Trinity College Trinity College Digital Repository

Resist Newsletters Resist Collection

10-28-1968

Resist Newsletter, Oct. 1968

Resist

Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalrepository.trincoll.edu/resistnewsletter

Recommended Citation Resist, "Resist Newsletter, Oct. 1968" (1968). Resist Newsletters. 130. https://digitalrepository.trincoll.edu/resistnewsletter/130 a call to resist ...... illegitimate authority 28 October 1968 - 763 Massachusetts Avenue, #4, Cambridge, Mass. - Newsletter #18

NOVEMBER, 14 THE CATONSVILLE NINE

I shall try to report on the The draft has been stopped in Catons­ events that occurred in Baltimore ville and Milwaukee. But even before during the week of October 7, 1968, the nine and fourteen acted, it had surrounding the trial of the been reduced to its lowest level in Catonsville Nine. The major purpose of years - by the action of the 4000 men the week's events was to provide of the Resistance (and other resisters) visibility and support for the Nine who for a year have been the leading beyond the courtroom and the usual edge of the anti-war movement. That press coverage. (In other words, we edge is still in motion, still cutting had learned a bitter lesson from the - and its support remains one of the trial of the Bos.ton Five and were not basic commitments of the RESIST signers. about to repeat mistakes made there.) Once again, in a nation-wide draft card Other purposes were accomplished as turn-in on November 14th, young men well. Organizing the events organized will say NO! They want us to stand a movement in Baltimore that had with them - personally, visibly. existed heretofore only as potential. "We did it ourselves," Dee Ann Pappas ·what can we do? exulted one night, "no one from the movement out there had to come in and 1) Call them, meet with them to plan run the show." But the movement out for the 14th. there also came to Baltimore, as witnesses, speakers, marchers, and 2) Join them on the 14th. Invite demonstrators, and as supporters of them home for dinner after the event. the Nine. Even more significant was Find out what they're doing and think­ the result of what I can only call ing, what they need. Reinforce the the "surfacing" of the Nine: their connection. presence each evening, after the court had been dismissed, allowed more than 3) Earlier that week help them to 2,000 people through the week to see build up to the event. Put an ad in and hear them firsthand. Their lives, a college or local paper to demonstrate acts, and words may serve, especially faculty and professional support. Put because of the week's events, to set pressure on college administrations to a new direction for the non-violent follow the lead of Harvard, Chicago, peace movement. and others in guaranteeing re-admission The Courtroom. The Catonsville after jail to resisters. Visit, picket, Nine were charged with damaging telephone draft boards and their indi­ government property and interfering vidual members - ask if they know what with ·the Selective Service System. they're doing; suggest that they quit. They had hired a panel of lawyers Tell the press and the television and (including William Kunstler, Harold radio people what you are doing. Buchman of Baltimore, and Harrop Freeman of Cornell) who organized a If you need encouragement, or more collective defense and worked specific suggestions, contact Support­ together as a team. As Kunstler said in-Action (the New York Resist chapter) at a rally on the evening before the at 135 West 4th Street, New York City, 10014 (212 533 5120). They are full Cont'd on p. 2 ... of experience, ideas, and inventions. Page 2 THE CATONSVILLE NINE continued A SENSE OF RESPONSIBILITY trial, their job was to serve a political movement, to devise At the time of writing, we are only strategies to help keep it in two weeks away from an election in which operation and give expression to its we do not have a meaningful choice. The ideas, since the law itself lessons people draw from this situation functioned to impede that movement. are various: for some it only confirms The strategy devised was straight­ their distrust of electoral politics; forward. The Nine declared that they others believe that a better (McCarthy­ had, indeed, burned with napalm ite) Democratic Party must be built; several hundred 1-A draft files and there are those who tell us to vote for they clarified in testimony that they the "lesser evil"; finally, there are had accomplished part of what they the advocates of street action. I intended - to interfere with the should like to call attention to some­ draft - since the Catonsville board thing which goes beyond the elections~ was no longer drafting men. At the the building of communities of resis­ same time, the Nine pleaded not tance. It seems clear that there will guilty, arguing, in the words of be more and more sanctuaries - both on Thomas Melville, that "We recognize and off campus, religious and secular. no crime in what we did." Rather, as The actions of the Catonsville Nine and Mary Moylan put it, burning files the Milwaukee Fourteen are likely to be constituted a "celebration of life." imitated by those courageous enough to Just before the trial began, the risk long terms in jail. In the past defense had decided to ask for a jury, these actions have drawn people together persuaded in part by Joseph Sax's and given them a sense of responsibility essay in the Yale Review (Summer, 1968) toward each other. Often enough, this and Paul Freund's subsequent interview~ newly found sense of community has not in the New York Times, both of which managed to last beyond the event itself: had raised the seemingly defunct the communities have simply dissolved. notion that juries have a right and a Yet if resistance to the war and to duty to decide against the judge's conscription is to be deepened, if our interpretation of the law, if, as sense of purpose is to be taken serious­ Alexander Hamilton said in 1804, ly, we should develop a more solid and "'exercising their judgment with lasting sense of responsibility toward discretion and honesty, they have a those who take great risks. This kind clear conviction that the charge of of community has been developing in the court is wrong.'" Interestingly, Baltimore. But its development is not though Judge Roszel Thomsen allowed accidental: it took a good deal of care­ the defendants unusual latitude ful preparation and hard work. It (especially when compared with Judge strikes me that rather than worrying Ford's courtroom in the Boston trial) about the elections, resistance and to explain their histories, motives, peace groups might better spend their and rationales, including their views time developing strategies for building of American foreign policy, he would communities of resistance. To begin, not allow defense counsel to tell the we should all carefully consider (prob­ jury about Sax's view of their ably in study groups) what the meaning responsibility. Instead, Judge of the Catonsville and Milwaukee actions Thomsen charged the jury precisely as is for people like ourselves. What pur­ Judge Ford had: they were to consider pose do these actions serve? Of what the "facts" of the case, not the moral use are they? And how do we - as groups excellence nor the good motives of of opponents to the war - relate to the defendants, which he and the them? November 8th is sentencing day government readily acknowledged, nor for the Catonsville Nine. On November the morality or legality of the war in 14th there will be a national draft card Vietnam. Even the government's turn-in. These are dates which can acknowledgement that it was reasonable have, unlike electiqn day, a lasting effect on the building of a resistance Cont'd on p. 3 ... community. --Louis Kampf Page 3

THE CATONSVILLE NINE continued picketing around the Post Office building continued, and on Thursday to believe the war illegal was ruled this became a candle-lit silent vigil. irrelevant. Thus, the jury's verdict When the defendants emerged after the of "guilty as charged" came as no verdict had been announced, they saw surprise to anyone. hundreds of people holding tall white The Streets of Baltimore. candles in the growing darkness. Several hundred people were witness ~ Note on Hospitality. No one to some ,extraordinary moments in the knows how many people came to courtroom when, for example, the Judge Baltimore for some or all of the week's and the Nine debated during the 90 events, but on Sunday night, one minutes that the jury was out. But thousand non-Baltimoreans registered several thousand people participated at St. Ignatius Church. In the course in some or all of the week's events of the week, 800 people were housed outside the courtroom - to which (and perhaps as many Baltimoreans the city of Baltimore was witness. complained that they had not happened Street events had been planned for to be sent a visitor). This, too, was the four days of the trial. On Monday new for Baltimore. Hundreds of Cornell morning, about two thousand people students, supporters of Father Dan gathered in Wyman Park, near the Johns Berrigan and many of them draft Hopkins campus, for a 40-block march resisters, lived with Baltimore through Baltimore's business and families that week. shopping district, on main streets But the individual hospitality that had been cleared of traffic. There of Baltimoreans was not matched by its had never been anything remotely like institutions. Both the black Masonic it in Baltimore. Noon~ime crowds Temple and the Unitarian Church had emerged to see Howard and Baltimore agreed to rent their halls and then Streets filled with priests, nuns, and cancelled agreements, admittedly seminarians, young people and old, because of outside pressures. The only some imaginatively and other place in the city willing to serve as conservatively dressed - marching a meeting place (and for nightly behind two American Revolutionary War communal suppers) was St. Ignatius flags (the lone pine and the rattle­ Church. Father Michaelman offerred the snake, Don't Tread on Me), carrying _church meeting hall in spite of the signs and chanting, "join us, join us," overwhelming lack of support from his or J\peace, now," or more rarely, "more priests and his lay board. pay for cops." Many people did come "Surfacing" at the Forums. The off the sidewalks to join, and the relatively small number of general response was wonderment at the Baltimoreans - perhaps 25 - who size and spirit of the march. planned and coordinated the week's A brief rally was followed by a events see themselves as part of the picket around the Post Office building Peace Action Center, a group that has where the trial was being held, and had sectarian quarrels with other then by a distribution of leaflets peace-minded people in town. But the to rush-hour crowds. On Tuesday, three week's events served to erase or four hundred people marched sectarian lines. The militant but solemnly behind a casket which they disciplined tone of the street actions delivered to the Selective Service contributed. But even more important offices in the Customs House, scene of were the nightly forums held at St. the Baltimore Four's blood-pouring Ignatius Church. These five mass action on draft files. Afterwards, meetings attracted some of the same groups visited individual draft board crowds that had marched, but this time members at their downtown offices, they were sitting down in a hall delivering letters urging their jammed with from 400 to 1000 (depending resignation, and talking with on the night) participating in a new secretaries, colleagues, and passers­ by about how they felt, as the draft board member stood by. On each day Cont'd on p. 4 •.. Page 4

THE CATONSVILLE NINE continued special themes: imperialism, revolution and risk; property and poverty. Because three of the Nine had worked in Guatemala (the Melvilles had been priest and nun there, she for form of teach-in. 14 years and he for more than 10), they The nightly meetings were could speak directly about their designed originally so that the experiences with peasants and the role defendants and their witnesses might of the Church and the U.S. government say what they could not say in court. in their lives. Others among the Nine But the Forums quickly outgrew this had worked in Africa or in South function. Because of the daily -street America. Several speakers, Father actions, they were the place, first Blase Bonpane for example, also of all, in which plans might be reported experiences in the third reviewed and arranged and announced. world. Scholars like Noam Chomsky The local organizers, thus, were in and Richard Schaull contributed nightly communication with their historical and political analyses. The constituency. The program each view of American imperialism was a evening was a fluid affair, in which sobering one: its history extending those in the courtroom reported to far back of Vietnam and its roots in those who had been in the streets and racism and in American political and vice versa. Each night as well, economic patterns extending over much distinguished visitors - intellectuals of the globe apart from Vietnam. and activists both - addressed the Change, speaker after speaker made Forum. These included Dorothy Day, plain, was hardly likely without Howard Zinn, Richard Schaul!, Noam great personal sacrifice. And yet, Chorns,y, Harvey Cox, Barbara Deming, the gloom did not, finally, dull the Robert Bly, Ahmed Eqbal, Michael Novak, feelings of vitality and hope. On the Bishop Pike, I.F. Stone, Linda Forest following evening, for example, a for the Milwaukee Fourteen, Marvin spontaneous series of 25 draft card Gettlernan, Rennie Davis, and others. burnings punctuated the meeting and But most of all, people came to see dramatized the theme of "revolution and hear the Nine: each evening and risk." several defendants (except for Father But perhaps the week's significant Philip Berrigan and Torn Lewis, who contribution was, finally, the theme were returned to the Baltimore County of "property and poverty." "Some Jail after court each day) talked property, like some laws and some about what had happened that day or actions of our government, is about their lives or their view of illegitimate, and people of their act and the movement that was conscience have a right and a growing from it. responsibility to take action against As the week went on, those drawn it. That the perpetuators of such to the Church each evening were action expect (and even welcome) the joining a community there, Eather than punishment that, in our society, going to a teach-in. Partly, this had follows their revolutionary acts to do with recognizi~g more and more obviously links them with the faces. But chiefly, the spirit of nonviolent movement. At the same time, community was an extension of the the actual destruction of property - Nine's collective act. They had begun of pieces of paper called "files" - to "celebrate life" over the burning is a new step in a direction that I files. WHen the people in the hot, expect will significantly alter the c~owded, smoky hall of St. Ingatius peace movement. The act of burning stood to applaud and cheer the Nine, files was not a "symboli c" one: draft they were also feeling the power files are not ordinarily duplicated. within themselves to work for change. The destruction of 1-A files last At the same time, the Forums month in Milwaukee may well tie up served to feed the intellect as well indefinitely the drafting of men in as the spirit. Three of the evening,s, for example, were arranged around a Cont'd on pages .•• Page 5 THE CATONSVILLE NINE continued PUNITIVE RECLASSIFICATION: JIM OSTEREICH that city. Beyond the effectiveness of their Jim Ostereich returned his draft card act, beyond its usefulness to the to the Justice Department in ceremonies peace movement locally and in in the Arlington Street Church, Boston general, there is another aspect of on October 16, 1967. {Ferber and Coffin the Nine and the Fourteen that merits of the Boston Five were later convicted comment. Is it not ,wasteful, people for participation in this same ·service) ask, that articulate, knowledgable, On November 7 he was declared delinquent movement people like the Nine and the and reclassified lA by his local board. 14 serve many years in jail? That they, The constitutionality of the board's at least, don't think so needs to be action is now being decided by the emphasized. Their resolution and Supreme Court. Jim has worked with the energy, even about imprisonment - New England Resistance and is now a are extraordinary. In the historical field secretary for the AFSC in Boston. tradition of movements for change, Recently, Erwin Griswold, Solicitor they regard the time they will spend General of the US, has asked the Court in jail as further opportunity for to rule in Ostereich's favor. Griswold's organizing and activating the main argument is that Ostereich, a movement. divinity student, is exempt from military The day of the verdict, Father service and cannot be reclas~ified. If Dan Berrigan was interviewed by a such a ruling were made, it would pre­ Baltimore newswoman, and the interview sumably also hold for other mandatory was run by the radio station at least exemptions or deferrments such as that three times the next day. Father Dan given to college students (2-S), fathers said that it had been the "greatest or hardship cases (3-A), and physically day of their lives," that at last they or mentally unqualified (4-F). were one with the "poor and the However, the Solicitor General has powerless" of the world, and that now broadened his attack to include the they - the Nine - could legitimately delinquency regulations themselves: "Theri speak for those voiceless ones. "But are some disquieting circumstances what can you do in prison?" the surrounding the delinquency reclassifica­ newswoman asked. "My brother and I tions of (Ostereich) and others who, like are writers , " Father Dan said," and him, have violated their duties as some of us are teachers. We will registrants by engaging in protest continue to work in prison as we have activities." Griswold says that examina­ outside." tion of the regulations suggests "that -Florence Howe the delinquency reclassification of (Ostereich) constituted punishment, which was imposed without the constitutional safeguards prescribed for criminal trials" SENTENCING OF THE NINE: and "raises questions under the Fifth NOVEMBER 8 llmendment." Presumably the lolicitor General is now subject to conspiracy charges. On the evening of November 7, at 8:00, in the Goucher College gymnasium, Father Dan Berrigan will read poetry. SUGGESTIONS FOR THE NEWSLETTER Others of the Nine will be present. Louis Kampf will introduce Father Dan. •. The evening is being sponsored by The Newsletter staff is eager to Goucher's student newspaper, its relig­ print articles concerning local ious association, and its general stu­ activities, especially those which dent organization. There will be no can serve as models for other groups. charge. Please send material {including newspaper clippings and your own There will be supportive activities comments) to the RESIST office. during the day of sentencing and a Suggestions about past newsletters rally at St. Ignatius Church that eve­ and future articles will also help ning. COME TO BALTIMORE. us make the Newsletter more useful. Page 6 O'BRIEN CASE: IS THE DOOR TO THE COURTS NOW CLOSED?

David O'Brien and three other resisters to raise armies. We think it also burned their draft cards in Boston on apparent that the nation has a vital March 31, 1966. O'Brien was convicted interest in having a system for raising in U.S. District Court under a 1965 armies that functions with maximum amendment to the Universal Military efficiency and is capable of easily and Training and Service Act which provides quickly responding to continually criminal penalties for anyone "who forges, changing circumstances." ·alters, knowingly destroys (or) knowingly The "substantial" functions which draft mutilates", his draft certificates. This cards play are: they are proof of conviction was overturned by the Circuit rejistration; they provide information Court which held that the 1965 amend­ such as the local board's address, "an ment was an unconstitutional abridgement item unlikely to be committed to memory"; of free speech. (The Circuit Court they contain "continued reminders" that nonetheless found O'Brien guilty of non­ the registrant must notify his local possession of his draft card.) On May 27 board about changes in his status. of this year, Chief Justice Warren As a protection of these substantial deli vered the opinion of the Supreme functions, David O'Brien, now married, Court: The 1965 amendment was not will begin to serve an indeterminate unconstitutional. The Warren deci"sion sentence (up to 6 years) in November. went beyond the particular issue of draft card burning, however, and may offer clues as to what might be expected in future decisions about the constitutionality of other aspects of the draft laws. PEOPLE ARE NOTICING Below is a summary of some of the main points of the decision. The full opinion may be obtained from the Printing Resist ran advertisements in the New u. s. York Review of Books and the New Repub­ Office. lic in October. We have received many (1) The 1965 amendment prohibiting responses, including the following draft card burning is not "on its face" letter: ·an abridgement of speech. The Court compared this obviously innocuous "After a long and agonizing reapprais- amendment to a law which prohibits the al of my political allegiances, I have destruction of drivers' licenses. decided to respond to your appeal for (2) Speech may in some cases be aid. I was a Gene McCarthy liberal who abridged. "A governmental regulation is still had faith, quite misplaced it now sufficiently justified if it is within appears, in the possibility of effecting the constitutional power of the govern- change within existing institutions and ment; if it furthers an important or political channels. The events of the substantial government interest; if the Democratic convention disabused me of governmental interest is unrelated to the my illusions, and nothing since then has suppression of free expression; and if served to reassure me. The decision of the incidental restriction on alleged the ADA National Board on October 5 to First Am·endment freedom is no greater endorse the Humphrey-Muskie ticket was than is essential to the furtherance the last straw. We can no longer afford of that interest." to be co-opted by a "lesser-of-two-evils' f3) Draft cards are of sufficient philosophy. Since the bankruptcy of "legiti mate and substantial" im ortance mainstream liberalism is now so patently to·.· e protected b:( l~ws which inv

(The following is excerpted from an I agreed wholeheartedly with these de­ article which appeared in the Boston fendant s, but ••• I felt that techni­ Globe on September 8th. It is written cally they did break the law ••• by Frank Tarbi, one of the u. s. Dis­ trict Court jurors in the trial of the Visibly shaken, we solemnly marched to Boston Five.) our appointed seats. The eyes of all were on us. The time of reckoning had "I found Dr. Spock guilty ..• so far arrived. As the individual names were as I was concerned, the decision we ren­ read, all were found guilty, except Ras­ dered was based strictly on the official kin ••• So great was our anguish that charge of 'conspiring to counsel, aid our scheduled get-together at the hotel and abet young men to evade the draft rooms for that climactic drink was im­ and to hinder and interfere with the ad­ mediately cancelled ••• ministration of the Selective Service Act.' I can admit I spent many a sleep­ I departed to the awaiting car and less night wrestling with the signifi­ then to home. There I was embraced by cance of this charge ••• my lov~d ones and I began to think and try to explain the paradox of my deci­ How and why did I find four men sion. These four men were trying to guilty? All men of courage and individ­ save my sons whom I loved dearly. Yet uals whom I grew to admire as the trial I found them guilty. To hell with my developed. As I searched my conscience, ulcer. After four or five stiff hookers I had to admit I profoundly agreed with (I lost count) I began to cry bitterly these defendents ••• Just as a gang of locked up in my room. Maybe it was tem­ dissenters dumped a cargo of tea into porary insanity? Or was it remorse for the brink and were declared patriots for a world gone mad? Only history will an­ their action, so were these men protest­ swer the question that is forever nag­ ing against a war they termed unjust and ging me--the law of God or the law of brutal. Only this time, the bells from the land?" the church· steeples did not proclaim this an act of patriotism. Now, voices had come to take the place of these bells--and it was these voices l was trying to analyze.

As the father of three teen-aged sons, two eligible for draft, and a veteran myself, my abhorence of war is under­ standable. These men castigated the NEWSLETTER STAFF MEMBER INDICTED Vietnam war as immoral ••• and weren't these five trying to buck the hardline politicians stressing the gobbledygook Mike Zigmond, a member of the Resist of making the world safe for democracy. Newsletter staff, has been indicted and High sounding phrases until I realized arraigned in Boston on charges of induc­ this would be our fourth attempt since tion refusal. Zigmond refused induction 1915, to play God. Was I ready to com­ on May 31st after having been declared mit my sons, thousands of miles away delinquent for returning his draft cards where even victory bears no fruit? Rev. to the Justice Department in November, Coffin's thought-provoking argument 1967 at services held by New England Re­ struck home--'Isn't the Cross higher sistance. Zigmond, 27, is married and · than the flag? Must we not obey God is a research associate at MIT. He ex­ before we obey man?' ••• Was I, as a pects to be tried in early December. juror, going to scrap the very shreds Approximately 35 indictments have been of moral sinew that bind this great na­ issued in Boston since the trial of the tion together? ••• The paradox was that Boston Five, most within the last month.i