5

Defeating Goliath

As we have explored in the previous three chapters, the ultra-wealthy have been instrumental in developing and advancing the education, criminal justice, and immigration policies that continue to oppress people of color on a massive scale. However, their strategic racism is certainly not limited to those three systems. We could conduct the same type of analysis around low-wage labor, environmental degradation, health care inequities, voter suppression, and numerous other issues. What we would find in each case is a similar story: a small group of racism profiteers has been aggressively implementing an agenda that, while enormously beneficial for them, has been devastating to communities of color.¹

The tyranny of the ultra-wealthy hasn’t been limited to just domestic issues either. Consider how we have chosen to use, and dramatically expand, our military and national security apparatus. No matter how old you are, the United States has been at war for at least a substantial portion, or even a majority, of your lifetime.² Indeed, there are currently college students who have never known a world in which the United States wasn’t engaged in a war. The United States now has around eight hundred military bases around the globe, and we spend more on our military than any other country in the world. In fact, our military budget is roughly the same size as the combined military budgets of the next seven countries on the list.³ While we like to think of ourselves as a force for peace and democracy around the globe, because of our propensity toward perpetual war and aggressive military involvement, the rest of the world tends not to share that perspective. Instead, multiple opinion polls of people around the world, taken over many years, have found that the United States is perceived as the greatest threat to world peace of any country.⁴ (In other words, for anyone who has ever seen Star Wars and rooted for the Rebel Alliance against the evil and tyrannical Empire, it is worth reflecting on the fact that from the perspective of much of the world, we are the Empire.)

None of this is new, of course. In his famous “Vietnam Speech” in 1967, Martin Luther King Jr. made the case for linking the civil rights movement to the antiwar movement by stating, “I knew that I could never again raise my voice against the violence of the oppressed in the ghettos without having first spoken clearly to the greatest purveyor of violence in the world today: my own government.” What Dr. King recognized is that our militarism abroad is thoroughly intertwined with our systemic racism here at home, and even worse, we have obviously prioritized investments in the former over addressing the latter. (“I knew that America would never invest the necessary funds or energies in rehabilitation of its poor so long as adventures like Vietnam continued to draw men and skills and money like some demonic destructive suction tube.”)⁵ Those dynamics have only deepened over time, such that our annual defense spending is now over $316 billion more than it was during the mid-1970s (after adjusting for inflation).⁶ And in 2016, $630 billion of our federal discretionary spending went toward the military, but only $183 billion went toward education, housing, jobs, health care, and other antipoverty programs.⁷

Additionally, we all have to recognize that the ideology used to defend the harming of US residents through mass criminalization is the same as that which is used to defend our militarism and the harming of people abroad. The so-called war on terror that we have been fighting for twenty years is essentially our “tough on crime” criminal justice approach applied to the people of other countries. It is, in many ways, the Criminalization Trap: International Version. It should also be noted that, just as in our domestic version, most of the people who are harmed by our military policies—including both our soldiers and the citizens of other countries around the world—are people of color.

Plus, as with the issues discussed in previous chapters, perhaps the biggest winners from the use of military aggression to expand US power overseas have been the ultra-wealthy.⁸ They are the primary beneficiaries of all the new markets, expanded markets, and international access and influence that our military interventions have provided. The ultra-wealthy have also engaged in rampant profiteering off the privatization of national security functions, mirroring the dynamics around the privatization of education, criminal justice, and immigration enforcement.⁹ In short, our hyperaggressive use of the military has been, much like the other issues covered earlier, a key wealth accumulation strategy for Corporate America and Wall Street.¹⁰ (It should come as little surprise that large defense contractors like Northrop Grumman and Boeing were early members of ALEC.)¹¹

This again demonstrates that while the primary target of the unjust policies being advanced by the ultra-wealthy has been people of color, they certainly haven’t been the only target. Just as white Americans suffer the effects of underinvestment in education and overinvestment in criminalization, so too do they suffer when the ultra-wealthy are able to implement such an extreme anti-worker, anti-environment, anti-health-care-reform, anti-democracy, and pro-military agenda. While these are all racial justice issues, they are also responsible for many of the most significant challenges faced by white Americans. In other words, racial justice issues are “white issues” too. The overall effects on white folks aren’t identical to, or as severe as, the effects on people of color, but they are real and they are significant. And whether we choose to admit it or not, they demonstrate clearly that the interests of low-income, working-class, and middle-class white people and people of color are aligned and that we all have much to gain by working together to defeat the ultra-wealthy agenda.

The Nightmare Scenario

It is difficult to imagine any greater threats that our population could face than the challenges outlined previously. It is indeed a scary time. The only thing scarier is that the ultra-wealthy are seemingly not content with dominating US policy making within Congress, the White House, and at the state and local levels in order to advance their own interests. What should be truly frightening is that they are attempting to reshape the “supreme law of the land” to ensure that their agenda is forever enshrined as our national system of values and priorities.

There are currently two efforts being led and financed by ALEC, the Koch network, and other billionaires and multimillionaires that propose to make substantial changes to, and perhaps completely rewrite, the US Constitution. They are attempting to convene an Article V constitutional convention, which is one of two methods outlined within the Constitution for making changes to its contents. It has never been done before (unlike the second method—the amendment process—which has been done successfully seventeen times). To convene a constitutional convention, thirty-four states must pass resolutions through their state legislatures calling for such a convention. Regardless of what the stated purpose of these resolutions is and how narrowly they are framed, constitutional scholars have long warned that if a convention is called, there will be virtually nothing to prevent a “runaway convention,” or an expansion of the scope of the convention to completely rewrite the Constitution.¹² In short, once the contents of the Constitution are opened up, everything could be up for grabs.

There have been right-wing efforts to call such a constitutional convention for decades. However, owing to the investment and support these efforts have received from the ultra-wealthy, they have escalated dramatically in recent years. Indeed, there is a significant likelihood that one of them will be successful in convening a constitutional convention within the near future.

The most advanced is the effort to call a constitutional convention around a “balanced budget amendment” (BBA). As of April 2020, backers had already secured twenty-eight states, leaving them just six short of the thirty-four needed, with at least another eight states that are actively considering proposals to join the effort.¹³ ALEC has been a key driving force behind this effort. It has produced three model resolutions for states to pass, done extensive behind-the-scenes work to push states to pass these resolutions, actively recruited state legislators to join its effort, and even begun drafting proposed rules for when and if such a convention does occur.¹⁴

Another effort, which is more recent but expanding quickly, is from an organization called Convention of States (COS). Thus far, fifteen states have passed the COS resolution since 2014, another seven states have passed it within one legislative chamber, and an additional fourteen state legislatures were actively considering it in 2020.¹⁵ COS is very well funded, having received millions of dollars in recent years from the Koch network and affiliated organizations, as well as other prominent Republican donors such as the Mercer family. There are also extensive ties to the Koch network and ALEC within COS leadership, including former Heritage Foundation president and US senator Jim DeMint. The COS effort has generated so much momentum and excitement within certain circles that supporters even held a mock convention in 2016 to come up with proposed amendments to the Constitution.¹⁶

The stated justifications for these two efforts are to limit federal spending and federal power, both of which tend to be effective talking points with the great many people who—justifiably—don’t feel like Congress and the White House have traditionally served their needs very well. However, let’s be clear: the primary purpose of these efforts to convene an Article V convention is to create a US Constitution that better serves the interests of the ultra-wealthy at the expense of the overwhelming majority of US residents. First, to believe otherwise would require that we ignore the well-established track record of the primary supporters and organizers of these efforts.¹⁷ Second, the types of limits on federal spending and power that are included in these Article V resolutions would, if implemented, clear the path for Corporate America and Wall Street to implement even more of their agenda (including the Doctrine of Corporate Greed discussed earlier) and would thus be disastrous for low-income, working-class, and middle-class people. Third, if the Constitution were opened up entirely, the possibilities would become even more terrifying. All the policies that are favored by the ultra-wealthy and that they have been so successful in getting passed through state legislatures and Congress could be formalized and protected within the Constitution. This would be devastating for virtually all US residents. And, again, this is a very real possibility as early as this year.

Time to Circle the Wagons

We all desperately need to understand the gravity of the threat posed by the ultra-wealthy to the rest of us. The constitutional convention effort, alongside their other policy reform efforts described earlier, demonstrate that they are going for the political jugular, nothing less than a radical reshaping of our laws and policies to fully align with their agenda. Though the adherents to this vision may be few in number, they are strategic, they are methodical, and they are of course extraordinarily well funded. In 2016, the Koch network alone employed sixteen hundred paid staffers across thirty-five states, all dedicated to advancing their agenda.¹⁸

This isn’t to say, however, that their victory is inevitable. The ultra-wealthy can be stopped. We can reverse the damage their agenda has already wrought and begin to craft policies that truly meet the needs of all our people. But the question is: How does David beat Goliath?

There is much that is going to be required to get out of this mess, but if we had to boil down what we need most into just one word, it would be democracy.

In order to move away from a government that is overwhelmingly controlled by Corporate America and Wall Street executives, there is, unfortunately, no simple policy solution. There is no magic bullet that will address the plutocracy we have created. Those individuals will certainly not give up their power willingly, nor will our policy makers be willing or able to solve the problem unless they are made to by their constituents. Thus, the only solution is for more people to get involved and demand something different. In other words, we need more democracy, and lots of it. This isn’t the kind of democracy that involves showing up for elections and then tuning out until the next election and hoping that our elected representatives do a good job. Hopefully it is obvious by now that we cannot depend on the benevolent paternalism of the ultra-wealthy or the politicians they fund so heavily to meet the needs of low-income, working-class, and middle-class people. No, the type of democracy that is needed involves ongoing, active participation by far more people in far more ways than perhaps we have ever had before. It entails diverse groups of people from all sorts of backgrounds and walks of life coming together to make their communities stronger. It demands a collective recognition that to solve community problems most effectively, and to make sure that public resources are being used in alignment with community needs and priorities, we need many more voices at the table than we have currently. And it requires that communities are actively holding policy makers accountable for their actions (and inactions).

There may be nothing more threatening to the ultra-wealthy than this type of participatory government. From the very beginning of US history, the ruling class has sought to limit democracy, not expand it. The affluent and politically powerful members of our society have always been afraid of what would happen if the rest of us ever activated our enormous—yet largely latent—political power around our common interests. For example, in the debates that produced the US Constitution, James Madison—aka the “Father of the Constitution”—argued that the major concern of any society has to be to protect “the minority of the opulent against the majority.” That is why the original US Constitution rested so much power in the members of the Senate, who were, at that time, unelected appointees of state legislatures (and were largely wealthy white men).¹⁹ It is also why we have an Electoral College that can select a president who lost the popular vote. These antidemocratic tendencies have continued to this day, with campaign finance rules that allow the ultra-wealthy to dominate political giving, numerous restrictions on voting, and political processes that are generally inaccessible for most people, among many other strategies for limiting the political participation of low-income, working-class, and middle-class people.

The primary justification for the various antidemocratic measures that have been implemented has always been that the general public couldn’t be trusted to act in the best interests of the country, that the wealthy would be more responsible protectors of our national interests. However, I suspect that this rationale is inconsistent with most readers’ experiences. It certainly has been with mine. Most of my career has involved assisting groups of community members of various races, ethnicities, socioeconomic levels, and backgrounds to come together and address community problems. I have found that when they are provided the factual information they need and the opportunity to work collaboratively, communities have a remarkable ability to solve even the most difficult of problems. Plus, the collective wisdom of low-income, working-class, and middle-class people produces far more humane results than the policies advocated by the ultra-wealthy. In fact, most of the community-based groupings I have worked with were formed only because of the need to address the devastation that had been caused by the ultra-wealthy and their favored policies.

So how do we create a government that is truly “of the people, by the people, and for the people”? First, it will require an army. Not a violent, military-style army, but an army of people committed to participatory democracy, justice, and equality. An army of people who recognize the immense power of collective action. An army of people who refuse to be pitted against each other on the basis of race, ethnicity, national origin, or any other demographic characteristic.

The reason I say that an army is needed is that, whether we like it or not, we are in a fight. The ultra-wealthy have been taking that fight to us for decades, so the only question is whether or not we decide to fight back and demand that they end their assault on the greater good so that we can all find a better way forward together.

To be clear, the type of army I am referring to isn’t one that is centered on any particular political party. While there are those who say that the path forward is through the Democratic Party, note that in all three examples of systemic racism discussed in previous chapters—within our education, criminal justice, and immigration systems—what started out as far-right and Republican priorities were subsequently embraced by Democrats as well. Thus, relying on that or any other political party as the primary means of advancing racial justice would be unwarranted, to say the least.

Similarly, there are a great many people who resist the notion that we face an adversarial situation with regard to the ultra-wealthy. They insist that the path forward is to collaborate and find common ground with the Corporate America and Wall Street executives who are responsible for the conditions we face. Included within this group are the many politicians who determine their own positions on issues by seeing which way the wind is blowing at any given moment. They stick their fingers in the air, and whichever direction they feel the breeze heading, that is the direction they go. What they don’t know is that, most often, the ultra-wealthy are out of eyesight with a giant fan.

What we all must recognize is that there is no relief to be found from compromising with those who promote, or are indifferent to, your destruction. Or, as Malcolm X put it, “If you stick a knife in my back nine inches and pull it out six inches, there’s no progress. If you pull it all the way out that’s not progress. Progress is healing the wound that the blow made. And they haven’t even pulled the knife out much less heal the wound.”²⁰ Thus, merely following the direction of wind that has been created in large part by the ultra-wealthy will never produce the results we need. Instead of following the wind, we need to get to work in shifting the wind by creating our own gusts. We need low-income, working-class, and middle-class people of all races and ethnicities to come together around real, transformative change. This doesn’t mean that everyone has to all of a sudden become politically active, but we do need enough of a critical mass of change makers that, in the future, whenever policy makers decide to stick a finger in the air and check the wind, they will notice that it is blowing in a far more just direction.

In short, we need to build stronger, multiracial mass movements.

The Movement Moment

There are many misconceptions about how social change actually happens. One particularly popular one is that change happens as a result of charismatic leaders or random acts of individual courage. Thus, within our sound-bite versions of history, we typically mythologize or romanticize individuals such as Martin Luther King Jr., Cesar Chavez, and Rosa Parks. While these individuals’ place within the pantheon of our greatest social justice leaders is unquestionable, focusing such a disproportionate amount of attention on them as individuals does a great disservice to the massive social movements that were built around them. It was only because tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands, or even millions of others devoted some portion of themselves to these collective efforts that they were able to succeed and the leaders of those efforts became household names.

While there are many ways to create social change, by far the most effective way to create transformative and sustainable change is through grassroots-led social movements. This is true now, and it has always been true. To illustrate, think about every issue area in which we have seen significant, progressive social change over the years. What they all had in common is that each had been the subject of strong nationwide grassroots organizing, activism, and communications efforts for many years prior to policy makers taking action. Meaningful change didn’t just come out of nowhere. Our political leaders didn’t just decide one day to magnanimously implement dramatic policy changes. In all cases, there was a long-term, collective effort to apply the kind of political pressure needed, and to change public opinion enough, that the government ultimately felt compelled to respond.

Thus, when we think about how we can turn the tide on the political agenda being advanced by the ultra-wealthy, our strategy should reflect that history. Here is one formulation of such a “theory of change”: Transformative and sustainable social change occurs when those who are most directly impacted by oppression take collective action, lead their own social movements, and build power with other impacted individuals to change the conditions that produce their oppression.²¹

What does it mean to “build power”? In this context, it refers to the ability to shape the world in ways that match your priorities. Currently, despite being few in number, the ultra-wealthy have far more ability to shape the agenda around education, criminal justice, and immigration issues, as well as all the other issues discussed previously. While this is profoundly unfortunate and unjust, it shouldn’t be discouraging. Just as David prevailed against Goliath, so can we if we are strategic and intentional about building solidarity with each other.

For example, if the low-income, working-class, and middle-class people of all races who are currently active politically were all pulling in the same direction and were able to aggregate their power, the public policies of the United States would be dramatically different, and far more just, than the ones we have currently. On top of that, there are massive, largely untapped sources of grassroots power all across the country, especially within communities that are currently marginalized politically or that haven’t traditionally been active on racial justice issues. Effectively engaging those communities represents the key to dramatically expanding our collective power and allowing us to create a system in which resources and decision-making power are allocated equitably across the population.²² (After all, the goal isn’t for roles to be reversed and the oppressed to all of a sudden become the oppressors. The goal is justice, not an inverted form of injustice.)

Of course, this is also why divide-and-conquer strategies have such appeal for the ultra-wealthy. If they can pit white people against people of color, middle-class people against low-income and working-class people, African Americans against Latinx people, and so on, then our collective power becomes diffuse. We become so consumed with interracial and interclass conflict that we are unable to consolidate our existing power or build new power. Ultimately, we become far less than the sum of our parts. Thus, we squander our capacity to mount an effective opposition to the ultra-wealthy and never reach our full potential as a unified group.

Plus, the reality is that if you analyze where power lies with regard to these large, systemic problems, no matter how you do the math, there is no scenario under which a US populace that is so thoroughly divided by race and class will be able to build enough power to win those fights. We simply won’t be able to get there. The power imbalances are simply too great, and the ultra-wealthy have demonstrated many times over that they will devote extraordinary resources to defend these systems that have been so profoundly beneficial for them. Thus, the primary purpose of forming a unified, multiracial force isn’t so that we can all join together and bask in our collective “wokeness.” It’s a necessity to overcome the extraordinarily well-financed effort to uphold the thoroughly unjust system that affects all of us. It’s how we win.

While there are always a multitude of voices out there suggesting that this type of movement building is impossible, or that it is a waste of time to even try, the reality is that these kinds of unified, grassroots efforts are being formed constantly in ways that both prevent the worst abuses of the ultra-wealthy and move our country forward. There are innumerable examples of this throughout history, including the creation of Social Security, Medicare, and the rest of the social safety net; winning forty-hour workweeks and other labor protections; ending Jim Crow segregation and various other racial justice victories; and passing the Nineteenth Amendment and numerous other advances in women’s rights, among many, many others. We need not look to the distant past for examples of these dynamics in action, either. In the past ten years, there have been strategic mass movements that have passed living-wage policies, expanded the rights of undocumented youth, advanced marriage equality, raised awareness of workplace sexual harassment and sexual assault against women, and begun to dismantle the school-to-prison pipeline, among many other important victories. Plus, every day, in communities across the country, there are people coming together to solve a wide variety of problems in powerful and authentically democratic ways. These stories aren’t told very often, and even when some attention is given to them, the real story about how those changes came about is almost never discussed. But they are out there, and they can show us the way forward.

And here’s the exciting part: While there is no denying that the challenges we face in defeating the ultra-wealthy agenda are substantial, there are no limits to what can be accomplished once we start to embrace multiracial, grassroots movement-building strategies. There are no problems too large or intractable once we begin to play with all the pieces on the chessboard. There are no unwinnable advocacy campaigns. For every system of oppression in existence, there is far more than enough latent grassroots power to dismantle it. All that is required is that we join together and be strategic about building the power needed, and the possibilities for building a more just and equitable society become endless.

Calling All White People

Fortunately, there is a great foundation upon which to build such movements. All across the country, there is more organizing, activism, and coalition building under way than we have seen in decades. That is not to say that there aren’t some complexities involved, however. The most significant of them involves the role of white people. To win this fight, large numbers of us are going to have to come to terms with the reality that modern-day systemic racism is, in significant part, our fault.

Obviously, the ultra-wealthy are disproportionately responsible for the racial injustice described in previous chapters. However, they couldn’t have succeeded in their efforts without their predominantly white group of minions. Whether we want to admit it or not, white Americans carry a great deal of responsibility for millions of people of color suffering from education inequities, mass criminalization and incarceration, dehumanizing immigration policies, and numerous other injustices. It is our votes that are overwhelmingly responsible for translating the priorities of the ultra-wealthy into policies that oppress communities of color in particular. It is mostly our views that shape the public dialogue in ways that support racial injustice. And it is our advocacy and activism that has been the largest barrier to fixing these problems.

The fact that we are complicit—often unwittingly, but complicit nonetheless—in the perpetuation of systemic racism doesn’t mean that we have to walk around with our heads hanging in shame, riddled with “white guilt.” It does mean that we have a responsibility to acknowledge it and then get to work in fixing it. All white Americans should be taking a rigorous self-inventory of how their actions, or inactions, have contributed to systemic racism. Then we should all be modifying our voting patterns, charitable giving, career decisions, political activity, and overall behavior accordingly.

Beyond that, we must also recognize that if white folks continue to sit out the fight for racial justice, the potential path to victory against the broader ultra-wealthy agenda disappears. It ceases to exist. The numbers simply no longer add up. So we simply have to start pulling our weight.

Of course, while the marriage equality and #MeToo campaigns demonstrated that white people are capable of propelling major social change efforts when they come out in force, it must also be acknowledged that we have a long history of undermining and destabilizing social movements and potential social movements, often despite having good intentions. Dr. King warned us all of the destructive tendencies of well-meaning white liberals in his “Letter from Birmingham Jail” in 1963, and the ensuing fifty-plus years have provided an abundance of evidence to reinforce the point he was making. Thus, it is worth repeating the theory of change mentioned above: transformative and sustainable social change occurs when those who are most directly impacted by oppression take collective action, lead their own social movements, and build power with other impacted individuals to change the conditions that produce their oppression.

In other words, white people shouldn’t expect to achieve significant social change when their advocacy efforts are disconnected from grassroots-led social movements (which happens often). They shouldn’t expect people of color to become the on-the-ground foot soldiers in support of their social change goals (also quite common). And they shouldn’t expect to be successful when their advocacy fails to speak to the issues of greatest importance to communities of color (which almost always happens).

There can be dynamic and compelling advocacy campaigns around education inequities, mass incarceration, the criminalization of immigrants, and other systems of oppression, but if the individuals and communities who are bearing the brunt of those injustices aren’t at the forefront of the efforts to address them, then those campaigns will rarely achieve anything more than superficial, symbolic, or short-lived victories. The leadership and authentic engagement of those most directly impacted are absolutely essential to building the level of public support, and thus the level of power, needed to dismantle oppressive systems.

Additionally, the centering of grassroots leadership from the most affected communities is absolutely essential to truly solving these problems at their roots. Communities of color are typically the “miner’s canary” of unjust policies; they are the ones who are affected first and most severely, thus alerting the rest of us to the dangers we all face.²³ If we fix those issues, then everyone benefits. However, the inverse isn’t true. If we fail to employ a racial justice analysis and merely address the issues that are most salient for white communities, the challenges faced by communities of color typically go unaddressed. This, in short, is why so many of even the most well-meaning progressive reform efforts have actually widened racial inequities.²⁴

None of this should be read as suggesting that predominantly white communities don’t have their own vested interests in tearing down oppressive systems. It is also not meant to suggest that there isn’t a place for white leadership within these fights. On the contrary, we need “leader-ful” movements in which both people of color and white folks are exercising many different forms of leadership to address these injustices. There must also necessarily be processes by which predominantly white communities and communities of color explore the unjust conditions they face and jointly address the root causes that lie at the intersection of them. But to create the type of change that is both necessary and possible, white people are going to have to join the fight for racial justice, not take it over. In other words, while we desperately need more white people to prioritize the dismantling of systemic racism, we also need them to avoid doing so in ways that essentially gentrify racial justice movements.

Building a Counterweight to the Power of Extreme Wealth

There are two primary ways to move public policy: with money, and with people. The ultra-wealthy obviously have massive advantages with regard to the former, but the rest of us overwhelm them with regard to the latter. So why has their strategic advantage been so much more effective than ours?

Say what you will about these Corporate America and Wall Street executives, but you have to admit that they are supremely organized. They are using their wealth in highly strategic ways to advance their priorities. In particular, they have recognized that the key to moving their agenda is building organizational power. They have invested heavily in the creation and growth of organizations to represent their interests within local, state, and federal policy making. These organizations include ALEC, Americans for Prosperity, the Club for Growth, Americans for Tax Reform, the LIBRE Initiative, the NRA, and FreedomWorks, among numerous others.

The ultra-wealthy have also recognized that these organizations need a supportive infrastructure. Thus, they have invested heavily in organizations that can provide their advocacy organizations with the research, policy, communications, and legal support they need to be effective in shaping policy and shifting the public dialogue. Among the many organizations within that infrastructure are the Cato Institute, the Heritage Foundation, the American Enterprise Institute, the State Policy Network and its affiliates, and the Federalist Society. Overall, this group of Corporate America and Wall Street executives has effectively leveraged its wealth to create a massive network of organizations that largely operates from the same playbook.²⁵

There is only one effective counterweight to the power of such organized wealth, and that is the power of organized people. To resist the Corporate America and Wall Street agenda and ultimately advance an agenda that is more favorable to low-income, working-class, and middle-class families, we must take a page out of their playbook and invest far more deeply in organizations. However, unlike their organizations, which are fueled primarily by money, we need to build people-powered organizations.

Building strong mass organizations represents the difference between winning and losing; between having a powerful, organized force pushing for change and merely having a large number of isolated voices in the wilderness. There may be a million protesters out in the streets yelling about various injustices, but if those million protesters are a million atomized individuals, then whatever impact is created by their actions will quickly dissipate. If, however, those million protesters are members of organizations that can build off the momentum created by that protest and channel it into positive social change, then we start to collectively shift the needle.

Building the types of organizations that can form the organizing, policy, communications, and legal infrastructure of successful social movements is complex, long-term work. However, for the average person, the two most important action items are actually quite simple.

Action Item 1: Show Up for Racial Justice Base-Building Organizations

It is critically important that low-income, working-class, and middle-class people who support racial justice have a consistent, organized presence to advance that agenda. Fortunately, there are already numerous grassroots racial justice organizations all across the United States, within every single state. Unfortunately, these organizations are typically severely underresourced relative to their opposition. Thus, to truly build the type of unified grassroots force that can defeat the ultra-wealthy agenda, we are going to have to make a collective investment in these types of organizations. Certainly that includes financial investments, as all of these organizations would greatly benefit from donations, even small ones.

Beyond that, these organizations need people who can invest their time, their skills, and their perspective to advancing racial justice efforts. They need people who can conduct research, analyze data, assist with public relations and communications, and provide policy and legal assistance. They need visual artists, musicians, and dancers. They need cooks, fund-raisers, and people who are good at just getting things done. They need people who can share their lived experiences with the systems of oppression that they are confronting on a daily basis. Whatever skills or knowledge you have accumulated in your life, it is virtually guaranteed that at least some of it would be of great value to an existing or potential mass movement. And even if you don’t want to contribute in any of those ways, grassroots organizations also just need people who will consistently show up for public events.

Thus, if you are inclined to want to advance racial justice, start by finding an organization near you and seeing what you can do to help move its agenda forward. If you need a place to start, table 14 provides a list of some of the best and most strategic racial justice organizations in the country. There may be nothing more valuable that individuals could do to advance racial justice than contribute whatever time, energy, and money they have available to support the work of these or other like-minded organizations.

In other words, what we need is for more people to show up. And to keep showing up. Even if the work gets hard. Even if you get uncomfortable, frustrated, or offended. Take it from someone who has been to hundreds of community meetings, rallies, protests, and strategy sessions all across the country. At most of those gatherings, I felt like I was being welcomed into a family. At others, I felt like an outsider. Many of the convenings were inspiring, invigorating, and highly productive. Some of them were not. On occasion, at some of these meetings, my feelings got hurt. At others, it was my ignorance that offended others. But I kept coming back, kept trying to build relationships, kept trying to learn, kept trying to do better, and at the end of the day, the rewards for just the simple act of showing up—on both a movement-building level and on a personal level—have been extraordinary.

Table 14

Action Item 2: Create Community Equity Assemblies

Beyond plugging into the racial justice infrastructure that has already been built, we also need to create new structures for more people to become involved, particularly for the members of communities that have been systematically excluded from the political process for generations. In every community in the United States that struggles with equity issues (which is to say, every community in the United States), we need to create “community equity assemblies” where regular people can come together to learn about systemic racism and other forms of oppression and then get to work in dismantling them. These need not be formal bodies, particularly initially; just places where community members can gather together and find ways to collaborate. They also don’t have to be large. As is demonstrated every day all across the country, even small groups of dedicated advocates can have a remarkable impact within a community. However, over time, if we can grow these assemblies by bringing in more like-minded people from our neighborhoods, workplaces, community groups, churches, mosques, synagogues, student groups, labor unions, volunteer organizations, and other formations, then the possibilities for what we can accomplish together begin to grow dramatically. All of a sudden, the many people of all races and ethnicities who care about these issues can become transformed from a collection of individuals into a powerful political force. From there, they can start influencing policy decisions, they can demand a seat at the table for budgetary decisions, they can hold policy makers accountable in far more meaningful ways, and in relatively short order they can create truly transformative change in their communities.

There are innumerable benefits to building and expanding these types of people-powered organizations—both existing base-building organizations and community equity assemblies. They create stronger, tighter-knit communities, they give people a stronger sense of purpose, and participating in them also tends to be a lot of fun. Most people find that those reasons alone are more than enough justification to commit one’s time and energy. Beyond that, though, these types of organizations represent the only way that we will be able to create the type of power needed to defeat the ultra-wealthy and achieve racial justice. They are simply essential for bringing more people into these fights, shifting the public narrative around these issues, advancing more just public policies, building a more participatory democracy, and creating public institutions that are accountable to the needs of all people.

If there are any doubts in your mind about how effective and necessary this type of community organizing is, consider this: The Koch family and their network have themselves begun investing heavily in their own grassroots organizing efforts in recent years, even creating a “Grassroots Leadership Academy” modeled after progressive community organizing efforts.²⁶ Plus, they and other ultra-wealthy corporate executives have created a large network of “astroturf” organizations that are designed to convince the public and policy makers that they represent authentic grassroots efforts.²⁷ In other words, the ultra-wealthy have recognized that there is so much power in the strategies available to the rest of us that they are actively co-opting them.

Looking for Answers

As we strengthen the network of organizations pushing for racial justice, the next question becomes: What are the policies that we should be advancing to create more just and equitable communities? Obviously, one place to start would be with the solutions identified in the previous chapters. However, it is important to understand that those ideas were all the product of many years of collaborative work within communities of color around the country. I offered them as a way to advance the conversation, but they are not “my” ideas, per se. They come from the many black and brown communities that I have been fortunate to work with and that have been severely impacted by the worst our education, criminal justice, and immigration systems have to offer. It was large groups of community leaders who identified the solutions to the challenges they face; my contribution has involved little more than passing them along.

In other words, there won’t be the typically long list of specific policy proposals that you find at the end of most policy-focused books. The goal here isn’t to get people to listen to my ideas about how to address various social problems. It’s to get more people to listen far more closely to those who are most affected by systemic racism and then find ways to support efforts to address those injustices. Thus, rather than trying to provide all the answers to our numerous racial justice issues, this book is intended to spur more multiracial community collaborations so that people can discover the answers for themselves. My hope is that through authentic participatory processes, groups of community members can improve and expand upon the solutions I have offered, while also tackling the numerous other racial justice issues that weren’t covered at length here.

What I will suggest is that, regardless of the particular policy proposals that are eventually identified, the focus of our collaborative work moving forward should be centered squarely on redefining what it means for all of us to find true freedom.

Liberatory Communities

There may be no word in the English language whose meaning has been more thoroughly distorted in recent years than “freedom.” The network of far-right organizations that has been propped up by the ultra-wealthy has long attempted to redefine freedom as being about the individual’s relationship to government regulation. Thus, imposing a minimum wage that is enough for people to live on is portrayed as an attack on “American freedom.” Expanding health care protections is an assault on liberty. Preserving or expanding the social safety net is un-American socialism that will make us all less free. You will notice that the litany of mass criminalization policies—those that literally deprive millions of people of their most basic freedoms—aren’t typically included within the laundry list of policies that are considered by these organizations to be anti-freedom. The most oppressive education, health care, employment, voting, reproductive rights, and anti-LGBTQIA+ policies also tend not to even make it onto that list. What usually separates the policies that make the cut from those that don’t is (a) they benefit low-income, working-class, and middle-class families; and (b) they lead to diminished profits and power for Corporate America and Wall Street executives. In other words, the concept of “freedom” has been reduced to the freedom of the ultra-wealthy to accumulate extreme wealth on the backs of the rest of us. And those who talk the most about freedom tend to be the ones who are also most responsible for passing policies that oppress low-income, working-class, and middle-class people.

We need to rediscover a more authentic notion of freedom, one that is centered on all people having the ability to lead full, rewarding lives. Despite what ALEC and the Koch network would have us believe, government regulation isn’t necessarily the enemy of that type of freedom.²⁸ There are both policies that foster that type of freedom and those that stifle it. However, the latter category is quite different from the far right’s conception of anti-freedom policies. For example, when our policies limit the healthy education and development of youth, hinder families’ health and economic security, promote criminalization, fail to address injustice or discrimination, undermine our democracy, or compromise the environment, then our collective ability to lead fulfilling lives is diminished, and we all become less free. Our task is to eliminate such policies and replace them with those that will allow all people to live within Liberatory Communities.

Liberatory Communities are those in which all public policy decisions are centered on what is needed to help all people thrive and enjoy health, safety, and happiness. They embrace participatory democracy and providing all people with meaningful and equitable opportunities to shape the public policy decisions that affect their lives. They recognize that there is nothing more valuable than people’s lives, and that all people’s lives have equal value.²⁹ They seek to maximize community wellness and minimize community harm. In short, they are communities designed around the needs of the people who live there, by the people who live there.

To ensure that all people are able to live within Liberatory Communities, we need to reassess how we allocate our public resources. We all have to recognize that every community is, in significant part, the product of the investments that have been made into it. There are positive investments—such as those for education, health care, living-wage jobs, and wraparound supports for youth—that address the essential needs of individuals, families, and communities and advance people’s liberation. There are also harmful investments—such as those connected to mass criminalization—that make communities less liberatory. In many communities, we have supplied residents with a heavy dose of positive investments while making relatively small harmful investments.³⁰ In other communities, however, this relationship is reversed. The positive investments are far too small to meet the needs of residents, while a disproportionate share of resources is devoted to harmful investments. It is of the utmost importance that we remedy these discrepancies and ensure that our public dollars are aligned with community needs instead of exacerbating those needs, as is often the case currently.

This may seem pie-in-the-sky to some. One might understandably question whether it is feasible to align public resources with these goals, and whether we could even afford to pay for the types of policies being alluded to earlier. However, even if we accept the perhaps dubious notion that government spending must come from a fixed set of resources, it is not that difficult to imagine a policy landscape that would support the creation of Liberatory Communities across the country.³¹

As one example, we could reduce the harmful investments we have made in school privatization, the criminal justice system, and the immigration enforcement system, as discussed in chapters 2, 3, and 4. Then, if we roll back military spending to post–Vietnam War levels and implement Senator Elizabeth Warren’s proposed “wealth tax” and the modest tax reforms on Wall Street, Corporate America, and other extremely wealthy individuals that have been proposed by Senator Bernie Sanders, we would create $1.3 trillion in additional annual revenue that could be reinvested in other priorities (see table 15).³²

With those resources, we could be dramatically expanding our positive investments into families and communities across the country. Merely as an illustration of what could be done with these funds in a given year, consider the reinvestment possibilities presented in table 16.³³

Under this scenario, millions of additional living-wage jobs would be created, and the most urgent needs of tens of millions of families would be addressed.³⁴ Countless children, families, and communities would experience dramatic improvements in their quality of life. Hundreds of struggling communities would be revived. Many of the most significant root causes of crime, violence, poverty, and war would be addressed. The health of our planet would finally be given the attention it deserves. We would be making investments that would actually produce taxpayer savings instead of the typical downward financial spiral of our harmful investments.³⁵ Plus, if these types of investments were continued over time, intergenerational poverty—which is now generally accepted as a permanent feature of American life—could be eliminated. And if we were intentional about addressing racial inequities instead of just hoping that “universal” reforms would benefit everyone, the systematic underinvestment in communities of color could finally be remedied.

Table 15

Table 16

Process all of that for a moment. Then consider how the types of alternative investments listed earlier could benefit you, your family, and your community. Ask yourself: Would you be better off under our current system of government spending, or under this one? Which one would best support the overall health and well-being of you, your family, and your community? Which would make you safer on a day-to-day basis? Which would allow you to live a happier and more fulfilling life?

The simple truth is that there is no good reason why, in the United States, we can’t guarantee every person a high-quality education, a living-wage job, an adequate social safety net, a public safety system that doesn’t criminalize people, and a clean and healthy environment. Yet over time most of us have been convinced that these things are unattainable. We have been operating from a scarcity model in which we act as if there aren’t enough of these things to go around and thus only some of us are able to enjoy them. Yet in reality we have all the resources we need to ensure that all US residents are able to thrive and be free from numerous unnecessary challenges, struggles, and abuses that they currently face. The only real question is whether enough of us are willing to demand that our country be made to serve our interests, and not the interests of those who have been exploiting it, and us, for far too long.

When the “Supreme Law of the Land” Isn’t Supremely Aligned with People’s Needs

Whether we are able to achieve our collective liberation is ultimately dependent on whether we can build the level of power necessary to prevail over those who benefit from oppression. While that is eminently feasible, one must also acknowledge that the ultra-wealthy have a number of built-in advantages over low-income, working-class, and middle-class people. Among them are our campaign finance laws that overwhelmingly favor wealthy interests, our heavily gerrymandered legislative districts, our court system stacked with far-right judges, the significant legal hurdles that have been put in place to limit social justice advocacy and organizing, and the fact that the ultra-wealthy own much of the media that we all consume on a daily basis. All these elements, among many others, serve as obstacles that protect the overwhelming power of wealthy Corporate America and Wall Street executives even in the face of popular resistance. While these challenges certainly aren’t insurmountable, the fact that the ultra-wealthy have been strategically stacking the deck in their own favor for decades makes it far more difficult than it should be to provide all people with an equal say in our democracy. (It is also why purely electoral strategies—that is, just focusing on electing better people into office—are insufficient to address the challenges we face.)

That brings us back to the US Constitution and the efforts to convene an Article V constitutional convention discussed previously. Because of the enormous structural advantages currently enjoyed by the ultra-wealthy, there is justifiable concern that if an Article V convention were to be called in the near future, the results would likely be extremely damaging and perhaps catastrophic for low-income, working-class, and middle-class people. Thus, many social-justice-focused organizations have understandably taken the position that the calls for a constitutional convention should be defeated.³⁶ This is likely a wise strategy in the short to medium term. However, we must still prepare ourselves to participate in the rewriting of some or all of the US Constitution in the event that either the BBA or COS initiatives are successful. If that were to happen, it would be vitally important not only that those who receive the overwhelming share of the benefits from our current legal system aren’t allowed to advance their interests any further, but that the rest of us are able to mount an affirmative strategy around our interests as well. In other words, we should be getting ready to play offense as well as defense.

Beyond that, it is worth noting that the ultra-wealthy clearly don’t believe that the Constitution is set in stone, so perhaps the rest of us shouldn’t either. While the BBA and COS initiatives could hardly be more wrong in their analysis of what ails our country and how it should be fixed, the one thing that the organizers and funders of those initiatives have gotten right is their assertion that our Constitution isn’t doing enough to serve the interests of the American people. Indeed, the very reasons why the prospect of an Article V constitutional convention is so terrifying—namely, the hugely disproportionate influence of the ultra-wealthy over the political system, legal system, and mass media—may be the best of all possible justifications for reshaping our governing documents. Thus, rather than just waiting around until the BBA and COS initiatives get the votes they need, it may be worth considering the possibility of our own grassroots-led call for a constitutional convention centered on addressing these inequities and advancing the interests of low-income, working-class, and middle-class people. While this would almost certainly be a long-term strategy, there may be no more effective approach to addressing our deep, long-standing systemic injustices. In fact, while there are of course substantial gains to be made irrespective of the Constitution, it may not be possible to fully address these issues without modifying the “supreme law of the land.”

Believe me when I say that I don’t offer this up lightly. Not long ago I would have scoffed at the idea that we should consider revising the Constitution. I, like most everyone else in the United States, was raised to revere that document. I went to law school in large part because of my desire to learn the Constitution and constitutional law inside and out. For years, I even carried a copy of the Constitution around with me in my computer bag. I will also continue to assert that, for whatever flaws it may have, it represented a major achievement for its time. It has been a model for countless other constitutions and legal documents around the world. The mere fact that it has held up this long, when virtually every other country in the world has updated its governing documents, is remarkable. Nevertheless, when I read the document now with fresh eyes, and particularly in comparison to the constitutions of other countries around the globe, I must admit that some of the shine has come off the apple. I now realize that perhaps the Constitution shouldn’t be considered quite so sacrosanct.

Consider this: How effective is the US Constitution at protecting individual rights and promoting justice when millions of people have been suffering from the effects of under-education, mass criminalization, and other dehumanizing policies for generations? How successful is it in promoting basic human equality when deep racial inequities persist throughout the country more than two centuries after it was written? Indeed, if we are being honest about it, it must be acknowledged that our Constitution has served as a barrier to the change that is needed across a wide range of issues, including education, criminal justice, democratic rights, environmental protection, women’s rights, and workers’ rights, among others. Sometimes that is because of what the document says, but far more often it is because of what it doesn’t say. There just isn’t much language in the Constitution that speaks to the issues of greatest importance to low-income, working-class, and middle-class people. In other words, our Constitution often serves not as an instrument of justice, but as an impediment to achieving it.

As a result of these deficiencies, there is a certain absurdity to how we use the Constitution in modern times. Judges deciding issues of constitutional law are often basing their decisions on a document that doesn’t even speak directly to those issues. In fact, if you convened a group of non-lawyers and asked them to read the text of the Constitution, they would probably question—rightfully—its relevance to the major challenges facing our country. If you then told them that they had to use the text of the Constitution to decide cases, they would likely become extremely confused. How do you decide cases involving the use of automatic weapons capable of firing hundreds of rounds per minute by relying on two-hundred-plus-year-old language that was concerned with militias armed with muskets and bayonets? How do you decide cases involving the right of privacy from government surveillance using a document that couldn’t possibly have imagined police officers collecting digital data from people’s cell phones to determine their location?³⁷ How do you decide cases around issues of public education, abortion rights, climate change, and labor rights when the Constitution doesn’t even speak directly to any of those issues (along with many other important issues)? It’s like asking someone to learn how to fix a computer by reading War and Peace. It’s just not the right tool for the job. So those non-lawyers would have to go through a series of analytical and logical gymnastics to find some tenuous relationship between whatever decisions they make and the text of the Constitution, just as judges often have to do. While the legal profession has developed a series of customs and interpretive methods that provide some semblance of order and reason to this process, that shouldn’t blind us to the reality that constitutional decisions are often only loosely connected, at best, to the document on which they are supposedly based.

One’s response to this might be to suggest that this isn’t a problem with the Constitution, but rather it is a problem with the judges we appoint and elect. You might think that if only we had better judges, then we would have better law, and thus the solution is a political one. However, as long as we provide judges with such extraordinary latitude to interpret the Constitution, we as a country run a terrible risk that it will be used in ways that are contrary to our national interests. That is why we devote so much collective energy to the fights over Supreme Court nominations, because we recognize that the unelected, lifetime-appointed justices have enormous power over the rest of us, with very little language in the Constitution to prevent them from using that power in deeply harmful ways (or to guide them in using it in beneficial ways).

But what if they didn’t have quite as much room for interpretation? What if, like most other countries around the world, we provided them with a document that actually had guidance that was germane to the cases they had to decide? What if we didn’t have to be quite so concerned about how the ideological or political leanings of judges would factor into their decisions?

For example, out of the 202 constitutions in use around the world that have been cataloged by the Comparative Constitutions Project, consider how many of them have explicit language in them that the US Constitution does not:

•149 recognize a right to education.

•145 recognize a right to health care.

•101 recognize the right to equal pay for equal work.

•167 recognize a right to environmental protection or conservation.

•91 recognize the right to a reasonable standard of living.

•158 recognize a right to join a union.

•86 recognize a right to rest and leisure.

•166 prohibit the use of torture.³⁸

The truth is that, for as groundbreaking as the US Constitution was in its time, most countries around the world now have constitutions that advance the rights of their citizens and promote justice and equality far more than our own. Here are some examples:

•Sweden: “Public power shall be exercised with respect for the equal worth of all and the liberty and dignity of the individual. The personal, economic and cultural welfare of the individual shall be fundamental aims of public activity. In particular, the public institutions shall secure the right to employment, housing and education, and shall promote social care and social security, as well as favorable conditions for good health. The public institutions shall promote sustainable development leading to a good environment for present and future generations. The public institutions shall promote the ideals of democracy as guidelines in all sectors of society and protect the private and family lives of the individual. The public institutions shall promote the opportunity for all to attain participation and equality in society and for the rights of the child to be safeguarded. The public institutions shall combat discrimination of persons on grounds of gender, color, national or ethnic origin, linguistic or religious affiliation, functional disability, sexual orientation, age or other circumstance affecting the individual.”

•Pakistan: “The State shall: (a) secure the well-being of the people, irrespective of sex, caste, creed or race, by raising their standard of living, by preventing the concentration of wealth and means of production and distribution in the hands of a few to the detriment of general interest and by ensuring equitable adjustment of rights between employers and employees, and landlords and tenants; (b) provide for all citizens, within the available resources of the country, facilities for work and adequate livelihood with reasonable rest and leisure; (c) provide for all persons employed in the service of Pakistan or otherwise, social security by compulsory social insurance or other means; (d) provide basic necessities of life, such as food, clothing, housing, education and medical relief, for all such citizens, irrespective of sex, caste, creed or race, as are permanently or temporarily unable to earn their livelihood on account of infirmity, sickness or unemployment; (e) reduce disparity in the income and earnings of individuals, including persons in the various classes of the service of Pakistan.”

•Belgium: “Everyone has the right to lead a life in keeping with human dignity…. These rights include among others: … the right to social security, to health care, and to social, medical and legal aid; the right to decent accommodation; the right to the protection of a healthy environment; the right to cultural and social fulfillment.”

•Brazil: “The following are rights of urban and rural workers, in addition to any others designed to improve their social condition: … a national uniform minimum wage, fixed by law, capable of meeting a worker’s basic living needs and those of his family, for housing, nourishment, education, health, leisure, clothing, hygiene, transportation and social security, with periodic adjustments to maintain its purchasing power …; normal working hours not to exceed eight hours per day and forty-four hours per week …; paid weekly rest, preferably on Sundays …; an annual paid vacation, at a rate at least one-third higher than normal pay; maternity leave without loss of job or wages for a period of one hundred-twenty days; paternity leave, as provided by law …; free assistance for children and dependents from birth to five years of age in day-care centers and preschools …; prohibition of any difference in pay in performance of duties and in hiring criteria by reason of sex, age, color or marital status …; prohibition of any distinction among manual, technical and intellectual work or among the respective professionals.”

•Democratic Republic of the Congo: “All Congolese have the right to enjoy the national wealth. The State has the duty to redistribute it equitably.”

•Bolivia: “Every person has the right to health. The State guarantees the inclusion and access to health for all persons, without any exclusion or discrimination. There shall be a single health system, which shall be universal, free, equitable, intra-cultural, intercultural, and participatory, with quality, kindness and social control. The system is based on the principles of solidarity, efficiency and co-responsibility, and it is developed by public policies at all levels of the government.”

•Switzerland: “Men and women have equal rights. The law shall ensure their equality, both in law and in practice, most particularly in the family, in education, and in the workplace. Men and women have the right to equal pay for work of equal value.”

•Ecuador: “Education will focus on the human being and shall guarantee holistic human development, in the framework of respect for human rights, a sustainable environment, and democracy; education shall be participatory, compulsory, intercultural, democratic, inclusive and diverse, of high quality and humane; it shall promote gender equity, justice, solidarity and peace; it shall encourage critical faculties, art and sports, individual and community initiatives, and the development of competencies and capabilities to create and work…. Education shall be for general welfare of the public and shall not be at the service of individual and corporate interests. Universal access, permanence, mobility and graduation without any discrimination shall be guaranteed…. Public education shall be universal and secular at all levels and shall be free of charge up to and including the third level of higher education [postsecondary undergraduate schooling].”

•Egypt: “Every individual has the right to live in a healthy, sound and balanced environment. Its protection is a national duty. The state is committed to taking the necessary measures to preserve it, avoid harming it, rationally use its natural resources to ensure that sustainable development is achieved, and guarantee the rights of future generations thereto.”

•Angola: “The Republic of Angola shall … establish friendly and cooperative relations with all states and peoples on the basis of the following principles: (a) Respect for sovereignty and national independence; (b) Equality amongst states; (c) The rights of peoples to self-determination and independence; (d) Peaceful solutions to conflicts; (e) Respect for human rights; (f) Non-interference in the affairs of other states; (g) Reciprocal advantages; (h) Repudiating and combating terrorism, drug trafficking, racism, corruption and people and human organ trafficking; (i) Cooperation with all peoples for peace, justice and progress. The Republic of Angola shall defend the abolition of all forms of colonialism, aggression, oppression, domination and exploitation in relations between peoples.”³⁹

Obviously, these countries don’t always live up to the standards set in their constitutions. However, at least they set their sights high. The US Constitution has nothing comparable to the protections and value statements just listed. Instead, what most distinguishes our Constitution from others around the world are the sections that are more shameful than admirable, such as the three-fifths clause (referring to the value of a slave in determining a state’s population), and the fact that it was written entirely by white men, many of whom were slave owners. Even the sections that most people would cite as the most important parts of our Constitution—such as the First Amendment right to free speech—no longer stand up that well to scrutiny. (After Citizens United declared that political spending equals protected free speech, it is difficult to argue that the First Amendment is serving our collective interests as well as it could, or should.)

While it might strike some as blasphemous, when the US Constitution is viewed in context and in comparison to other constitutions in use throughout the world, it is difficult not to be at least a little embarrassed by how outdated it looks in comparison. It is also hard not to be a little jealous of the many ways in which other countries’ constitutions do far more to promote social justice and protect the interests of low-income, working-class, and middle-class people.

The contents of the “supreme law of the land” should be aligned with our values, priorities, and needs as a country, and yet nobody could legitimately argue that the US Constitution is so aligned. At some point, the question must be asked: How long are we going to continue to rely on the same document? How long is long enough? Another hundred years? Another two hundred years? Forever?

Of course, there are many provisions of the Constitution that have served us well and should be preserved. However, our Constitution clearly doesn’t do nearly enough to protect individual rights, address racial inequality, advance participatory democracy, promote the freedom and well-being of all people, and establish a direction for the country that best serves our collective interests. Thus, it is worth considering whether an authentic, grassroots-led alternative to the BBA and COS initiatives—that brings together the racial justice, economic justice, gender justice, LGBTQIA+ justice, climate justice, and other social justice movements—could allow us to reshape our governing documents with more meaningful language around issues of key national importance, such as democratic rights; educational and developmental opportunities for children and youth; health care; protection of the environment; corporate accountability; workers’ rights; criminal justice; social safety net; women’s rights; LGBTQIA+ rights; immigrants’ rights; rights of people with disabilities; Native American tribal rights; equality and nondiscrimination; gun control; the right to privacy; and international relations.

These are all vitally important issues, and yet our Constitution is either silent on them or constitutional law has, for much of US history and increasingly in modern times, tended to reflect only the views of a small subset of the most privileged among us. That has been holding us back as a country for far too long. Thus, an inclusive, unified, and democratic process to revise the United States Constitution may be precisely what is needed to help create a far more inclusive, unified, and democratic United States.

Making Politics “Our Thing”

As I mentioned in chapter 1 of this book, my key epiphany came once I finally realized that the continued existence of systemic racism wasn’t due to older generations of Americans or the small minority of hateful bigots. Instead, I realized that it hinged entirely on normal, everyday white people. We are by far the single largest force propping up systemic racism. Of course, the flip side of that is that we are uniquely well positioned to help tear it down. The question is whether enough of us are going to choose to join the multitudes of people of color who have been in the fight since the beginning. If we do, then the dreams of every person in the United States about what we want for our lives can get a whole lot bigger. If we don’t, then the ultra-wealthy will continue testing the limits of how much injustice and social, economic, and political inequality we can all tolerate before we reach our breaking point.

Nevertheless, many people tend to say things like “I’m not that into politics,” or “Politics isn’t really my thing.” Indeed, it would be nice not to have to devote so much energy to such things. But the reality is that while we might not be that involved in politics, the people who own the companies we work for, the banks we use, the insurance companies we send our premiums to every month, and the makers of the products we rely on are very involved in politics. While we are focused on other things, they are putting their resources—the money we make for them or give to them—to use in advancing policies that harm us in a multitude of ways. And they are really hoping that we all continue to say things like “I’m not that into politics,” or “Politics isn’t really my thing.”

Ultimately, there are only two things that can happen from this point forward. Either we are going to collectively make things better, or they are going to continue to get worse. So when it comes to deciding whether or not to get involved, do we really even have an option?