Your Place and Our Place in History
The Original Committees of Correspondence
The original Committees of Correspondence were local groups of citizens that communicated with each other to coordinate their efforts at resisting the British government’s unjust acts. The Committees of Correspondence facilitated civil disobedience and the passage of laws by colonial legislatures that hindered the implementation of British legislation.
Our organization has chosen the Committees of Correspondence as our namesake to call back to the original group’s grassroots structure and goal of coordinating efforts to provide an efficient way of protecting liberty. Just like the original Committees of Correspondence, our organization is nonpartisan. We formed only because Donald Trump made violating numerous rights protected by the Constitution a centerpiece of his campaign. Further, our organization believes that eliminating the bigotry promoted by President Trump from our public discourse and combatting the type of government corruption Trump engages in are also central to ensuring liberty for all.
Tough Times Can Make Us a Stronger Country
It’s important to remember where this moment right now fits into the larger story of American history and progress. The election of Donald Trump presents tremendous difficulty because the nation has never had to confront a President so openly hostile to the Constitution or who, in recent years, has threatened to rip open the nation’s divides that we have been working to heal. But this moment will not be more trying than the battle to end slavery, or the labor struggles for economic equality, or the civil rights struggles for gender and racial equality. Our country has been through wars, economic catastrophes, and social upheavals while managing to emerge a better country. The thing that stands out about the trying times in our nation’s history is that they were overcome by the power of the American people, citizen and resident alike. From abolition to the labor and civil rights movements, it was people forming communities, lobbying their leaders, and organizing for action that made our society more equal, more just, and a better place to live for all Americans.
The Committees of Correspondence hopes that like with major past crises in our country’s history, we can emerge from the election of Donald Trump as a stronger and more just country. The Civil War left us with amendments to the Constitution banning slavery, establishing birth-right citizenship, and denying racial discrimination in voting. The labor and progressive movement gave us amendments allowing the people to directly elect their Senators and laws that still protect workers today from abusive labor practices. And the civil rights movement gave us an amendment against the poll tax and laws banning discrimination in business and in larger society.
What We Can Accomplish With Our Moment In History
If we organize like generations of Americans before us, we can not only keep Donald Trump honest and protect our rights, we can end up with amendments, legislation, and connections that strengthen our society. Trump’s threat to “shut down” parts of the Internet and expand NSA spying can lead to an amendment protecting a free internet and preventing future politicians from meddling with our right to information. Trump’s cruel and public racism can be the spark that leads us to come together and work to eliminate the evil of bigotry from our country. And Trump’s shameless conflicts of interest and corruption can lead to an amendment that finally fixes our broken campaign finance system so that all citizens have a voice regardless of their wealth. Finally, if we come together, politically and socially, to create these changes, we will forge stronger connections with each other that will keep our country strong.