from Marquette Monthly December, 2011
Jogging down the stairs at Heathrow Airport to the underground train running to London, I carry in my overnight luggage a small container of wild rice, formal letters from the Keweenaw Bay Indian Community, and a document signed by a hundred faith leaders. My twenty-eight-year-old traveling companion, a local organic farmer, writer and activist, carries in his duffle bag—along with a newly purchased bargain-basement suit—a bottle of homemade maple syrup and seven packets of background information on a controversial proposed sulfide mining project near our homes in Northern Michigan.



In the contentious battle unfolding around a proposed sulfide mine in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula, the particular focus of intense opinion depends, of course, on whom you’re listening to. Most of the pro and con arguments are based in science and economics. Lost in most public debate is any reference to the moral implications of this heated public controversy.



