16 Jan Did MLK influence the EPA and DOJ?
In 2011, U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder addressed the Environmental Protection Agency's (EPA) Office of Civil Rights Affirmative Employment and Diversity at an event honoring Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., "I am old to enough to have witnessed and experienced the remarkable progress that's been made since the 1960s when Dr. King, in addition to his many other achievements, helped to plant the seeds for what would become our nation's now-thriving environmental justice movement."
‘Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere."
Holder, went on to say things like, "I want you to know that – at every level of the Justice Department, just like here at the EPA, (Environmental Justice) is a top priority — and, for me, it is also a personal calling."
"Dr. King did not have the chance to witness the impact of the movement that he began. But he left with us the creed that continues to guide our work. His enduring words, which he penned from a Birmingham jail cell, still remind us that, "Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere."
"In 2011, the burden of environmental degradation still falls disproportionately on low-income communities and communities of color, and most often on their youngest residents: our children, my children.
"This is unacceptable. And it is unconscionable. But through the aggressive enforcement of federal environmental laws in every community, I believe that we can – and I know that we must – change the status quo." (Holder)
The event's program concluded with the EPA's general counsel and EPA's associate director of the Water Protection performing "Free at Last" for the audience at the Ronald Reagan Building in Washington, D.C.
Attorney General Eric Holder,
"Environmental Justice is a Civil Rights issue."
Happy MLK Day, 2012, to you. Read this blog in its entirety: http://chrissearles.blogspot.com/2012/01/epa-sings-we-shall-overcome-celebrates.html
No Comments