"Not since the days of Bull Connor has this country seen a public official abuse his authority in order to terrorize and intimidate communities based on the color of their skin," states a call for the big January 16th march in Phoenix against Arpaio. Sheriff Joe Arpaio is often compared to Bull Connor, the police official in Birmingham who fought civil rights activists with attack dogs, and strong water hoses back in the 1960's. He acted above the law, although some could argue that his actions were not contrary to the general orientation of the rule of law then or even today. He was more blatant about abusing protesters and disregarding federal law than most law enforcement officials, which is why Arpaio is compared to him.

During the civil rights movement, there were no marches against Bull Connor, but there were efforts to produce situations in which he would show the world what he was willing to do to fight integration. The horrible treatment of marchers drew the attention of the nation and encouraged John F. Kennedy to initiate the Civil Rights Act of 1964. To some, the Civil Rights Act was a victory, and the story somewhat ends there. This perspective makes it seem that Bull Connor was an important catalyst and therefore target (although he wasn't quite a target in the way Arpaio is today). Yet if this was the case, why do stories that focus on a wider black liberation movement rather a focus on aspects of what's called the civil rights movement that often focus on the federal government's benevolence or Martin Luther King's heroism not really mention Bull Connor at all?

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By Joel Olson

from http://imagine2050.newcomm.org/2009/12/08/minutemen-and-klansmen/

I recently reviewed The Rise of the Ku Klux Klan by Rory McVeigh (University of Minnesota Press 2009) for the academic journal American Studies. The book is a little dry, but there were some notable lessons in it for understanding anti-immigration organizations today.

The Klan originated after the Civil War to restore white supremacy by terrorizing ex-slaves and antislavery whites during Reconstruction. This generation of the Klan ended when Reconstruction did in the 1870s. McVeigh’s book studies the second generation of the KKK, which started in 1915 (coinciding with the release of D.W. Griffith’s famous pro-Klan movie The Birth of a Nation) and exploded in growth from 1920-1924, with a membership of over four million people at its peak.

So many people are thinking it: Arpaio and his collaborators are putting the law into question, especially with the latest lawsuits and the disproportionate ways in which the laws have been enforced. After the stories on the singing protest of Arpaio that caused him to walk out on an interview, a news search for Arpaio will give you these stories: Arpaio and County Attorney Andrew Thomas are suing several judges and other county officials, and an MCSO officer recently got jail time for contempt of court for not apologizing for stealing files from a defense lawyers folder (and the resulting chaos involving a walk-out and a bomb threat, and the likelihood that the officer is in Arpaio's fancy jail for his allies).

When you hear statement after statement from the sheriff and county attorney and others that they're enforcing the law- that undocumented people are stopped/jailed because they're breaking the law, and then on top of that they all seem confused about what is actually legal or illegal and law-breaking cops get different treatment, you can't help but find that they are amazingly hypocritical.

What I'm getting at certainly isn't that we should be concerned that the sheriff and county attorney and others are making a mockery of law enforcement or the rule of law in general. The purpose of bringing these things up in relation to immigration is to point out that the rule of law is and always has been used to work in certain people's favor- those in power and with money, and to work against anyone who is a threat to holding onto that power and money. It's not quite as simple as that when you have a local sheriff giving a big middle finger to the federal and local governments- certainly they don't all work together.

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One of Bluestem's young friends tipped me off yesterday that one of the speakers at this morning's Tea Party Against Amnesty, organized in Minnesota by Ruthie Hendrycks, would have an interesting message for the fans of Minnesotans Seeking Immigration Reform (MINN-SIR) and their fellow travelers.

DJ Danielson of I Don't Hate America was intrigued by the tip as well and so joined me at the state capitol. Together, we watched "Robert Erickson" of Minneapolis rally the anti-immigration part of the crowd with his objections to the mass invasion of America by immigrants who brought disease and took away jobs. They stayed with him as he called for a mass deportation of these invaders.

To Europe.

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By Phoenix Insurgent

Local videographer and anti-fascist bulldog Dennis Gilman has posted up his much-anticipated video from the anti-National Socialist action a couple weeks ago. The video is quite interesting and in particular I enjoy the way it complements the point that PCWC was making with regard to the rally.

Unlike so many liberals and pro-immigrant movement movers and shakers, who would rather have ducked their heads in the sand as the racist NSM pranced about on the state capitol lawn (and in fact denounced the action in some embarrassing cases), PCWC wanted the National Socialist Movement to get some attention precisely because we wanted to highlight both the overall reactionary climate and rhetoric surrounding the "mainstream" anti-immigrant movement (after all, what attracted these NSM scum to Phoenix if not the tenor of the reactionary politics?), but also specifically to point out the congruence between the NSM's vile message and that of the "mainstream" anti-immigrant types. We at PCWC see no light between them. Dennis seems to have caught onto the same theme and he does a great job, especially in the first part of the video, of making that overlap in message starkly clear.

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I don't have a lot of time to write at the moment, but I wanted to mention that I was able to hear David Bacon speak the other night. I've been reading his articles on migration for a while, and I have enjoyed his book "Communities Without Borders" as well as the bits of "Illegal People" that I've read so far.

I was disappointed, though, that although he mostly advocated for migrants' rights, he really fell short on challenging white citizens on their racism. He mainly argued that white citizens should not oppose undocumented migrants because migrants can contribute to a stronger political power (we can join with them to get health care), and the economy wouldn't be as great without them. That's why you should care. This bugs me to no end, and it's so common, you hear folks saying it who stand side by side with migrants in their struggles.

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