A Threatening Protest for Peace?
News: Last month's massive antiwar demonstrations in Washington and San Francisco were notably peaceful. Why do New York City authorities think this weekend's march in Manhattan will be any different?
February 14, 2002
|
|
On Wednesday, a federal appeals court upheld New York City's refusal to grant a permit to antiwar protesters wanting to march past the United Nations building. Tens of thousands of war opponents are still expected to swarm into the city for Saturday's demonstration, and protest organizers do have a permit for a stationary gathering just north of the UN. But the court's decision -- and the city's rigid refusal -- have baffled and angered civil libertarians and antiwar activists.
In its ruling, the three-judge panel supported New York's assertion that a march past the UN would represent an "unacceptable risk" during "this time of heightened security." City officials told the court that they were concerned both by the size of the expected crowd and the 'unpredictable' nature of such a march.
Mayor Michael Bloomberg officially explained the city's decision to deny a permit by declaring, "we will not allow any event to jeopardize public safety." But protest organizers are questioning the mayor's motives, arguing that there is no reason to believe that the New York protest would present any more of a risk than last month's massive antiwar demonstrations in Washington and San Francisco.
The gathering in Washington drew some 200,000 to the National Mall -- an easy stone's throw from the Capitol. Washington and Capitol police apparently determined that did not constitute a security threat. And they were proven correct, as less than 16 arrests were reported. In San Francisco, more than 100,000 gathered and marched through the city's downtown. Police there reported only two arrests.
A spokesman for the United for Peace coalition, the group organizing the New York demonstration, argues that the makeup of the crowd will be virtually identical to those in Washington and San Francisco. And Leo Stegman, a paralegal with the Berkeley, California East Bay Community Law Center who has observed marches for more than a decade, suggests that the antiwar demonstrators are predictably a law-abiding, non-violent bunch.
"The people who go to peace demonstrations generally believe in the system," Stegman explains.
Of course, New York is different from San Francisco and Washington, if only because of the lasting psychological damage from the Sept. 11 attacks. Indeed, Michael O'Looney, New York's deputy commissioner or police, told Newsday recently that the city has been following a blanket policy of denying all permits for non-stationary protests since the fall of 2002 because of post-Sept. 11 security concerns.
But Robert Becker, a central organizer of the Jan. 18 San Francisco march, asserts that New York began making it more difficult to obtain march permits well before the terror attacks. Rather than grant a permit for a traditional march, the city has only allowed stationary demonstrations in specified locations -- often barricaded pens -- with increased police presence, Becker says.
Last February, when over 10,000 gathered in Manhattan to protest the World Economic Forum meeting, the NYPD presented a textbook example of crowd control. Not only were barricades set up on nearly every corner in Lower Manhattan, but police lined the march route with motorcycles, riding in single file just inches from one another on both sides of the street.
And police are clearly drawing a fine distinction between protests and other gatherings. After all, large and unpredictable gatherings are hardly unusual in New York. Each year, the city accepts the security risks surrounding events like the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade, the Columbus Day Parade, the St. Patrick's Day Parade, and the New Year's Eve celebration, among others. Last year, New York police reported five arrests related to the St. Patrick's Day celebration, and seven at the Time's Square New Year's Eve gathering.
Some sources close to the Mayor's office have even suggested that Bloomberg may have another reason for refusing the permit -- a desire to avoid paying police the overtime that might be required. One officer in the department office that issues parade permits said that police are prepared to provide crowd control for a 100,000-person demonstration and would actually welcome the extra duty -- if only because it would mean extra pay.
Donna Lieberman, executive director of the New York Civil Liberties Union, which brought the issue before the federal appeals court, called the decision, "a stunning blow to democracy." But some of the organizers see a more mundane threat. Becker, who obtained the permit for the San Francisco march, says that it is in any city's best interest to make the permitting as efficient and non-confrontational as possible. Otherwise, he says, protest organizers "are not going to deal with the permit process."
Still, whatever New York's motives for denying the organizers' request to march past the UN, the demonstration will go ahead.
"If there were a permit granted, everything would be easier for us and for the city," says Leslie Cagan, co-chair of the United for Peace coalition. "But people are coming here regardless."
