The Unfinished Revolution: The Deep Work of Non-Violence

The America 250 Town Hall Series, a collaboration with Brooks Memorial Library and Vermont Independent Media, publisher of The Commons, is made possible, in part, through a generous grant from the Vermont Humanities Council.

This town hall will consider the theory and practice of Lewis’s unfinished revolution. We’ll consider the philosophical underpinnings to non-violence, drawing on Gandhi’s satyagraha and Catholic understandings of natural law. We’ll also think practically about what it would take for us to engage in a revolution in which our current enemies are seen as future friends.

In 1963, John Lewis envisioned a non-violent revolution that would achieve the ends of freedom and liberty without taking up arms. In this “unfinished revolution,” current enemies are seen as future friends. Black and white, men and women, rich and poor, he argued, must learn to work together for their mutual benefit.

After twenty years of teaching political theory and constitutional law to Marlboro College undergraduates, Meg Mott has taken her love of argument to the general public. She attended the University of New Hampshire in the 1970s and is currently teaching at Keene State College. Meg’s award-winning series, Debating Our Rights, on the first ten amendments, brings civil discussions on contentious issues to public libraries and colleges.