Faster, and we wanted and efficient way to adjudicate their patents. A consequence was that people were using them to validate pharmaceutical patents. We worked 14 years to bring a product to market and spent 2 billion and now we dont have the same standards as the civil courts. You have others shorting or taking a patent into patent review and shorting the stock. Theyre using it away of making money. Were trying to get this change. So we go to congress and the senate says if we change it car they said it has to be paid for because of the patents are protected its going to cost society more money. You have to pay more money and have it paid for for the score to be zero. I thought patterns were a good thing. I thought patents created wealth. I thought patents were a central part of our society. If patents are being destroyed, we will score positively. Our system is so crazy that we have to pay so that we can reestablish the right to have a patent. I Hope Congress gets one of york coins before its too late. I hope i get one of your coins. It sounds awesome. Thank you very much ian read, its been awesome. [applause]. Thank you very much indeed. If washington adopts the node jerks policy we might all be in a better place. That was a fascinating discussion and were grateful for you being with us and thank you dennis. Thank you all for being here this morning. I want to pay special tribute to our sponsors. Thank you for joining us, we couldnt do it without your support. That concludes our morning session and we will be back in january. We look forward to that and in the meantime have a a wonderful day and thank you all for being here. Goodbye. [applause]. Tomorrow night on cspan, a look at how congressional gold medals are designed and a look at the highest honors. Thats the eight eastern time. Friday night, the annual Hispanic NationalBar Association conference with a keynote from the director of immigration and customs enforcement. Watch it at 8 00 p. M. Eastern on cspan. Hello this is hillary clinton. I want to thank you for letting me speak with you about an issue that is central to our childrens future and critical in our fight to restore this nations economy. Solving our Nations Health care crisis. There is no prescription or role model or tip book for being first lady. The future is created every day. Is not something that is out there waiting to happen to us. The future is something that we make. I have said and i believe that theres a good possibility that sometime in the next 20 years we will have a woman president. She experienced many first in her role as first lady. Her and her husband bill clinton have been political figures since college. Hillary clinton, this sunday night at 8 00 p. M. Eastern on cspan original series, first lady. Examining the public and private life of the women who filled the position of first lady and their influence on the presidency. From Martha Washington to michelle obama. Sunday at eight pm eastern on American History tv on cspan three. Political activists and academics at the university of massachusetts discuss the history of nonviolent political protest from the Civil Rights Era to black lives matter. This is just over an hour. Just going to introduce our moderator for tonight. I am really please to introduce professor dan. He is a real inspiration and longtime activist for a great many of us on this campus. Most recently he has been very active in building the educators for a democratic union, the progressive caucus within the Massachusetts Teacher Association which is the Largest Union in the state. He has been a tremendous organizing power. So i will turn it over to dan clawson. Thank you. So heres how the evening will work. Ill give you a brief overview of how the evening will work. I will do a few minutes on the theory of direct actions and some questions to vague about this evening and then ill turn it over to our panelists. Each of the five panelists have been asked to speak for not more than 12 minutes. Ill give him a time check near the end. The focus for tonight is on direct action. How it operates, whats involved, its effects on the participants in the larger movement, what works and what doesnt, the concerns raised within the movement and by then those on the outside and similar questions. Our panelists will focus exclusively on personal stories, specifics, this is what happened on this occasion, this is what we learn from it, this is why it worked or didnt work. The focus tonight is not primarily on the issue that led to the direct action. Selfish night we are more interested in resistance and rather than why the war was bad. We want to know more about what black lives matter rather than how the police treat black people. We are going to focus primarily on non violent direct action. After the panelists be, we will throw the floor open to people in the audience and we very much want audience participation. You do not have to pretend to be asking a question. You can just make a comment, but just as we are limiting the panelist, we will limit the people in the audience and people can have up to two minutes but not more than two minutes for the questioner. We will collect several questions or comments and then go to the audience for responses and each panelist will again have, not more than two minutes to respond to the set of three or four questions that they received so they can choose to focus on just one of them. So let me pose two questions to think about tonight as we hear the specific stories and remarks. First why engage in direct action . Why is direct action the way we should approach something . So by that i dont mean what moves people to action in the first place but why choose direct action and what does it hope to accomplish . I will suggest three possible reasons to do so, to take direct action recognizing that there are others that believe every action will have a mix of reactions. I refused to drafted and be somebody who is asked to go out and kill other people. I will not do it. That is what this is about. Thats all there is to it. Second, you could do it as a way of bringing public attention to the issue. The media will not cover it this that if we mount a large demonstration, if dozens of people or hundreds of people are arrested they will have no choice but to cover it that will bring publicity to our issue and help raise awareness. Third people do it as a way to change conditions. I dont care whether or not the media covers it. Nobody is riding the buses in montgomery until they are integrated. We will keep not riding the buses until we win. So that is a third purpose. We can do direct action in a variety of ways and its partly determined by the goal of the action. If the goal of the direct action is to get Media Attention and in my experience, these days, that is most of the direct action is intended for that purpose. Then the action is usually planned by organizers who notify the media in advance, often notify the police in advance, often negotiate the terms of the arrest and how the whole operation will operate. In general, the more people arrested, the more Media Attention it will get. So they usually want more people to get arrested. If you taking that approach, there may be some tendency to being more likely to recruit people who have some level of privilege, whether that is racial privilege or class privilege or whether they dont have a fixed employment schedule that they will lose if they dont show up for work because its easier for them to pay the costs in those situation. None of this is inevitable. I want to emphasize that. Thats a good thing. Thats what we want the panel to do. If the aim of the disruption, if the aim of the direct action is to disrupt the normal functioning of society in ways that matter to the people with power and that society and uses sustain it until the people with power have to give in, then you have a somewhat different equation. In that case may be the goal is to not get arrested but you can continue the demonstration as long as possible. So especially young people have dozens of demonstrations where thousands of people show up to protest and they disrupt the flow of traffic. Sometimes two or three different groups are in different places and they rejoin later. If its done properly, you hope nobody gets arrested but you had a successful action in some way. Those are two different ways of thinking of it. Generally speaking most of the direct actions that we will be hearing about will be in public but thats not always the case. We were talking before the meeting began where some people broke into the fbi office, backed the truck up and stole all the files that were in the fbi office and released all the political files which was a lot of files. Those people were never caught. They told their stories to the media long after the event was over in the statute of limitation was over but the goal was not to wait around to be caught. It was to do it without being caught but was definitely a form of direct action. Now let me turn it over to our five terrific panelists and we will take them, as it happens in the order that is on this sheet and thats also the order that were sitting up. Table so if you dont have a a sheet yet we are going to get copies and pass them out. I will say the name of the person thats doing it because the sheet has more information than i could do without taking up a lot of time. Our next speaker will be randy keeler. Its good to be here with you for this very important discussion. To tell you the truth, i dont really, really know exactly what direct action is. I dont know if theres a direct or correct definition. If there is i dont know it. In my life ive just done what i thought made sense to me in the face of certain circumstances that made sense to me both strategically and ethically. I think loosely defined, i think ive spent most of my adult life engaged in direct action. Some of that is in the program you have. I think many of us who first get involved in direct action of any kind, there is a moment in an issue that gets involved. For me the moment was 1966 and i was 22 years old and the issue was the u. S. War in vietnam. I went gradually but steadily from peaceful protest to out now resistance and noncooperation in a very public way. I turned in my draft card and was arrested by the fbi. I spent 22 months in federal prison as a result. In other years i found that organizing was something that i like to do and i could do and seemed like a helpful thing to do. So wasnt just an active participant, but i spent far more time organizing them. Whether it was to stop twin Nuclear Power plants from being built in the 1970s are stopping the construction which we did not succeed exceed of the Nuclear Power plant in New Hampshire in the 1970s. A number of things like that. I also started early with my wife. The war was so horrendous in our mind, in so many ways whether it was the korean poverty and abuse and destruction of land, i didnt want to give my body so we have been for text resistors ever since 1976 as a result. We had our First Bank Account seized and then our wages levied and finally our home in 1991 was seized and sold out from under us. We had hundreds and hundreds of supporters which was an amazing thing. Most of the 80s and 90s i spent organizing two Major National campaigns. One for Nuclear Disarmament and one for the abolition of privately financed campaigns. After trying to recuperate from my exertions, i tried to stop the power plant in vermont. That has now been stopped [applause]. The people here have been very much involved in that. Now, im one of many people, including a number of people here tonight, who is trying to determine the role of direct action in this huge pipeline project that wants to destroy major pieces of land through towns throughout western massachusetts to carry unneeded gas that should have never been fractured in the first place for the corporations that want to build a pipeline. Thats a whole other issue and i think well talk about that in the discussion. So let me just share a few observations or conclusions about things i have learned from the activity ive just described. [inaudible] direct action can be any number of things. Not just blocking or stopping things which again is a a primary activity and ive been involved with lots of things, that can be impromptu speak outs and hanging banners on buildings. You name it. Direct action is usually a key factor in political change. Its rarely, in my estimation, unable to do it on its own. It is often a key element of a broader strategy that involves all kinds of other things from neighborhood organizing to public education, using them media and others. As they said, there is a risk in direct action but the risk is undeniably always almost greater for people of color, to women, to our working class or poor class than it is for myself who are white male privileged people. I think that always needs to be recognized. I want to also say that acts of courage and passion are contagious. They are contagious. When people step out with courage compassion, passion, they take a risk in the mix inspires other people. It is contagious and that is key to building a movement. It spreads and it inspires. Next i want to just mention, some people have told me, why do you bother risking arrest or risking taking time off from work or disrupting family events or anything for a direct action event when you know wont do any good. You cant fight city hall. Who will care, it doesnt matter. I want to say that ive heard them many times. I want to say that no act can ever be said to be futile. Simply because we dont know what ripples throw out from what we do. Who listens to what. In my own life, i was giving a speech in 1969, just giving a talk. I was talking about the fact that i had been arrested by the fbi and felt it was almost certainly on the way to federal prison for draft resistance. Unbeknownst to me there was a man in the audience who later revealed to the public the topsecret pentagon papers. I didnt know he would hear something i said which was what could any of us do more than what were already doing if we were willing to risk imprisonment. He said when he asked himself that question he knew that topsecret study had to be revealed to the public showing years and years of lies about the war in vietnam. So he did that and he faced a possible 115 years in prison. but you never know down the road. Those of the examples i could give. And winning is they keep beecher and should be a strategic focus. We will end when we get enough people if not joining us but supporting us to pressure Decision Makers to change things to affect other people and i want to say that people that are so afraid of violence to matter who they are or their cause. If there is the reason to win over others. This is an ethical and spiritual question it coincides with my values to feel good about the actions over the long haul. There is something called the of lot of ends and means. And we dont get what we want but what we do. If we use violence that is the story of the tragic story so that is one reason to think about how not just what impact it had on us. [applause] now our next speaker. I want to note what i see as direct action is any number of things sometimes sitting sometimes marching sometimes walking or sometimes just standing. I remember talking with one of miamis sisters with one of my sisters and said what did you want from me . Is sometimes a what he tuesday and with me because if youre white this will protect us and sometimes the what you to walk behind me. The person that seems to have the beast privilege has to be the voice. What i think about direct action i think of the different factions and their realized one of the things that keeps me going is the sense of community that i have. What i have done tonight i could talk to for 12 years about the power of community. Dont worry i have not. I brought along my sisters the raging grannies are here. Because this is one of the things our communities to, we sing. We pass out song sheets for you to join us because were not doing a concert, one song so what if we do that right here . So it was about the pipeline that we just talked about. Hit it. Please join. Viewer not seeing the same notes dont worry that is just another way to do harmony. [laughter] [applause] not only was that a nice song in that wonderful rendition but in singing with us become part of the community. Some of us are already are but any way that we can emphasize those connections is a good. Thanks for singing along. That was just a couple of minutes. I am paying attention. But what i wanted to do was to look at how i came to this and my real story that i grew up in new orleans for 1943, some of you your grandparents were born about then. In the apartheid south. It was an amazingly horrific time and i didnt know it because i was very privileged. But i had another dimension of my life with my parents who were extraordinarily already quite advanced alcoholics. So where did i turn and find a voice . I found support in the church with the nuns and the priest who were strong people, carrying people who provided the early seeds of my appreciation of community. Not only were they there to nurture and carrying but also the people who were aware of the Racial Injustice that was happening so through them i learned what was happening in the various dimensions of the involvement and i was there when we took the signs down. In those days we were working for integration be the better not. But it was a step and as i talk to my other friends like the white southerners who also learned how not only did the people of color suffer, but we did because we bought the lie. And it has taken many years to undo those lies. But those are the release seeds. Since then, i have realized we are in this world, where all context matters. Is so important with some of the students here and i realize each of us is abetted in where we came from with their own stories. Delaying those histories and stories we are informed to participate in what we find ourselves, this present and it is an extraordinary time. When they were talking about once upon a time when we did activities and actions i remembered to be part of the women pentagon action that was part of the washington post. And today we have at the Regulatory Commission protesting and walking out im sure you have read all about it. Because we dont have a press that covers anything of substance but of a story that happened last week i was in washington, last tuesday, the day after labor day a man was speaking at the American Enterprise institute. Somebody thought it was american empire inc. [laughter] dick cheney was giving a the talk god knows what they were paying him. One of these young people tried to give. An interim losses coated pink. Iran during his speech he stood up that said a rest dick cheney he is a war criminal. Wow. That was amazing. Needless to say a man was very upset and went over and started to pull the banner away from her. She did not let it go. Finally he fell over trying to take it away. Later in the day, she was sitting down talking about it and she got a call from the press who wanted to know what was her workout exercise. [laughter] how irrelevant can you possibly be . That that was their question. What did you really want to do . They have been horrible war crimes but this 21 yearold intern god bless her but that is why we need to keep doing what were doing and if we dont make the noise or tell the stories they dont get out. Or have radio programs on the Community Radio stations and that is where you get your news. But even abc or nbc big networks you just will not get it. This is the piece of news behalf to keep alive to know it is not just a question of where do you get your exercise regimen. That is one of the pieces and the issue for me that i call personalism. I get distracted by numbers and statistics like how many feet toward mm. I am not a mathematician. But if my friend says this is really bad and i want you to learn about it and stand with me i will do that. And i had the good fortune recently to be offered that kind of invitation by the man who started the school of americas watch were at the same house and he said by the way tomorrow im going to be a busy they are doing terrible things to women there there imprisoning women with miscarriages charging with aggravated homicide going to jail for years we protest with me . If you said this is the protest, would you come to do this with me . Come to the state house i would say i trust you i knew we were doing i will be there. And black lives matter says were doing something come stand with us ill be there. That is the call to stand with one another to be in community. A lot of us are familiar with the Martin Luther king. You need to know the rest of the because it is not the complete sentiment. It is neutral italy been stored justice when we put our weight on it. But he was in fact, my brother. [laughter] my next speaker talks about the springfield that no one leaves. [laughter] emma member of Springfield Gore leaves an organization for people and their housing struggles. In 2006 tragedy when dash tragedy stock stroke my family is my son was killed in an automobile accident, four months later led mother passed away. I became distraught and spiraled into depression. It consumed me and i was unable to return to work for cry used up all love major Term Disability and in 2008 and then quit in, i had access to. I. A. Immediately contacted the bank to redoubt in they refuse to work with me in any capacity the only option bush to sell because after years of fighting on my own i found that was not alone with what the hell of the big bath with theres a premium bid to raise the policies may be in for profit and not for people. The more involved they became with those injustices happening in my community and the underlying system that we allow this to happen people are evicted who could afford to pay a fair rent or recovered from the crisis and jim got a afford to pay to them to have compassion and children and adults couldnt be out on this street were working with families that left them a good and notes. Family was a twoyear old child hurt disabled grandparent in her prepared to. I knew it this dimly head dash testable and then to see what role like to play to keep the family in their home. Although a person could play but then i believe the nef is a movement but now but then to risk arrest and then with the police to be rested. We could be treated differently because their gender or color of our skin. We made it clear sum could be held longer than others based on the same reasons. I was not shocked as a black that was just during the mid60s and 70s and here we are in the year 2015. And was not and were those taken by and then to beat neck and head and other family pushed out into the street and the homeless kept me from being scared were nervous. I was ready. The first was called off over a technical error of the bank, the judge with the families filed a motion for a stay of execution. In april, led the bank served a family with a 72 hour notice of eviction. After thousands of phone calls on behalf of the family the bank called of the eviction. Finally in may the family was again served with another 48 hour notice of eviction. After many calls to negotiate, and other alternative the family was told there were no alternatives and they were going to follow through. The awarding of the blockade i was motivated to do what i felt was right to keep the family in their home. I knew i was properly trained and made aware of what i could possibly be facing that day. I didnt care are without a higher risk because it was a black woman or the condition that would face one that was processed in a jail cell program was consumed to make sure another family was not made homeless by degree banks. We gathered at the home that morning as the depiction was scheduled at 9 00. About 830 the Bank Attorney kept driving back and forth taking pictures with his cell phone of the protesters gathering that were quietly talking and enjoying coffee at 850 dash share if showed up in the death notice in the left the family met with organizers of no one leaves in the review the paper work. It was announced the banks attorney had filed a motion that the peaceful protest which had not even begun was impeding the bank and they felt their safety was a risk although they were unable to schedule the lockout there were asking the state to allow to carry out the eviction without any notice at any date or time the family was to appear at a Court Hearing scheduled 2 p. M. That afternoon to respond to the allegations made. So they left to defend against the foolish motion. Other stayed behind to defend it in case they showed up to carry out the eviction. We were successful to keep another family in their home. Recap another child with a roof over her head and kept aid this elderly couple from being pushed out into the streets. We won the battle but the war against the bank is ongoing and will continue until it is recognized that housing should not be for profit. It is a human right. [applause] para last speaker. My name is rose i was the member since freddie mac for closed on my home and i am still in my home i am still fighting to keep my home i will even continue to fight when a judge tells me i have to leave. [applause] through my journey, now a community organizer. I believe in the movement so much 68,000 bailies the boss their homes in the state of massachusetts theyre not eligible for shelters because massachusetts has a law that states if you are a former homeowner and evicted you are not eligible for shelter. So we have thousands of families out on the street which we believe is not correct in springfield we have 1300 vacant homes there is no reason for anybody in the state to be homeless there are they didnt buildings we could occupy to takeover. So some of my direct actions that i participated the National Coalition made up of fannie mae and freddie mac fighters pushing really hard to get policy changed. 60 of the mortgages are owned by freddie then the mayor freddie mac. We believe there are three demands of millions of families due to the housing bubble that will never as of equity believe they should reduce the principal to the current market values of their out of the risk of falling into foreclosure. We believe he should be allowed to rent after foreclosure why make another home vacant and make the Property Values decrease if you can afford to stay in the house. The banks have a practice to make sure we continue to feel shame by erecting the family from the home of forcibly. I have participated in civil disobedience in washington d. C. Where we should down washington avenue in front of the fannie mae offices and from there we drove to virginia to the freddie mac offices and protested. From there we then drove to the head of the house and we tell the people party in front of his fellow calling for the firing as he was not willing to push fannie and freddie to work with the people. Since all direct actions we have gotten significant policy changes. They used to have the armslength deal that meant i was not allowed to buy back my home. When you had to sign the deal and would not read to me or anybody in my family, no contact but now that policy is changed ivan the process of buying back my home. Caller and then to and the proposed to build and maintain Affordable Housing there is the depiction perspective bill to make the banks less is say hello lou that will occupy the property so they have to except the brent. Once implemented as a 90 success rate. But if the bank refuses to repeat so it is able to maintain this the whole and also requires the banks of the now we are in boston pushing for a bill through the Municipal Authority that will allow musicality is to control and dimbleby is cities and neighborhoods. I am the mother of two young children. So i have to be very careful if i want to remain inactive participant because if i dont come i cannot chaperone . I do talks American Culture limo laziness schools countersigned told the shy. In begin by giving your name. My name is very. End and i really enjoyed the presentations that may help to clarify because i am not sure everybody here. Hagen to your thought. Review and direct action limited to talking. My name is billion so i do remember in the 80s there was a movement that the college against apartheid in selfie africa. It is hard to get the visualize now but there was as many 5,000 people in south africa. They say theres numbers in a string if you want to accomplish anything, apartheid was put out of business so to speak. It ended that part so i dont say that was and when the action but they are all over the world. Mitt would be a good idea to put away the high tuitions that people pay for college. When i look at how much they owe, went to College Living for years of the debt for petitions and actions and demonstrations against the exploitation. Also organizing student athletes there the most exploited people women and men athletes they get injuries that last for life but they lose their scholarship and dont play anymore. [applause] but had the privilege of being part of the resistance studies and that is a new entity where we steady resistance of different forms. And wanted to ask that with my a understanding to have a defining quality that we try to solve the problems ourselves. Going through legislatures in to solve the problems for us. That could be civil disobedience so it is about people power and your understanding of it. Thank you. This is the last one. Bid evening. I am from ash field zero local pipeline activist. My history also includes activism and antiwar, antinuclear arms arms, the antiwar. What i have seen it is about people so how does the panel see nonviolent direct action to people of different political persuasions . Everyone in your fighting against it basically in the high minority positions of power to to take resources whether land, housing, lives , from us the people. Deal is the nonviolent direct action cutting across political color boundaries . Weld boundaries to bring us together as people who face the onslaught across the board to put us in the position of defensiveness . Lets give the panel a chance to respond and we will start reverse order. You can choose to pass if you want. A background check that includes credit history, criminal basically a complete background check that has gone to the system will then report back to whatever agency has asked for it. The Indian Freddie are basically mortgage guarantors why small banks back well loans so that people can get mortgage loans. Darr the entity behind the scenes. Most of the time people think even though your statement says u. S. Bank really it is just the servicer is it is freddie mac that owns the note until you pay off your mortgage. Will quickly remind you of the question is this is very brief. The first one has been answered i will skip bit the next with about direct access of high student tuition and student athletes in the defining qualities trying to solve problems for themselves but the what the panelists think about that if they agree or disagree and to what extent is that the way to cut across the political boundaries to mobilize action . I think those were more comments ban questions thatll have any questions or answers bedmate appreciate those for every institution of Higher Learning to organize and support them. I think the issues raised about direct action coming it is multifaceted on one hand it certainly can be in europe among the folks in mexico where the people have taken over as part of direct action but were still may mean the problem. And they think maybe there places where people have taken over were springfield no one believes is the place we can support people taking over how many hundreds of empty homes of people who need homes . That is the Perfect Place to do it ourselves and not to wait for the mayor of springfield and that would be an excellent action to be involved. The other thing the comments about building a movement. I dont know if we ever get everybody right away. Think of vietnam and how long it took before it