How New Hampshire Saved America
On August 11th, Lawrence Lessig, the Roy L. Furman Professor of Law and Leadership at Harvard Law School, addressed the Rotary Club of Nashua regarding “How New Hampshire Saved America.” Professor Lessig is the director of the Edmond J. Safra Center for Ethics at Harvard University, and founder of Rootstrikers, a network of activists leading the fight against government corruption, addressed the Rotary Club of Nashua. He has authored numerous books, including Republic, Lost: How Money Corrupts Our Congress—and a Plan to Stop It, Code and Other Laws of Cyberspace, Free Culture, and Remix.
Professor Lessig serves on the Boards of Creative Commons, AXA Research Fund and iCommons.org, and on the Advisory Boards of the Sunlight Foundation, the Better Future Project, and Democracy Café. He is a Member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and the American Philosophical Association, and has received numerous awards, including the Free Software Foundation’s Freedom Award, Fastcase 50 Award and being named one of Scientific American's Top 50 Visionaries.
He noted in his presentation that the number one issue, as revealed through a recent Gallup Poll, is the “Failure of our Government to Govern.” Eighty percent of those polled agreed that our current political system needs reform.
His premise is that the corruption at the heart of American politics is caused by the dependence of Congressional candidates on funding from the tiniest percentage of citizens. The way candidates raise campaign dollars encourages a system in which deals are struck in exchange for selling votes.
Professor Lessig also told of Granny D’s walk across America to shine a light on campaign finance reform. In January 2013 , he mirrored this way to drawing attention to the political system with his 190 mile walk from Dixville Notch to Nashua. 207 people walked with him. (He plans a walk in 2015 rallying 1000 people; and a walk in 2016 rallying 5000 people.)
His goal is to make this question central to the presidential election: How are you going to end this system of corruption in Washington, DC? This will be an important message from New Hampshire for the next campaign. He does not want the presidential candidates to move forward without answering this question.
Lessig holds a BA in economics and a BS in management from the University of Pennsylvania, an MA in philosophy from Cambridge, and a JD from Yale. As Professor at Stanford Law School, Lessig founded the school’s Center for Internet and Society. He clerked for Judge Richard Posner on the 7th Circuit Court of Appeals and Justice Antonin Scalia on the United States Supreme Court.