Court's flag-burning ruling: Bait for a trap

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Staff: Paul Colvin, May May Gong, David Kirschner, Hayden Perry, PUSTMASTEK: Send address changes to Socialist Action, 3435 Army RATES: For one year (12 issues)—U.S. 2nd Class: $8, 1st Class: $12; Canada and Mexico 2nd Class: $12, 1st Class: $15; All other countries 2nd Class: $15, 1st Class: $30. (Canada money orders or checks should be in 2 SOCIALIST ACTION AUGUST 1989 The Supreme Court's decision upholding the right of the people to burn the American flag as an expression of free speech is, on its face, anomalous. This decision comes in the context of a wide-ranging attack on basic human and democratic rights.

This month, Nat Weinstein is the guest columnist of "Behind the Lines." Michael Schreiber's regularly featured column will return in September ActioN Editor: ALAN BENJAMIN Asst. Editors: MICHAEL SCHREIBER JOE RYAN Kwame M.A. Somburu, Sylvia Weinstein.

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The just-concluded session of the Supreme Court reversed such pre-. vious decisions as outlawing harassment of Blacks and other targets of racism and sexism on the job, and upholding mandatory drug tests-violating the right to privacy. The latter is designed to make workers the goat for unsafe corporate practices in rail and other industries.

And topping it off, the assault on democratic rights culminated dramatically in the Court's decision gutting the right of women to choose when to give birth. American supporters of the Bill of Closin date:

July 24, monthly for $8 per year Army St., No. 308, San at San Francisco, Calif. views of Socialist Action. Rights, thus, have cause for deep suspicion over the real purpose of the high Court's "defense" of flagburning.

The July 14 New York Times gives an ominous clue as to the real intent of the Supreme Court. The paper's "Quotations of the Day" features a statement by Rep. G.V. (Sonny) Montgomery, Democrat of Mississippi, who sends a message to potential shock troops of capitalist reaction.

Montgomery is quoted as saying: "If we don't do something [to reverse the flag decision], I fear that Americans, and especially veterans' groups, are going to stop the desecration of the flag in their own way and people are going to get hurt."

Montgomery's statement is hardly motivated by a "fear" of violence. It constitutes a call to action!

The Court's one-two-punch strategy is apparent. Their attack on a woman's right to choose, they knew, would set into motion massive counter-mobilizations at clinics, in the streets of the nation's capital, and in other cities across the land. They needed, therefore, to maximize support for the anti-abortion shock troops of capitalist reaction. Otherwise, their attack on women's rights could backfire, forcing the Court to retreat.

Seeming to have come from out of the blue, the flag decision is calculated to entrap the impatient and unwary into this highly abstract and diversionary expression of protest. The decision serves to provoke actions that will "outrage patriotic Americans," and provide a symbol around which to justify right-wing physical attacks on women exercising their right to have an abortion.

The Court's decision already has served to bait a small minority of outraged supporters of women's rights. At mass protest rallies held on the day of the Court's anti-abortion decision, a few people swallowed the bait. That night and the next day the media-as was to be expected-focused their attention on images of American flags being burned by supporters of abortion rights.

The ruling class of America lost no time in mobilizing their forces for putting down a developing mass movement in defense of women's rights. The news coverage of the pro-choice demonstrations further illustrates how the capitalist-controlled media mis-handles reporting of such events.

Operation Rescue (OR) leader, Randall Terry, lost no time taking advantage of the Supreme Court's attack on Roe v. Wade. On the day of the decision, he announced from the steps of the Court a big escalation of his right-wing extra-legalaction group's attempted blockade of abortion clinics.

But despite massive news coverage of Terry's declaration, OR's attacks on clinics the following Saturday, July 8, were decisively defeated by much larger pro-choice counter-mobilizations.

This writer was fortunate enough to be present at the confrontation between pro-choice and anti-abortion forces in Orange County that Saturday [see story on page 5]. Of the nearly 2000 defenders (who outmobilized OR by as much as four to one), not one person was foolish enough to burn a single flag.

True enough, without any flagburning to feature on TV screens, the media barely covered this genuinely news-worthy event. And to the extent they did cover it, they gave the false impression that the contending forces were evenly divided. They suggested, as well, that OR had succeeded in their goal of preventing clients from entering the clinic.

But over 2000 defenders of the clinic know better. We celebrated this important victory—in which the pro-choice forces kept the clinic open without depending on the treacherous support of the police. A model example was given of how to defend women's rights without swallowing the flag-burning bait.