UNITED STATES: Voice of the anti-war majority takes to the streets

Elizabeth Schulte
& Eric Ruder, Chicago

From all 50 states and all walks of life, they poured into the US capital on September 24. On buses and trains and planes, in cars and vans, they made their way to Washington, DC, to take a stand against the US occupation of Iraq.

So many people responded to the call to march against the war that at 11.30 am, when speakers began addressing the crowd, tens of thousands were still fighting traffic jams and the crush of people to make their way to the Ellipse, with its clear view of the White House.

The crowd roared with approval as speaker after speaker — including Reverend Jesse Jackson, actress Jessica Lange and former US attorney-general Ramsey Clark — took to the podium to make the case against war.

Organisers say as many as 300,000 came to the march, making it one of the largest — if not the largest — anti-war demonstrations ever in Washington.

Cindy Sheehan, the mother of a soldier killed in Iraq, who jump-started the anti-war movement by camping outside President George Bush's vacation ranch in August, received especially loud cheers. "If it wasn't for the thousands and thousands of people that came to Camp Casey, if it wasn't for the millions in support of us, I'd still be sitting in that ditch", she told the crowd. "But you guys got me out of the ditch, you got us to our nation's capital. And we mean business, George Bush!"

The massive turnout for the march may have been the weekend's highlight, but Washington wasn't the only city with a large protest, and the march wasn't the weekend's only event.

In San Francisco, as many as 50,000 took to the streets making it one of the largest demonstrations there since the war began. In Seattle, 5000 marched, chanting, "Money for levees, not for war" and "No more blood for oil, US off Iraqi soil".

In San Diego, a march of 50 demanding justice for Palestine and relief for Hurricane Katrina victims fed into the main march of 2000. "Freedom is on the march", Pablo Paredes, who was sentenced in May to two months' confinement and three months' hard labour for his refusal to deploy to Iraq, told the crowd. "It's on the march when we confront the Minutemen. It's on the march when we protest the war. It's on the march anytime we come out to protest."

In Denver, more than 2000 marched. In Phoenix, some 1500 took to the streets.

Across the Atlantic, organisers in London reported that up to 100,000 took part in a huge anti-war march, timed to coincide with the US demonstrations — and put maximum pressure on British PM Tony Blair at the start of the Labour Party conference.

The issue of ending the occupation brought protesters together, but many were quick to point out the connections of the war in Iraq with other issues.

"The resources that go into illegal imperial wars are the resources taken away from our true homeland security, which includes education and health care, but it also includes levees, evacuations plans and other systems for caring for our citizens", one speaker in Washington, Suheir Hammad, a Palestinian poet and activist, told Socialist Worker.

"We begin with 'Bring the troops home', because it feels closest to home. But we can't stop there", said Hammad. "We have to continue to make the connection between not just the war in Iraq, but where we are in Afghanistan and throughout South America, the Bush administration's support for Israel — all of these are connected to where our resources are spent and where they aren't spent."

The human-made disaster that gripped New Orleans in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina was at the forefront of everyone's minds.

"Our domestic policy and our foreign policy are part of an equation of racism — fighting people who are not white in Iraq and abandoning folks who are not white in the Gulf states", Reverend Graylan Hagler, a Washington minister who's also the national president of Ministers for Racial, Social and Economic Justice, told Socialist Worker.

A sea of homemade signs gave voice to the anger that many have been anxious to express in a national protest two-and-a-half years since the invasion. One sign that kept appearing was "Make levees not war", underlining the warped priorities of the Bush administration that was so quick to wage war on Iraq, but slow in responding to the catastrophe in New Orleans, whose main victims were poor and predominately African-American residents.

This was the message that University of New Orleans student Lester Perryman, who helped carry a banner leading the "College Not Combat" contingent, brought to the march. "The hurricane was a big disaster, and it's really sad that our government can ship troops over to Iraq in 24 hours, but we can't get adequate help until three days later", said Perryman, who is currently a transfer student at New York University. "The president says he's trying to enhance homeland security and protect us. There was money set aside for levee problems that weren't fixed. Instead, this money was diverted to the war in Iraq."

At least 1000 students from dozens of campuses gathered to march in the Campus Antiwar Network's College Not Combat contingent, with signs that read "Relief Not War".

"We're here to rebuild the student antiwar movement", said Leela Yellesetty from Southern Connecticut State University in New Haven. "We've been doing counter-recruitment at our campus in New Haven and have kicked the recruiters off every time. It's making a real dent because recruitment numbers are down. They're trying to tell people that if they can't afford college, you should join the military, but people aren't buying it."

As people jammed the streets at the beginning of the march route, Maureen Glover was organising others to help her carry the pictures of the more than 1900 US soldiers killed in Iraq. She had strung the pictures together in a long line. "I lost a family member in 9/11", Glover said, "and I'm outraged that Bush used the surge in patriotism, and manipulated and deceived us into going to war in Iraq."

Marchers clogged the area in front of 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, taking the opportunity to yell at the White House, where — even though Bush was not in town — the rooftop swarmed with armed guards.

Gene Tebo took a bus from Detroit. "I was drafted in 1966", he said. "I just went over to the Vietnam War Memorial, and I have about 10 guys I know personally who were killed over there. This kind of march shows that the emperor really does have no clothes. I feel it's an absolute honour to be able to be a part of something that might make a little difference down the line to somebody else."

Organised labour made its presence felt, with a large contingent from US Labor Against War and a speaker at the main event.

"This is an historic moment for the labour movement to take a united stand against this war and the lies of the Bush administration", said Nancy Wohlforth, a member of the AFL-CIO executive council. "The Bush administration doesn't give a damn about what happens to the people of New Orleans, but we in the labour movement are going to do our damnedest to see that the money, job training and rebuilding go to the people of New Orleans who are doing the jobs, not to Halliburton. Guess who got the first contract in New Orleans? Halliburton! And guess who is stealing the Iraqi country and its resources? Halliburton!"

Attorney Lynne Stewart also spoke at the march. She was convicted of "aiding terrorism" for no more than providing her client with a vigorous defence. "My conviction had a chilling effect on the whole defence bar", Stewart, who's still awaiting sentencing, told Socialist Worker. "There's no defence lawyer that handles cases in quite the same way anymore — in particular, the absolute assault on attorney- client privilege so that no one feels really secure in talking to their client and believing that the government isn't listening in to every word they say. I'm no friend of John Roberts, but in his confirmation hearings, he said that when he was arguing for Reagan, he was just representing a client. That's all that I was doing, representing a client.

"By being out here today, I'm showing that this is my movement — the American movement to make things better, equal and inclusive, including the right of self-determination for all peoples all over the world. We have to know that the power of people can change things."

Before the march in Washington, 400 people — primarily members of Veterans for Peace, Iraq Veterans Against the War, Gold Star Families for Peace and Military Families Speak Out — attended a vigil for the fallen at 14th Street and Constitution Avenue, followed by a candlelight procession to the Vietnam War Memorial.

After the march, 700 people packed the First Congregational Church to hear British MP George Galloway speak at the final stop of his two-week North American tour. Galloway was joined at the podium by Iraq war veteran and war resister Camilo Mej¡a; Rose Gentle, the mother of Scottish soldier Gordon Gentle, who was killed in Iraq; Elias Rashmawi of the National Council of Arab Americans; and Ahmed Shawki, editor of the International Socialist Review.

The mood was electric as several familiar names were recognised in the audience: independent presidential candidate Ralph Nader, South African poet and anti-apartheid activist Dennis Brutus, and Ward Reilly of Coalition Against War and Injustice in Baton Rouge, who organised a "peace train" from Louisiana.

[Abridged from Socialist Worker, weekly paper of the US International Socialist Organization. Visit <http://www.socialistworker.org>.]

From Green Left Weekly, October 12, 2005.
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