John Jay, the First Chief Justice of the United States Supreme Court, was born on this day in 1745.

There’s no single cause of inflation. Among the past and current factors are the pandemic, supply chain disruptions, and the war in Ukraine.

Corporate actions also contribute to inflation. These are four ways corporations and inflation are related – not all of which are economic.

Much will be said, remembered and commemorated on this day, the 21st anniversary of the tragedies on September 11, 2001.

While there are many lessons from what happened prior to, during and following that day, there’s one take-a-way that should never be forgotten: the political and economic power elite never lets a tragedy, catastrophe or crisis go to waste to further attempt to increase their political and/or economic dominance. 

In the case of September 11, a major success in this vein was the Patriot Act, passed soon afterwards to supposedly enhance “national security” to catch “terrorists,” specifically Middle Eastern Muslims inside the United States. While some of its provisions were intended to address problems that predated 9/11, most of the others allowed the government to more easily and effectively violate the privacy rights of innocent citizens and residents. These included tracking the activities of people on the Internet, compiling credit and bank records and expanding the monitoring of phone and email communications. September 11 was just a pretext by the government to enact unprecedented violations of civil rights and surveillance expansion that were labeled as “un-American” prior to 9/11.

Labor Day is a terrific opportunity for Move to Amenders to make personal and issue connections with working members of Labor Unions and other working people. Many fundamental rights and protections of working people (e.g. the weekend, 8-hour work day, collective bargaining, end of child labor, employer-based health coverage, workplace safety) came into being because working people organized powerful movements that created positive change.

It's happening again...

You may have received a recent mailing from a national group calling for reversing the 2010 Citizens United vs FEC Supreme Court decision. Enclosed was this U.S. map showing by state the number of communities that have passed resolutions, in this case, supporting a “Citizens United Amendment.” 

The number of resolutions totals more than 800.

The map is extremely misleading. It gives the impression that the resolutions primarily address Citizens United. 

Wrong. 

The reality is that the vast majority of the passed resolutions by municipal governments and citizens at the ballot box affirm that the rights protected under the U.S. Constitution are the rights of natural persons only or end corporate constitutional rights or corporate personhood and some variation that money spent in elections is not First Amendment-protected free speech. Most don’t directly mention Citizens United. 

Credit: iStock/kamilpetran

by Jasmin Enciu

The Supreme Court is set to decide one of the most consequential environmental cases it has heard in decades.  West Virginia v. Environmental Protection Agency will address whether the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) shall continue to have the authority to regulate the levels of greenhouse gas emissions. This case puts the EPA in an extremely vulnerable position. VOX News reporter Ian Millhiser even stated, “West Virginia could wind up permanently hobbling the government’s ability to fight climate change.”

West Virginia threatens all government regulations that protect the public, not just the EPA. It is also concerning since the Supreme Court has recently taken an anti-agency regulation stance on many cases. The court has used the “major questions doctrine” in these instances to prevent agency actions from addressing important issues. For example, they recently struck down the CDC’s coronavirus eviction mortarium, which paused evictions for Americans who were suffering and not able to make rent due to the rise in COVID-19 cases. The Majority opinion stated: “It is indisputable that the public has a strong interest in combating the spread of the COVID-19 delta variant…but our system does not permit agencies to act unlawfully even in pursuit of desirable ends…it is up to Congress, not the CDC, to decide whether the public interest merits further action here,”

There are two ways to create change: by having lots of organized money or lots of organized people. Since MTA isn’t flush with cash from billionaires or business corporations, our route to build power to help create real democracy is to recruit and organize people at the grassroots. 

That’s why we’re organizing Summer Signature Saturdays

We need to add more people to our base. Our goal is to recruit 10,000 more supporters by the end of the summer – which will get us to 500,000. 

How do we recruit more supporters? 

The major way over the next several months is to designate one Saturday each month for Move to Amend volunteer leaders (like you!) to spend at least 1 hour collecting signatures on our Motion to Amend petition. 

• The top 2 individuals who collect the most signatures that day will receive a cool MTA t-shirt to wear  – maybe for the next time they go out to petition!
• MTA affiliates who organize several individuals to petition and submit signatures all together will be recognized on our website and in our monthly newsletter.

Check out the Leaderboard here!

The next Summer Signature Saturday is this Saturday!

Can you commit to collecting signatures wherever you this Saturday? Feel free to recruit one or more friends!

If so, email [email protected]

Where to petition in your community

Public places to petition: farmers markets, festivals, parades, sidewalks in commercial districts, your neighborhood, libraries, post offices, bus stops, parks

Petition tips

• Place petitions on clipboard or sturdy piece of cardboard with a large clip
• Try to get 1 sheet of signatures from your family members, friends or neighbors – even if they’ve already signed – and place the full sheet on top. The first few signatures are always the hardest when the petition is blank. Having a full sheet from the start will make it more comfortable for people you approach to sign when they see several have already done so.
• Consider taking 2 sets of petitions. This saves time if you come across 2 or more people and they are more likely to sign
• Use only black or blue ink. No red ink or pencils. Take one or more extra pens
• Ask people to PLEASE PRINT CLEARLY
• Quickly check after each person has signed to make sure you can read all the information. If necessary, fill in for them what you can’t read
• Please encourage that at least name, city, zip code and email are filled in. Emails allow us to send educational and action updates – including how to get more involved.
• Don’t petition in the rain. Rain and paper are a bad combination.

Want to participate but cannot get out this weekend?

Another way to engage is by asking people to sign the petition via your personalized link. Everyone that signs the petition from your link will be credited to you.

You can find your personal recruiter link here: https://www.movetoamend.org/recruit

Email [email protected] if you plan to collect petition signatures . We’ll send further details before the date.

Thank you for helping Move to Amend grow and build power for helping create real democracy!

Citizens, elected officials and more are invited to take part in this year’s Democracy Day event, taking place on Wednesday, March 30 in Council Chambers at One Government Center, or via Zoom.

The annual event, presented by the City, Toledo Move to Amend and Our Revolution in Northwest Ohio, is held by City Council to discuss the corrupting influence of corporate interests in politics. Speakers address a wide variety of topics related to the public interest during the event.

Carolyn Harding with Greg Coleridge and Sandy Bolzenius organizers with Move to Amend, a movement to Amend the US Constitution to codify that Corporations are not People & Money is not speech.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2x1IgL95_GA

Move to Amend sponsored panel at the 40th Annual Public Interest Environmental Law Conference (PIELC) on March 4, 2022

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IsKX3KQ0yHc

Description:

As an advocate trying to protect the environment, your opponents are almost certainly the wealthy, a large corporation, an entity funded by them, or a government agency overly influenced or beholden to them. The political, legal, and economic playing fields are slanted in favor of large monied interests more today than at any time since the Gilded Age. Only a constitutional amendment abolishing corporate constitutional rights and returning power to regulate campaign financing to the People’s elected representatives can restore balance to our political system and legal institutions.

Panelists:

John Fioretta (Move to Amend)
Karen Coulter (Blue Mountains Biodiversity Project)
Kai Huschke (Community Environmental Legal Defense Fund)
Ben Manski (George Mason University)

Moderator:

Greg Coleridge (Move to Amend)