Part one is a personal report on becoming involved in civil disobedience with the Surge Protection Brigade, and an overview of arrest and court procedures. Part two, which will appear in the July issue, will look at civil cisobedience throughout Oregon and will feature resisters talking about the impact of civil disobedience.

By Bonnie Tinker

Civil disobedience as a resistance tactic is on the rise in Oregon. Most of it is unreported in the mainstream media. I am personally involved in ongoing civil disobedience opposing the U.S. occupation in Iraq. We have few other tools to resist complicity with our government’s actions. Mass marches, electoral politics, and other traditional democratic means to achieve change in governmental policy have failed us. I do not know if civil disobedience will “work.” But, following the logic of Howard Zinn, it is our responsibility to future generation to leave a record of our resistance. If I have nothing else to leave to my grandchildren, I will at least leave them my arrest record.

October 5: Arrested with “The Black Block”
On October 5, 2006 I went to the Impeachment march sponsored by World Can’t Wait, Portland. I joined my family and friends and several hundred people in the South Park blocks for a well planned rally, including an open mike, preceding the march. The march was energetic and followed the route outlined by police. With a friend, also a grandmother, I was straggling along at the back of the march. When we got back to the park no one was there; we followed some marchers who had gone up Jefferson Street.

The police were blocking the street at 12th and ordering the crowd to get up on the sidewalk. Some of the protesters had been hit with pepper spray; they were angry and frustrated that they could not continue marching through downtown. A number of protesters refused orders to leave the street and were willing to be arrested. The police declined to arrest them and gradually most of the crowd was pushed onto the sidewalks. At that point the police began firing rubber bullets at the people on the sidewalk. A line of police horses closed in from behind. I was in the street and feared that the police were completely out of control and creating a very dangerous situation. When they pulled out what appeared to be cans of pepper spray I said to the nearest officer, “I am a peaceful protester. You can arrest me.” I have asthma and felt it was unsafe to remain where police were armed and apparently losing control of their own responses to a nonviolent crowd.

Eventually ten people were arrested: nine young people, including my son, and me. This was not the way I intended to become involved in civil disobedience; in my youth civil disobedience at civil rights marches and peace marches was well planned in advance, although illegal violence by the police was also common. I recognized, however, that young activists today, who are sometimes called “the black block,” are following in the American tradition of civil disobedience. They are angry at the extreme violence and injustice perpetrated by our government. They consider marching on an officially approved route to be a parade, not a protest. They are ready to protest and they are ready to defy local symbols of governmental authority — the police — in order to make their point that something must change if the planet is going to survive as a home for their grandchildren.

These earnest activists are not “troublemakers” out to “spoil an event they did not organize,” as I’ve heard some people suggest. They are deeply concerned, educated world citizens who believe that “it is not too soon for honest men to rebel and revolutionize.”

Fortunately, I didn’t have to think long and hard about the potential consequences of getting arrested. The moment arrived when it was clear that was the only moral, and safe, option and there I was. It is also fortunate that it had occurred to other people that the police might decide to arrest people. Legal observers were present with video cameras and protesters were supplied with a phone number to call for jail support in the event of arrest.

Arrest and Booking
You can’t count on what will happen if you are arrested, but our case is fairly typical in Portland.

When arrested you will be handcuffed, placed in a police car or van, and taken to Central Precinct to be “booked.” Many of the officers are personally opposed to the war and sympathetic to the need to protest; others are not and are unnecessarily rough and rude.

At the precinct your possessions will be taken, including cell phones, pens, pencils, paper, medications, shoe strings and drawstrings from pants or sweatshirts. You will be patted down, asked for identification, and told to sit in a waiting area until they can take a mug shot (you’ll be told not to smile) and get your fingerprints. Then you will be taken to a holding area to wait while they process your information.

A process which used to take a few hours now relies on technology and can take 6-8 hours. For some unknown reason undoubtedly related to antiquated patriarchal assumptions, men and women are seated across from each other with a low concrete wall between them. It is strictly forbidden to talk across the wall to people of the other sex, but you are allowed to converse with others on your side, and to move about to make phone calls.

In the waiting area you can make collect phone calls. Even if you are not anticipating arrest, it is a good idea for protesters to write the phone number of someone providing legal support on your arm in indelible ink. In October I had Catherine Stauffer’s phone number from the Portland Legal Defense Network and she was reassuring.

It is important to contact a lawyer as soon as possible, ideally while you are in jail awaiting release. In the Portland area, Stu Sugarman is the National Lawyers Guild (NLG) member responsible for assigning pro bono (free) legal counsel to political protesters who request legal representation. He contributed to this article and is responsible for the legal advice presented. Stu Sugarman’s number is 503.228.6655; write this number on your arm in indelible ink if you are going to any protest in the greater Portland area. Call as soon as possible and leave a message with your contact information and the date of your arrest. If you are on medications keep your current dose with you and try to take it before being arrested. At the Portland Central Precinct you can let the medical person on duty know if you have a medical need, but don’t be surprised if they can’t help you. One of the women arrested with me in October urgently needed aspirin for ongoing chronic pain. She demanded help and was locked into solitary confinement in a cement cell. On the positive side, I did inform arresting officers and the jail medical support person that I have asthma and I was allowed to keep my inhaler with me at all times.

If you don’t aggravate any of the officers too much, have no outstanding warrants, and don’t tell them that you intend to go right back out and do the same thing when you get out, they will probably release you on your own recognizance within about eight hours. You’ll be given a paper with the charges against you and a date to appear in court. Keep this paper for future reference.

Court processes and outcomes vary according to the arresting officer, the judge, and the geographic jurisdiction of the court. It is a good idea to get local information before placing yourself in a position to be intentionally or accidentally arrested. This is the process in Multnomah County.

When you get to court, the charges will probably have changed. The police and prosecutor are under no obligation to stick with the charges they used to arrest you; they can add, drop, or completely change the accusations. If the charges are misdemeanors, or felonies, follow Community Court Judge Steven Evans’ advice: “Let your lawyer do the talking.” If you are low income, request a court appointed defense attorney. Your other options are to hire an attorney, to represent yourself, or to contact the National Lawyers Guild (503-228- 6655). Charges that start as misdemeanors may be dropped to violations in which case you are not entitled to court appointed representation, but you can still request a NLG lawyer.

Violations are handled in community court. Here you are given the opportunity to plead guilty in exchange for your serving 8 hours of community service. The first time this happens the charge can be dismissed when the service is complete. If you plead not guilty, the trial will be set over, and you are sent to another court which primarily handles traffic cases. The lawyers refer to this as “the guilty court” because almost everyone is found guilty and fined or given more hours of community service than they would have had if they had pled guilty in the first place.

Obviously, this makes it very tempting to plead guilty. Lawyers are predisposed to want to take cases they can win. If it is clear that you will be found guilty because you deliberately violated a law as an act of civil disobedience and they don’t see a good legal case in extenuating circumstances they will probably advise you to plead guilty and do the community service. There have also been plenty of occasions where, if you and your lawyer agree to do whatever it takes to at least make life difficult for the prosecutor, they will suggest going to trial anyway. In all cases, your NLG lawyer will represent you pro bono if you wish to go to trial.

If you are charged with a misdemeanor the penalties are more severe and your case is not eligible for community court. You can still plead guilty early in the process in exchange for a lighter sentence, but if you plead not guilty you have a right to a jury trial.

If you and your lawyer think there is a case worth pursuing and it is wise not to change your plea to guilty the process will take a lot longer. This means you will need to go to many court hearings over a long period of time. NLG Lawyers like to win cases; they know how to work through the court system in a way that gives you the best chance of winning your case and of having an opportunity to make some statement.

The court itself will do everything possible to keep you from entering any of your political reasoning into the court or public record, or presenting your political motivation to a jury, but on rare occasions the trials provide an opportunity for some public statement. The National Lawyer Guild volunteer lawyers in Portland have, over the last seven years, won almost all cases they have taken to trial.

Traditional Civil Disobedience
My somewhat accidental arrest in October crystallized the need for civil resistance, not just protest, to try to impact military aggression perpetrated by the U.S. government. I was ready to seek out a group willing to plan civil disobedience actions.

Simply defined, “Civil Disobedience” is willfully violating a law as a form of protest against injustice. In the United States, schoolchildren are taught a proud history of civil disobedience going back to the Boston Tea Party while they are also taught blind obedience to the government.

Gandhi was one of the first people to propose systematic, sustained civil disobedience as a means to overcome rule by an imperialist government. His tactics were widely adapted by the Civil Rights Movement in the United States and articulated by Martin Luther King. In “Letter from A Birmingham Jail” King reiterates Gandhi’s four steps for a nonviolent action: In any nonviolent campaign there are four basic steps: 1) collection of the facts to determine whether injustices are alive; 2) negotiation; 3) self-purification; and 4) direct action.

Gandhi was very clear throughout his writings and his lifetime that nonviolent action was not just a tactic, but was part of a way of life that required continual moral self-examination which he called “self-purification.” My own translation of this is that nonviolent civil disobedience is not just a spontaneous act of anger and frustration, but is a considered action which serves the greater good of humanity and life on our planet. In considering moving toward civil disobedience as a form of protest against the war in Iraq and world domination by the U.S. military I wanted the support of a group of people committed to non-violence as a way of life.

Surge Protection Brigade: The Seriously Pissed Off Grannies
My spouse, Sara Graham, and I joined the Surge Protection Brigade (SPB) in January, shortly after five members of the group were arrested for hand cuffing themselves together and locking themselves to the doors of the Federal Building. The resulting Federal charges, by the way, led to an entirely different court proceeding, and the need for lawyers who practice in Federal Courts. After consultation they decided to plead guilty in exchange for 16 hours of community service.

There have been fairly extensive reports of the actions of the Surge Protection Brigade, also known as the “Seriously Pissed Off Grannies,” on Portland Indymedia so this is just a summary. Since January, 14 different people have been arrested a total of 28 times. In February the group decided to risk arrest blocking the doors of the Army/ Marine recruiting center on NE Broadway in Portland. Several other groups have been picketing these offices regularly, but the Surge Protection Brigade wanted to actually disrupt the recruiting by blocking the doors. Since January the group has closed the recruiting office on NE Broadway in Portland about 12 times; on five occasions people were arrested.

Most of the arrests were planned. The doors were blocked with rocking chairs several days, and with bikes on another day. Recruiters called the police. The police asked the protestors to move to no avail. Squad cars were assembled, officers marched up to the protestors and read the city ordinance forbidding blocking a public sidewalk, or trespassing. People who didn’t want to be arrested complied and moved back, others said they wouldn’t move and they were arrested.

The first time three of the rocking chairs were also arrested, which made great news footage. Evidently it was a bit inconvenient for the police as they have since been releasing the rocking chairs. They did keep the bicycles that were used to block the doors on April 30.

The Surge Protection Brigade protest on Good Friday was a bit different. In recognition of the holiday the theme was “Blood and Roses.” Demonstrators threw fake blood on the street in front of the recruiting office doors and put “bloody” handprints on the windows with red tempera paint.

The demonstration was carefully planned not to do any damage with the expectation that there would be no arrests. Wrong. The police went into overdrive and arrested everyone with red paint on their hands. Those arrested were taken first to NE Precinct (the quick alternative) and then transferred downtown to Central Precinct on the orders of some unknown
superior officer and were not released until evening.

Much to everyone’s surprise, the “offensive littering” was changed to a graffiti violation charge for “damaging real property,” but the “criminal mischief” charge for placing a “red substance on the windows with the intent to cause substantial inconvenience to the United States Army Recruiting Center” was a misdemeanor, the most serious charge to date. The six defendants felt that they could not honestly plead guilty as charged and they have retained an assortment of legal counsel (some pro bono from the National Lawyers Guild, some court appointed, and one pro se).

A perceived attack on property, even with no permanent damage but causing inconvenience, is apparently more serious than blocking entry to a recruiting office.

The Surge Protection Brigade has also engaged in several public actions that have not resulted in arrest, although some of them may have involved action of questionable legality.

On April 13 members of the group secured dinner reservation for a “birthday party” at the hotel where Karl Rove was speaking. The “birthday presents” were a jail suit, handcuffs, a Rove mask, and proclamation of charges against Karl Rove. The group succeeded in moving to a table right outside the room where he was speaking. They unwrapped the presents and performed a “citizen’s arrest” of Rove before an audience of about 75 people in the hotel’s atrium before they were pushed out by police. Not only did police not arrest them, they actually held the doors open for the “birthday party guests” when they arrived and waited for them to conclude their performance before escorting them out.

On May first (mayday is the international distress signal), members inserted an “Oregon Extra Peace Report,” with a masthead designed to look like the Oregonian, into about 1,200 Oregonians in about 200 news boxes throughout the Portland area. Nobody was stopped, and there has been no feedback from the Oregonian.

Before Mother’s Day the SPB produced Mother’s Day cards with the group’s rocking chair logo or the words “I will not raise my child to kill your child” and inserted them into card racks all over town. On Mother’s Day they joined members of CodePink and Women Standing for Peace around the world for at a silent vigil. This vigil was held outside of the Rhododendron Gardens, a very popular Mother’s Day visit in the Portland area. They wore black and pink and held enlarged photos of victims of the war in Iraq.

Police Are Unpredictable

One other action with CodePink, on May 12 at the in the St John’s parade, resulted in two more accidental citations. CodePink has several sets of large pink umbrellas, with one large black letter each, they spell out “IMPEACH.”

The group had asked to walk in the parade, but was denied entry. They simply followed along behind the parade with their umbrellas and were enthusiastically received by the crowd. After the parade was over one officer took it upon himself to lecture the women. When they grew tired of his sermon and walked away, he wrote citations for two of them — not for being in the parade, or in the street, but for walking away from him. Police officers have enormous latitude in making decisions about making arrests.

Resisters also have a great deal of latitude in protests — especially if they are willing to risk harm and inconvenience being arrested. The goal of a protest is always to resist injustice, not to be arrested. But the willingness of protesters in Oregon and across the country to be arrested highlights growing popular resistance to the occupation of Iraq.

Bonnie Tinker is a Portland based activist who has been involved in many social change protests since she was a child. She is a lesbian grandmother and her lawful social change work is carried out through her employment with Love Makes A Family, Inc. She can be reached at bonnietinker(at) gmail(Dot)com.