SEEDS’ Hosts Michigan’s First Democracy School
Michigan’s first Democracy School taught by The Community Environmental Legal Defense Fund (CELDF) in Traverse City on Nov. 17-19th was a great success! Sixteen people from near and far came together for three days of eye-opening history and stimulating stories around individual and corporate rights. Democracy School taught how to reframe exhausting and often discouraging single issue work (such as opposing sulfide mining, coal fired power plants, factory farms, etc.) in a way that allows citizens to confront corporate control on a powerful single front: people’s constitutional rights.
We discussed the fact that there has never been an ‘environmental movement’ in this country. Movements drive rights into the constitution and neither nature nor any natural systems have no rights under our current constitution. Maybe nature should? What do you think? Stay tuned to SEEDS’ websites for future gatherings and related work.