Woman gets arrested for reading The Constitution

[NHRes2004]

Arrested for "unlawful assembly."

Quilcene woman is 'Code Pink' in anti-war protest in D.C.

By Patrick J. Sullivan, Leader Staff Writer

Quilcene's Kit Siemion spent more than a week in Washington D.C., wearing pink and seeing red.

She's a "Code Pink" volunteer, a group of mostly women who rally in D.C. and make daily trips to Capitol Hill to lobby senators and representatives to stop funding America's war in Iraq.

It was her third such trip to D.C. and it won't be her last. Her visit Sept. 14-23 did include a "first" - the first time in her life she's been arrested. She and three other Code Pink women were arrested for being too loud at a rally. And she'd do it again.

The message she brings back to Jefferson County is: Stand up for your rights and what you believe to be wrong.

"I've been politically active, but I've never been so involved at this level. People need to quit talking and step forward and be active," said the 49-year-old woman. "I basically feel we all need to be active because our rights are being impinged. We need people to walk their talk, in whatever capacity they can, as a writer or a banner waver or a photographer or a teacher."

Siemion is a volunteer firefighter/EMT in Quilcene, vice president of the Quilcene School Board of Directors, an organic farmer and massage therapist. She is a mother of three, and her husband, Phillip, is a Vietnam veteran.

She said she was opposed to the war in Iraq before it started.

"I knew in Quilcene, Wash., before the war started that it was built on lies. I'm concerned that the American people are not taking the time to look beyond the propaganda news."

She continued: "People say 'Yes, we want to end the war,' but they're not contacting their congressmen and saying, 'You're not going to get my vote unless you stop supporting the war.'"

She stressed that Code Pink is not anti-military or anti-soldier.

"What I like about Code Pink is they are positive. They are creative; they are intelligent. We have a lot of fun trying to educate people and make a change and be patriotic."

Many members are women "who have quit their professional jobs and who are living off savings and devoting their lives to ending this war. These incredibly brilliant women are impassioned, and they know what's going on is wrong."

The war is all about money, she said. "The war is making money for corporations supplying the private 'contractors' who now outnumber actual U.S. troops in Iraq. It's about the money being spent on war instead of on education or healthcare or environmental issues back home.

"Our country is suffering incredibly. I see it as a school board member." She said Quilcene School had to cut a special education teacher this year due to budget issues, but there is no drop in the mandated services the district must provide.

"Our intent is to de-fund the war and stop the occupation and bring the troops home," she said of Code Pink goals.

Code Pink members talk to a lot of senators and representatives.

"A lot of them give ending the war lip service, but their votes continue to fund the war," Siemion said.

Siemion does not feel much support from two of Washington's strongest figures in D.C.: Sen. Patty Murray and Sen. Maria Cantwell. "Patty Murray has voted for every dollar spent [on the war]. Cantwell just got onboard last August but still voted for every dollar spent." She thanked Sen. Murray for helping pass a bill that gets more help for veterans. "Norm Dicks says he supports impeachment [of President Bush] but won't sign on to the bill for impeachment.

"Nancy Pelosi is great disappointment. She's just one more Democratic pushover," she noted. "We're disappointed in the Democrats but we're not discouraged."

She supports Dennis Kucinich for president because "he is the only one steady against the war. I want to vote for him in the primary, anyway."

Code Pink members want to deflect a typical comment directed at Siemion when wearing her pink shirt emblazoned with "No to War" while traveling in airports: Support the troops, they are defending America's freedom.

"That's a fallacy. Our troops are defending Halliburton. They are not defending Iraqis. The Iraq war did nothing for America's freedom."

Her beliefs cost a bit of her own freedom. On Tuesday Sept. 18, she was part of a Code Pink group that attended a Vets for Freedom rally where Sen. Joe Lieberman and Sen. John McCain were due to speak.

"We decided to go to the rally and make some noise," she said. Police told the 50-some protestors where to stand, and yet four - including Siemion - were arrested for unlawful assembly, she said. "They said it was because I was yelling too loud." She said the group was alternating between yelling "End the War" and simply reading the Constitution.

She was in jail for about eight hours, handcuffed, fingerprinted and a mugshot taken. It was her first time in jail. She paid $50 and was released, without having to make a plea.

At the Jefferson Memorial on Sept. 20, the Code Pink people were allowed to congregate outside the memorial, singing and wearing shirts that read "Stop funding the war." She said they were then told they could not be inside the memorial with a shirt that had words on it. But many people had shirts with words on them, from college names to music names. One Code Pink person was arrested for having a "No War" shirt and was in custody for seven hours before the case was dropped, Siemion said.

Siemion said that's an example of how basic freedoms in America are being eroded.

"That is happening day in and day out right now. Our rights are being impinged. There is more spying, more lying. People who have spoken out against the war are being listed and stopped at airports.

"I didn't realize it so much until I went to D.C. The American people need to realize their rights are being eroded. This is exactly how fascist regimes have taken over in the past. People are put in a fearful mode with the media and propaganda from the politicians, and there is a police state presence. And so they buy into it because they are in a very defensive and fearful mode, and then they stop educating themselves."

She advocated that people tune their radio dial to the Democracy Now program at 91.3 FM at 5 p.m. weekdays, and Free Speech talk on 1090 AM progressive talk radio, all day.

She went to protest President Bush's appearance last month at a hotel in Bellevue and was disappointed there were not more people present. She noted that Washington state receives 10 percent of the federal military budget. She intends to return to D.C. in November, but she also wants to work locally on the issue of high school students and military recruiters.

She said that students and parents need to know they can sign an "opt-out" form to prevent military recruiters from contacting them.

"I want to make sure other schools have it in place in a very visible form. I want school counselors to be clear and provide counter-recruiting pamphlets that show what being in the military really means. I want to work with some of the local vets and have them come in and educate kids on the reality of war."

[Jim Johnson]

The difference is that there is a duly-enacted law against driving a car on public roads without a license, regardless of what you think of such a law.  There is no law against reading the Constitution, and cannot be.

If there where a duly-enacted law against reading the Constitution, would you be all cool with that?
There is absolutely nothing in the Constitution that would prevent a law that said it is illegal to read the constitution.

Actually your wrong here.  The 1st amendment's freedom of speech would prohibit the government from being allowed to pass any such law on any level.

You are equivocating on the word, read.

[Jim Johnson]

Lauren opposes drivers licenses on moral grounds.  People who are going to obey laws just because they are written down have no moral foundation because they accept the morals of the state.

While you can object to drivers licenses and car registrations on moral grounds, you cannot however make it a constitutional argument.  The reason being is that while the Constitution does specify what powers the FEDERAL government has, it does not do so with the state.  It only points out a series of things the states cannot do... ban freedom of speech, take away the right to bare arms etc.  Anything not specifically prohibited by the federal Constitution can be put into law on the state level.

You can argue that some state laws are immoral, yes.  But you cannot argue as you are trying to do here that it violated the federal constitution, because it doesn't.

I didn't make any objection here to any thing in the constitution.

[kola]

It is my take (like I previously assumed) that the ladies were yelling out and disrupting the speeches. IMO that is not proper. I am a hardcore beliver in free speech but not when it violates others to speak out and exercise their same rights...even if the other folks are treasonic assholes.

I think the title of the topic/article is a bit misleading. Yes, she/they were reciting the Constitution but they were also disruptive. There is a price to pay for "civil disobee".   

Kola

[mvpel]

You make good points mvpel and I always appreciate your viewpoints and logic, although we sometimes disagree.  Wink

I am more of a common sense type of guy than a common law guy. I feel that if I ask someone (in all due respect) a question that I should receive a legitimate answer. Latley that is hard to get from the goonies. That becomes frustrating to me and others and only escalates to bitterness towards these goonies.

Karma to you, Kola.

I myself have a rather analytical mind and find the theory and practice of law to be fascinating, as one might discern from my various traffic ticket wins over the years for myself and family - http://www.aidoann.com/

Perhaps it's partly a Jewish trait, as Judaism holds a law book (scroll, really) at the center of our religious reverence.

I'll close this post with a couple of quotes:

No society can exist if respect for the law does not to some extent prevail; but the surest way to have the laws respected is to make them respectable. When law and morality are in contradiction, the citizen finds himself in the cruel dilemma of either losing his moral sense or of losing respect for the law, two evils of which one is as great as the other, and between which it is difficult to choose.

...and...

One who breaks an unjust law must do so openly, lovingly, and with a willingness to accept the penalty.

[mvpel]

I think Lauren is aiming at the root, while resisting the newest layers of tyranny only hacks at the branches.

That's the crux of my admiration for her and people like her, and their willingness to risk their livelihood and freedom in striking at the root while the rest of us run around with the pruning shears and spritz-bottles of Round-Up.

It's true those of us who have moved to the freest state are already doing more than those we left behind fighting rear-guard battles against leviathan governments in places like California, where a good year for gun owners is defeating all but one or two of the really horrible gun bills, but people like Lauren are doing even more than that.

[mvpel]

"Unlawful assembly" is found in DC Code section 22-1307:

It shall not be lawful for any person or persons within the District of Columbia to congregate and assemble in any street, avenue, alley, road, or highway, or in or around any public building or inclosure, or any park or reservation, or at the entrance of any private building or inclosure, and engage in loud and boisterous talking or other disorderly conduct, or to insult or make rude or obscene gestures or comments or observations on persons passing by, or in their hearing, or to crowd, obstruct, or incommode, the free use of any such street, avenue, alley, road, highway, or any of the foot pavements thereof, or the free entrance into any public or private building or inclosure; it shall not be lawful for any person or persons to curse, swear, or make use of any profane language or indecent or obscene words, or engage in any disorderly conduct in any street, avenue, alley, road, highway, public park or inclosure, public building, church, or assembly room, or in any other public place, or in any place wherefrom the same may be heard in any street, avenue, alley, road, highway, public park or inclosure, or other building, or in any premises other than those where the offense was committed, under a penalty of not more than $250 or imprisonment for not more than 90 days, or both for each and every such offense.

Presumably this is the law from which the public demonstration permit process secures a waiver.

[lildog]

"Unlawful assembly" is found in DC Code section 22-1307:

It shall not be lawful for any person or persons within the District of Columbia to congregate and assemble in any street, avenue, alley, road, or highway, or in or around any public building or inclosure, or any park or reservation, or at the entrance of any private building or inclosure, and engage in loud and boisterous talking or other disorderly conduct, or to insult or make rude or obscene gestures or comments or observations on persons passing by, or in their hearing, or to crowd, obstruct, or incommode, the free use of any such street, avenue, alley, road, highway, or any of the foot pavements thereof, or the free entrance into any public or private building or inclosure; it shall not be lawful for any person or persons to curse, swear, or make use of any profane language or indecent or obscene words, or engage in any disorderly conduct in any street, avenue, alley, road, highway, public park or inclosure, public building, church, or assembly room, or in any other public place, or in any place wherefrom the same may be heard in any street, avenue, alley, road, highway, public park or inclosure, or other building, or in any premises other than those where the offense was committed, under a penalty of not more than $250 or imprisonment for not more than 90 days, or both for each and every such offense.

Presumably this is the law from which the public demonstration permit process secures a waiver.

Ah see now THAT law is just as unconstitutional as it would be to arrest someone for reading the Constitution.

1st Amendment:
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.

[mvpel]

The wording of the law does not prohibit you from congregating and assembling as long as you don't engage in "loud and boisterous talking or other disorderly conduct" - due to the word "and" before "loud."

[mvpel]

If we (porcs) had a big anti-war rally, got a permit to hold it in Vetrans Park, had Ron Paul and other cool peeps come to speak and a bunch of pro-war dummies came and were being loud and reading whatever....we'd get pissed. I doubt, because of who we are, that we'd call the cops....but we wouldn't appreciate our special event being disturbed.

And I think we'd be right and justified to object if they characterized their ejection from this hypothetical anti-war rally as being a result of "reading the Constitution" (for example, the Congressional power to provide for the common defence in Article I, Section 8, paragraph 1, and to punish offences against the Law of Nations - such as genocide - in paragraph 10) or as a violation of their "freedom of speech."

[enloopious]

The Constitution and the Bill of Rights do not give you freedom. All people are inherently free. The CP ladies have the right to stand and protest anywhere they want so long as they are not on private property. The video doesn't show if they were or they were not. What it does show is that they were told by police that they could stand there quietly holding signs. They didn't remain quiet so they were arrested.

Do they have the right to make a disturbance? Depends on whether or not it was a public arena or private property and they were party crashers. It seems only logical that it was a public debate and anyone could walk in freely so it was in fact a public forum and they are entitled to speak just like anyone else present.

Of course, in reality, they went there looking to cause trouble and getting arrested was probably what they wanted. It is good publicity for their movement.

There was an executive order issued one or two months ago that defined all public voices against the war as supporting terrorists etc and that it probably the "authority" they used to black bag the ladies. Wasn't there a thread on these forums about that exact thing?

[kola]

I think the "pinkys" created a scene to arouse awareness. That is always good, especially with so many ignorant sheeple in this country. But I think it is wrong for them to say their free speech was violated. Sometimes when folks do things like this it falls into the "cry wolf" analogy. It also makes people like us (who are attempting to revive constitutional rights) look like loonies.

I commend their efforts and actions but disagree with their opinion on why they were carted off to the gulags.

edit/correction: and that is why they were carted off to the gulags
I type and write like shit..sorry...dyslexic/ADD thing goin on...
Kola   

[mvpel]

It's also wrong for them to claim that they were "arrested for reading the Constitution."

[kola]

It's also wrong for them to claim that they were "arrested for reading the Constitution."

yeah mvpel..thats what I meant..lol

Kola

[EthanAllen]

The difference is that there is a duly-enacted law against driving a car on public roads without a license, regardless of what you think of such a law.

Just because it's the law doesn't mean it's right.

Morality is the inviolate personal domain of each individual, up to the point where it violates the equal rights of others.  My rights end where yours begin (and vice versa), and that morally trumps any written law. 

Yes and the exercise of your individual equal right of freedom of speech within common right of ways is only against the law if you are impeding the common right of ways of other individuals. You have to keep moving on the sidewalks - you can't stand still.