Before I begin my short remarks I feel I must, as an American, comment on the recent US presidential election. Last year when I spoke to you I talked about the second moment of "hope" we were experiencing in the US. That "hope" was the awakening of a peace and justice movement that, unlike many of its counterparts around the world, had been dormant. and therein lies the good news of the Presidential election.

· More US citizens voted against George Bush than any sitting President in US history.
· First time progressive candidates turned out incumbents in local and state races across the US.
· The record turnout (120 million), regardless of the outcome, meant that we have begun to revive our democracy.
· Voters rejected George Bush's Iraq policy 75%-25%.

But you will not hear about these things in the media because the news media, that is the conglomerates who control our news, will never air it. They have nothing to tell and everything to sell! In addition some, like the NBC Network, are owned by one of the world's largest military contractors--General Electric. This is something to be watched carefully because there can be no true democracy without accurately informed citizens.

It has been said that there might be a great conspiracy going on in the United States between the radical religious right and the neo-conservative political right. They have teamed up to give a public, deeply in need of calm and reassurance, rhetoric inflamed by fear, name calling and mis-information. This is not new. we have seen it before in other countries, in other times.

I have come across a quote by Hermann Goering, Vice Fuhrer to Hitler, from the Nuremburg Trials that states, "It is always a simple matter to drag people along whether it is a democracy, or a fascist dictatorship, or a parliament or a communist dictatorship. Voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. This is easy. All you have to do is tell them they are being attacked, and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. It works the same in every country."

I am here to assure you that it will not work now or ever in the United States. We, in the US peace and justice movement, who are especially grateful for support from peace movements around the world, will not sleep at night until we have our country back. It is our right. It is our responsibility!

And there is much work to be done. As Vaclav Havel of the Czech Republic said, "When we tried to change the government it didn't work.it was only when we were able to change the people, did the government change."

Which brings me to the topic of human rights.

Our mission of human rights at the American Friends Service Committee is based on the Quaker value and belief that there is "that of God in every person". Thus human rights mean the right to be human, to be a person, to be a fully recognized member of the community anywhere-and everywhere.

Current trends in the US and in the world about human rights show retrenchment and retreat, with the rights of immigrants a touchstone of these issues.

Where is the world headed? Most of the answer lies in the status of the rights among us of women and communities of color, and of immigrant communities within them. We see walls coming down in Berlin and barriers falling to free trade and to the free flow of capital. At the same time, walls are rising up everywhere around us; from the US/Mexico border, to Israel/Palestine, to the Straits of Gibraltar.

Daily in the United States, I see the national myth of the melting pot held up against the reality of how we treat minority populations. Along the Mexican border I see the creation of one of the greatest militarized zones since the end of the Cold War. Across long stretches of the US-Mexico border there is a ten-foot high steel fence built to promote American security. It is a reminder of the estimated 3,000 people who have lost their lives in the last decade as they attempted to enter the US from Mexico.

The US is not the only place where we see violations of human rights: Darfur, Congo, North Korea, Chechnya, France and just this past week the Netherlands. Where and when will it stop? When will we collectively say "enough"? It is clear to me that we must recognize that abuses of human rights, which are usually found in a backdrop of multi-ethnic violence, should always be viewed in a context of white supremacy, colonialism or empire building.

I know that systems of law are, by their nature, defensive. Laws speak to our shared agreements as a society. But how are we to bolster and build agreements about how we are to treat one another as human beings?

If we are to create a world in which there are no more walls, a world in which we see one another first as brothers and sisters and secondly as Latinos, Arabs, Africans, and Anglo-Saxons, we must change hearts.

The Quaker leader William Penn, founder of my home city of Philadelphia, said, "Let us then try what Love will do."

Human rights begin and are built upon a commitment to doing what is right. Based on the deeply-held Quaker commitment to the dignity and equality of all people, AFSC has lifted up the shared humanity of all people since World War I. Through changing ourselves and through a myriad of programs, we seek to show that cultural diversity is an opportunity, a strength, a gift.

We bring no great numbers, we bring no great wealth. Instead, we bring our commitment to integrity and our commitment to a method. In the absence of more conventional types of power, we have trusted in the power of listening.

Quakerism has always been a listening religion. In the silence we listen for the voice of God as best we can hear it. Our history tells us that to act wisely, we must listen earnestly for wisdom, human and divine.

We believe that it is in being open to the wisdom and gifts of those around us and in risking our own inner transformation that the world will achieve lasting peace and the right-sharing of resources.

Our experience tells us that encountering one another as human beings with hopes and dreams, with more in common than we ever expected and with differences that enrich us, we gain a security far greater than any wall, be it along a border or on the edge of a gated community.

We lift up those people who are rejecting the politics of fear and reaching out to one another and to those who are told they are the other, are different, are less than.

When people see the goodness in one another, when they have broken bread together, when their children play together, then formal declarations of human rights can become a shared creed. When people know and love their neighbor, then they are open to enshrining in law that which they know to be true from their experience.

We must always speak out against repression and discrimination. We must always work to strengthen those institutions which hold up that which is best in humanity. But we must never lose the power of human relationships.

Even as we work to enshrine our beliefs in treaties and national codes of law, we must never forget that their viability rests upon the mundane gesture and the chance encounter.

We must never forget that as the ideals of the UN Charter were born from the brutal experiences of world war, the hope of their full realization lies in how we use our daily experiences.

Thank you, Mr. Gorbachev, for bringing us together to talk about these important issues.