"Facing spiritual struggles" - Tim de Christopher |
A
recent Moyers & Company broadcast on PBS featured Tim de
Christopher. This young man was recently released after two years in
prison for interfering with a 2008 auction of oil leases in a very
beautiful section of Utah. The auction was being rushed by the outgoing
Bush administration. Tim came to protest what he felt was an illegal
auction, but found himself being asked if he was a bidder. He said yes,
was admitted, and started bidding and winning; the auction was suspended
when it was realized what Tim was up to. He didn't have the money for
his bids, but supporters raised the money afterwards. Soon after, the
whole auction was canceled by the new Secretary of the Interior. But Tim
was prosecuted and jailed for two years. His example has breathed new
urgency into the environmental movement. He was recently interviewed by Bill Moyers; video and transcript are online. A few highlights:
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Moyers: (after speaking first with business journalist Gretchen Morgenson, author of Reckless Endangerment: How Outsized Ambition, Greed, and Corruption Created the Worst Financial Crisis of Our Time.)
So if we now have representative government in name only, and are
governed instead by corporations and their lobbyists, what’s to be done?
Tim DeChristopher wrestled with that reality and... spent almost two
years in prison. He’s out now, and you can learn the whole story in the
new documentary, Bidder 70...
Tim DeChristopher held out for a trial by jury, despite government
attempts to make a deal... So when did you know for sure that you were
going to be convicted?
DeChristopher: During the jury selection of the trial... there was a moment where the prosecution and the judge found out that most of that jury pool had gotten a pamphlet before they came in on the first day, from the Fully Informed Jury Association. And it was a pamphlet that didn't say anything about my case, but it talked about jury's rights. It talked about why we have juries. And it, you know, quoted the founders of the country on juries being the conscience of the community. And the prosecution flipped out over this... And then rather than get rid of the whole jury pool, the judge called the jurors in one at a time to his chambers... And the judge would say, "You understand it's not your job to decide what's right or wrong here. Your job is to listen to what I say the law says, and you have to enforce it, even if you think it's morally wrong. Can you do that? Can you follow my instructions, even if you think they're morally wrong?" And unless they said yes, they weren't on the jury.
Toward the end of the lengthy interview, Moyers asks about goals, about "overthrowing WalMart."
DeChristopher:
We don't want Walmart to be a greener, corporate citizen. We want
Walmart to be subservient to human interests. We don't think
corporations should be masters of men. That's the difference between the
climate justice movement and the environmental movement...
Moyers: ... What do you mean when you say overthrow corporate power? DeChristopher: I mean get corporations into an economical rather than a political role. You know, corporations do have a role to play in our economy, but they don't have a role to play in our government that… Moyers: They have a stake in policy. DeChristopher: But corporations don't have a conscience. And so they're not appropriate for being part of our political system. And when I say overthrow I mean ending corporate personhood, I mean kicking them out of our government. And that will take a constitutional amendment to get that to happen. ... They're not going to easily give that up.
What next for Tim? A spiritual struggle...
DeChristopher: In the fall I'll be going to Harvard Divinity School to study to become a Unitarian minister.
Moyers: Not law school with your concern about juries and the founding fathers and civil disobedience? DeChristopher: No, because I think a lot of what we're facing is really spiritual struggles. I think we have enough people onboard, but not enough who really have faith in their own power to make a difference. And that to me is an internal struggle, something that's more on a spiritual level. Moyers: What do you mean spiritual? DeChristopher: You know, the point where I fully decided that I was going to become a minister or go to divinity school was the same point that I mentioned earlier was when I knew that I was going to be convicted. That point when I watched one juror after another say I'll do whatever you tell me to do even if I think it's morally wrong. That to me was a huge turning point. Because I saw two things in that situation where he was telling people they had to let go of their own moral authority. I saw how willing people were to let go of their moral authority. But at the same time I saw the vulnerability of the prosecutor. And you know, he was the United States attorney, the whole power of the United States government behind him, and he was terrified. He felt vulnerable to the notion of citizens using their conscience in exercising their civic duties. [See the full program.]
From the film:
"At this point of unimaginable threats on the horizon, this is what hope looks like. In these times of a morally bankrupt government that has sold out its principles, this is what patriotism looks like. With countless lives on the line, this is what love looks like, and it will only grow..." |
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