As I sit and listen to Edgardo Reyes of the Coalition of Immokalee Workers speak of the struggles of farm workers in Florida and across the country, at the Community Food Security Coalition conference in Des Moines, the trial of Sholom Rubashkin is beginning today in Sioux Falls, SD.

The Des Moines Register, headquarters located a few blocks away, has reported that despite Mr. Rubashkin’s 163 charges and maximum life sentence, his son Getzel has said that [Rubashkin] has prepared for trial “intensely, but also with the peace of mind of a man who knows he will be, G-d willing, fully exonerated…He has been the source of strength and encouragement for those around him, instead of the other way around.” Mr. Rubashkin maintains that he is innocent of the 91 fraud-related charges for his first trial, which begins in Sioux Falls, SD, moved from Cedar Rapids, IA to account for any media to which potential jurors would have been exposed, according to the NY Times.

According to the Register, one of the fraud charges arises from violation of a provision in the 1921 US Packers and Stockyards Act, which requires cattle providers to be paid within 24 hours of sale, according to a 2002 order by the U.S. secretary of agriculture. Although a legal scholar interviewed by the Register thought this was a new application of the law’s provision, it speaks directly to one of the most severe problems with the US food system, which is informed by Jewish law.

Anyone who is familiar with the the status of labor rights in Jewish law will recall the requirement for laborers to be paid on time. Based on research by Mary Hendrickson, who presented at the CFSC conference last night, it is clear that one of the biggest challenges in the industrial food system stems from the lack of control and power among livestock producers, due to the increasing horizontal concentration among companies which purchase livestock. This concentration creates non-competitive environments which perpetuate the lack of worker rights, land degradation, animal cruelty and inability for livestock producers to move to more sustainable methods of farming and ranching.

While it is clear that the worker, immigration and other violations of which Rubashkin has been accused are not unique to Agriprocessors, they are representative of common practices in the industry, including lack of respect and prompt payment of livestock producers. As people concerned about our food system, we must work to strengthen the ability of the US Justice system to enforce all of the provisions of the Packers and Stockyards Act, through mechanisms such as upcoming anti-trust listening sessions around the country organized jointly by USDA and DOJ, which will begin in January 2010.

In parallel to the trial of Rubashkin’s actions relative to US law, we must think about the actions taken by Rubashkin and other Agriprocessors managers in the context of Jewish law, which many of their acts also violate. One wonders if Rubashkin was able to stand with the same peace of mind that he would be exonerated, as he stood in repentance before God and his community last month. As his community, we are responsible for holding him and others with power in our food system to account for acts which violate both US and Jewish law.