Crowd Control

Somehow I found myself alone in the middle of a crowd of about 6,000 people that spilled out from the plaza of the Columbia Tower in downtown Seattle on 5^th Avenue across from City Hall.  It was the early ‘70s, and we were mad as hell about something, probably the War in Viet Nam.  There seems to be this pressure relief valve built into American politics, brought about by the Bill of Rights.  When times get tough, people know that, if we take to the streets in large enough numbers and raise enough hell, something will have to be done, one way or the other.  We’re just thankful that the police don’t have a habit of shooting us for doing so, unlike other countries.

As demonstrations go, this one was typical of many.  People streamed in to the area all morning long, many on busses, carrying signs and banners.  Then as now there were many competing groups on the Left, all raising their own banner high and proclaiming themselves the Vanguard of the New Revolution that was bound to happen if only enough people turned out.  They never did, of course.  The powers that be always opened the floodgates and poured a bunch of your tax dollars on the problem, which eased the pressure somewhat.  It’s hard to get too angry when you’re busy pigging out at the public trough, something I can say with a twisted smile after 27 years of service to the Citizens of Seattle and I hope they’re grateful.

Back then, though, I was as young and dumb as any of them, and for some reason, the Bank of America was the enemy of the people that week, probably as a result of their loan policies or some such.  They had this big black tower in the middle of downtown that was an easy target, and also had a nice big plaza on which to gather, so it all came together on this day.

There is a pattern and a routine to demonstrations, once you’ve done a few.  First you listen to a couple of unintelligible speakers shouting over a bullhorn, then the singer gets up and you all join hands and sing about how we shall overcome some day.  The volume and energy of the crowd seems to be proportional to the proximity and number of nearby taverns.  The Hare Krishnas, along with the usual downtown beggars, milk the crowd for spare change all day long.  Usually, after all the speeches and cheers, the crowd slowly disperses each little group to their own neighborhood to rehash the splendor of the day.  This time, however, there was still unfinished business after all the ceremonies, and someone shouted out that we should go across the street and take over the Columbia Tower.  That sounded right, so about 6,000 of us, who were already blocking all of 5^th Avenue for two blocks anyway, decided to do just that.

The 5^th Avenue plaza off the Columbia tower is fronted at the street level with a glass wall about two stories high, with two main doors.  For some reason, when the 6,000 of us reached those doors, they were locked, and the lobby in the background was deserted.  Maybe it’s because it was a Sunday.  So the crowd formed into a churning millipedial mass of sign waving slogan chanters standing about 20 feet back from the doors so we could be sure the TV cameras could see our signs.  I was in the middle of the crowd at that point, about in the middle of the street in front of the tower.

I watched a line of men, Seattle Police officers, in full riot gear, each equipped with a plastic shield and a night stick, come up the escalator inside the tower and form two lines inside each door.  There were about 20 cops in each group, maybe 40 in all.  Somehow, the doors unlocked, and the officers marched out in a formation that swung to either side just like the band at half time of a college football game, ending up in a double wide line facing the crowd.  They said and did nothing, just stood at attention.

The crowd was dead quiet, waiting for what was to come.  I remember a single empty beer bottle was thrown from somewhere near the middle of the crowd in front.  It described a lazy arc through the air and landed with a crash in the middle of no-man’s-land between us and the cops.  All of the officers in unison took one step forward, assuming a martial arts position with their shields raised and night sticks held high, and let out a loud, “Huh!”   6,000 people turned in unison and ran like hell.  I remember thinking, as I ran, “Why are we running?  There are only 40 of them!”  Somehow, this thought did not prevent my feet from doing their stuff, and I got away clean.  My attempt to lead the vanguard of the new revolution would have to wait for another day.

I think back on days like those, and it’s hard to see we made any kind of a difference in this country.  The banks are still screwing us, and the feds are using our tax dollars to bail them out, so it appears that nothing changed.

But to be out there in the street in a crowd like that, the energy and the atmosphere combines to turn a crowd of individuals into a single minded mass that carries a lot more weight than any one of us.  Each of us was marked by the experience internally and indelibly, and that’s where the real change comes from.  The fact that we did it without killing or being killed is a bonus, something we should not take for granted.  :-{)}