Enshrined in the founding documents that lays out our system of laws and governance are guarantees of basic freedoms: the freedom to voice our opinions, the freedom to assemble to collectively voice our opinions, the freedom to read and write without government interference or censorship, the freedom to petition our government for a redress of grievances, and the freedom to choose our representatives in government.
These freedoms are rightly viewed as critical to the well-being of our society, and have become a source of inspiration to people around the world. But today, as we recognize the tenth anniversary of the Patriot Act, we see a continued erosion of these central freedoms. Well, not for all Americans, but for some – say about 99% of Americans - have seen limits placed on their rights to speak, assemble, vote, and petition their government. Meanwhile, a fortunate few, around 1% of Americans, have been blessed in recent years with an expansion of some of these same basic civil rights.
In recent weeks, large groups of American citizens have joined together in many cities across the US to voice their grievances with the economic and governmental status quo. And in doing so, they have identified many ways in which their guaranteed rights have been abridged. In order to assemble to petition your government for a redress of grievances these days, you have to first get a permit. The permit will state where, when, and for how long you can protest. That is because the government wants to pick and choose where exactly you can assemble for your protest. If you want to assemble and petition your government for a redress of grievances in front of City Hall or at the State House, you are most likely SOL. You have the right to assemble and the right to petition your government, but you do not specifically have the right to do so where your government might notice you.
None of that has discouraged those protesters who have assembled in many cities across the US. And in many cities across the US, in Boston, Chicago, San Francisco, Atlanta, and now Oakland, the police have arrived, typically in the dead of night, to arrest the assembled citizens, and seize their tents and sleeping bags. The police have the law on their side, after all; those assembled citizens petitioning their government do not have the proper permits, they are not permitted to assemble in that specific area, and your right to express your grievances by sleeping and camping out is not guaranteed under the law.
In fairness to the municipalities involved, camping in a public local does raise issues of safety and sanitation, as any homeless person can tell you. And the city wants to make the public parks available to the public. After all, the public spaces are paid for by the tax-payers for the benefit of everyone, and everyone should have access to the public parks. Excepting those assembled to petition the government, and especially not if they are assembled in tents and sleeping bags. For while you have the right to lose your home or dwelling, and lose your job, and lose all manner by which you might keep yourself comfortably domiciled, you have no right to go out and just sleep in a public park
For, after all, if protester were allowed to camp out in the public parks, then the cities would have to allow others to sleep out in public parks, like the many homeless Americans. And to allow that would mean confronting those many homeless, and the very same economic inequalities from which those assembled citizen petitioners are seeking redress. Such a sight could lead to public unrest or trouble in the streets. Of course, the municipalities would vastly prefer that the homeless and the protesters who look and act like them would exercise their rights under a bridge somewhere far from the public eye.
Long gone are the days when anyone with a grievance could harangue a crowd from a street-corner soapbox (if those days ever existed). Today, you are only allowed to assemble and petition your government for a redress of grievances if your protest meets the approval of the government.
However, for those with the wherewithal, the ways in which they can petition their government have been vastly expanded. You can pay to fill the public airwaves with your favorite issues and ideas. Your paid spokesperson, looking for all the world like a concerned citizen, can appear on a talk show to support your position. If that's not enough, you can buy an hour of television time and produce your own political infomercial. For that matter, you can buy an entire radio or television station, nay a complete broadcast network, to ensure the public hears and sees exactly and only what you want them to hear and see..
But your rights don't stop there. You have the right to hire a lobbyist. In doing so, you can avoid entirely the messy necessity of permits, go right into a law-makers office, and address your grievance directly to your representative's very own staff. Lobbyists are mostly friends or former co-workers of the representative, and so can provide that sort of face-to-face interaction. Using a lobbyist, you can write out precisely the sort of legislation you would like to see your representative support, and discuss the various pros and cons of that legislation for as long as you like, perhaps even in a pleasant fern-bar while sipping intoxicants long after the public parks have been closed. Your guaranteed freedoms include the right to give unlimited amounts of money anonymously to aid your champion's election to office. Some states are even seeking to protect your right to put unlimited amounts of money directly into your representative's hands. And with enough money, you can encourage your representative to vote for just about anything.
This sort of access to government officials is perfectly in keeping with the unique American conception of egalitarianism Everyone, regardless of their station in life, has the right to spend money to gain access to their government's representatives. And everyone is equal in that more money confers greater rights for greater access.
The protection of the rights of citizens as guaranteed by our constitution, and the proper functioning of the government requires the active participation of the citizens. When the citizens fail to attend fully to their democratic roles, the government is in danger of drifting from its prescribed functions. Unfortunately, such a drift may result in laws and regulations that impede the abilities of the citizens to fulfill their democratic roles and obligations. Such a situation seems to exist today as many states enact laws to limit the abilities of citizens to register to vote and to vote. The laws of the land guarantee the citizens the right to assemble and to petition their government for a redress of grievances. Indeed, in a democratic form of government, that is the proper and necessary role of all citizens, not just the monied few.