Prisons, Prose & Protest - #22

Rants, Musings & More

There was a presidential election last month in the US and Kamala Harris lost. People have lots of explanations for this. I’m choosing to de-center the election; it takes up too much space and is limiting. I’m not a Democratic pundit [thank God] and I’m not interested in diagnosing the party’s woes. I’m unqualified for both things and others are paid a lot of money to do this already. The Democratic party is not the horizon of my political vision.

The problems that existed in November remain and we’re going to face new ones. That means that our conditions are in fact different now. What is to be done for those of us who want to see a different world rooted in liberation of and for all? I’ve said many times that “we’ll figure it out as we work to get there” is abolitionist praxis, not evasion. So let’s commit to working to figure things out together. I’m still in the struggle for the long haul. I know that many of you are too. If we’re already building together, let’s continue. If we’re not, let’s get to know each other through struggle. I’m bringing this spirit with me daily. Also, here’s a list of actions each of us can take right now that don’t involve voting or protesting.

I’ve been going back and forth about whether to continue this newsletter in 2025. After all, it’s just a newsletter and there are thousands of others for people to read. I’ve been able to work on it this year because I was on sabbatical from most of my work. That ends next month and there’s already a lot on my plate. For now, I’ve decided to keep publishing the newsletter monthly. Should my capacity change, I will revisit this decision. Also, if you find the newsletter useful, let me know. It helps to keep me motivated to work on it. For now, it will continue to be free.

Tomorrow is Giving Tuesday, and lots of wonderful organizations will ask for funds to support their ongoing work. It can be overwhelming to be online on this day. But it’s an essential opportunity for most groups to invite others to support their work. Please consider giving to at least one group. I’d like to suggest REBUILD if you are so inclined. In addition, it’s the 11th Annual Holiday Solidarity Gift Drive for children with incarcerated loved ones.

Finally, because I have zero chill, I have pulled together a mini-series of virtual workshops facilitated by long-time activists and organizers to support people who feel at a loss about how to take action where they are. I’ve heard many people ask, “How do I even start to take action where I am?” This series is my small offering and it is specifically for people who are new to activism/organizing. I am very grateful to my friends and comrades who said yes to facilitating workshops. Learn about the series and sign up for sessions here. The first two sessions are at capacity.

In this month’s edition of Prisons, Prose & Protest, I share some thoughts about the Children’s Crusade for Amnesty, a 1922 protest. I recommend a podcast, several good recent articles, and much more…

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Prisons/Policing

This newsletter is titled Prisons, Prose & PROTEST. I’ve been protesting since I was a very young person. I was asked a few years ago in an interview about the first protest that I attended. And I had to go way back to 1983 when I was turning 12 years old. I attended a protest organized after NYPD cops murdered a young Black man named Michael Stewart. I’ve essentially spent the 40 years since then refusing the current order through protest, activism and organizing. I continue to believe in my marrow that another world is possible if we make it so.

And over the years I’ve been consumed by questions like why do some people take direct action to express their opposition to an issue or problem? What motivates people to actively refuse the current order? I’m particularly interested in and curious about those who do this consistently over a lifetime. As part of my curiosity, I keep track of examples of historical protests. Today, I’m sharing one called “The Children’s Crusade for Amnesty.” It’s a good example of how a small protest can make a big difference.

A Brief History of The Children’s Crusade for Amnesty, 1922

In late April 1922, around 30 women and children began picketing daily in front of the White House. They demanded that president Warren G. Harding free their husbands and fathers, imprisoned years earlier under the Espionage Act for criticizing the war effort during World War I.

Kate Richards O’Hare, a socialist who had herself been imprisoned under the Espionage Act, organized the protest against war, prisons, and suppression of free speech. And, given its small size and limited resources, it was surprisingly successful.

The Espionage Act of 1917

Woodrow Wilson passed the Espionage Act of 1917 in the middle of World War I. It severely curtailed freedom of speech, setting criminal penalties for obstructing enlistment or “urging treason.” Expanded by the Sedition Act of 1918, the Espionage Act made virtually any criticism of the war, the draft, or the war effort illegal. It was used to hand a ten-year prison sentence to socialist leader and presidential candidate Eugene V. Debs for making a pacifist speech.

As a socialist writer and speaker, Kate Richards O’Hare spoke extensively against the US entering World War I. She served a year in prison after being convicted under the Espionage Act, but her sentence was eventually commuted. She continued to be concerned about the fate of the hundred or so men who remained imprisoned under the act.

Marching to Washington

Kate and her husband Frank were approached for help by Dorothy Clark and Martha Reeder, wives of two of the imprisoned men. The O’Hares raised money for a protest in Washington in the pages of their socialist paper, The St. Louis Rip-Saw. They eventually gathered around thirty women and children and organized a series of sixteen stops between Missouri and Washington, DC. Funding was difficult, because the O’Hares were feuding with the Socialist Party. But Eugene V. Debs spoke at their event in Terre Haute, and the famous social worker Jane Addams provided funds in Chicago. In Chicago, the group also received aid from the American Civil Liberties Union.

Frank O’Hare did not want to set up a picket in front of the White House, fearing it would be a distraction, but Kate and the ACLU overruled him. Powerful images of children carrying signs that read “Is Opinion a Crime in U.S.A.?” and “Four Years Since I Saw My Daddy” appeared in newspapers across the country.

Source: Library of Congress (1922)

President Harding refused to meet with the protestors. He argued that reviewing cases was the responsibility of the Justice Department, and insisted he would not provide a blanket amnesty. Kate did manage to meet—and have a heated conversation—with Attorney General Harry S. Daugherty. National sympathy for the protestors built, however. Picketing continued until May. At that point, there was an outbreak of mumps, and most of the children headed home.

Success

Kate stayed on, however, and declared that though Harding had rebuffed her twenty times, she would stay “until we have succeeded in getting the administration to meet this issue squarely.” By the middle of June, the administration had freed fourteen men out of the eighteen fathers represented by families in the crusade. Kate declared victory and returned home in August.

On December 15, 1923, President Calvin Coolidge commuted the sentences of the last of those jailed under the Espionage Act. A small protest, conducted on a shoestring budget, used innovative tactics to strike a powerful blow for free speech and freedom of conscience in wartime.

Source: Library of Congress (1922)

Publications

I wrote a children’s book titled Prisons Must Fall with my long-time friend and comrade Jane Ball, gorgeously illustrated by my friend and comrade Olly Costello, that will be published in Spring 2025 by Haymarket Books. It’s been a few years in the making and there were a lot of twists and turns in the process. I am happy with how the book turned out. You can preorder now.

Olly Costello (2024)

Prose

I recommend spending time with each essay and interview in the Spring 2024 issue of Spectre. It was published in May, eight months into the Gaza genocide, and all of it still resonates powerfully half a year later.

Read this selection of life updates from Gazan editor and poet Mahmoud Al-Shaer that Arab Lit published last month. I sat with these words for a long time and they continue to resonate.

For Truthout, my friend Lewis Raven Wallace has looked at campaign materials and precedents to craft this clear-eyed breakdown of what Trump’s second term will mean for our trans siblings.

Also for Truthout, Silky Shah talks us through the strategies we’ll need to employ and the obstacles we’ll encounter as we work to keep our immigrant siblings safe amid renewed attacks.

Historian Brianna Nofil writes about the long history of the federal use of local Texas jails to detain immigrants, and about the equally long history of resistance to the inhumanity of the practice.

I really appreciated this coverage of the excellent work the California Coalition for Women Prisoners (CCWP) has done advocating for incarcerated women and of CCWP’s ongoing campaign to close California’s remaining women’s prisons.

This essay by English professor Eunsong Kim—about her correspondence with a former student who became a political prisoner in Hong Kong—looks beyond the quantifiable aspects of protest. Through her student, Kim explores the inherent, personal value of refusing to accept injustice.

I’m grateful to Kai Cheng Thom for this beautiful reflection about “how to survive the apocalypse (again).” She writes of her realization that “queer and trans people are, perhaps, the best-qualified community to survive the end of the world as we know it. After all, we’ve done it so many times before.”

This is an excellent look at the past, present, and future of community self-defense on the left.

This essay by writer Hugh Ryan offers a fascinating look at how carceral misogyny, racism, and queerphobia—in the forms of the Women’s Night Court and Manhattan’s notorious House of Detention—helped forge the queer resistance and Bohemian culture that Greenwich Village became known for.

Podcast

Conversations about building power and developing winning strategy for the left(s) are so critical in this moment. Deepak Bhargava and Stephanie Luce have been thinking and teaching about these issues for a long time, and they’ve put their conclusions into Practical Radicals, an accessible, smart, and energizing podcast to accompany their book of the same name.

Poem

Jane Hirshfield’s poem “Hope and Love” feels like a timely reflection as we collectively contemplate the approaching seasons of darkness and cold.

Potpourri

A couple of years ago, I was invited to share some words to close the Black Feminist Future Jubilee convening. I think they still hold up.

This is one of my favorite zines that I published this year. It includes gorgeous art! Some of my other zines are only available through Printed Matter. I donate all proceeds from zine sales to organizations doing important work.

For the People Leftist Library Project’s application to join FTP’s 2025 cohort for people who want to seek election or appointment to their local library board is open until December 14. There is a virtual open house on December 5th for those who want to learn more about the cohort. Register here. Get off the sidelines and move into governance!

The application for Black Zine Fair exhibitors, workshop facilitators, and volunteers is open until February 8, 2025.

A call for submissions from children and youth.

This book is essential for our current historical moment.

We need to tend to our collective spaces.

We all need political homes.

I love this so much! These students used Our Girl Tuesday, a Sojourners for Justice Press publication, to create a podcast episode about Dr. Margaret Burroughs.

This is a whimsical delight.

I aspire to be this smooth.

Jamming to Ella Baker…

Cool Library Thing

Last month, the Gloria Coles Flint (MI) Public Library hired a DJ, had a party, and gave away $7,000 worth of books to young people in its community.