The Rev. L. LaSimba M. Gray Jr., pastor of New Sardis Baptist Church in Memphis, Tenn., lobbied Congress on behalf of Bread for the World for reforms in the 2007 farm bill.

Michael Leo Owens is an associate professor of political science at Emory University in Atlanta, Ga. specializing in urban politics; state and local politics; political penology; governance and public policy processes; religion and politics; and African American politics. He is the author of the 2007 book God and Government in the Ghetto: The Politics of […]

Norman Wirzba is professor of theology and ecology at Duke Divinity School in Durham, N.C. His research focuses on “understanding and promoting practices that can equip both rural and urban church communities to be more faithful and responsible members of creation,” specifically through eating as a spiritual discipline, theological reflection as informed by place and agrarianism […]

Daniel Vestal was the executive coordinator of the Atlanta-headquartered Cooperative Baptist Fellowship until 2012. He lobbied Congress about the 2007 farm bill for reforms aimed at helping rural areas and poor farmers.

Eva Clayton is a former Democratic congresswoman from North Carolina who worked with Bread for the World for change in the 2007 farm bill.

Sen. Saxby Chambliss, R-Ga., serves on the Senate Agriculture, Nutrition and Forestry Committee. He did not support the farm bill that came out of that committee.

Howard Leathers is an associate professor of agricultural and resource economics at the University of Maryland, College Park, and specializes in agricultural policy.

Barry L. Denk directs the Center for Rural Pennsylvania, which is a bicameral legislative assembly within Pennsylvania’s General Assembly. It develops rural policy.

Garrett Martin directs the Maine Center for Economic Policy, which in 2007 called for increases in the food stamp program.