My parents took me down to Washington DC for large demonstrations to protest the Vietnam War when I was a kid. I loved seeing a sea of people in all directions on the Mall and the feeling of camaraderie among strangers. I loved the slogans on the buttons and the signs (e.g. “If you’re not part of the solution, you’re part of the problem.” “War is not healthy for children and other living things”). I loved that we were all coming together with a common purpose. My parents and I were teargassed after one such peaceful protest when I was about 9, but I still went back to more demonstrations. It took several years and lots of people speaking up, but eventually, we won and the US pulled our troops out of Vietnam.
A year later, I took a seminar on Gandhi and learned the concept of satyagraha, or nonviolent resistance. This was the model for those antiwar demonstrations and the model for the Civil Rights sit-ins and actions in the 50s and early 60s.
This week, we saw a stellar example of satyagraha in Sen. Cory Booker’s 25-hour, 3-minute speech.
He started by saying,
I rise tonight to disrupt the normal business of the United States Senate for as long as I am physically able… These are not normal times in our nation. And they should not be treated as such in the United States Senate. The threats to the American people and American democracy are grave and urgent and we all must do more to stand against them.
Hour by hour, he talked about the many ways in which the current administration is hurting Americans. He talked about attacks on Medicaid, on health care, efforts to slash Social Security, the crumbling of our education system, attacks on immigrants, the crumbling of due process, dismantling of foreign aid programs that make us safe, rising prices and falling stock markets, about threats to clean energy, to jobs, and failing to address the housing crisis. He told stories about his constituents, showing how each of these policy changes hurt particular American families.
This was a courageous and strenuous act of speaking truth to power. He stood on his feet, without eating or sleeping, or using the restroom, the whole time. He barely drank any water. At one point, there were over 300,000 people watching. He had over 350,000,000 likes on TikTok. While he’s gotten press this week, I worry that we will forget as the stock market crashes and everything we purchase is so much more expensive because of tariffs.
We don’t know what will happen, or where this will lead. Sen. Booker is right that this is not a normal moment in American life or American politics.
Tomorrow, thousands of people across the country will participate in “Hands Off!” demonstrations. I have the feeling that this will be one of many such actions. I hope that it is peaceful and effective.
Sen. Booker started and ended his 25+ hour speech, by quoting Sen. John Lewis, telling us to cause some “good trouble – necessary trouble to redeem the soul of the nation.” He ended by saying,
The power of the people is greater than the people in power…. This is a moral moment. It is not left or right. It’s right or wrong. Let’s get in good trouble.