A Different Kind of Political Leadership

Rep. Tony Hall had just been informed that the House of Representatives' Select Committee on Hunger, which he chaired, was being terminated for budgetary reasons. Hunger had captured the heart, time, and energy of the young legislator from Ohio.

But it had become more than an "issue." Hall had seen the human face of hunger in famine-plagued countries around the world, as well as in the poverty-stricken inner cities and forgotten rural areas of his own nation. Those faces stayed with him. They motivated him to try to move the U.S. government to action.

The Select Committee on Hunger spent just $652,000 per year, and James Grant of UNICEF credited the committee with saving millions of lives. By contrast, the powerful House Appropriations Committee spends $19 million a year--just for overhead. Nonetheless, the hunger committee didn't have clout and was cut without debate, process, or even bothering to tell its chair until after the decision was made.

"Why don't you fast? Why don't you go on a hunger fast?" When Janet Hall raised the question of fasting to her husband, Tony Hall was "amazed." He told her he had thought about fasting a couple of weeks before, but had worried about the pressure it might put on their family. "Some things are worth standing up for," she replied. Together, they read Isaiah 58, "Is this not the fast I choose....to share your bread with the hungry...."

After much prayer and seeking counsel from friends, a respected eight-term member of Congress began an open-ended water fast to bring attention to the urgent question of hunger. By his own admission, this was not typical.

On the 12th day of his fast, Hall told me, "Sometimes I feel alone because I've done something that is politically incorrect in my environment. I stepped out of my comfort zone and challenged [my colleagues]. I said, 'What do you stand for here? If you cannot stand for the poor and the hungry, if you cannot stand for the 35,000 people that are dying every day, if you're not going to focus on this problem, then something is really wrong with this institution.' When I did that, I separated myself from my colleagues; I feel like I'm standing alone." But, he added, "I am at peace."

A FAST HAS A way of bringing focus to an issue--Hall's goal. "I'm trying to get Congress and the country to focus on the issue of hunger. Congress is for everything and for nothing. We fund everything but never solve anything because we never focus. We never decide what is important."

Both before and during the fast, I spoke with Hall about the power of fasting and its spiritual consequences. "One of the things I am learning is that this is a very humbling experience," he said. "I'm also learning that I want the fast to be successful. But God's not calling me to be successful. He's calling me to be faithful. He's saying let the results be up to him. There are times when I can be very lonely, and therefore have to draw very close to God....I'm trying to learn how to completely give in to God in this fast, and I haven't gotten there yet. But that's how I got this far. I don't know what else is going to come."

The limits of his political world were very apparent to Hall. "We need a politics of conscience. We politicians suffer from a disease called 'everybody has to love us.' We don't take giant steps, we take little ones. We're always worried about re-election, thinking about raising money. So we never move the agenda. We fill potholes, but we never take a stand. After a while you wonder, What do we stand for?"

Two weeks into the fast, Hall had no hopes that his committee would be restored, but the fast was developing a broader and deeper purpose. At first, Hall's congressional colleagues didn't quite know how to respond. But in Ohio, and around the country, many others were responding.

High school and college students, community groups, and just ordinary people were so deeply touched by a member of Congress taking such a personal stand that they began fasting themselves in support. An amazing 205 universities got involved, as well as countless high schools. People from 46 states became active, with thousands fasting or donating time and money to the cause of hunger. Hall's office on Capitol Hill was soon overwhelmed with a resounding public response to a very different kind of political leadership.

No one was more surprised than Hall when, in the third week of the fast, Agriculture Secretary Mike Espy called the thinning congressman to offer national and regional "summits" on the issue of hunger in America. "We're moved by your fast; we want to do something," said the new Clinton administration Cabinet member. Then the World Bank phoned to suggest a series of similar summits on world hunger.

When Hall was called to appear before the Democratic Caucus of the House of Representatives, he didn't know what to expect. He certainly wasn't prepared for the standing ovation he received. After Hall spoke, Majority Leader Richard Gephardt rose to say, "I feel ashamed. You've embarrassed us in the right way." Gephardt said the speech Hall had just given was one of the best he had ever heard on Capitol Hill, and he promised to appoint a new task force on hunger to be followed by his own recommendation for a permanent committee on hunger.

After ending his fast, Hall was "feeling really good." In just 21 days, he had seen a "cold shoulder" turn into a real "changing of the wind." A relatively obscure politician had demonstrated again that one person's stand can make a difference and that principled direct action can make the most difference of all. Perhaps most important, Tony Hall showed even the cynical Washington establishment that politics can, indeed, be moral.

Jim Wallis is editor-in-chief of Sojourners.