Protest: The Disruptive Dozen

Disappointed when the seven radicals charged with inciting the 1968 Chicago riots were acquitted on the conspiracy counts against them, the Justice Department has been searching for a new opportunity to test the effectiveness of federal law in dealing with disruption. Now it has another chance.

Last October, members of the Students for a Democratic Society's ultramilitant Weatherman faction battled Chicago police, smashed windows and beat up hapless passers-by in a futile attempt to disrupt the conspiracy trial. Last week a federal grand jury indicted twelve of their leaders for conspiring, and then actually crossing state lines, to perpetrate the bloody violence that stunned the city. Bringing them to trial will be no simple matter: most of them are in hiding.

The indictments were processed routinely. Moments after they were handed up, the documents went to the office of Court Clerk Elbert Wagner for assignment to a judge. There, an assistant stamped them with a file number, then moved to a row of cubbyholes and drew a sealed block of cards from the one marked CRIMINAL CONSPIRACY. The cards, arranged face down, each bore the name of one of the district's ten active judges. After freeing the top card with a letter opener, the clerk found before him the name of the trial judge whom he had just selected at random: Julius J. Hoffman.

Tiny Following. The coincidence was as ironic as it was unfortunate. The irascible Hoffman, who presided at the celebrated Chicago Seven trial, has little love for militants. His heavy-handed conduct on the bench and repeated rulings in favor of the prosecution helped the Chicago defendants to assume a martyrs' mantle that they did not deserve. His obvious contempt for the defense also gave ammunition to those who question the administration of American justice. On hearing of Hoffman's selection for the second trial, Jay Miller, executive director of the Illinois chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union, said: "It's an absolute disaster. These kids have a tiny following compared with the Chicago Seven, but by the time their trial is over, if it ever gets under way, the Government may have succeeded in making bomb throwers out of all our kids." Said Judge Hoffman: "I take the cases as they come. I'll treat this one like any other."

This time, at least, the issues are more clear-cut. The indictments charge the twelve with deliberately planning and organizing last fall's "days of rage." Unlike their conduct during the Democratic Convention, the behavior of the police in the later battle was marked by great restraint; they can hardly be accused of fomenting the fight. According to the indictments, the disruptive dozen trained the rioters in karate and techniques for resisting arrest, and formed them into "affinity groups" that attacked policemen, private citizens and property. All twelve face up to five years in prison and $10,000 in fines for each of the several counts against them.