------------------------- Via Workers World News Service Reprinted from the Aug. 05, 2004 issue of Workers World newspaper -------------------------
HOW PROTESTERS CHALLENGED MARCH BAN--AND WON By Dustin Langley Boston In the days before the Democratic National Convention, a war of nerves took place between protest organizers and the various federal agencies working under the umbrella of the Joint Terrorism Task Force. "We will win our battle in the courts or we will win it in the streets," Steven Kirschbaum of Steelworkers Local 8751, an organizer with the Coalition to Protest the DNC, told a media conference. The coalition, which had called a July 25 protest, challenged and eventually defeated attempts by the City of Boston and the JTTF to prevent protesters from marching down Causeway Street in front of the Fleet Center in Boston, site of the convention. Maureen Skehan, an organizer for ANSWER Boston, which initiated the coalition, said, "We will not allow our rights to be taken away so that the Democratic Party can have unrestricted access to our city for their posh parties and convention, which are costing almost $100 million. We will bring the message to this convention loud and clear: Bring the troops home now!" The coalition filed suit on July 19 in federal court against the City of Boston's refusal to allow protests at the site of the DNC. Its legal team included lead counsel John Pavlos and attorneys from the American Civil Liberties Union and National Lawyers Guild. Two days later, Judge Douglas P. Woodlock ruled that the city had no legal or constitutional basis for preventing the march. He issued an injunction ordering the city to grant a permit. "It's our hope that what happened today will begin pushing back the efforts by the government to restrict free speech, right of assembly and the right to march," said Peter Gilbert, an activist from North Carolina who traveled to Boston to help organize the march on the DNC. "The police commissioner and the mayor of New York City should be condemned for denying those organizing the big protest at the Republican convention in late August the right to rally in an acceptable place. We hope that what happened today shames the New York City government for violating the rights of protestors." Although Judge Woodlock ruled in favor of the permit to march in front of the Fleet Center, he demonstrated his contempt for free speech by ruling, in a separate case, that a "protest pen" would be allowed to stand. The city, in anticipation of angry protests at the DNC, had constructed what many described as "internment pens" to contain demonstrators. This area is under an abandoned elevated train line, surrounded by a double row of chain-link fences covered with thick mesh and topped with rolls of razor wire. Organizers with ANSWER Boston denounced the pen in a public statement on July 21, saying, "We refuse to be penned in, in any way. The City of Boston and the Department of Homeland Security have no right to decree that the First Amendment only applies in a cage. We will exercise our right to free speech anywhere in the city we choose, especially on Causeway Street, at the site of the DNC, throughout the entire duration of the convention." The judge himself admitted that the pen was "corrosive of democratic values" and said, "There is nothing more that could be added to the pens that would be more of an affront to free speech." Despite this, he ruled that the pens would be allowed to stand. ANSWER Boston responded to this decision at a press conference calling on protestors to "boycott the pens" and join the mass march on the DNC on July 25. Thousands responded to the call, marching past the DNC and the empty pens, bringing their anti-war, pro-worker message to the streets. They and thousands more will continue their march--onward to the Republican National Convention in New York and then to the Million Worker March in Washington, D.C., on Oct. 17. - END - (Copyright Workers World Service: Everyone is permitted to copy and distribute verbatim copies of this document, but changing it is not allowed. For more information contact Workers World, 55 W. 17 St., NY, NY 10011; via e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subscribe wwnews- [EMAIL PROTECTED] Unsubscribe [EMAIL PROTECTED] Support the voice of resistance http://www.workers.org/orders/donate.php) ------------------ This message is sent to you by Workers World News Service. To subscribe, E-mail to: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To unsubscribe, E-mail to: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To switch to the DIGEST mode, E-mail to <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Send administrative queries to <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
