="showcase_HEAD">'.$row->title. '</div>';
        echo    '<div class="showcase_TYPE">'.$row->type. '</div>';
        echo    '<div class="showcase_date">&nbsp;&nbsp;'.$row->date. '</div>';
        echo    '<div class="showcase_THUMB" style="float: left;" ></div>';
        echo    '<div class="showcase_TEXT">'.$row->details. '</div><br/>';
        echo    '<div class="showcase_URL"><a class="purl" value='.$row->num. 'href="'.$row->url. '">PROJECT URL</a></div>';
        echo    '</div>';
        echo    '</div>';

A:

You can use the attr() function like this:
$(".showcase_URL a").click(function() {
  alert($(this).attr("value"));
});

Note:  You should have quotes and a space here like this:
value='.$row->num. 'href="'.$row->url.'" 

to:
value="'.$row->num.'"  href="'.$row->url.'"