The Last Jamboree

The promises and rhetoric of the protesters had been almost as puffed up as those of the politicians. The Youth International Party had billed both conventions as "ten days to change the world." Rennie Davis, former S.D.S. leader and veteran of the Chicago '68 riots, foresaw hundreds of thousands of demonstrators descending on Miami Beach for the Republican National Convention. Later he pared his estimate to 5,000 to 10,000, but continued to hold out the promise of the "largest sit-in in history." To ensure tight organization, Davis and leaders of the other, disparate protest elements banded together to form The Miami Convention Coalition; they held numerous meetings with each other and the Miami Beach police, and promised that there would be no "trashing" and no violence.

By the end of the convention, those promises and hopes had been toppled over as surely as some of the wooden police barricades near the convention center. Of the 4,000 or so demonstrators who did show up, only the Viet Nam Veterans Against the War remained well disciplined throughout. The night of Nixon's nomination, instead of forming the announced "gauntlet of shame" for the delegates to pass through as they filed into the hall, protesters formed what must have seemed to many delegates gauntlets of terror, thumping the doors and trunks of the arriving cars and taxis, and spitting, swearing and screaming at the delegates themselves. The performance moved the Miami Beach police to tow old city buses into place to block off access to the convention site the following night.

A Huff. Denied the possibility of throwing a wrench in the Republicans' clockwork organization by blocking all entrances to the hall, the demonstrators milled about in the streets, slashing tires, abusing more arriving delegates and breaking a few windows. Al Hubbard, a V.V.A.W. leader, walked off in a huff. "If trashing is the thing, if assaulting delegates is the thing, then we will have no part of it." The Miami Beach, county and state police forces who cracked scarcely a skull all the long week in a masterly display of restraint and cool, finally drove the protesters from the convention-center area with barrage after barrage of CS gas, whereupon the protesters marched peaceably back toward the beachfront hotels that were serving as Republican headquarters. By the end of the evening, the 4,000 had shrunk to 400 weary protesters sitting outside the Doral Hotel singing "All we are saying is give peace a chance," and waiting for the inevitable arrests (which went over 1,000 for the week).

The height of the sporadic chaos, caused mostly by a few small "mobile affinity groups" of trashers, who in some cases came equipped with their own tear gas, occurred during Nixon's and Agnew's acceptance speeches, and therefore received almost no television coverage. But simultaneous logs of the police radio channel and the convention proceedings capture the yin and yang of the final evening:

9:50 P.M. Senator Robert Griffin introduces Agnew: "The magic hour is at hand."

Police radio: "Did you read that message about gas? They're starting to feel the effects of gas in the north hall. Is there something you can do to reduce that gas on the outside?"

10 P.M. Vice President Agnew: "Mr. Chairman, members of the committee and my fellow Americans..."

Police radio: "There's a big group down here at 20th and Collins putting trash cans and everything in the roadway."

Agnew: "It is our mission to create a climate of dignity and security and peace and honor..."

Police radio: "We just sent Miami police back north on Collins to quiet down the area up there."

10:26 P.M. President Nixon arrives on the podium, and the band strikes up The Stars and Stripes Forever.

Police radio: "Get people in here on the double. We need help."

Nixon: "Four years ago, standing in this very place, I proudly accepted the nomination for..."

Police radio: "There's a large group throwing trash on the street. You got anyone up there you can move in from the south?"

10:41 P.M. Nixon: "The choice in this election is not between radical change and no change. The choice is between..."

Police radio: "Be advised that a group of 200 just left Flamingo Park. Many of the group have clubs. There's a male Negro, striped shirt, striped pants, waving a revolver in the mall. Six feet, in his 20s."

11:05 P.M. Nixon finishes his speech: "Let us build a peace that our children and all the children of the world can enjoy for generations to come."

Police radio: "There are 60 or 75 in the area of Pennsylvania and One-Six Street with iron bars and pipes."

11:07 P.M. The Republican assemblage rises to sing God Bless America.

It was the end of the convention, and it may well have been the end of massive war protests in the U.S. To many of the antiwar leaders, Miami Beach had seemed the chance to reassemble the movement and kick off a national campaign against Nixon. More likely it was, as Jeff Nightbyrd, a yippie leader, put it, "the last of the national jamborees."

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.