Edwards calls for Citizen Congress

Presidential candidate John Edwards brought national attention to the citizen engagement movement on Saturday with a New Hampshire speech calling for the creation of a Citizen Congress. In a message that also addressed campaign finance reform and voting rights protection, Edwards cited local engagement efforts by Portsmouth Listens, the November Fifth Coalition, and America Speaks in announcing his plan for a biennial Citizens Congress that recognizes the "wisdom of the American people and the power of deliberation."

According to the Edwards campaign website, "Every two years, he will ask 1 million citizens nationwide to participate in Citizen Congresses combining local town halls with the latest technology to create true national discussions, unfiltered by interest groups. Americans will discuss the challenges and trade-offs facing our country and offer advisory opinions to leaders."

We posted coverage of Edwards' plan and its origins at Daily Kos, the nation's busiest Democratic blog. The Saturday-afternoon diary drew more than 230 comments, and although much of the debate represented jockeying among supporters of Edwards and other leading Democratic candidates, some commenters expressed hope that the speech might lead to action. "It's clear our representative democracy is a failing system in need of major reform," one wrote. "Whether we are talking about voter ballot initiative, national referendums, or direct election of presidents, any proposal first needs to enter the political dialogue in order to draw attention to the problem. Great for Edwards. Even better for us." Many commenters wondered how a Citizen Congress would work, suggesting that Edwards now needs to flesh out his proposal with more specifics.

Matt Leighninger echoes that desire in a post today at TomPaine.com: "His proposal should serve as a wake-up call to the other candidates in both parties: They too should be giving specific proposals (not just feel-good language) about how they want to make democracy work better.

"All of these proposals should recognize, and build upon, the new examples of democratic governance that have proliferated all over the country. In hundreds of communities—and on some state and federal issues as well—public officials and other leaders are involving thousands of citizens in addressing some of the key challenges we face. ... There is a legitimate debate to be had here, and an important opportunity for candidates to clarify their own identities and philosophies. Instead of simply telling us what they would do about immigration, education, or Iraq, they should let us know what role they would like citizens to play in addressing these issues."

Also worth reading:

At The Democracy Movement, Joe Goldman offers more insight into how a Citizen Congress could work, and why it's worth doing. A snip: "National deliberations should empower the public and increase the capacity of our governing institutions to address difficult policy issues. Not only can a national deliberation identify clear public priorities, it can mobilize citizens behind those priorities. It should build the political will needed to act by creating a constituency behind a given action."

At his blog, Peter Levine writes, "It's a strong program, but there's room for other candidates to match Edwards or to make forays into other aspects of a 'democracy agenda'-for instance, expanding the opportunities for national and community service, improving civic education, rethinking the federal civil service, and revising No Child Left Behind so that citizens can get more involved with their schools."

Update: Edwards' speech can be viewed on the C-SPAN website. Look under "recent programs" for "Fmr. Sen. John Edwards Campaigns in Keene, N.H." The speech begins 50 minutes into the file, and Edwards talks about the Citizen Congress at 1:06:20. "Like so much of what Washington needs, this idea of grassroots democracy is already working out in the real world, in places like this," Edwards says. "Right here in New Hampshire, the Portsmouth Study Circle has brought hundreds of regular people together for over a decade to work out issues from school redistricting to ending racial profiling ..."

Comments

[The Liberal Democratic Party of the United States]

I have a citizen's congress at http://liberal.democratz.org

People work like citizen legislators where they call a company and demand that the company CEO get legislation passed and until that happens the person will refuse to buy the company's product. Imagine thousands of people doing that each day. Now that shows power!