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04/12/2007
Protesters' arrest attempts fizzle'Sit-ins' held at Levin's and Stabenow's officesTRAVERSE CITY — What does a nonviolent protester have to do to get arrested in this town? Acts of civil disobedience at the Traverse City office of Sen. Carl Levin and the Garfield Township office of Sen. Debbie Stabenow ended without incident but also without arrest Wednesday. Members of the Traverse City Peace and Justice Community intended to stage peaceful "sit-ins” at the offices. They want Levin and Stabenow to call for an immediate end to funding for the war in Iraq. They also wanted to stage a sit-in at U.S. Rep. Dave Camp's office but the office was closed on Wednesday. Seven of the protesters planned to stay at Levin's and Stabenow's offices until they were removed by police and taken to jail. At Stabenow's office, Grand Traverse County Sheriff's deputies arrived shortly after the office closed at 5 p.m. and were able to make the protesters in the office believe they were under arrest so they would leave. Once out of the office, the door was locked behind them and the police left, activist Jim Coats said. Coats said he still hopes the group was able to send their message to the senators. "People aren't standing up the way they could to reflect the will of the people,” he said. At Levin's office in the Milliken Place building at the corner of Front and Cass streets, building owners told the protesters to leave at 5:30 p.m. Five or six refused and remained in the small reception area at Levin's office. Activist Steve Morse said he finally had to suggest to the owners that they call police because the group was not going to leave. "I'm occupying this office because the United States government is doing the illegal occupation of Iraq,” another protester, Kay Bond, said as she was asked to leave. But the owners and Levin's staff did not call police. Instead, a staff member apparently resolved to wait out the protesters until they decided to leave on their own at around 6:40 p.m. Morse said the group will consider staging similar protests more frequently. "I've had friends ask me, my kids, like, 'What are you getting out of this?'” Morse said earlier Wednesday. "It's not as like we sit around and say, 'OK, if we do this, they'll give in.'” Rather, Morse said, he and the others believe they need to make a moral statement. "If you have an immoral war, and we're all convinced of that, then we take moral positions,” Morse said.
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