Civil disobedience is key element to inciting change

Miriam Kashia, North Liberty, Letter to the Editor 12:02 a.m. CDT March 19, 2016

State Rep. Ralph Watts  [Don’t let IUB’s work on pipeline become undone, March 7] seems to have a problem with the idea of civil disobedience in the name of sustainability being used to right injustices or protect the citizens of Iowa. May I remind him that is what it took to undo slavery, give women the right to vote, move forward on civil rights, and give gay and lesbian people the right to marry whom they love. This is how we create change in a democracy when partisan, gridlocked legislators and our system of law obstructs our legal protections. Because of the community rights movement, 200 communities in nine states have protected their families from encroachment and extraction practices they did not want threatening them.

The Iowa Constitution says “All political power is inherent in the people. Government is instituted for the protection, security and benefit of the people, and they have the right, at all times, to alter or reform the same, whenever the public good may require it.”

Paul Cienfuegos has been an educator in this movement for 20 years, and he was invited to Iowa by 100 Grannies for a Livable Future, a growing eastern Iowa organization whose motto is “Educate, advocate and agitate.”

— Miriam Kashia, North Liberty