Origins
In the late 1960s into the 1970s, there was a revolutionary current throughout the college campuses in the United States. In the midst of the Vietnam War and the counterculture movement, student groups and protests began popping up around the country—and then progressively growing larger and more networked. Chief among those revolutionary leftist groups was the Students for a Democratic Society, which would become nearly synonymous with the growing youth discontent. In what would become an official SDS charter, the Port Huron Statement, Tom Hayden laid out his generation’s growing discontent:
“We are people of this generation, bred in at least modest comfort, housed now in universities, looking uncomfortably to the world we inherit. …show more content…
Their theory, as Rudd said (2006), was that militancy was an end in itself; that the more militant they became, the more attention and followers they would draw, and that revolution would snowball. In 1969 they hosted the Days of Rage, intended to rally support to “bring the war home”, a growing battle cry. Over several days they staged two separate riots, resulting in dozens of arrests and injuries both for protestors and police, and hundreds of thousands in property damage. As the SDS disintegrated and police pressure mounted, the group was driven fully underground, and began its arson and bombing campaigns in cities around the …show more content…
The Weathermen began manufacturing explosives, and would plant and detonate bombs overnight in unoccupied public buildings—police departments, banks, courthouses, army bases, and eventually the Pentagon and the US Capitol. (Jacobs, 1997) In 1970, they broke counterculture leader Timothy Leary out of a state prison. In the span of just seven years, the Weather Underground committed countless violent acts throughout the country, grabbing headlines and leaving bodies in their wake. Failed explosives claimed the lives of several members, and bystanders were often caught in the fire of their explosives. Federal investigators were always just around the corner, and dozens of members were tried on charges from murder to conspiracy, landing countless members in prison with hefty sentences. In the fervor, many slipped through—Bernardine Dohrn, once on the FBI’s Most Wanted List, never saw jail-time as federal prosecutors broke laws and due process chasing the Weathermen. (Jacobs,
In the late 1960s into the 1970s, there was a revolutionary current throughout the college campuses in the United States. In the midst of the Vietnam War and the counterculture movement, student groups and protests began popping up around the country—and then progressively growing larger and more networked. Chief among those revolutionary leftist groups was the Students for a Democratic Society, which would become nearly synonymous with the growing youth discontent. In what would become an official SDS charter, the Port Huron Statement, Tom Hayden laid out his generation’s growing discontent:
“We are people of this generation, bred in at least modest comfort, housed now in universities, looking uncomfortably to the world we inherit. …show more content…
Their theory, as Rudd said (2006), was that militancy was an end in itself; that the more militant they became, the more attention and followers they would draw, and that revolution would snowball. In 1969 they hosted the Days of Rage, intended to rally support to “bring the war home”, a growing battle cry. Over several days they staged two separate riots, resulting in dozens of arrests and injuries both for protestors and police, and hundreds of thousands in property damage. As the SDS disintegrated and police pressure mounted, the group was driven fully underground, and began its arson and bombing campaigns in cities around the …show more content…
The Weathermen began manufacturing explosives, and would plant and detonate bombs overnight in unoccupied public buildings—police departments, banks, courthouses, army bases, and eventually the Pentagon and the US Capitol. (Jacobs, 1997) In 1970, they broke counterculture leader Timothy Leary out of a state prison. In the span of just seven years, the Weather Underground committed countless violent acts throughout the country, grabbing headlines and leaving bodies in their wake. Failed explosives claimed the lives of several members, and bystanders were often caught in the fire of their explosives. Federal investigators were always just around the corner, and dozens of members were tried on charges from murder to conspiracy, landing countless members in prison with hefty sentences. In the fervor, many slipped through—Bernardine Dohrn, once on the FBI’s Most Wanted List, never saw jail-time as federal prosecutors broke laws and due process chasing the Weathermen. (Jacobs,