Members of Congress are urging President Biden to declare a climate emergency and use his presidential powers to take immediate action to address the crisis, which is quickly accelerating. Having Kids is urging Biden to do the same. Here’s why:

The climate crisis fundamentally arose from our global prioritization of economies over human rights. Because of this, we have failed to guarantee that all children have an eco-social fair start in life. But the right to a fair start in an equitable and habitable environment is the first and overriding human right. Ensuring that right does the most good for the most vulnerable.

Given that, President Biden has a constitutional obligation to protect the right to a fair start. Declaring a climate emergency is part of that obligation. It would also enable him to fulfill universal obligations to advance reproductive justice, promote a restorative environmental baseline pegged to things like a 300ppm climate emissions target, revise tax incentives to instead promote eco-centric, antiracist, and egalitarian family planning policies, and secure adequate funding for the approval, marketing and subsidization of the male pill.

Fair Start is the genesis of social justice, and the beginning of actually constituting democracies through the limitation and decentralization of human power. It was and is wrong to put population-driven economic growth over that right, or over smaller and more functional democracies where each voice is influential.

Biden acting to declare an emergency now, and to take immediate next steps for any or all the reasons given above, would start to right this wrong.

We’re asking organizations to add their name to our letter. Sign on here.