A letter to the editor in today’s New York Times:
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Fortunately, because federal courts have ruled that denying food constitutes “cruel and unusual punishment” barred by the Constitution, prisoners in the United States have a constitutional right to food that can be enforced by courts.
No such constitutional right to food, however, exists for law-abiding citizens. In 2007, before the worst of the economic downturn, fully 36.2 million Americans lived in households that could not afford enough food. The United States government has even long opposed attempts to create a worldwide right to food under international law.
Now that President Obama has made the courageous pledge to end child hunger in the United States by 2015 as a down payment on ending all domestic hunger, I hope the administration and Congress can not only agree that food should be a right for all people of the world, but also start making that a reality by enacting the policies and providing the funds necessary to eliminate hunger in America.
All of us deserve three square meals a day, and shouldn’t have to commit a crime to get them.
Joel Berg
Executive Director
New York City Coalition
Against Hunger
New York, June 29, 2009
We all have an obligation to protect the hungry.
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