Works In Progress - September 2003 - Olympians Resisting the Patriot Act

On Tuesday, August 19th, a newly formed coalition presented a draft resolution to the Olympia City Council in support of civil liberties and against the USA Patriot Act. City Council Member Curt Pavola acted as the point person for the City of Olympia and has been working with organizers from the coalition. All city council members present that evening spoke to the resolution, except for Doug Mah and Jeannette Hawkins (Hawkins was absent). There were 8-10 people who spoke, all in favor of the proposed resolution. Coalition member Bruce DeLoria (Thurston County ACLU) also met with Olympia Chief of Police to get his agency’s input on the resolution. The Police Chief was receptive, and offered a few slight modifications to the resolution.

The council, while fairly supportive of the resolution at face, decided it needed to get some answers to the financial impact of the resolution on the city and Mayor Stan Biles stated that he’d also like to hear the opinion of those who support the Patriot Act. (He wants to hear from those who OPPOSE the U.S. Constitution?)

The Olympia Coalition to Protect the Constitution is made up of members of a broad swath of peace and justice, free speech, religious and civil liberty-support groups in Thurston County. So far, the coalition includes members of the Thurston County ACLU-WA, the Green Party of South Puget Sound, United for Peace of Thurston County, the Unitarian Universalist Congregation’s Social Justice Committee, the League of Women's Voters , the Olympia Movement for Justice and Peace, and the Welfare Rights Organizing Coalition.

Spurred to action by the passage of and aggressive use of the new powers in the USA Patriot Act, this group aims to include Olympia on the list of 157 communities that have passed resolutions against the new set of laws, which includes 3 state-wide resolutions (Vermont, Alaska, Hawaii).

With great haste and secrecy and in the name of the "war on terrorism," Congress passed legislation that gives the Executive Branch sweeping new powers that undermine the Bill of Rights and are unnecessary to keep us safe. A massive 342-pages in length, the USA PATRIOT Act was passed on October 26, 2001, with little debate by Members of Congress, most of whom did not even read the bill. The Administration then initiated a flurry of executive orders, regulations, and policies and practices that also threatened our rights.

The Thurston County ACLU-WA created an Anti-Patriot Act Sub-Committee in the spring of 2003 and converged with other concerned community organizations to form the Olympia Coalition to Protect the Constitution.

When this issue of WIP went to press, coalition members and supporters were

planning on attending the August 26th city council meeting and speaking to the

resolution to shore up more support for its passage. The city is expected to

take some time to answer some questions they have about the resolutions impact

on the city and possibly take a vote on it sometime in September.

The coalition is asking people to write letters to the editor of local newspapers, and to the Mayor and City Council members in support of this resolution. Write to the Olympian at: Letters to the Editor, The Olympian, PO Box 1219, Olympia, WA 98507 or online at http://www.theolympian.com or at news@theolympian.com

Coalition members are also setting sights on getting resolutions passed in Thurston County, Lacey and Tumwater. If you’d like to get involved in the effort, please send an email to ThurstonResCoalition@yahoogroups.com or call Bruce at 456-7180.

Coral Spickler contributed to this article.