Private Prison Off the Table in NH

New Hampshire will not privatize its prisons, at least not in the near future.  That’s the decision announced by the state today with the release of a long-awaited analysis of bids submitted by four private firms in response to a 2011 Request for Proposals from the state. 

The state’s consultant, MGT of America, found that none of the bids met the requirements spelled out in the RFP.  All of them “had deficiencies from an operational standpoint.”

[Click here for the report from MGT of America.]

Specifically, according to a parallel report released by the Departments of Corrections and Administrative Services, “all were non-compliant with meeting the Department of Corrections’ legal obligations.”

“More specifically, the proposals exhibited a lack of understanding of the overarching legal requirements placed upon the DOC relating to the court orders, consent decrees and settlements which, in large part, dictate the administration and operation of their correctional facilities and attendant services to the inmate populations,” the state agencies said. 

[Click here for the report from the state agencies.]

The agencies concluded, “The immediate next step, taken in conjunction with the release of this report, is the formal cancellation of the solicitation process. This decision, based upon the detail provided above, is made in the best interests of the State.”

That the private industry leaders were not able to explain how they would actually meet the state’s legal obligations should be seen as evidence that these companies can’t be trusted to operate prisons anywhere. 

MGT also reported that the staff compensation levels built into the privatization proposals was “one-half of the current compensation currently paid to similar positions in the state.”

“The state should be concerned that this significantly lower wage may make it difficult to maintain a trained and experienced staff. This could result in high turnover and ultimately impact the safety and security of the correctional facilities,” MGT added.

“In prior MGT studies of private correctional facility operations,” the report   elaborated, “we have found private correctional facilities with annual staff turnover rates of 42 percent compared to 13.3 percent for nearby public facilities. High turnover, which can result from non-competitive compensation levels, produces a chronically inexperienced work force with direct implications for the integrity of facility security and safety. Low compensation levels can also make staff recruitment more difficult, resulting in staff vacancies and reliance on overtime, which again has a negative impact upon facility security.”

The state’s report leaves open the possibility that the state would entertain privatization as an option at some point in the future.  That would be a huge mistake.  Instead, the legislature should pass HB 443, a bill that blocks the state from considering privatization.  This measure has already passed the NH House and comes before the Senate Finance Committee next Tuesday. 

Does Political Speech Trump a City Curfew?

Democracy is a 24-Hour Enterprise, Manchester Occupiers Explain in Court

The spirit of the Occupy movement reappeared this morning in Hillsborough County Superior Court, where three activists arrested on criminal trespass charges October 19, 2011 took their case before a jury.

That day, the fifth in which occupiers were encamped in Manchester parks to show their displeasure with the imbalance of power in American economic and political life, Manchester police made it clear the city would no longer allow them to violate the curfew which bans public presence in city parks between the hours of 11 pm and 7 am.  As Captain Robert Cunha explained then, and repeated in court today, the occupiers would be warned to vacate the park at 11 pm.  If they did not leave, they would be issued a citation for violating the curfew.  If they still refused to leave, they would be arrested for trespassing. 

Today’s defendants – Matthew Richards, Beth Grunewald, and Elizabeth Edwards – were among those arrested for trespassing.  Today they had their day in court.  Or rather, their first day in Superior Court.

The three had already been tried in District Court, where they were found guilty.  Unlike most of the others tried that day, the three were eligible to appeal for a jury trial because their arrest on misdemeanor charges meant they could potentially be subject to time in jail.   With the able leadership of Barbara Keshen of the NH Civil Liberties Union, they tried to tell the jury their actions were warranted by the extreme problems facing the country and constitutionally protected.

I was in the courtroom as a witness for the defense.  Unfortunately, that meant I was “sequestered” for the first part of the trial.  No this was not like the current “sequester” of funds by the US Congress.  I did not have to give up a percentage of my income.  It meant I sat out in the hall gabbing with Will Hopkins and Matt Lawrence until we were called as witnesses after lunch.  And that meant I missed the opening arguments by the prosecutor and the defense.

As I understand the case, the prosecution wants to convince the jury that the occupiers knew  their presence in the park after 11 pm was illegal, and that they had ample alternative means to express their political views, for example by being in the park between 7 am and 11 pm.  The defense argued that the rights to speak, assemble, and petition the government for redress of grievances under the NH Constitution is a higher order legal principle than the city’s curfew ordinance.  

As an Occupy participant who observed the police actions which ended the Veterans Park occupation 17 months ago, I was there to help the jury understand the background of the Occupy movement, the principles of active nonviolence, and the role that civil disobedience can play in challenging unjust laws.  Unfortunately, the judge sustained objections to many of the questions Barbara asked me.  Will  and Matt, both of whom left the park with citations, were similarly constrained.

But the defendants, who were all called as witnesses, were given greater latitude and delivered eloquent explanations to an attentive, mostly female jury.  

Matt Richards was first.  The 21-year-old Manchester native was allowed to describe the Occupy General Assemblies, at which participants practiced horizontal democracy, “where everyone can speak their mind.” 

“I shouldn’t have to leave when I’m protesting in a public park,” he said.  “My right to speech and assembly has more weight than a curfew.” 

Matt said he fled morally obligated to remain in the park, despite the curfew and the police order to leave.  He would not want his actions to imply that protests should take place “only when it is convenient to those in power.” 

Occupy is about endurance.  It is about not giving up when injustice is higher then the clouds and you can barely afford a step ladder.

Matt teared up as he recalled meeting a homeless mother of three in one of the parks.  She was carrying a sign that said, “I’m homeless.  Do I have a voice?”  Matt explained he, too, knows what it feels like to be treated as a trespasser in his own city.  But he said he also knows miracles can happen when people reclaim their voices and speak out for justice.

“Occupy is about endurance,” he told the jury.  “It is about not giving up when injustice is higher then the clouds and you can barely afford a step ladder.”

“The amount of money someone has should not influence how much power they have,” Beth Grunewald said.  The 26-year-old Merrimack native said the occupiers showed by example how to create a consensus democracy that is fair to everyone and takes care of those who need help. 

Refuting the prosecutor’s implications that the occupiers could have made their point without violating the city’s curfew, she said, “Democracy is not a 7 am to 11 pm job.”   By building community, sharing meals, and figuring out how to live together, the occupiers were demonstrating that “another world is possible.” 

Harkening back to civil rights activists arrested and brutalized for being in spaces the law told them they had no right to occupy, she said, “if it takes me staying in a park 24 hours a day, I will stay there.”

The final speaker was Elizabeth Edwards, a 24-year-old Manchester resident who said she joined the Occupy movement because she didn’t like some of the messages coming out of Occupy Wall Street and she wanted to keep an eye on what was developing here.  But she soon found out, she said, that she could be part of a community and engage in dialogue, even with people who might have some different ideas.  “Occupy was about proving that we can create this peaceful camaraderie now,” she said.

Her intent is to create solutions to social problems based entirely on voluntary consent, without government or coercion.  “We could do it with each other right here,” Elizabeth told the jury. 

The demonstrations in Veterans and Victory Parks in Manchester was part of a national movement based on occupation of public space to show the “long haul” nature of what is required to bring about change, she told the jury in response to aggressive questioning from the prosecutor.  “Nothing else is working,” she said.  

Elizabeth also made it clear it was her intent to put the issue before a jury, not a judge or panel of judges.  Her argument:  “In a public park I absolutely have the right of freedom of speech and assembly.”

“Sometimes,” she said, “you have to back down because the system is so much bigger than you are.”  But sometimes, she concluded, you have to stand up and do what’s right even if you don’t know what the consequences will be.

The trial continues in the morning, presumably with closing arguments and jury deliberation.  

POST-TRIAL NOTE:  The jury deliberated for only an hour before finding the defendants guilty.  The were apparently unwilling to see the case as a legitimate conflict between the constitution and the municipal curfew ordinance.  Elizabeth, Beth, and Matt were sentenced to community service.  The  convictions of the larger group for  violating the curfew will be appealed to the NH Supreme Court.  One of the questions:  what is the meaning of the word “inviolable” in Article 22 of the NH Bill of Rights? 

 

Corporate Prison Leaders Tell the Truth about Themselves

FORM 10-K IS A TREASURE TROVE OF INFORMATION

Maggie Hassan made it pretty clear during her successful campaign for governor that she has no interest in turning over control of New Hampshire’s prisons to for-profit corporations.  The majority of Executive Councilors elected in November feel the same.  While the State is still formally reviewing proposals from four private companies to build and operate its prisons, the chance that a contract for prison operation would be drawn up in the next two years is about as close to zero as it can get.  So why have at least two of the companies (CCA and MTC) bothered to invest in lobbying services to defeat HB 443, a bill which would ban private prisons in New Hampshire?

For insight into this and other questions, the companies’ Form 10-Ks, filed annually with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), are worth a read.

According to the SEC, “the 10-K offers a detailed picture of a company’s business, the risks it faces, and the operating and financial results for the fiscal year. Company management also discusses its perspective on the business results and what is driving them.”

Unlike the glossy Annual Reports for stockholders, Form 10-K comes without photos and with a more straightforward writing style.  The SEC says, “Laws and regulations prohibit companies from making materially false or misleading statements in their 10-Ks. Likewise, companies are prohibited from omitting material information that is needed to make the disclosure not misleading.”  In other words, they have to tell the truth, including reporting on what the SEC calls “risk factors.”

Efforts to ban private prisons, even in states that don’t have them and aren’t about to get them, are a risk to the business model of private prison companies.

Corrections Corporation of America

The Form 10-K for the Corrections Corporation of America says, “We are the nation’s largest owner of privatized correctional and detention facilities and one of the largest prison operators in the United States behind only the federal government and three states,” but acknowledges,  “As the owner and operator of correctional and detention facilities, we are subject to certain risks and uncertainties associated with, among other things, the corrections and detention industry and pending or threatened litigation in which we are involved.”

Among the risks they face:  “The operation of correctional and detention facilities by private entities has not achieved complete acceptance by either governments or the public.” 

How’s that for understatement? 

In fact, CCA states, “the movement toward privatization of correctional and detention facilities has also encountered resistance from certain groups, such as labor unions and others that believe that correctional and detention facilities should only be operated by governmental agencies.”  

The GEO Group

The GEO Group, the industry’s #2, agrees.  In its Form 10-K, GEO says, “Public resistance to privatization of correctional, detention, mental health and residential facilities could result in our inability to obtain new contracts or the loss of existing contracts, which could have a material adverse effect on our business, financial condition and results of operations.”

“The movement toward privatization of such facilities has encountered resistance from groups, such as labor unions, that believe that correctional, detention, mental health and residential facilities should only be operated by governmental agencies… Increased public resistance to the privatization of correctional, detention, mental health and residential facilities in any of the markets in which we operate, as a result of these or other factors, could have a material adverse effect on our business, financial condition and results of operations,” GEO adds.  

“Immigration reform laws are currently a focus for legislators”

CCA gets pretty specific about the “factors we cannot control” which consitute risks to their business:

“The demand for our facilities and services could be adversely affected by the relaxation of enforcement efforts, leniency in conviction or parole standards and sentencing practices or through the decriminalization of certain activities that are currently proscribed by criminal laws. For instance, any changes with respect to drugs and controlled substances or illegal immigration could affect the number of persons arrested, convicted, and sentenced, thereby potentially reducing demand for correctional facilities to house them. Immigration reform laws are currently a focus for legislators and politicians at the federal, state, and local level. Legislation has also been proposed in numerous jurisdictions that could lower minimum sentences for some non-violent crimes and make more inmates eligible for early release based on good behavior. Also, sentencing alternatives under consideration could put some offenders on probation with electronic monitoring who would otherwise be incarcerated. Similarly, reductions in crime rates or resources dedicated to prevent and enforce crime could lead to reductions in arrests, convictions and sentences requiring incarceration at correctional facilities.”

This interest in a continued and growing supply of prisoners explains the industry’s interest in immigration reform.  CNN reports, “Big tech firms and private prisons represent two industries vigorously lobbying to influence the scope of legislation aimed at overhauling U.S. immigration policy, a political priority in Washington.”

While CCA’s 10-K sates, “Our policy prohibits us from engaging in lobbying or advocacy efforts that would influence enforcement efforts, parole standards, criminal laws, and sentencing policies,” CNN notes “Corrections Corporation of America, which builds detention facilities to house illegal immigrants, [has] contributed heavily to the campaigns of lawmakers who take tough stances on the issue.”

CNN also reports, “Sen. John McCain has changed his views on immigration over the years. For instance, the Arizona Republican first supported and later opposed a path to citizenship for illegal immigrants.  He is also the fourth-highest recipient of campaign donations from Corrections Corporation of America.”  Maybe it’s just a coincidence.  Maybe not.

If corporate persons can be said to have a corporate conscience and a corporate mind, we can say that private prison companies are morally flawed.  But we shouldn’t discredit their brains.  They know how their bread is buttered, and they are acutely aware that we can cut off the butter by changing immigration laws, reducing sentences, and de-criminalizing offenses like possession of marijuana.  We can take away the whole loaf by banning private prisons, as HB 443 proposes to do in New Hampshire. 

HB 443 states that incarceration is an “inherently governmental” function and cannot be outsourced to for-profit companies like CCA, GEO, and the Management & Training Corporation (MTC).  An amendment approved by the House Criminal Justice and Public Safety Committee would allow the Commissioner of Corrections to transfer prisoners to privately operated prisons on a temporary basis in the event of an emergency, such as a fire.  With that amendment and a bi-partisan 13 to 5 “ought to pass as amended” recommendation from the committee, the bill is heading for a vote by the full House this week.  Illinois and New York already have similar laws on their books.  Since passage of HB 443 would have an “adverse effect” on their business model, we can expect the private prison companies to step up lobbying efforts in the Senate if the measure clears the House.

GEO makes another interesting point in its 10-K (page 31 if you want to look it up):  “State budgetary constraints may have a material adverse impact on us,” they say.  This is a curious observation given the fact that the private prison companies insist they save money for taxpayers.  Yet, GEO says, “budgetary constraints in states that are not our current customers could prevent those states from outsourcing correctional, detention or community based service opportunities that we otherwise could have pursued.”  In other words, GEO appears to acknowledge that private prisons aren’t less expensive after all. 

There’s plenty of other data in these reports.  There are lists of their prison facilities.  CCA reports that only 785 of its 17,000 employees are unionized, while GEO says 21% of its workforce is covered by collective bargaining agreements.   Both companies see union organizing as a risk.  Both companies provide extensive details about their creation of Real Estate Investment Trusts.  Enjoy your reading, with awareness that if you are working for immigration reform, reduced incarceration, and the shut-down of the private prison industry, someone in GEO’s and CCA’s corporate offices sees you as an element of their risk profile.

If anyone has the Form 10-K for the Management & Training Corporation, please pass it along. 

 

Threats to Democracy in USA and S. Africa

Both countries have great wealth and staggering inequality.  Both countries have political systems plagued by institutionalized, legal corruption.  South Africa’s government has been controlled by the Black majority for nearly twenty years since the official downfall of apartheid.  The USA, too, has a Black president.  But both countries retain the poison of racism in their political and economic circulatory systems.  Can either really be called a “democracy?”

That was the question raised by Daniel Weeks in a talk last night at South Congregational Church in Concord.  Weeks, a former President of Americans for Campaign Reform, has been living in South Africa, where he has found disturbing parallels with the flaws of his native land.  

Dan Weeks talks with local residents.

Weeks knows that as a white foreigner it’s not his job to lead reform movements in his wife’s country.  But he is learning from and lifting up the examples of South Africans, like members of the Treatment Action Campaign, who are protesting corruption and demanding health care for people with HIV/AIDS.

South Africa’s problems are perhaps more extreme than those we see here.  Black majority rule – in the political system – has not greatly altered the economic realities for most Black South Africans, Weeks said.  Fifty percent of the country’s population lives on less than $2 a day, and 25% live on less than a dollar.  While all of the poorest South Africans are Black, not all Black South Africans are poor, he reported.  A small number have been welcomed into the nation’s economic elite in a country he said is the most unequal on earth.

The USA, on the other hand, is the most unequal among “developed” nations.  With poor Americans much less likely to vote, contribute to candidates, or otherwise get involved in the political process, inequality at this level means we can’t have a functioning democracy, Weeks said.  Ten individuals, he said, donate as much to political campaigns as the poorest 99.9% of Americans.  And citing the analysis of Michelle Alexander, author of The New Jim Crow, Weeks noted that 10% of Black Americans can’t even vote and are barred from access to an array of federal benefits, due to criminal convictions.

Moreover, the role that private funds play in elections systems is a form of institutionalized corruption that is entirely legal in both countries.

Weeks is now traveling the USA to develop further insights into the realities of poverty and the intersection of economic and political inequality.  He suggests a need for “radical integrity,” perhaps modeled on Doris “Granny D” Haddock, the woman who inspired his activism when he encountered her during his high school years.   

Structural racism is hard to dislodge, he said.  I hope he’ll return to Concord soon with more insights into how we can meet this challenge.   

 

Death Penalty Discussion Gets Real

New Hampshire hasn’t executed anyone since 1939, but since Michael Addison was sentenced to death for the 2006 murder of Michael Briggs, there’s been a man on death row at the state prison in Concord.  Except “we don’t really have a death row,” William Wrenn, New Hampshire’s Commissioner of Corrections said this afternoon at a death penalty forum held at the UNH School of Law in Concord. 

Neither does the state have a death chamber or anyone with experience conducting executions, Wrenn said.

Several years ago the Department of Corrections solicited a design for an execution chamber and found out it would cost about $1.8 Million to build one.  So Wrenn doesn’t think he’d ever get authority to construct such a facility.  Instead, the state would convert a gymnasium or some other space to be a temporary execution facility, at least if it could be done without creating a problem for the rest of the prison.  

Wrenn was joined on the panel by former Phil McLaughlin, who supported the death penalty during his term as Attorney General but who now supports its repeal.  Other speakers were Chris Keating of the NH Judicial Council and Tina Nadeau, Chief Justice of the NH Superior Court. 

A second panel included Representative Renny Cushing, who also heads a national anti-death penalty group made up of relatives of homicide victims; Tim Anderson, who served as a jury member on a capital murder case in Connecticut and later became a repeal advocate; and David Rothstein, Deputy Chief Appellate Defender, who also heads up Michael Addison’s legal appeal.

The procedures to be used for an execution are spelled out in RSA 630:5, which says:

“The punishment of death shall be inflicted by continuous, intravenous administration of a lethal quantity of an ultrashort-acting barbiturate in combination with a chemical paralytic agent until death is pronounced by a licensed physician according to accepted standards of medical practice.”

It’s the Commissioner’s job to determine what mix of chemicals would be used to perform the killing, though the law also states that “if for any reason the commissioner finds it to be impractical to carry out the punishment of death by administration of the required lethal substance or substances, the sentence of death may be carried out by hanging.”

The law also gives the Commissioner the authority to determine who will perform the execution and spells out that “the person administering the injection need not be a physician, registered nurse, or licensed practical nurse, licensed or registered under the laws of this or any other state.”  No prescription for the drugs would be required. 

If he can’t find anyone in New Hampshire qualified – or willing – to do the job, he said, there are people in other states who could be hired.  “Their names and identifiers are kept very confidential,” he said.

Chris Keating headed the Public Defender program during the time of the Addison trial.  He pointed out that the agency conducts about 27,000 cases a year for a budget of about $18 Million.  The Addison case alone has cost the agency about $3 Million so far, he said.  And the tab is still running with an appeal process only just getting underway.  Fiscal realities certainly could figure in legislative judgment about whether the state should repeal the death penalty before another case gets launched.

Tim Anderson had to be “death qualified” in order to be admitted onto the jury for a capital murder case following a horrific home invasion/murder in Connecticut.  In other words, he had to say he was willing to vote for execution if he felt the facts of the case warranted it.  Despite reservations, he ultimately joined the other jurors in a decision to hand out a death sentence in the case.  Now he believes the death penalty is “barbaric: and “corrosive.” 

“What I did was morally and ethically wrong,” Anderson said.  He hopes to speak in other death penalty states to “make sure that no juror has to do what I did.”

New Hampshire’s legislature will take up death penalty repeal next year, and Rep. Cushing is optimistic it will pass.  But meanwhile, William Wrenn  is working with the Attorney General’s office to determine the protocols the state would follow as the Addison case proceeds and what he would have to do “if and when I’m called upon to carry out the sentence.”  Given the length of the appeals process, he won’t be the Commissioner any more by then. 

The forum was put on by Law Students for Human Rights, the Diversity Action Coalition, and the UNH Law School chapter of the National Lawyers Guild.

Time to Raise NH Minimum Wage

Judy and I wrote this one together.  It was published yesterday in the Concord Monitor.  We both testified at the public hearing, along with other advocates for low-wage workers.  The full force of the business lobby and the House Republicans were arrayed on the other side.  This is a good time to contact members of the House Labor Committee to support raising the minimum wage.

When the clock struck midnight on New Year’s Eve, the minimum wage went up in 10 states. But not New Hampshire, where the minimum wage is stuck at the federal level and the state’s minimum wage was abolished by the Legislature two years ago. Without change at the state level, thousands of New Hampshire workers will have to wait for the gridlocked Congress to raise the federal minimum wage above the current rate, $7.25 an hour.

What does it mean to live on $7.25 an hour? If you work 40 hours a week every week of the year, your annual income will be $15,080. Enough to live on? Not by a long shot. You’ll earn $4,000 less than the poverty-level income for a family of three. And even the poverty income is less than you need to keep a roof over your head. At the minimum wage, you’d have to work 106 hours a week to afford a typical two-bedroom New Hampshire apartment, according to the National Low Income Housing Coalition.

Help could be on the way.

Two bills coming before the House Labor Committee today would re-establish the state’s authority to set a minimum wage and raise it above the federal level. Rep. Tim Robertson of Keene is sponsoring House Bill 241 to establish a New Hampshire minimum wage of $9.25. HB127, co-sponsored by Reps. Peter Sullivan of Manchester and Timothy Horrigan of Durham, would set the minimum wage at $8 per hour.

In 1949 New Hampshire established a state minimum wage, though it seldom rose above the federal rate. But the state law was repealed in 2011. “There is no reason for New Hampshire to set ourselves higher than the national average and make ourselves less competitive for these workers who need to gain experience,” then-House Speaker Bill O’Brien said at the time.

No detectable employment losses

But would employers really hire fewer workers if the wage went up? Research suggests otherwise. Recent research by a team of economists from the Universities of California, Massachusetts and North Carolina “suggest no detectable employment losses from the kind of minimum wage increases we have seen in the United States.”

Why? Wouldn’t higher wages make it harder for businesses employing low-wage workers to earn a profit? Not necessarily. Raising wage rates tends to reduce employee turnover, reduce the costs of recruiting and training, and raise productivity. As Henry Ford discovered a century ago, increasing wages can be profitable.

Some opponents say it is mainly teens who earn minimum wage. Not true. Many of New Hampshire’s lowest-wage workers have families to support. Although we lack state-level statistics, we know that teens comprise only a quarter of minimum wage workers nationally.

Who will benefit from an increase? While most New Hampshire workers earn more than $8 an hour, plenty of workers would see their incomes rise. The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reports that 14,000 New Hampshire workers earn $7.25 per hour or less.

Raising the wage also will help thousands of workers now earning above $7.25 per hour. For example, a worker who currently earns $7.75 per hour will get a raise if the minimum wage goes up to $8.

Even people with somewhat higher wages will benefit. This is because many employers intentionally keep their pay a certain margin above the minimum in order to compete for employees.

HB 127 has an important additional feature, a process to raise the minimum wage as the cost of living increases. This is critical. The federal minimum wage would be $10.58 per hour now if it had kept up with inflation over the past 40 years.

Two more minimum wage bills – one in the House and one in the Senate – will come up soon.

Raising the minimum wage will not eliminate poverty in New Hampshire. But it will make a concrete difference in the lives of thousands of people struggling to earn a living. Every New England state except New Hampshire has a minimum wage above the federal level. Our workers deserve better pay for their hard work.

“Celebrate, Remember, and Act”

 

Talesha Caynon and Marsha Murdaugh make last minute preparations for the 29th annual MLK Day Breakfast.

MLK Day Celebrated in Hollis and Manchester

“Celebrate, Remember, and Act” was the theme of the Rev. Renee Rouse’s message to the Martin Luther King Day Breakfast held in Hollis, New Hampshire this morning.  Yes, today is a day to celebrate freedom.  But what we each do with it is the challenge, the minister from the Brookline Community Church said to a full hall at the Alpine Grove, where Southern New Hampshire Outreach for Black Unity held its 29th annual MLK Day event.

Likewise, Nashua Mayor Donalee Lozeau talked about memory, calling the holiday a day for “thoughtful reflection” on lessons we can learn from history, including what she called “intentional mistakes.”

Surely among those we can count New Hampshire’s stubborn resistance to honoring Dr. King, resistance that was finally overcome in 1999 after a 20-year struggle.  One thing we might learn, I suppose, is the importance of persistence.  Another worthy of reflection is the importance of the holiday itself as a day to not only ponder history but to ponder our own roles as makers of history.  In those roles, Dr. King remains a powerful model.

Every year I  have the privilege of speaking at the MLK Breakfast, giving what OBU calls “the update.”  Back in the day it was an update on the campaign to prevail at the State House for the King holiday.  Now, I get to speak about what is going on at the State House related to the prophetic vision we associate with Dr. King.

Today I began my comments at the beginning of King’s career, before Rosa Parks (and Claudette Colvin) refused to give up seats on Montgomery buses.  The issue mobilizing the Montgomery “Negro” community was the wrongful conviction and death sentence of Jeremiah Reeves, a Black musician accused of raping a white woman.  In his Montgomery memoir, Stride Toward Freedom, King said “the Reeves case was typical of the unequal justice of Southern courts,” where Black men could be executed based on false accusations yet white men who raped “Negro girls” were rarely arrested and never brought to trial.

The fact that King’s activism began with a campaign to stop an execution is little known, but might carry some weight in the only New England state where the death penalty remains on the books.  We are also a state in which the outcome of two recent capital trials demonstrates that the “unequal justice” King described is not limited to the South or confined to history.  Remember and act.

King’s career ended in Memphis during a strike of city workers aiming for recognition of their union, and that was where I took my comments.  While our own legislature finally rejected last year’s poisonous right-to-work-for-less bills, attacks on public sector collective bargaining are back.  Senate President Peter Bragdon has just come out with SB 37, a bill that would eviscerate the power of public sector workers at the bargaining table.  We need the spirit of Dr. King and the Memphis workers at the State House this year.  Remember and act.

But we can’t forget to celebrate, and this year we celebrate the dedication of the  NH Sisters of Mercy, who were awarded the Martin Luther King Award in Manchester at an event aptly called the Martin Luther King Day Community Celebration.  The “Mercies” have been at the forefront of umpteen struggles for social justice longer than I’ve been in New Hampshire.  While the MLK Day Award has almost always gone to individuals in previous years, it felt great for the Sisters to be recognized as the community they are.  

Selina Taylor, an organizer with the NH Coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty and a member of the leadership of the Manchester NAACP was also recognized with an award. 

Richard Haynes delivered the keynote at the afternoon celebration, where he stressed the importance of education to a full house at St. George Greek Orthodox Cathedral’s community hall.  I’m sure he would have agreed with Rev. Rouse, who said we make a difference every day by “leaving footprints behind” for those coming up behind us.