Why lakes and rivers should have the same rights as humans | Kelsey Leonard

Aquay Wunne Kesuk. Kelsey Leonard Nooweesuonk.

Hello, good day, everyone.

I'm from the Shinnecock Nation.

Tabutni to the Cahuilla peoples,

whose land we gather on today.

I was taught that water is alive.

It can hear,

it holds memories.

And so I brought a water vessel up with me today,

because I want it to hold the memories of our conversation today.

Who gets legal rights?

History has shown us some people but not others.

In the United States, Indigenous peoples like myself

were not citizens under the law until 1924.

My Shinnecock ancestors, pictured here,

were not citizens under the law.

Then why do we claim to be nations governed by the rule of law

if some people are protected, but not others?

Because it remains one of the best ways to fight injustice.

And, as Indigenous people, we know injustice.

A dear friend, mentor, water walker,

Nokomis, Grandmother Josephine Mandamin-ba,

she told me of a prophecy that comes from her people,

the Anishinaabe of the Midewiwin Society.

And in that prophecy,

she told me that it tells of a day that will come

where an ounce of water costs more than an ounce of gold.

When she told me that prophecy, I sat for a moment,

and I thought about all of the injustices we see in our world today,

the water crises we see in our world today,

and I said, "Nokomis, Grandmother,

I feel like we are already in that time of prophecy."

And she looked back at me directly,

and she said,

"So what are you going to do about it?"

That's why I'm here with you today,

because I believe that one of the many solutions

to solving the many water injustices we see in our world today

is recognizing that water is a living relation

and granting it the legal personhood it deserves.

So to do so, we need to transform the way in which we value water.

We have to start to think about how do we connect to water.

Usually, someone might ask you,

"What is water?"

and you would respond with "Rain, ocean, lake, river,

H20, liquid."

You might even understand the sacred essentiality of water

and say that water is life.

But what if I asked you, instead,

"Who is water?"

In the same way that I might ask you, "Who is your grandmother?"

"Who is your sister?"

That type of orientation

fundamentally transforms the way in which we think about water,

transforms the way in which we make decisions

about how we might protect water,

protect it in the way that you would protect your grandmother,

your mother, your sister, your aunties.

That is the type of transformation

that we need if we are going to address the many water crises we see

in our world today,

these harrowing water crises

that have streamed across our digital devices

in countdowns to Day Zero,

the point at which municipal water supplies are shut off.

Places like Cape Town, South Africa,

where in 2018,

residents were limited to two-minute showers

and 23 gallons of water per day per person,

or just this past summer, where the mismanagement of water

led the streets of Chennai

to be lined with thousands of plastic water jugs

as residents waited hours for water tankers

to deliver water, first by rail, then by truck,

to meet their daily needs.

Or even here in the United States,

one of the most developed nations in the world.

Today, Flint, Michigan still does not have clean water.

But you are likely unfamiliar with these water crises,

such as Neskantaga First Nation in Northern Ontario, Canada,

where residents have been on a boil water advisory since 1995.

Or Grassy Narrows First Nation,

which for decades has been dealing with water contamination

from the paper mill industry

and where a recent study found

that nearly 90 percent of the Indigenous population

has some form of mercury poisoning,

causing severe health complications.

Or even among the Navajo Nation.

Pictured here is the Animas River on an early morning in 2015,

prior to the Gold King Mine spill.

After the spill leaked millions of hazardous mine waste

into the river system,

this was it later that day.

Today, the Navajo Nation and the Diné People

and the river itself are still trying to recover from contamination.

Or even right here in Palm Springs, California,

where the Agua Caliente Band of Cahuilla Indians

has been fighting for decades to protect groundwater from exploitation

so that future generations

can not only live but thrive in their homelands,

as they have since time immemorial.

You see, a recent study by DIGDEEP and the US Water Alliance

found that race, in the United States,

is the strongest predictor of water and sanitation access,

and that for us,

as Native American people,

we are the group most likely to have access issues

as it comes to water and sanitation.

So, as an Indigenous legal scholar and scientist,

I believe that many of these water injustices

are the result of the Western legal system's failure to recognize

the legal personhood of water.

And so we must ask ourselves --

who is justice for?

Humanity alone?

We've granted legal personhood to corporations.

In the US, the Supreme Court found in "Citizens United"

that a corporation was a person

with similar protections under the Constitution,

such as freedom of speech,

and applied similar reasoning in "Hobby Lobby,"

finding that a corporation had the right to freedom of religion

in defense against the implementation of the Affordable Care Act

for its employees.

Now, these are controversial cases,

and as a Shinnecock woman and a legal scholar,

they make me question the moral compass of the Western world,

where you can grant legal personhood to a corporation

but not nature.

You see, legal personhood grants us the ability

to be visible in a court of law,

and to have our voices heard as a person protected under the law.

And so if you can grant that to a corporation,

why not the Great Lakes?

Why not the Mississippi River?

Why not the many waterways across our planet

that we all depend on to survive?

We know we are in a global climate crisis,

but globally, our waters are also threatened,

and we are facing a global water crisis,

and if we want to address these crises in our lifetime,

we need to change.

We need to fundamentally transform the way in which we value water.

And this is not something new for us as Indigenous peoples.

Our Indigenous legal systems have a foundational principle

of understanding our nonhuman relations

as being living and protected under our laws.

And even for the Western world,

environmental legal theorists

have argued for the rights of nature since the 1970s.

But we need to do better.

We need to change.

And we need to grant legal personhood to water,

because it affords the following rights and protections.

It grants water the right to exist,

flourish, and naturally evolve,

and most of all, it protects the water from us,

from human beings that would do it harm,

from human-caused climate-change impacts,

from pollutants,

and from man-made contamination.

Moreover, it reverses the accepted hierarchy

of humanity's domination over nature.

As human beings on this planet,

we are not superior to other beings on this planet.

We are not superior to the water itself.

We have to learn how to be good stewards again.

We often imagine that the world is filled with infinite water.

In fact, it's not.

This planet, Ohke, Mother Earth,

has very finite freshwater resources.

Currently, nearly two billion people

live in countries experiencing high water stress.

It is also estimated that by 2030,

up to 700 million people could be displaced, worldwide,

due to water scarcity.

We have to address this crisis.

And so it's time for us to change.

We have to transform the way in which we value water.

And we can do that.

We can learn to be good stewards again.

We can create laws through which we grant legal personhood to water.

We can start to honor the original treaties

between Indigenous peoples and non-Indigenous peoples

for water protection.

We can appoint guardians for the water

that ensure the water's rights are always protected.

We can also develop water-quality standards

that have a holistic approach,

that ensure the well-being of the water before our human needs.

And moreover, we can work to dismantle exclusive property ownership over water.

And there are amazing successful examples of this around the world.

The Whanganui River in Aotearoa, in New Zealand,

and the Ganges River in India

were both granted legal personhood in 2017.

And even this year,

the residents of the city of Toledo

recognized the legal personality of Lake Erie.

And right here in California,

the Yurok Tribe granted legal personhood to the Klamath River.

You see, I imagine a world where we value water

as a living relation,

where we work to restore our connection to water.

As women, we are water carriers.

We nurture water in our wombs for nine months.

It's the first medicine that each of us as human beings

is exposed to.

See, we are all born as human beings with a natal connection to water,

but somewhere along the way, we lost that connection,

and we have to work to restore it.

Because I imagine a world

in which water is healthy and ecosystems are thriving.

I imagine a world

where each of us takes up our right of responsibility

as water citizens

and protects water.

So, in the words of Nokomis,

what are you going to do about it?

What are you going to do for the water?

Well, you can call your local politician.

You can go to a town meeting.

You can advocate for granting legal personhood to water.

You can be like the residents of the city of Toledo

and build from the grass roots,

and craft your own legislation if the politicians won't write it,

recognizing legal personality of water.

You can learn about the Indigenous lands and waters that you now occupy

and the Indigenous legal systems that still govern them.

And most of all, you can connect to water.

You can restore that connection.

Go to the water closest to your home,

and find out why it is threatened.

But most of all, if you do anything,

I ask that you make a promise to yourself,

that each day, you will ask,

"What have I done for the water today?"

If we are able to fulfill that promise,

I believe we can create a bold and brilliant world

where future generations are able to form

the same relationship to water that we have been privileged to have,

where all communities of human and nonhuman relations

have water to live,

because water is life.

Tabutni. Thank you.

(Applause)