March 2004

CONTENTS

Greenpeace, Earth First!, PETApage 1

Briefly Noted: page 8

Summary: Last month’s OrganizationTrends profiled the radical tactics of three“direct action” groups—Sea ShepherdConservation Society, Rainforest ActionNetwork and the Ruckus Society. In partII, author Neil Hrab looks at three othergroups that use calculated acts of disrup-tion for political ends. Radicals are usingthese “direct action” tactics to win moreand more influence, and bypass normalpolitical processes.

Greenpeace, Earth First!, PETARadical Fringe Tactics Move Toward Center Stage

By Neil Hrab

Equipped with their own fleet of ships, Greenpeace activists frequentlyengage in illegal activity such as interfering with commercial shipping.

G reenpeaceThe grand-daddy of environmental

direct action is Greenpeace. This organiza-tion has long functioned as a kind of pro-test “skunkworks,” dedicated to findingever-more-unorthodox strategies for ac-tivists to use to confront their opponents.Examine the current activities of any radi-cal group protesting capitalism, corpora-tions or globalization and it’s likely thatGreenpeace pioneered their tactics. A Sep-tember 2001Boston Globe article summa-rized the standard Greenpeace methods ofoperation: “…rappelling down skyscrap-ers, occupying abandoned oil rigs, andputting inflatable dinghies between whalesand hunters with harpoons.” This is onegroup that has done it all.

Started in 1971 by activists inVancouver, Canada, it is now an interna-tional organization, headquartered in theNetherlands, with 41 national affiliates anda global membership of 2.8 million.Greenpeace’s reach is world-wide, stretch-ing through the developed world and intomany Third World states as well. The totalrevenue that Greenpeace International (GI),

the group’s central coordinating body,takes in each year has been estimated ataround $50 million; GI is believed to havearound $17 million in assets. The groupused to be much larger in terms of member-ship. As one analyst of Greenpeace’s for-tunes has noted, “at its peak in the mid-1980s, the organization had more than 5million supporters worldwide – includingcelebrities such as Sting, Sir Elton Johnand Tom Jones, who supported its save-the-rainforest campaigns.” By 1994, itsmembership stood at 4 million. By 2000, itwas estimated at 2.4 million – so the latestfigure of 2.8 million indicates it may haveturned the corner. Some people within thegroup believe Greenpeace’s obsessionwith “direct action” may be what drovethose numbers down. “The public is boredwith seeing us chaining ourselves to ships

and cranes,” one anonymous activist toldBritain’s Sunday Times in 2000. “The troubleis, that’s what we do best.”

Greenpeace USA, the US affiliate head-quartered in Washington, DC, claims

OrganizationTrends

2 March 2004

Editor: John Carlisle

Publisher: Terrence Scanlon

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250,000 members, down from more thanone million members in the early 1990s,when it was a cash cow for GreenpeaceInternational. Greenpeace USA is a non-profit 501(c)(4) lobby organization thatworks “to change current environmentalpolicies and practices” through what itcalls “grassroots lobbying for various leg-islative initiatives.” It reported $10.7 mil-lion in 2001 revenue and has assets of $9.3million. Under IRS legislation, its activitiesare treated as tax exempt but are not chari-table and tax-deductible. A separateGreenpeace Fund, which is registered as a501(c)(3) organization, “focuses on re-search and education on environmentalissues.” Its activities are treated as chari-table. The Greenpeace Fund had 2002 rev-enues of $8.7 million and assets of $7.5million.

Some observers question the propri-ety of this arrangement. In September 2003,a watchdog group called Public InterestWatch based in Washington, DC releaseda report entitled “Green Peace, Dirty Money:Tax Violations in the World of Non-Prof-its.” Public Interest Watch (PIW) claims to

have evidence that Greenpeace has “know-ingly and systematically violated UnitedStates tax laws.”

“At the heart of the matter is the wayin which Greenpeace’s complex corporatestructure masks its misuse of tax-exemptcontributions,” says Mike Hardiman,former executive director of PIW. “The IRSvery clearly differentiates between taxableand tax-exempt contributions, and the waysin which they can be used,” Hardimansays. “Greenpeace has devised a systemfor diverting tax-exempt funds into non-exempt organizations within its empire andusing the money for improper and illegalpurposes. It is plainly a case of moneylaundering.” Public Interest Watch con-tends that over a three year period oneGreenpeace entity diverted over $24 mil-lion in tax-deductible contributions thatwere supposed to be used for charitable,educational or scientific programs, butinstead financed advocacy campaigns.

“Greenpeace is cheating the taxpayerby accepting tax-deductible contributions,and then misusing the funds,” Hardimanasserts. “They are accepting taxpayer sub-sidized funds for charity and education,and then using it to hang banners on build-ings and break into nuclear power sta-tions.” The complaint is pending with theIRS.

With a staff and budget now compa-rable to many mainstream environmentalgroups, Greenpeace activists continue toundertake radical “direct action” tactics.They routinely stage stunts that violatelaws in order to generate publicity for theircause.

Anti-Bush and Anti-CorporateCampaigns

Lately Greenpeace has energized itsmembers by linking its attacks on BushAdministration policies to its attacks oncorporations. These are more than simpleverbal assaults.

• In 2001 Greenpeace dumpedfive tons of coal onto a street just ashort distance from the home ofVice-President Dick Cheney to pro-test the Administration’s energy

policies.

• On Earth Day [April 22] in 2001Greenpeace USA leader JohnPassacantando—who called Presi-dent Bush the “‘face of a thousandopponents’” because he represents“the oil, coal, plutonium, auto andgas industries”—was arrested withRainforest Action Network founderRandy Hayes for locking himself toa gate during an anti-Bush protestin Washington, DC. The protestblockaded the entrance to the Envi-ronmental Protection Agency.(Passacantando, a veteran of theactivist group Ozone Action, is aformer executive director of the Flo-rence and John Schumann Founda-tion whose president is PBS museBill Moyers. Moyers is the father ofPassacantando’s first wife.)

• Last year Passacantando wasone of 15 Greenpeace activists ar-rested in the Netherlands outsideDow Chemical headquarters inAmsterdam. Displaying seven bar-rels of what they said was contami-nated soil from a major chemicalspill in India, the activists disruptedtraffic and distracted motorists byhanging giant posters on Dow’sheadquarters building.

• In December 2003, GreenpeaceUSA went on trial as a corporateentity for an incident in the springof 2003 where two activists boardeda cargo ship off the coast of Floridathat allegedly carried timber loggedfrom the Amazon rainforest. OtherGreenpeace activists in inflatableboats allegedly tried to preventCoast Guard vessels from haltingthe attempted takeover (See sidebaron page 7). Greenpeace defendsitself with arguments like those usedby the Sea Shepherd ConservationSociety. Said a Greenpeace spokes-man: “While the U.S. watches itsborders for drugs and counterfeitGucci bags, no law yet exists tostop importation of most wood ille-gally cut in other countries...We

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OrganizationTrends

took action when our governmentfailed to.” Said Passacantando:“Never before has our governmentcriminally prosecuted an entire or-ganization for the free speech ac-tivities of its supporters.” Of course,illegally boarding a ship is moreakin to piracy than free speech.Couldn’t Greenpeacers have law-fully assembled at dock-side tomake their point?

Anti-Military ActivitiesGreenpeace also protests against mili-

tary installations and military exercises.While Greenpeace rhetoric is often paci-fist, it usually takes second place to envi-ronmental advocacy. But Greenpeace in-volvement with anti-war organizationsshows its penchant for savvy risk-taking.By championing the anti-Iraq war cause, itis broadening its appeal to the most mili-tant student protestors. Like labor unionsthat have tapped student energies to sup-port union campaigns against global freetrade (known as the “Teamster-turtle” al-liance), Greenpeace is using the anti-war/anti-globalization cause to pull studentprotesters into its environmental crusades.

If Greenpeace can win even a smallportion of the anti-globalization movementto become dues-paying members, it willtake an important step to rebuilding itsdepleted membership.

• In March 2003, activists usedthe Greenpeace flagship RainbowWarrior and a flotilla of inflatablerafts to blockade a joint Spanish-U.S.-run naval base in southwest-ern Spain. The activists wanted tostop an American freighter fromtransporting supplies to coalitionforces on patrol in the Persian Gulfregion. Their effort to sabotagepreparation for the war in Iraq re-sulted in two arrests.

• That month Greenpeace ac-tivists also blockaded the officialresidence of Australia prime minis-ter John Howard to protest his sup-port for the U.S. decision to go towar against Saddam Hussein.

• In April protestors in inflat-able boats disrupted an officialAustralian naval ceremony as war-ships headed to the Persian Gulf.Ten Greenpeace protestors werearrested for attempting to board aship to hang anti-war posters.

• In 2002 Greenpeace reached aplea bargain agreement with De-partment of Justice prosecutors. Byagreeing not to trespass on U.S.military bases for five years,Greenpeace helped 15 of its mem-bers avoid lengthy jail terms forattempting to disrupt missile test-ing at California’s Vandenberg AirForce Base in July 2001. The pro-testors had entered restrictedcoastal waters by piloting inflat-able boats into off-limits zoneswhere they swam and donned div-ing equipment to disrupt missiletests. Greenpeace also paid $150,000in fines - equal to taxpayer costs –and agreed to pay $500,000 shouldit violate the agreement. Still,Greenpeace claimed it was strong-armed into the agreement by avengeful Bush Administration.

Measured by media attention, the in-ternational Greenpeace network seems justas powerful as it was in the 1980s. But interms of membership, the organization isjust coming out of a long spiral of decliningpopularity. Greenpeace USA is taking arisk in protesting issues outside of its coreenvironmental concerns, but if its anti-waractivities can win new converts, they willbecome an increasingly prominent part ofthe Greenpeace mission.

How do the big environmental groupslike the Audubon Society and Sierra Clubregard Greenpeace? Mostly they keepquiet. Like Greenpeace, they have experi-enced periodic declines in membership.Unlike it, however, they have shown littleeagerness to identify themselves with di-rect action.

Earthfirst!Unlike Greenpeace, Earth First! (EF!)

is not an incorporated nonprofit. It files noforms with the IRS to allow donors to take

a tax deduction on their contributions. Ithas no board of directors or officeholderswho take responsibility for its actions.Indeed, it has no formal leadership, prefer-ring to think of itself as “a movement”rather than an organization.

Founded in 1980, EF! operates in theshadows—and through the internet—as asemi-underground group. It’s hard toknow who is accountable for EF! actionsbecause the group cloaks itself in secrecy.We know there is a bi-monthly Earth First!Journal based in Tucson, Arizona (“Sub-scribers are welcome to use aliases foranonymity”), a state contact list that con-tains no names but only post box numbers,and a “Direct Action Fund” that acceptscontributions. It also lists only a post boxnumber in Canyon, California.

Earth First! literature is sprinkled withthe word “monkeywrenching” - its euphe-mism for direct action. As explained byEarth First! Journal , the act of throwinga monkey wrench into a complex socialmechanism is “a means of striking at theEarth’s destroyers at the point where theycommit their crimes.”

Like the Sea Shepherd ConservationSociety, EF! justifies illegal activities byexplaining that violence against livingbeings—including plants and animals—isqualitatively far worse than violence di-rected at inanimate objects. For example,it’s okay to destroy logging companyequipment in order to save trees. For EF!private property is meaningless at bestand a crime against nature at worst. Vio-lence against property is really “the wil-derness acting in self-defense.”

According to EF!:

“Monkeywrenching is a step beyondcivil disobedience. It is nonviolent, aimedonly at inanimate objects, and at the pock-etbooks of the industrial despoilers. It isthe final step in the defense of the wild, thedeliberate action taken by the Earth de-fender when all other measures havefailed, the process whereby the wilder-ness defender becomes the wildernessacting in self-defense.”

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The founding members of EF! are be-lieved to have been no more than fivepeople in the Tucson area. But one of themwas veteran activist Dave Foreman, aformer Wilderness Society lobbyist andonetime (1995-1997) member of the SierraClub board of directors. Foreman drew hisinspiration from a 1975 novel, The MonkeyWrench Gang by author Edward Abbey,which detailed the fictional adventures ofa group of violence-prone, anti-growthenvironmental activists. The novel culmi-nates in their attempt to blow up Arizona’sGlen Canyon dam. Between 1980 and 1989,EF! members attempted in real life to copythe novel’s fictional acts of “eco-sabo-tage.” In 1981, for example, saboteurs be-lieved to be affiliated with EF! engineeredthe sudden collapse of a power line con-nected to a Tucson radio tower.

Eco-SabotageIn 1985 Foreman prepared a 350-page

compendium of tips and tricks on eco-sabotage. Now in its third edition andavailable at amazon.com., ECODEFENSE:A Field Guide to Monkeywrenching pro-vides detailed instructions showing whatdedicated activists can do to wreck powerlines and facilities, disable heavy equip-ment, trash billboards, hinder logging—and not get caught.

The practice of “tree-spiking” is thetactic that made ECODEFENSE notorious.This involves driving a nail as deeply aspossible into a tree intended for logging inorder to disable any saw that comes incontact with it. ECODEFENSE calls tree-spiking “an extremely effective method ofdeterring timber sales which seems to bebecoming more and more popular.” Ac-cording to the dust jacket, “No good Ameri-can should ever go into the woods againwithout this book and, for example, a ham-mer and a few pounds of 60 penny nails.Spike a few trees now and then wheneveryou enter an area.”

In 1987, tree-spiking claimed its firstknown casualty. A 23-year-old loggingcompany employee suffered what the SanFrancisco Chronicle called “serious fa-cial and neck injuries” after “he was struckby a jagged section of a saw after it rippedinto a large nail buried in a redwood log.”

George Anderson “incurred severe facelacerations, cuts on both jugular veins andthe loss of upper and lower front teeth.”Dave Foreman’s response to the incidentwas chilling. “It’s unfortunate this workerwas injured and I wish him the best,” hetold the San Francisco Chronicle . “Butthe real destruction and injury is beingperpetrated by Louisiana-Pacific and theForest Service in liquidating old growthforests.”

A year later, self-identified EF! mem-ber Mitch Friedman wrote the Seattle Timesto complain about media references to tree-spiking as terrorism: “Logging has drasti-cally changed the face of our land. Clear-cutting scars are everywhere, once-pro-ductive rivers are choked with silt, wildlifepopulations maintain but a tenuous graspon survival, and the greenhouse effect -abetted by this deforestation - threatensthe entire planet’s climate. Isn’t this eco-logical terrorism?…Tree spiking is not ter-rorism; it is a justifiably extreme and nobledeed.”

EF! tree-spiking has become so wide-spread that logging companies are forcedto use metal detectors to prevent injurieslike those George Anderson suffered. How-ever, in 2001 British Columbia loggers dis-covered a new tree-spike that conventionalmetal detectors couldn’t locate. The spike,reported the Vancouver Sun , is “made ofconcrete instead of metal…The concreteplugs are meant to splinter the metal bladeof a logger’s chain saw or break huge sawsused in mills, wrecking machinery and send-ing broken metal and concrete shrapnel inevery direction.” The paper noted that“concrete spikes had all been placed intrees at eye level, or the level where a chainsaw would be used to take down the tree”– exactly where they would cause mostinjury.

Negative Publicity Changes EF!Tactics

EF! seems to have begun changing itstactics because of all the bad publicity. In1989, an EF! team was caught vandalizingski-lift supports at an Arizona resort. Italso planned to disrupt operations at anArizona nuclear power plant. Five defen-dants eventually went to jail for terms rang-

ing from 30 days to six years. The followingyear, however, an EF! spokesman claimedthe group had abandoned violent tactics,including tree-spiking. EF! claimed it wouldthereafter opt for non-violent tactics suchas sit-ins.

Why the moderation? In testimonybefore Congress in February 2002, JamesF. Jarboe, the FBI’s domestic terrorismsection chief, summarized what had hap-pened:

Disaffected environmentalists, in1980, formed a radical group called“Earth First!” and engaged in a series ofprotests and civil disobedience events. In1984, however, members introduced “treespiking”…a tactic to thwart logging. In1992, the ELF [Earth Liberation Front]was founded in Brighton, England, byEarth First members who refused to aban-don criminal acts as a tactic when otherswished to mainstream Earth First…In1994, founders of the San Franciscobranch of Earth First published in “TheEarth First Journal” a recommendationthat Earth First mainstream itself in theUnited States, leaving criminal acts otherthan unlawful protests to the ELF.

It’s ironic that Earth First! campaignshave started to injure its own memberswhen the organization claims to be moder-ating its tactics. In October 2003, 25-year-old Robert Bryan fell to his death whileparticipating in a California EF! “tree-sit”(i.e. the equivalent of a sit-in or squatters’occupation, only high up in a tree.) EF!’scomment: “We never like to lose an activ-ist.”

More and more activists are killed orinjured by dangerous EF! tactics. In April2002, Beth O’Brien of Portland, Oregon,fell to her death during a tree-sit in MountHood National Forest. Jenna Griffith, a 20-year-old EF! activist, fell from a tree andsuffered a head injury in 2001. ChrisCoursey, a columnist for the CaliforniaPress Democrat, put it best. If Earth First!really doesn’t “like to lose an activist,” hesaid, then perhaps “it should stop encour-aging tree-sits as a logging protest.”

Violence in EF! direct action cam-

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paigns may have subsided, but EF!websites and the latest editions ofECODEFENSE still encourage activists tolearn about “monkeywrenching” and otherdirect action tactics. And EF! members stillromanticize the deeds of eco-saboteurs. InJune 2001, for example, many Tucson resi-dents feared eco-terror was returning totheir region following a mysterious case ofarson against a property development. JohnStephens, an Arizona EF! member, told theDaily Star that EF! was not involved. Buthe added that arson was “a positivething…Modern American environmentalgroups—although they’ve done a valianteffort—haven’t really slowed down sprawl.What are people supposed to do?”

People for the Ethical Treatmentof Animals

Unlike Earth First!, People for the Ethi-cal Treatment of Animals (PETA) haslearned the value of good public relationscampaigns. The public increasingly asso-ciates PETA with humorous stunts orheart-wrenching promotions. Comely nudemodels denounce fur coats in PETA pin-up calendars. Mass mailings tell touchingstories of animal cruelty and offer person-alized return mail labels for a small dona-tion.

PETA has successfully exploited le-gitimate public concern about animal wel-fare to raise very large sums of money. In2002, it reported revenue of more than $17million and assets of about $6.5 million.Most revenue comes in small amounts,often from PETA’s 300,000 members. PETAalso benefits from the endorsement of ce-lebrities such as Pamela Anderson(“Baywatch”), Dennis Franz (“NYPDBlue”) and best actress nominee CharlizeTheron (“Monster”).

But PETA president and founderIngrid Newkirk and other senior leadershave a habit of making extremist state-ments that undercut their organization’sincreasing public acceptance. Newkirk haslinked meat consumption to the Nazi Holo-caust and rationalized violent direct ac-tions. As Daniel T. Oliver documents inAnimal Rights: The Inhumane Crusade(Capital Research Center, 1999), Newkirkhas defended the Animal and Earth Libera-

tion Fronts, groups responsible for break-ins, vandalism and arson. Asked by EMagazine to comment on the $12 milliondamage caused by a 1998 Earth LiberationFront attack on a Colorado ski resort,Newkirk observed, “People forget that aski resort is anything other than a prop-erty investment or a place to have fun.They haven’t thought about the conse-quences for the environment or the ani-mals.”

Kim Bartlett, publisher of AnimalPeople magazine, worked for PETA in the1980s but now disagrees with Newkirk’spolicies. “I admired Ingrid in many re-spects,” Bartlett says, but Newkirk is “to-tally confrontational” and “doesn’t un-derstand the concept of compromise.”

In 1999 the Chronicle of Higher Edu-cation asked Newkirk to comment on ani-mal rights radicals who intimidate and ter-rorize university researchers to end ani-mal testing. Her response: “If a threat willscare an experimenter from [continuinghis work] - then so be it...When you seethe resistance to basic humane treatmentand to the acknowledgment of animals’social needs, I find it small wonder that thelaboratories aren’t all burning to theground. If I had more guts, I’d light amatch.” “We should all have the nerve tobreak down the gates and get the animalsout, but most of us are not that brave. I feelguilty that I do not have the nerve,” shetold National Journal a year later.

In 1998, Bruce Friedrich, PETA’s di-rector of Vegan Outreach, wrote that theanimal rights movement needed “directaction which utilizes a broader range oftactics, including secrecy and sabotage”to make it more effective. He denouncedanimal rights activists who opposedecoterrorism, calling their reasoning “ill-conceived...poorly supported [and] ob-scene.”

PETA isn’t just all talk. In 2002, theCenter for the Defense of Free Enterprisefiled an IRS complaint against PETA, ask-ing that its nonprofit status be revoked for“violations of tax laws and connections tounlawful activity.” The complaint, whichis pending, notes that the Animal and

Earth Liberation Fronts (ALF and ELF)have committed more than 600 criminal actssince 1996 and caused more than $43 mil-lion in damage, according to FBI estimates.These groups have been aided by PETA.In 1991 Washington State University pro-fessor John Gorham lost two years’ re-search on mad-cow disease after ALF mem-bers vandalized his office. Newkirk thenproclaimed the ALF action a good exampleof direct action and PETA paid $29,000toward ALF’s legal defense costs. PETAalso has contributed $1,500 to an EarthLiberation Front free speech defense fund.

PETA thinks animal rights terrorism ismorally legitimate. At a July 2001 animalrights gathering, Friedrich explained why:

“[If animals] have the same right tobe free from pain and suffering at ourhands, then of course we are going to be,as a movement, blowing stuff up, andsmashing windows. For the record, I don’tdo this stuff, but I do advocate it. I thinkit’s a great way to bring about animalliberation. And considering the level ofthe atrocity and the level of the suffering,I think it would be a great thing if… all ofthese fast-food outlets and these slaugh-terhouses and these laboratories and thebanks that fund them, exploded tomor-row… I think it’s perfectly appropriate forpeople to take bricks and toss themthrough the windows.”

In early February, the FBI declaredthat the most serious domestic securitydanger Americans face comes from violentenvironmental and animal rights groups.Such groups, according to Phil Celestini, asupervisory special agent, will “now andfor the foreseeable future [be] the top in-vestigative priority” for the Agency’s anti-domestic-terror efforts.

ConclusionMost environmental organizations re-

spect and cherish American political norms,including respect for the rule of law. So dothe vast majority of animal rights support-ers. But this is not true for what were oncefringe elements in both movements. Unfor-tunately, they are growing in size and de-veloping well-funded organizations thatare increasingly influential. These extrem-

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6 March 2004

ists frequently engage in illegal activities.Moreover, they make a point of defendingthe illegal actions of others, which theydefine as “non-violent.” These self-de-scribed “direct-action” tactics intimidatecitizens, destroy property, and drain lawenforcement authorities of money andmanpower.

“Mainstream” environmental and ani-mal rights groups acknowledge that “di-rect action” tactics will alienate potentialsupporters and give critics ammunitionagainst their causes. But their relation toextremist groups is more complex and en-tangled than necessary.

Indeed, says philosophy professorSahorta Sarkar, extremist group actionsmake “other organizations appear more‘moderate’” and have “helped legitimizethem in the eyes of the public.” The agendaof the Sierra Club, National WildernessSociety, Natural Resources Defense Coun-cil and other groups is opposed to prop-erty rights and free markets. But by con-trast they seem more palatable to bureau-crats, elected officials and the public.

Myron Ebell, a policy analyst at theCompetitive Enterprise Institute, says thisdelicate association is not far-fetched. Hecites a remark by David Brower, a long-time eco-radical: “I founded Friends of theEarth to make the Sierra Club look rea-sonable. Then I founded the Earth IslandInstitute to make Friends of the Earthlook reasonable. Earth First! now makesus look reasonable. We’re still waitingfor someone to come along and makeEarth First! look reasonable.”

As we noted in the first part of thisreport, direct action tactics employ a widerange of stratagems and stunts, many ofthem quite clever. Activists use such tac-tics because they offer unparalleled waysto capture public attention—and intimi-date opponents. Nearly all direct actionschemes, however, involve some viola-tion or defiance of the law.

When radical activists use direct ac-tion and break the law, they claim they areexercising their right to civil disobedience.And they compare themselves to well-

known proponents of civil disobediencesuch as Henry David Thoreau. In a nowfamous mid 19th century incident, Thoreaustaged a tax protest and went to jail for hisactions.

But Thoreau accepted the conse-quences and did not howl that he was“singled out.” Today’s radicals rarely wantto live with the consequences of theirchoices. When arrested, they claim perse-cution and demand immunity. They wantfreedom without responsibility.

Does direct action work? Does itachieve the activists’ goals? Certainly, itcan get them on the evening news. Butmeasure that against the public cost ofdisrespect for law. Advocacy organiza-tions should not tolerate any direct-actiongroup that would flout the law with impu-nity.

Neil Hrab is the Warren T. BrookesFellow at the Competitive EnterpriseInstitute.

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OrganizationTrends

Direct Action Protest Groups Not Above the LawBy

Glenn G. Lammi

When environmental activists are arrested and tossed in jail for a night they treat it as abadge of honor. But when the government has the nerve to indict an environmental organization,as the U.S. Attorney’s office in Florida did recently in pressing charges against GreenpeaceUSA, then you hear howls of outrage from every corner of the movement. Last July, a federalgrand jury in Miami indicted Greenpeace USA on one count of violating a federal statute makingit illegal to board a ship in port and one count of conspiring to violate that law. Earlier in thespring, Greenpeace activists boarded a ship off the Florida coast that they believed containedmahogany illegally imported from the Amazon. They attempted to unfurl a banner protestingPresident Bush and his trade policies before being arrested. The indictment is long overdue. Itsends a message that groups inciting or organizing disruptive or violent “protest” activity areaccountable to the rule of law.

The message can’t be repeated too often because incidents of violent activity for thesake of the environment are multiplying every month. Any group that destroys the environment inorder to “preserve” it or that seeks to prevent research on life-saving products should be treatedas a criminal enterprise. Thankfully, federal enforcement officials now have made the pursuit ofeco-terrorists a priority. Members of Congress and state legislators are strengthening rack-eteering laws so that the government can seize the assets and property of those who engage indestruction and mayhem for ideological or political reasons. Some proposed legislation evenempowers victimized property owners, researchers and businesses to file civil lawsuits againstenvironmental extremist groups.

But private lawsuits and government enforcement actions won’t be completely effectivebecause eco-terror groups are diffuse and underground by nature and are often organized asautonomous cells. Moreover, recent Supreme Court precedents have made it harder to uselaws like the Racketeer-influenced and Corrupt Organizations (RICO) Act against those whoclaim their illegal acts are forms of “protest.” But securing compliance with the law must be apriority when you consider how much damage radical green activists do to lives, property, andnew technologies.

It would be nice if some of the mainstream environmental groups helped rein in theirextremist colleagues. They are so adept at using the courts to win their cases. Perhaps theycould lend a hand in bringing to justice those who violate the law and trample on personal rightsand property just to make a point.

Glenn G. LammiChief Counsel, Legal Studies DivisionWashington Legal Foundationp:202-588-0302f: 202-588-0386

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BrieflyNotedConservatives are not surprised by the Bush Administration’s announcement that the Medicareprescription drug program will cost $540 billion over 10 years instead of the $400 billion estimateCongress relied on to pass the bill last November. Robert Moffit, health care expert at the HeritageFoundation, says he expects estimates to go even higher. “None of this bad news goes away. Itgets worse.” The Concord Coalition, a centrist budget watchdog group, calls the $540 billionestimate a real “shocker.” Says executive director Robert Bixby; “If a number like this had beenfloating around the Capitol last fall, it never would have passed.” Some members of Congress be-lieve the soaring cost projections may aid their fight for budget discipline. Mike Pence (R-IN), whovoted against the Medicare bill, says, “The silver lining of this disappointing news is it gives those ofus fighting for a more frugal budget real ammunition.”

The issue of immigration is causing turmoil within the 700,000-member Sierra Club. A small butvocal minority has organized a dissident group called Sierrans for U.S. Population Stabilization(SUSPS) that wants the Club to advocate sharp reductions in the number of immigrants the U.S.accepts each year. Like most environmentalists, SUSPS believes the world must take drastic stepsto cut population levels. But the Sierra Club has steered clear of a tough line on immigration to avoidangering liberal ethnic groups. Writing in the Nation magazine, academic Betsy Hartmann saysSUSPS and other immigration restriction activists represent the “greening of hate.” She equatesblaming immigrants for environmental problems to a kind of “racism.” SUSPS activists control about20 percent of the 15 seats on Sierra’s board of directors.

The future of the Baltimore office of the Open Society Institute will be decided this year, says OSIfounder George Soros. The New York-based OSI, which Soros uses to dispense his worldwidephilanthropy, opened a Baltimore office in1998 as a five-year pilot project for making grants todomestic U.S. programs. Its grants often go to controversial drug treatment, criminal justice andcommunity development programs. Soros has opted to extend his funding for another year to givelocal board members time to decide whether to close the office or reorganize it as an independentfoundation supported by additional funding sources.

A survey by the Pew Hispanic Center and the Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation shows thatHispanics generally have more positive opinions about public education than African-Americans andnon-Hispanic whites. More than half of Hispanics say they would give U.S. public schools a grade ofA or B compared with 45 percent for African-Americans and 25 percent of whites.

A new study by the John Hopkins Center for Civil Society Studies concluded that 90 percent ofnonprofit organizations experienced some degree of financial stress in 2003, but the largemajority still managed to boost their income. Nonprofits froze salaries, cut benefits, and postponedhiring, among other belt-tightening measures, to weather the fundraising downturn. Center directorLester Salamon says, “What this survey shows is that American nonprofits have become highlyentrepreneurial organizations, responding actively and often creatively to new fiscal pressures.”