The following is mirrored from its source at:
http://www.greenwatchusa.org/1222Veto-ShouldHave.pdf


                    What the Governor's Veto Message of
                      House Bill 1222 Should Have Been
              The Sons and Daughters of Liberty (Pennsylvania)


     Prefatory Note: On December 31, 2003, Pennsylvania Governor Ed
     Rendell vetoed House Bill 1222 -- legislation introduced by
     agribusiness corporations to strip away local control over
     corporate factory farms in Pennsylvania. In addition to the act of
     vetoing, the Governor released a Veto Message which explained that
     the Governor actually supported the goals of the legislation, but
     preferred a more comprehensive approach to what he termed
     "nutrient management." (a copy of the Governor's Message is at
     http://www.greenwatchusa.org/1222Veto-DidSay.pdf). The below Veto
     Message was drafted by the Sons and Daughters of Liberty -- a
     network of Pennsylvanians working to confront the power that
     corporations wield over communities in the Commonwealth. That
     network has drafted a Veto Message that should have been delivered
     by the Governor.



                    What the Governor's Veto Message of
                      House Bill 1222 Should Have Been

        Drafted by the Sons and Daughters of Liberty (Pennsylvania)
       For more information on the Sons and Daughters of Liberty, see
                           www.greenwatchusa.org



     TO THE HONORABLE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

     OF THE COMMONWEALTH OF PENNSYLVANIA

     I am returning herewith, without my approval, House Bill 1222,
     Printer's No. 3127, entitled "AN ACT" amending Title 42 (Judiciary
     and Judicial Procedure) of the Pennsylvania Consolidated Statutes,
     further providing for identification of incorrect debtor; further
     defining "other specified offense" for purposes of DNA data and
     testing; and further providing for summary offenses involving
     vehicles, for law enforcement records, for duration of commitment
     and review; ESTABLISHING A CAUSE OF ACTION FOR UNAUTHORIZED
     ENACTMENT OR ENFORCEMENT OF LOCAL ORDINANCES GOVERNING
     AGRICULTURAL OPERATIONS; PROVIDING FOR CERTAIN ATTORNEY FEES AND
     COSTS; AND FURTHER PROVIDING for sentence of intermediate
     punishment and for assessments.



          For starters, let's look at our own Pennsylvania
     Constitution.

          Article I, § 2 declares that "all power is inherent in the
     people, and all free governments are founded on their authority."
     Article 1, § 26 declares that the Commonwealth shall not "deny to
     any person the enjoyment of any civil right." Article 1, § 27 of
     our Constitution declares that the people "have a right to clean
     air, pure water, and to the preservation of" the natural
     environment.

          Thus, people are the source of all political authority,
     governments are established to secure people's rights, and people
     have a right to the protection of the natural environment.

          Accordingly, I am returning House Bill 1222 to the
     legislature unsigned because I find that the Bill tramples our
     constitutional ideals of self-government while strengthening the
     ability of agribusiness corporations to eliminate family farmers,
     destroy rural communities, and further harm people's health and
     the safety of their food.

          Although previous administrations have flouted the
     Constitution and the ideal of self-government, I refuse to do so.
     I, like the people who drafted the Pennsylvania Constitution,
     believe that governments exist to serve the majority of people,
     not the corporate few.



          Who has been clamoring for legislation like House Bill 1222?
     This legislative travesty is not the result of a great democratic
     groundswell, but is being pressed, instead, by a few organizations
     invested in corporate agriculture. Thus, I do not find it unusual
     that one of the principal advocates for House Bill 1222 has been
     the Pennsylvania Farm Bureau.

          Because of past experiences, I've taken the time to learn
     what the Farm Bureau is.

          The Pennsylvania Farm Bureau and its parent organization, the
     American Farm Bureau Federation, are lobbying arms for
     agribusiness corporations. Indeed, the first Farm Bureau in the
     country was created not by men and women of the soil, but by a New
     York State Chamber of Commerce. The vast majority of Farm Bureau
     "members" are either policyholders of one of numerous insurance
     corporations affiliated with state Farm Bureaus, or are customers
     of other farm bureau business ventures. Such "members" have no say
     in establishing or carrying out Farm Bureau policies. In most
     cases, they don't even have a particular interest in agriculture.
     The Farm Bureau is not a democratic institution. It is run by a
     few for the benefit of a few.

          I believe that the Farm Bureau -- and groups like PennAg
     Industries Association -- exist to impose a corporate food system
     on the many that benefits the corporate few. They lie about
     Pennsylvania needing more industrial farms, and urge legislators
     to turn more control over farming to the distant boardrooms of
     agribusiness corporations. They say there's no other way to grow
     food.

          Horsefeathers. Let's look at who's in charge of food in the
     United States and who has benefited from that control.

          Currently, four corporations control over 70% of pork
     production in the United States and over 80% of beef production.
     Fewer than five corporations control 90% of the export market for
     most major crops, and 10 cents of every food dollar spent in this
     country now goes to that friend of public health, the Philip
     Morris Corporation.

          This corporate dominance of agriculture has been a disaster
     for family farmers, rural communities, and everyone who eats.

          Over the past twenty years, a handful of agribusiness
     corporations has managed to eliminate over 300,000 family farmers
     -- and over 3,000 independent family hog farmers in Pennsylvania
     alone. According to the USDA, 6% of all farms -- the large
     corporate farms -- now receive 59% of all farm revenue.
     Middle-sized farms with gross sales under $100,000 are now being
     eliminated at a faster pace than any other group of farms.

          As independent family farmers are consumed by agribusiness
     corporations -- or shoved into bankruptcy -- economic competitors
     are eliminated, and agribusiness corporations are left with a
     deepening economic monopoly. That economic control has resulted in
     the creation of a political monopoly over Pennsylvania's
     legislative Agriculture Committees, which now foolishly refer to
     factory farms as "advanced" farms.

          That's quite a dead-end vision for Pennsylvania -- one which
     drives dollars from our family-farm based rural communities into
     the deep pockets of a distant corporate few.



          True to their revolutionary heritage, Pennsylvanians have not
     been taking this lying down. Many understand the underlying truth
     of what is happening.

          A Chairman of a Board of Supervisors in Fulton County
     declared defiantly last year, "I was elected to represent the
     people of this Township, not factory farm corporations." That
     Township has become one of several to adopt local laws to stop the
     corporatization of agriculture in the Commonwealth.

          I, too, understand what is happening. I support those
     Township Supervisors and their rural communities across this
     State. I will not be a party to their destruction.

          I know that I didn't get overwhelming support from rural
     Pennsylvania voters in the last election. We've got some basic
     differences. But I also believe that we share a core value -- that
     the corporate few should never dictate the rules to the rest of
     us.

          And that's what House Bill 1222 is really about. It's about
     trampling on the power of people to make decisions about the
     future of your community. It's about corporations using the
     people's legislature to claim that corporate "rights" override the
     rights of people and the land.



          I believe that the ideal of democracy is in big trouble,
     precisely because corporations have been preventing "We the
     People" from governing ourselves.

          I believe corporations today act like governments. Energy
     corporations make our energy policies. Insurance corporations
     define the healthcare we receive. Corporate polluters write our
     environmental laws. Transnational corporations override state and
     national laws through global corporate rights agreements like
     NAFTA. Military contracting corporations determine our foreign
     policy.

          Their wealth and power trample people and communities --
     along with the ideal of democracy -- everyday across this nation
     of ours.

          As if that's not enough, corporations now claim the
     protections of rights and privileges found in the Constitution and
     our Bill of Rights. Rights and privileges originally intended to
     only protect people. Today, corporations wielding those rights and
     privileges crush -- and then seek to punish -- communities and
     elected officials daring to practice democracy.

          Several stories have struck me over the past year --
     awakening me to this corporate trampling of self-government. In
     small, rural Belfast Township in Fulton County, residents told
     their local elected officials that they didn't want corporate
     factory farms. So, the Supervisors adopted an Ordinance
     prohibiting agribusiness corporations from farming within the
     Township.

          Small, rural Rush Township in Centre County had faced the
     death of Tony Behun, a child who died after being exposed to
     corporate-hauled and land applied sewage sludge. Residents and
     their elected Supervisors, like many before them, found that
     comforting the bereaved family of a dead child was simply not
     enough. To make sure that no one else died from the actions of
     sludge corporations, the Township adopted a local law requiring
     the corporations to prove to the Township that the sludge was safe
     prior to land application.

          What happened next? Agribusiness corporate interests swooped
     in and sued Belfast Township. Synagro Corporation descended on
     Rush Township. In both cases, the corporations sued the
     communities for violating what they called "corporate
     constitutional rights." Demanding millions of dollars from the
     Townships, they are pursuing the Township Supervisors individually
     and personally for payment of those damages.

          Township Supervisors taking such courageous stands on behalf
     of the people in their community has been both costly and
     dangerous. It has threatened to bankrupt several Township
     governments. I don't like that one bit.

          Now, I've read our Pennsylvania Constitution. I've read our
     U.S. Bill of Rights.

          I don't believe that either document confers constitutional
     rights -- originally intended only for people -- onto
     corporations, thus enabling them to override
     democratically-adopted laws.

          Laws like House Bill 1222 make things even worse by enabling
     corporations to take decisions that should be made at the local
     level and removing them into the Courts -- far from local
     legislators. What's more, laws like House Bill 1222 seek to punish
     elected officials for daring to actually represent the values of
     their communities. I find those goals appallingly counter to the
     ideal of self-government.

          House Bill 1222 all but guarantees that people will become
     powerless to make the rules for their communities.

          Which brings us to the real question. Who will make the rules
     in the future?

          Will it continue to be faceless, unelected corporate managers
     located far away from Pennsylvania's rural communities -- acting
     like puppetmasters with legislators dangling on long distance
     strings? Or will it be the many Pennsylvania families -- who live,
     work, and raise children in rural Pennsylvania -- who are
     confronting and resisting the corporate takeover of their
     communities? Those families fervently believe that it is possible
     to produce clean and nutritious food in vibrant rural communities,
     anchored by healthy family farms supported by people who eat.

          Today, I stand with those Pennsylvania families and their
     vision for this Commonwealth.

          I call on the legislature -- Democrats and Republicans alike
     -- to stop turning corporate wish lists into laws that trash local
     self-government, undermine democratic institutions, and destroy
     independent family farmers.

          For the reasons set forth above, I must withhold my signature
     from House Bill 1222 and I am returning the Bill to the House of
     Representatives.



     Edward G. Rendell

     Governor




     http://www.ratical.org/corporations/1222VetoSDL.html (hypertext)
     http://www.ratical.org/corporations/1222VetoSDL.txt  (text only)
     http://www.ratical.org/corporations/1222VetoSDL.pdf (print-ready)