Taking the Offensive: How do We Make Democracy Work?

By Ward Morehouse, Co-Founder, Program on Corporations, Law and Democracy (POCLAD)

Activists engaged in resisting the Bush-Ashcroft-Clinton assault on civil liberties are essentially on the defensive. Our adversaries have been defining our agendas for resistance as they issue executive orders and submit proposed legislation to Congress in the name of fighting terrorism. Consider the Bush speech earlier this month asking for additional authority for the government in issuing subpoenas and taking other actions that trample long established human rights and protections by government abuse of power.

Patriot Act 1 was bad enough. We now have to mobilize our friends in Congress--and even those who may not be so friendly--to defeat this legislation known informally as Patriot Act 2. This effort is a diversion from struggles to make democracy real.

I assume that most of those of us who are involved in resistance to the Clinton-Bush-Ashcroft attacks on our civil rights aspire to build a real democracy characterized by self-governance of, by and for the people and by the practice of social equality. We must, of course, continue to resist these attacks, but is it not time to begin to lay the groundwork for action agendas which we define and which will begin to move us ever closer to achieving a truly democratic society?

We might begin by looking at how we as a nation measure up to the standards set forth in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Of course, no country has achieved all of the rights set forth in the 30 articles that make up the Universal Declaration for all of its citizens. They should be seen as normative goals or standards towards which all countries are expected to aspire.

The United States may be seen to do better than some countries on some rights, but there are plenty of articles in the Declaration where we lag far behind other countries. Take Article 4, which prohibits "servitude". When U.S. workers cross the factory gate, they lose their First Amendment rights of free speech and assembly to their corporate employers. Or Article 5, which prohibits "cruel, inhuman or degrading punishment" characteristic of maximum secrurity prisons in the U.S.

What about Article 25 ("everyone has the right to a standard of living adequate for the health and well being of himself and of his family") or Article 23 (the right to work with equal pay and "just remuneration"--i.e., a living wage) or Article 21 (the will of the people--not some but all the people--is "the basis of the authority of government")?

I could go on, but I think the basic point is clear. If we were to go back to the status quo before Clinton signed his anti-terrorism legislation, followed by what the current Administration has done, we would find a constitution, with a seriously flawed bill of rights, and a body of legislation and judicial opinion that challenge, if not violate, many of the international standards for human rights set forth in the Universal Declaration and other international human rights conventions and agreements.

We live, alas, in a plutocracy--rule by the rich. Democracy remains, in my view, an unfulfilled aspiration. But what better time than now to launch a serious democracy movement built upon all of the political energy that has surfaced in more than 170 municipalities and three states that have taken actions opposing the Bush-Ashcroft terrorism policies--and the stirring of protest in dozens more cities and towns soon to follow with their own acts of resistance.