Northern Public Radio: Does the Mississippi River Have Rights?

May 30th, 2023

Juanpablo Ramirez-Franco of Northern Public Radio recently published “Does the Mississippi River have rights?” to discuss the expanding focus on the river rights of the Quad Cities in Illinois and Iowa. Over 80 people participated in the Great Plains Action Society’s Walk for River Rights as part of a three-day summit to build a riverwide coalition to rethink the legal framework they believe imperils life on and in the Mississippi River. Their answer? The rights of nature movement.

As Thomas Linzey, Senior Legal Counsel for the Center for Democratic and Environmental Rights (CDER) explains:

“It may be a radical concept, or it was 20 years ago, but we're rapidly coming to a place where without this kind of new system of environmental law, we're all kind of done, we’re kind of cooked.”

This article touches on the work already being done in the Indigenous world, particularly in tribal courts, to secure such rights for ecosystems. Examples include the White Earth Band of Ojibwe bringing a suit against the Enbridge corporation’s Line 3 on behalf of wild rice, called Manoomin. And last month, the City of Seattle settled a case with the Sauk-Suiattle Indian Tribe over the claim that salmon had the right to spawn, among other rights.

To read more about the work being done to protect the rights of the Mississippi River and other river sources, please read the article here.