Gandhi
In California
By David Howard
13 March, 2006
Countercurrents.org
Seventy-six
years ago, on March 12, 1930, Mohandas Gandhi began the Salt Satyagraha,
a seemingly quixotic journey of nonviolent protest against omnipotent
empire, a march to the sea powered by what Gandhi called his “inner
vision.” Joined by thousands of ordinary Indians, Gandhi walked
400 kilometers (241 miles) from Ahmedabad to Dandi, Gujarat.
The British then held a monopoly
on salt, and Gandhi knew that the proceeds of the salt tax helped finance
the forces of empire at the expense of the impoverished masses—the
campesinos.
When he arrived at Dandi
on the Arabian Sea, Gandhi picked up a grain of salt and spoke prophetic
truth to arrogant power: "With this, I am shaking the foundations
of the British Empire."
The truth and beauty of Gandhian
nonviolence resonated around the world. Here in the United States it
inspired some of our greatest social justice heroes: Martin Luther King
and Rosa Parks, American “untouchables” from the cotton-picking
Deep South; César Chávez and Dolores Huerta, children
of campesinos from the strawberry and lettuce fields of the Mexicano
Southwest. Their simple acts of civil disobedience—refusing to
sit in the back of the bus, demanding service at whites-only lunch counters,
boycotting grapes—changed our world.
On March 12, 2006, the seventy-sixth
anniversary of the Salt March, as the world suffers the intended and
unintended consequences of a hideous war of aggression against Iraq,
Latino conscientious objectors and parents of fallen soldiers begin
their own two-week march of nonviolent protest.
Like Gandhi in India, they
will walk 241 California miles between Tijuana on the Mexican border
and the Pacific Bay city of San Francisco. Each stop on the march for
peace and justice is important to the history of the Latino movimiento:
la frontera, the border between North and South, privilege and poverty;
La Paz, the burial site of César Chávez; Camp Pendleton,
where generations of troops have trained for the killing fields of Southeast
Asia, Afghanistan and Iraq. The march will end in San Francisco’s
Mission District on March 26-27,where participants will donate blood
for both soldiers and civilians in Iraq.
The leaders of the march
are Fernando Suárez del Solar, whose Marine Corps son was among
the first US soldiers to die in the Iraq War; Pablo Paredes, the Navy
seaman who was court-martialed for refusing to board an Iraq-bound ship;
Camilo Mejía, who chose military prison over redeployment in
Iraq; and Aidan Delgado, who was granted conscientious objector status
while stationed at Abu Ghraib prison.
We in Ventura County, California
will honor these peace marchers in the spirit of Gandhi, King, Parks,
Chávez and Huerta. On Monday, March 20, we will house them in
the sanctuary of Oxnard’s Congregation for Peace. We will walk
with them to teach our children at Oxnard High School. We will join
them in protest in front of Oxnard’s military recruitment office,
and we will arrive together at the County Government Center to call
upon attorneys, judges and elected officials to help us end the war.
No one knows when the Iraq
War will end. No one knows who among the children at Oxnard High School
will heed Gandhi’s message and who will fall prey to a multi-billion
dollar military propaganda program hell-bent on persuading them to fight.
But we do know that 75 years
from now, our great grandchildren will remember our grain of salt. They
will stand at our humble milestones and recall how we contributed our
drop of blood, sweat and salt tears to help end an obscene war of immense
cruelty and folly. They will remember not because our gestures are unique
or grandiose, but because they reflect a perennial vision of peace transmitted
across borders, cultures and religions. A vision worth a mere grain
of salt; a vision that shakes the foundations of empire.
David Howard
is co-chair of Ventura County Citizens for Peaceful Resolution/CPR.
[email protected]