“Red Square” is empty. It is 10 a.m. on Tuesday, Nov. 15, and Zucotti Square, a stone’s throw away from the New York Stock Exchange, where the Wall Street “occupants” have been squatting for two months, has been evacuated during the night by police. “An unfortunate minority” had created an “intolerable situation,” said Mayor Michael Bloomberg in order to justify his order. He used the [same] public sanitation argument used three days ago by Oakland (CA) and Salt Lake City (UT) town councilors in order to proceed the same way with their own protestors.
They all claim that it is in no way an attempt to silence the detractors of Wall Street and its actors, but the movement would have allowed rogue elements such as the homeless or delinquents to settle there, which would have rendered the open spaces where they set up camp “dangerous on security and health levels.” This is an assertion that the occupiers vigorously contest.
“The police arrived at about 1 a.m.,” recounts Kevin Sheneberger, a young chef who works during the day and comes to sleep here every night in support of the movement. “They told us to leave the bulk of our belongings, take only a few items of clothing, and that we would be sheltered for the night. They said that they would only be there to clean the place. The result,” he rages, once the occupiers left, was that they saw law enforcement “take everything: tents, books, first aid material, private computers, and throw them in a tub where a compressor crushed it all.”
One of the lawyers appointed to the movement, Michael Ratner, from the Center for Constitutional Rights, protested for another reason. His colleagues have filed an appeal contesting Mr. Bloomberg’s decision to allow the demonstrators to come back to the square after its cleaning but forbidding them to camp there overnight. However, Justice Lucy Billings, permanent judge of the State Supreme Court, gave them reason. Before the judge came to a decision, she ruled that law enforcement was “evicting protestors from Zucotti Park … or otherwise preventing protestors from re-entering the park with their tents and other property previously utilized.”
At the square, the occupiers protested the judgment. The imperturbable police were still standing in their way. “The appeal that the city has lodged is not suppressive. But in this country, what is the Constitution worth when you’re up against the 1 percent? (as opposed to the 99 percent who are said to represent the “outraged”),”* acknowledged the disillusioned lawyer. In the evening, Mr. Bloomberg will win the case: A new judge will validate the legality of the evictions.
All day, signs of sympathy for the occupants have been multiplying. Robert Williams, 48, who works at a major Wall Street investor, says he is “absolutely not in agreement with them,” but “their right to demonstrate is undeniable, or we’re no longer in America.”* On the sidewalk, a youth brandishes a placard calling for the president: “Obama, say something!” However, not only is the president keeping quiet, but many there suspect him of dishonesty. “He is campaigning; he needs money from Wall Street. The mayor’s attempt to break us is convenient for him,” occupier Jed Brandt said.
If, at the arrival of a harsh winter, the mayor has bet on the movement disintegrating due to loss of perspective, “He is grossly mistaken” assures Michael Levitin, one of the editors of The Occupied Wall Street Journal, which published 20 pages of amazing “May 68”** posters, slogans and press drawings on Tuesday.
A demonstration was called for on Thursday in New York to mark the second month of the movement’s existence. Its leaders expect to see lots of people show up. Whether a success or a failure, it should provide an initial indication of its future.
*Editor’s note: Quotes, accurately translated, could not be verified.
**Editor’s note: “May 68” refers to May of 1968 in France, when a series of student strikes led to France’s largest (at the time) general strike in the country’s history.
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