Community members and the CIW museum crew protest outside a Nashville, TN, Publix store Saturday. Photo by Alvine.

CIW members, Fair Food allies deliver change.org petition to Nashville, TN, Publix following protest…

Also: Check out change.org’s facebook, twitter actions!

With the CIW’s Modern-Day Museum truck back on the road after several days of mechanical difficulties (whoever thought it was a good idea to take a very used produce truck on tour all over the eastern United States?…), the museum crew headed to Nashville, Tennessee, for what turned out to be a very exciting weekend.

Nashville – site of one of the defining struggles of the Civil Rights movement, the Nashville lunch counter sit-ins — received the museum crew in style, including a visit with the Rev. James Lawson. Rev. Lawson is one of the living legends of the Civil Rights movement, and was a leader of the sit-ins, for which he was denounced as a “flannel-mouthed agitator” in a local editorial and was expelled from the Vanderbilt University Divinity School **.

Before Friday’s visit with Rev. Lawson, however, the CIW was hosted on Thursday night for a dinner and discussion with friends at Dignidad Obrera, a sister organization in Nashville comprised of low-wage workers using popular education to teach community members about their labor rights and grassroots organizing to reclaim stolen wages. It was a great evening, and Dignidad Obrera members showed up two days later — in force — for the cold, rainy, but exciting protest on Saturday.

On Friday, the museum set up outside the chapel on Vanderbilt University campus. Following a long day of visits by students and professors, the crew moved inside to the chapel, where a panel event, hosted (right) by none other than Rev. Lawson himself followed.

Rev. Lawson was remarkably generous in his comments about the CIW. Following the presentation by the museum crew and a question and answer session, he reflected on the Nashville sit-in movement and the similarities today with the CIW’s work and the Campaign for Fair Food. Rev. Lawson said both movements share a common spark in the call for people to be treated as fully human, for their personal dignity to be honored. He expressed a genuine admiration for the Coalition’s commitment to non-violent direct action for justice and praised the CIW as “the future” of work defending human dignity.

Finally, it was on to the protest at a local Nashville Publix store. Despite a steady, cold rain, several dozen people showed up Saturday to call on Publix to do the right thing and work with the CIW. The press coverage was strong, including Nashville print and tv media reporting from the protest. The Tennessean ran an excellent article following the protest. Here’s an excerpt:

“… The coalition has signed agreements with nine international corporations. Under the agreement, each company monitors conditions in the fields they buy from and pays workers directly a penny for each pound of tomatoes. Publix has not signed an agreement, officials say. ‘This sense that we can shrug off responsibility for the exploitation of the workers who feed the world is precisely what we are fighting,’ said Caitlin Mitchell, rally organizer, Vanderbilt student and member of the Vanderbilt Campaign for Fair Food. ‘As shoppers and community members, we’re demanding that Publix make fair labor standards part of their business, and pay farm workers a penny more per pound of tomatoes.’” read more

Click here for a television news report from the action.

At the close of the protest, a delegation delivered 848 pages containing more than 31,000 signatures to Publix PR staffer Brenda Reid and the local district manager. While Ms. Reid repeated the latest Publix line when receiving the signatures — “Put it in the price” (more to come on that later this week…) — Cruz Salucio of the CIW responded:

“We are not your enemies, we want to work together. We do not mind protesting in the cold and rain, and we will continue to protest until an agreement is reached and until then the more you resist, the more our numbers will surely grow.”

From the vocal response to Cruz’s statement by the protesters gathered for the picket — including members of Dignidad Obrera, union members from Vanderbilt campus, representatives of several local congregations, as well as students from Middle Tennessee State University and Vanderbilt — it seems certain that Nashville support for the Campaign for Fair Food will only grow! Thanks for a great weekend, Nashville. Hope to see you all again soon.

** Just for the record, from wikipedia: “Lawson’s expulsion from Vanderbilt… became one of the celebrated incidents of the era and eventually a source of deep embarrassment to the university. During the 2006 graduation ceremony Vanderbilt apologized for its treatment of Lawson; he is now a member of its faculty.”

Moral of that story: It’s always better to be on the right side of history. Lots less to apologize for (and, yes, we are talking to you, Publix)…