Granny D (Doris Haddok), living her belief that “You’re Never Too Old to Raise a Little Hell,” walked through Northfield on Tuesday to raise awareness in her campaign for Fair and Clean Elections (FACE). Despite the rain, there was a good multigenerational turnout from the St. Olaf campus. I joined Granny, several St. Olaf student organizers and staff, mayor Covey and a few Northfielders. 
We marched to Bridge Square where we were met by a number of activists from the Northfield area, and Carleton College students. From there we marched on to Sayles Hill to hear the Mayor, student organizers and Doris Haddock tell us about this important initiative.
This effort is sponsored by the League of Women Voters of Minnesota and Common Cause Minnesota, American Association of University Women, MPIRG, the Senior Federation, the Minnesota Alliance for Progressive Action and Democracy Matters, and organized locally by Breanna Peterson, a St. Olaf student. Over the weekend, she will be at the Free Democracy Summit in Duluth.
The populist-progressives are people who simply are politically awake. They can be liberal or conservative, they can be members of any party, but they believe in the Bill of Rights and they believe that we are a human community who have an obligation to work together to solve our common problems and advance our society, and they understand that local, state and federal governments are our tools, our meeting places, our tables of shared power where we meet and bring forth a better community, nation and world. Government is the enemy only when we let it be “the other” and not the us. It should be all of us working together for progress. That’s progressive. The progressives have a sparkle in their eye that you can see across the room. They are more alive and less fearful than the politically dead, the hate mongers, the fear mongers who think that only their own church or their own gated community can be the seat of common action. The progressives are more interested in responsible behavior than those who are interested in promoting oppressive power at home and around the world, and the suppression of diversity instead of the celebration and nurturing of diversity. The progressives celebrate and advance the sharing of power among equal citizens. Progressives are the Davids who defend the human scale of politics, the economy and civilization itself against over-scaled Goliaths, whether they be unrepresentative governments or overlarge corporations, which are also unrepresentative governments.
–Doris “Granny D” Haddock
In July, 2002, very early in my campaign, I signed the FACE pledge and support Fair and Clean Elections. There are FACE bills in various stages in the Minnesota House (HF1382) (Rep. Jim Davnie, chief author) and Senate (SF998) (Sen. John Hottinger, chief author), we should all encourage our legislators to support this non-partisan effort to improve our democratic process.
More than 62 organizations have signed on to FACE, and by doing so, the organizations adopt the following platform:
Organizational Endorsement
We believe a critical step towards making our political system more accountable to the voters, and therefore, more truly democratic, is replacing our system of financing campaigns with a system that is based on the following principles:
– People should have access to elected officials because they vote, not because they pay.
– Candidates should raise issues, not money.
– The strength of parties, candidates, and interest groups should come from numbers of supporters, not numbers of dollars.
– Your voice should really make a difference.We believe that the best mechanism for achieving such comprehensive and fundamental reform is the creation of a system which:
1. Provides candidates with the option of nearly full public financing if they agree to forego almost all private contributions;
2. Places limits on the size of contributions individuals and PACs can give to political parties and legislative caucuses;
3. Reduces unfair advantages caused by independent expenditures; and
4. Encourages grassroots participation in the political process.
We therefore join with other Minnesota organizations in endorsing the campaign for a Fair and Clean Elections system in Minnesota.
For more information contact Nick Palumbo at MAPA, phone (651) 641-4050 or e-mail npalumbo@mapa-mn.org