Community Rights
The meaning of self-governance must be a central discussion in our democracy. Prior to the U.S. Constitution, self-governance had a much stronger local community presence than exists in the U.S. today. Since our U.S. Constitution gave ample power of self-governance to the individual states’ level, local community self-governance has become a parent/child relationship. The concept of “home rule” has largely been subverted from local community control to state governments. In today’s industrialized corporate world, that usually boils down to one thing: statehouse legislators control corporate industrialized activity in every community, especially regarding powerful industries like oil and gas. Since our judicial system has equated money with free speech, powerful corporate lobbying has subverted the will of community constituents (real people) on legislators to the will of powerful corporate demands.
When it comes to access and control of resources that corporations covet for their profit-making enterprises, corporate lobbies such as the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) use their legal resources to write the regulations that our state regulators use for control of those resources. When corporate industrialized activities threaten the health and safety of communities, or even threaten the future existence of our ways of life on this planet, corporations decide how regulators handle our resources even when it becomes more obvious that they are not protecting public interests or seated in the public trust.
Lake Erie Bill of Rights
Toledoans for Safe Water have made waves around the world by convincing the residents of Toledo to pass a Lake Erie Bill of Rights. The city government now has a tool to fight the state level “corporate state” in Ohio, specifically to protect the condition of Lake Erie so that polluters will not continue to have unimpeded ability to pollute the drinking water that hundreds of thousands of Ohioans rely on. Click HERE to watch a clip on ‘The Daily Show’.
