420 Warrior
Well-Known Member
Unmoved by our recent admonition that they rein in plans to bolster ticketing and student discipline in conjunction with the annual 4/20 pot smokeout, University of Colorado officials have gone a step further.
They plan to close the Boulder campus to the public next Friday in hopes of shutting down the protest held each year to show support for marijuana legalization.
According to The Daily Camera, only CU-Boulder students and employees will be allowed on the campus on April 20 – and they will be required to show identification to authorities. Limited access will be available for visitors or people who have official business on campus.
We don't support the idea, but CU police would be within their rights to ticket people who light up during next week's demonstration – as 23 unlucky people found out last year.
But ticketing people merely for trespass, which carries a penalty of up to $750 and six months in jail, because they show up at a protest – even if they have no intention of breaking a law? Wow.
Clearly the school is serious about putting a stop to the gathering. They also seem to be inviting a fight.
Mark Silverstein, legal director for the ACLU of Colorado, told us Friday afternoon that it was too soon to say whether his group would challenge the action in court.
"The decision to close the campus is a wrongheaded, misguided effort to thwart students' right of association and right to free expression," he said.
"The constitution doesn't provide a right to smoke pot in public. But the First Amendment does provide a right for students to associate with others to amplify – to join with others to spread their message."
CU spokesman Bronson Hilliard said the chancellor can restrict access to campus because of weather, safety concerns or "disruption."
There is no question that the event is disruptive. Democracy can be messy like that.
CU would know,. The Boulder campus over the years has been home to other disruptive rallies – opposition to the Vietnam War and apartheid come to mind – that, as near as anyone we've spoken to knows, didn't result in closing the campus.
Chancellor Philip DiStefano wrote to us this week and said the 4/20 gathering is not a protest because there are "no microphones, demonstrations, or arguments advanced. If it is a protest, then every party on every college campus in America is a protest."
So a protest requires a PA system? What about sitting at a lunch counter, wearing a hoodie, or throwing tea into a harbor?
This demonstration – for many, but not all attendees – involves smoking pot in public on a specified date and at a specified time. It is by definition a demonstration.
In taking university officials to task last week, we noted they have brought much of the unwanted attention upon themselves for ham-handed efforts to quash a single event under the guise of protecting the school's reputation.
The latest iteration is heavy-handed and, in our view, an overreach.
Garrett Kramer smokes a large blunt during a 4/20 event on Norlin Quad at the University of Colorado in Boulder, April 20, 2010.
News Hawk - 420 Warrior 420 MAGAZINE
Location: Denver, CO
Source: The Denver Post
Contact: openforum@denverpost.com
Copyright: 2012 The Denver Post Corp
Website: www.denverpost.com
They plan to close the Boulder campus to the public next Friday in hopes of shutting down the protest held each year to show support for marijuana legalization.
According to The Daily Camera, only CU-Boulder students and employees will be allowed on the campus on April 20 – and they will be required to show identification to authorities. Limited access will be available for visitors or people who have official business on campus.
We don't support the idea, but CU police would be within their rights to ticket people who light up during next week's demonstration – as 23 unlucky people found out last year.
But ticketing people merely for trespass, which carries a penalty of up to $750 and six months in jail, because they show up at a protest – even if they have no intention of breaking a law? Wow.
Clearly the school is serious about putting a stop to the gathering. They also seem to be inviting a fight.
Mark Silverstein, legal director for the ACLU of Colorado, told us Friday afternoon that it was too soon to say whether his group would challenge the action in court.
"The decision to close the campus is a wrongheaded, misguided effort to thwart students' right of association and right to free expression," he said.
"The constitution doesn't provide a right to smoke pot in public. But the First Amendment does provide a right for students to associate with others to amplify – to join with others to spread their message."
CU spokesman Bronson Hilliard said the chancellor can restrict access to campus because of weather, safety concerns or "disruption."
There is no question that the event is disruptive. Democracy can be messy like that.
CU would know,. The Boulder campus over the years has been home to other disruptive rallies – opposition to the Vietnam War and apartheid come to mind – that, as near as anyone we've spoken to knows, didn't result in closing the campus.
Chancellor Philip DiStefano wrote to us this week and said the 4/20 gathering is not a protest because there are "no microphones, demonstrations, or arguments advanced. If it is a protest, then every party on every college campus in America is a protest."
So a protest requires a PA system? What about sitting at a lunch counter, wearing a hoodie, or throwing tea into a harbor?
This demonstration – for many, but not all attendees – involves smoking pot in public on a specified date and at a specified time. It is by definition a demonstration.
In taking university officials to task last week, we noted they have brought much of the unwanted attention upon themselves for ham-handed efforts to quash a single event under the guise of protecting the school's reputation.
The latest iteration is heavy-handed and, in our view, an overreach.
Garrett Kramer smokes a large blunt during a 4/20 event on Norlin Quad at the University of Colorado in Boulder, April 20, 2010.
News Hawk - 420 Warrior 420 MAGAZINE
Location: Denver, CO
Source: The Denver Post
Contact: openforum@denverpost.com
Copyright: 2012 The Denver Post Corp
Website: www.denverpost.com
