The Moral Mondays Campaign is Spreading Its Wings into Other States

The Rev. William Barber recalls his first reaction when he got the invitation to bring his ‘Moral Mondays’ message to North Carolina’s Mitchell County in the Appalachian Mountains.

“I said, hell, I ain’t going up there,” Barber said, a smile playing on his face because, of course, he did go up there.

The reason for his hesitation is understandable. Barber is president of the North Carolina chapter of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP). Mitchell County, by Barber’s reckoning, is 99% white, 89% Republican and conservative to boot.

“We’re in a time where corporations are treated like people and people are treated like things. ”  -Rev. William Barber

“When we got there,” he said, “we found those mountain folks had lost their textile jobs so they believe in labor rights. They need the unemployment. They have sickness in the mountains. They believe in voting rights and they need public education.”

“Moral Mondays” grew in response to a radical turn by North Carolina lawmakers and elected leaders. A cadre of conservative Republicans came into office, controlling the state legislature and governorship. Almost immediately, they drastically cut funding for public education and unemployment benefits. They cut taxes for corporations and terminated the earned-income tax credit for 900,000 low-wage workers. They refused to expand Medicaid that would have provided health care for at least 300,000 low-income North Carolinians. And they topped it off by rewriting state election laws to make registration and voting harder, especially for African-American, blue-collar, and younger voters.

In response, the coalition led by Rev. Barber has been growing. CWA activists have joined the weekly actions, some joining in acts of civil disobedience by refusing to leave the North Carolina Capitol Rotunda until they were removed by police. The arrests have led to charges and trials. But they also have led to a groundswell of support and new alliances in the state, among the NAACP, environmental, women’s, LGBT, labor, immigrant, and religious organizations. One weekend in February, more than 80,000 people turned out for the Moral March in Raleigh.

“When we build a movement, when we come together, across all of these lines, we can change and shift the discussion and the center of gravity,” Barber says.

Meanwhile, a moribund state commission—the Legislative Services Commission, which hadn’t changed its rules in 27 years and hadn’t even met in 15 years—was resuscitated by legislators to try to stop the message of “Moral Mondays.” The commission suddenly created a rule that calls for the arrest of anyone who “might pose an imminent threat of a disturbance,” even if that person hasn’t done anything.

That sparked an even bigger, but silent protest, as thousands of activists marched through the Capitol, two by two, in silence, with tape over their mouths. The protests are continuing, and spreading.

In South Carolina, activists started a “Truthful Tuesday” movement. In January, people in Georgia have formed Moral Monday Georgia, and the group has held civil disobedience actions in the Georgia State Capitol and been arrested for protests over Medicaid expansion.

More than 80,000 activists rally at the state capitol for a Moral Monday protest. Below, tennessee, CWAers and activists are building a movement to "put the people first."

A Moral Monday coalition is coming together in Binghamton, N.Y., with activists from unions, people of faith and community organizations. “Ethical Thursdays” are bringing thousands of Mississippi activists to the state capitol in Jackson, Miss. “Put the People First” is a Moral Monday movement in Tennessee, organized by activists from faith groups, unions and worker alliances, Jobs with Justice, the NAACP, Citizen Action and many more. In Tallahassee, Fla., CWAers joined members of the NAACP, Southern Christian Leadership Conference and others in a Moral Monday rally that called on the Florida legislature to “have some morals and raise their standards when it comes to enacting laws.”

“Secure pro-labor, anti-poverty, that’s a moral agenda. Educational equality for everybody, that’s a moral agenda. Health care for all and environmental protection, that’s a moral agenda. Fairness in the justice system for poor white people and blacks and browns and protecting and expanding voting rights and women’s rights and LGBT rights and immigrants rights and fundamental equal protection under the law,” Barber said.