“Why Democratic Self-Government is Impossible
When Corporations Wield Constitutional Rights
Against Communities to DENY The Rights of the People”

Introduction to Democracy School by Tom Linzey and community citizens (16 minute video)

Democracy School Schedule
with instructors Thomas Linzey, Richard Grossman, or Ben Price and
Gail Darrell of CELDF and/or Ellen Hayes of ACE

Contact us (below) for details on setting up one of these Democracy Schools in your community

NEW!  One-Day Democracy Schools:
August 16th 2008
Saturday, 8:30am-6pm
Cost: $150
Instructors: Thomas Linzey, Ellen Hayes, Gail Darrell
Location:     TBA Barnstead, NH
                      Contact:  Gail Darrell
                                        geodarrell@yahoo.com 603-269-8541
                                              or
                                        Ellen Hayes
                                        Ellen@ACEne.org    603-252-1411

August 17th 2008
Sunday, 8:30am-6pm
Cost $150
Instructors: Thomas Linzey, Ellen Hayes, Gail Darrell
Location:     TBA Nottingham, NH
                      Contact: Gail Darrell
                                      geodarrell@yahoo.com 603-269-8541
                                            or
                                      Ellen Hayes
                                      Ellen@ACEne.org    603-252-1411

ANNOUNCING
Fall 2008 Dates Reserved for New England Communities

Gail Darrell, CELDF NH Field Organizer and Ellen J. Hayes, ACE Director and Field Organizer work to bring the ground-breaking local democracy work of the Community Environmental Legal Defense Fund to New England communities. Ellen and Gail are training as 2nd chairs to become lead Democracy School Instructors (for information on how you can train contact either Gail or Ellen).
 
We have reserved the services of one of the lead instructors from CELDF, Thomas Linzey, Richard Grossman or Ben Price for the following weekends in Fall 2008 for New England community locations TBA. If you would like to arrange for one of these Democracy School dates to come to your community get in touch with the designated contact person for that date.  

September 26-28     Location TBA          Contact Ellen
October 3-5            Location TBA          Contact Gail  
November 7-9          Location TBA          Contact Gail  
Nov 14-16               Location TBA          Contact Ellen


Democracy School Evolution

Thomas Linzey, Richard Grossman and Ben Price, working as the Community Environmental Legal Defense Fund (CELDF), have collaborated  and worked with over 400 local Pennsylvania communities since 1996 to develop a local lawmaking organizing tool to leverage community decision-making authority onto the “offense” in defense of the public health, safety and welfare. 

In response to the many calls they receive to share their work with communities in need, they run Democracy School’s all across the country to empower others to take up this work. Democracy School, a 16 hour weekend intensive look at the fine print of American history, people’s movements, how law is made, who makes the law, whose values the law serves, and how real communities are using this education to change their organizing tactics to become more effective.

Democracy School Results --

To date, CELDF’s Democracy School style local law has been passed in Pennsylvania, New Hampshire, and Virginia to protect communities from corporate threats including water extraction, land applied toxic sewage sludge, toxic factory-scale hog farms, long-wall coal mining, uranium mining and other unwanted corporate projects. California has also passed similar local law in Humboldt County, restricting out-of-county corporations from contributing to local political campaigns. The challenge and design of democracy ordinances is to claim and defend the local community’s rightful authority to these critical decision-making powers.

Democracy School Graduates say:

"If you take no other training this year, do the Democracy School. It is a superlative unfolding revelation of how corporations have hijacked democracy. It meticulously deconstructs the historical arc that brought us to this precipice. But most importantly, it then departs into the highly pragmatic and inspiring work now underway that is slowly turning the tide. . . This Second American Revolution may be the most important political work going on anywhere in the country or the world."
-Kenny Ausubel ‘05, Founder and Co-Executive Director, Bioneers

"Democracy School was a mind-blowing experience. During the School, I was forced to come to grips with the understanding that I really knew very little about the true structure of law that controls our activism. Democracy School is a must for everyone who seeks to be liberated from our defensive, after-the-fact reactive organizing strategies."
-Krishnaveni Gundu, ’05, Calhoun County (TX) Resource Watch


Call now for more information or to Register
3-day school cost: $300
Limited scholarships available

Lecturers:
Thomas Linzey, Esq. CELDF Executive Director
Richard Grossman, CELDF Historian
Ben Price, CELDF Projects Director
Ellen J. Hayes Director, Advocates for Community Empowerment (ACE)
Gail Darrell, CELDF NH Field Organizer

Note: All Attendees receive a 350 page curriculum binder two weeks prior to the School, which contains curriculum materials used during the School.

Sample Curriculum Outline

First Evening
Arrival of Attendees
6pm to 9:30pm
Introductions of Attendees

Discussion:
“What is our Current Pattern of Activism?”
“What is Law?”
“How is Law Used and for What Purpose is it Used?”
How We Got Here: A Brief Overview of the School and the Evolution of POCLAD/CELDF
Case Study: Traditional Organizing and Corporate Power – Factory Farms

Second Day  8:30am to 6pm

By the Few, of the Few, and For the Few: The Constitution’s Replication of a Slave and Empire Form of Governance

-The History and Rise of the English Slave and Empire State
-The Declaration of Independence, Articles of Confederation, Constitution
A History of Peoples’ Movements in the United States
-The American Revolution
-The Articles of Confederation and the Constitution
-The Anti-Federalists
-The Populists
-The Abolitionists and the Fourteenth Amendment
-Women’s’ Rights and the Nineteenth Amendment
-The Labor Movement

From a Slave State to a Corporate State-Early Corporate Chartering
-Dartmouth College: Wrapping the Corporation in the Constitution
-Transitioning from a Slave State to a Corporate State
-Contemporary Corporate “Rights” and Powers

Building New Models of Organizing (The Pennsylvania Model)The “Single Issue” Model: From Reframing to Winning
Driving into Local Governing Arenas-Challenging and Contesting Corporations
-Contesting Government Actions Empowering Corporations to
Usurp Community Control
From Reframing to Drawing the Corporate Response
To Building New Constituencies
To Winning
Altering the Odds: Directly Challenging Corporate Rights

-The Porter and Licking Township, Clarion County Experience: Using Law to Eliminate Legal Privileges Claimed by CorporationsBuilding a Legal Framework to Support Elimination of Corporate Rights
-The Legal Defense Fund’s Model Legal Brief to Eliminate Corporate Rights
FROST v. St. Thomas Development, Inc.: A Rural South-Central Pennsylvania
Community Organization Takes on the Constitutional “Rights” of a Quarry Corporation

Third Day  9am to 3pm
Building the Connections Amongst All Single Issues-Our History of Collaterally Challenging Illegitimate Corporate Authority
 Reframing Single Issues by Rethinking Several Issues
An Exploration of Jurisdictions and Arenas
Other Constituencies
Critical Mass: Doing it Together and Building a Movement
This is the Work: Groups Across the United States Applying New Models

Discussion: How Do We Make Real the Promises of Democracy? (End: 3:00 p.m.)