Posted on 02/25/2003 8:51:56 AM PST by EvilOverlord
Civil disobedience ANTI-WAR ACTIVISTS PLAN TO DISRUPT DAILY ACTIVITIES IF WAR BREAKS OUT By Dana Hull Mercury News
More photos (EUGENE H. LOUIE / MERCURY NEWS )
Malcolm Moore, 45, Tristen Schmidt, 36, Amy Champlin, 32, practice non-violent protest tactics in Berkeley.
If U.S.-led forces attack Iraq, anti-war activists in the Bay Area and around the world have ``emergency response'' plans to immediately blockade federal buildings, shut down commuting arteries and disrupt the financial districts of major cities with massive protests and non-violent civil disobedience.
Many organizers have kept their intentions under wraps so that police and officials at U.S. military bases and large corporations will be caught off-guard. But drafts of some plans have already appeared on Web sites, and intensive training sessions covering everything from ``non-violent blockades'' to ``jail solidarity'' tactics are under way.
Civil disobedience implies the refusal to obey certain laws, and has a long history in the United States and abroad. But protest tactics have evolved in recent years, aided by the coordinating powers of the Internet and by strategic tactics designed to foil police.
Instead of staging docile sit-ins, some demonstrators now link hands by putting their arms through pipes and handcuffing their wrists together. Anti-globalization activists have developed attention-getting stunts such as scaling buildings.
(Excerpt) Read more at bayarea.com ...
A few days we had a (WA) state senate bill filed that would make this a felony. SB 5953 says, in part:
NEW SECTION. Sec. A new section is added to chapter 46.61 RCW to read as follows:
(1) Pedestrians may not intentionally impede, or otherwise disrupt, the flow of traffic on a highway that has been designated, in whole or in part, as a highway of statewide significance.
(2) A violation of this section is a class C felony punishable under RCW 9A.20.021.
I can say with certainty that not everyone will be "caught off guard"......
The way it works is this:
We have a bill of rights and a first amendment, and we are allowed to think anything we want about whether war is good policy. We have a Congress to authorize war and a President to carry it out. When we are at war, you may still be against the war, but you may not interfere with the nation's conduct of it.
Certainly, blocking roads and other acts that physically interfere with the conduct of the war, purposely, constitute treason, and should be prosecuted as such. I believe that we can go further than that--publications that are designed to demoralize our troops and our public also give "aid and comfort to the enemy" and, in time of war. I would prosecute egregious cases where people, like Sean Penn, intentionally harm the war effort.
It is hard to grasp for a free people with right of free speech that opinions as well as actions can be conduct, and can be treasonous. But they can be, and a full explication of the principles involved, of what goes beyond the line, should be undertaken.
I don't want to hear the argument about there being no "declared war" therefore anything goes. You can commit treason in time of peace, and in any event, Congress has authorized this war, which is all the Constitution requires.
So, in sum, debate is fine til the nation has decided. Once a decision has been made, it is the duty of all citizens to support the nation in time of war. Even Tom Daschle.
California Penal Code Section 837. A private person may arrest another:
1. For a public offense committed or attempted in his presence.
2. When the person arrested has committed a felony, although not in his presence.
3. When a felony has been in fact committed, and he has reasonable cause for believing the person arrested to have committed it.
839. Any person making an arrest may orally summon as many persons as he deems necessary to aid him therein.
841. The person making the arrest must inform the person to be arrested of the intention to arrest him, of the cause of the arrest, and the authority to make it, except when the person making the arrest has reasonable cause to believe that the person to be arrested is actually engaged in the commission of or an attempt to commit an offense, or the person to be arrested is pursued immediately after its commission, or after an escape.
The person making the arrest must, on request of the person he is arresting, inform the latter of the offense for which he is being arrested.
846. Any person making an arrest may take from the person arrested all offensive weapons which he may have about his person, and must deliver them to the magistrate before whom he is taken.
847. (a) A private person who has arrested another for the commission of a public offense must, without unnecessary delay, take the person arrested before a magistrate, or deliver him or her to a peace officer.
(b) There shall be no civil liability on the part of, and no cause of action shall arise against, any peace officer or federal criminal investigator or law enforcement officer described in subdivision (a) or (d) of Section 830.8, acting within the scope of his or her authority, for false arrest or false imprisonment arising out of any arrest under any of the following circumstances:
(a) The arrest was lawful, or the peace officer, at the time of the arrest, had reasonable cause to believe the arrest was lawful.
(b) The arrest was made pursuant to a charge made, upon reasonable cause, of the commission of a felony by the person to be arrested.
(c) The arrest was made pursuant to the requirements of Section 142, 837, 838, or 839.
849. (a) When an arrest is made without a warrant by a peace officer or private person, the person arrested, if not otherwise released, shall, without unnecessary delay, be taken before the nearest or most accessible magistrate in the county in which the offense is triable, and a complaint stating the charge against the arrested person shall be laid before such magistrate.
(b) Any peace officer may release from custody, instead of taking such person before a magistrate, any person arrested without a warrant whenever:
(1) He or she is satisfied that there are insufficient grounds for making a criminal complaint against the person arrested.
(2) The person arrested was arrested for intoxication only, and no further proceedings are desirable.
(3) The person was arrested only for being under the influence of a controlled substance or drug and such person is delivered to a facility or hospital for treatment and no further proceedings are desirable.
(c) Any record of arrest of a person released pursuant to paragraphs (1) and (3) of subdivision (b) shall include a record of release. Thereafter, such arrest shall not be deemed an arrest, but a detention only.
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