Occupy. The 1st Amendment.
"... Or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances."
Note: It doesn't also say: "only when they let us."
Why is the FBI spying on Occupy protesters? The ACLU-NC is determined to find out.
by Linda Lye, Staff Attorney, ACLU of Northern California; for aclu.org -- 07/19/2012
(Originally posted by the ACLU of Northern California)
The ACLU of Northern California and San Francisco Bay Guardian today filed a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit against the FBI to find out whether and to what extent the feds have been spying on members of the Occupy movement. Although the right to protest goes to the heart of our democracy, and the FBI exists to keep us safe, the FBI has a perverse history of interpreting its mission to mean that it can spy on political activists, including Martin Luther King, Jr.[emphasis added]Last fall, the grassroots protest movement Occupy Wall Street -- or simply "Occupy" -- swept the nation. Originating in New York, prominent Occupy movements sprung up all over Northern California. But the law enforcement response was swift and brutal, as police showered protesters with exploding projectiles, batons, and pepper spray.
[...]But we also have reason to believe that the FBI has been involved. Just days before the inaugural Occupy Wall Street protest on September 17, 2011, the FBI issued this Intelligence Bulletin, labeling the now-iconic OWS image as a "Propaganda poster."Why is the federal government spying on protesters? And just what arms of the federal government are involved? These are just some of the questions our [FOIA] lawsuit hopes to answer.
SO, in the spirit of clarity and concision, let me explain my thesis, for why we have yet another important reason that the secret spying on Citizens should matter in an open and democratic society. That reason is:
That such domestically surveilled information, when collected and used in secret without real oversight, can easily lead to the oppression of Citizens, who are simply trying to exercise their Constitutionally-guaranteed Rights, as Citizens.