Paranoid Policing of Political Protests

Ezekiel Edwards

Paranoid Policing of Political Protests

It is time New York start getting control of some of its many overlooked (yet raucous) parades. Sure, everyone is familiar with the well-policed Thanksgiving Day, St. Patrick's, and Puerto Rican Day parades, but what about the thousands of less publicized parades that take place everyday, at great risk to the public? You might have been at many of them without even knowing it! Remember, just because you do not see a giant Snoopy balloon floating above you does not mean you are not at a parade with serious security risks!

For starters, consider the daily "Take-Out Food Parade", a rowdy affair occurring every evening after 5 p.m. whenever two restaurant deliverymen on bicycles travel against the flow of traffic. Or the high-energy sounds and sights of the "Two Elderly People Crossing the Street When the Sign Says 'Don't Walk' Parade"; thankfully, this bonanza occurs only during the summer months. Always be on guard for the unannounced "Four Little Kids Riding Their Scooters on the Sidewalk" parade, an event so heart-stopping it may soon to be covered by ESPN's "Extreme Sports" series. Meanwhile, during the week, you can catch the equally exciting "5th Grade Class Trip to the Natural History Museum" parade, where at least 36 kids march hand-in-hand up Central Park West --- it's adorable, but dangerous!

The above parades may be entertaining, but they are clearly in desperate need of closer city supervision, as they are prone to getting out of hand, disrupting city life, attracting throngs of spectators, interfering with the flow of traffic, and generally threatening the public. Luckily, I'm not the only one who has noticed.

So has the NYPD, which recently just proposed to amend Chapter 19 of Title 38 of the Official Compilation of Rules of the City of New York. Under the NYPD's new definitions, each of the above "processions" could now be classified as a "parade" and, as such, their participants would be required to seek a permit from the NYPD before proceeding.

More specifically, the following organized groups would first need an NYPD permit: two or more people disobeying the traffic laws, 20 or more people in cars or on bicycles on the roadway, and 35 or more pedestrians on the sidewalk.

Phew! I feel better now, don't you?

In all seriousness, these proposed changes amount to a redefinition of the type of protest and the number of protesters permitted to demonstrate in New York City without first applying for Police Department approval. On August 23, 2006, the police department will discuss its new rules at a public hearing at police headquarters.

While the police claim the rules are to protect the health and safety of both the participants as well as members of the public, in fact they are a pretext to limit political protests and control the use of public space. The NYPD's desire to define and restrict political speech is not surprising, given its arrests en masse of bicyclists from "Critical Mass" (which defines itself as a bike ride, not an organization, focusing on "bringing attention to the deteriorating quality of life -- starting with the toxic levels of air and noise pollution -- that cars create for cities") and the fiasco during the 2004 Republican Convention, when police falsely arrested and detained hundreds of protesters (the vast majority of whose cases were dismissed, some after video footage exposed the unlawfulness of numerous arrests and subsequent fabricated police testimony regarding them).

It remains unclear whether the NYPD has the authority to unilaterally change the rules, or whether such modifications must go through the City Council. What is clear, however, is that they are ripe for abuse.

As the New York Civil Liberties Union states regarding the proposed NYPD rule changes:

"This proposal will suffocate spontaneous protest activity and inevitably lead to police micromanagement of sidewalk protests. [It] would be a dramatic and unnecessary expansion of police control over protest activity. Requiring groups that are doing nothing more than walking on public sidewalks to obtain police permits will suppress protest activity and lead to wholly unnecessary conflict between police and protesters. ... Groups would have to negotiate the details of their events with police officials and would face the risk of arrest if they did not agree to police demands. In many cases ... the groups would abandon their protest plans rather than face the risk of arrest."

The city has an obligation to protect the public and, in certain circumstances, manage public space. But under the guise of protecting people physically, the new rules threaten people socially and politically, setting up potential barriers to important political protests and unnecessarily giving the government a potential weapon to wield against our freedoms of speech and association under the First Amendment --- a weapon we know from experience it is not afraid to use.

So next time you see that 5th grade class --- all 36 of them --- trudging dutifully to the museum, make sure to ask their teacher if they have a permit for their parade. If not, call the police!