Americans are entitled to their civil rights in the United States. The most important of these rights are in the amendments to our Constitution. The first ten of these amendments were required to simply get the Constitution passed.

Amendment I

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.

The right to peacably assemble, the right of free speech and the right to petition for redress of grievances shall not be abridged.

In practice our civil rights have always been a battleground in America. On the battleground of civil rights the forces of entrenched power and privilege are represented by riot police and the forces of social justice carry satyagraha, soul force per Gandhi and MLK Jr.

After the fact, if you are assaulted or your civil rights are violated in the United States, you may take the police force or municipality that infringed upon your civil rights to Federal Court for redress. This patriotic right, this control upon the forces that would limit our freedom is USC Title 42, Section 1983 that holds that an agency or individual that violates your civil rights under "color of law" (like in police uniform or with megaphone presenting a message to disperse on behalf of city ordinance, etc) may be held liable for civil damages.

This means simply, the city or municipality may have to pay you money if a court finds that the city has inappropriately infringed upon your civil rights.

The City of Seattle is still facing payoffs to groups and individuals from their atrocious behavior during the WTO in 1999. This is not about money, it is about accountability, but the only way that we can hold cities accountable is through monetary awards and they do send a message.

SEATTLE TO CLEAR ARREST RECORDS, PAY $1 MILLION TO WTO PROTESTERS WRONGFULLY ARRESTED IN 1999 AND THE SETTLEMENT REQUIRES OVERHAUL OF POLICE TRAINING.

Public Justice is the law firm that handled the WTO suit against the City of Seattle and won.

If you think your civil rights were violated and you think you may want to pursue civil remedy against the people who under color of law may have violated your civil rights you need to begin working now to document your claim. You may want to make copies of pictures that document the violation of your rights, you may want to gather statements and contact information from witnesses who can corrorobate the violation of your rights.

I am thinking about the possibility that a clinic needs to be sponsored by OMJP and PMR to provide information about the protection of civil rights and the means to redress violations of civil rights. There may be more to come on these ideas. That's enough for now.

[edit by Robert Whitlock: link to photos
p.s. Thank you for using my photos, Mike.]