"Ecoterrorism"? A critical analysis of the vilification of radical environmental activists as terrorists.

• Author: Smith, Rebecca K.

1. INTRODUCTION II. THE CATALYST FOR RADICAL ENVIRONMENTAL ACTIVISM A. Ecological Problems B. Rise of Environmental Legal Tools C. Rise of Environmental Organizations D. Radical Environmentalism III. DEVELOPMENT AND USE OF THE PHRASE "ECOTERRORISM". A. Property Rights Group Creates the Term "Ecoterrorism". B. 1988 Congressional Testimony Calls Earth First! Activists "Ecoterrorists" C. Law Review Article Analogizes Radical Environmentalist Actions with Anti-Abortion Murders D. June 1998 Congressional Hearing Convened on "Ecoterrorism by Radical Environmental Organizations". 1. Testimony of Congressman Frank Riggs 2. Background Information and Context of Congressman Riggs' Testimony a. Police Reaction to Earth First! Protest b. Details About the Cloverdale Tree-Spiking Incident. c. Death of David Chain 3. Testimony of Other Witnesses E. February 2002 Congressional Hearing on "Eco-terrorism and Lawlessness on National Forests" F. Industry Group Publishes Model Act: Animal and Ecological Terrorism Act 1. The American Legislative Exchange Council 2. The Model Act G. Senate Environment Committee Hearings on "Ecoterrorism" 1. May 2005 Hearing. a. Testimony of Senator James Inhofe b. Testimony from Other Senators c. Testimony from the FBI 2. October 2005 Hearing H. Statement of U.S. Attorney General Alberto Gonzales I. Congress Passes the Animal Enterprise Terrorism Act IV. EFFECTS ON ACTMSM FROM THE USE OF THE TERM ECOTERRORISM A. Mass Media's Frame of Reference B. Ownership of the Mass Media C. Media Acceptance of the Term "Ecoterrorism" D. Impacts from the Acceptance of the Term "Ecoterrorism" 1. Increased Government Surveillance of Radical Groups 2. Increased Penalties/Convictions for Acts of Protest 3. Investigation of Mainstream Environmental Groups V. WHY RADICAL ENVIRONMENTALISTS SHOULD NOT BE BRANDED AS TERRORISTS A. Terrorism Means Murder, Not Property/Damage B. Government's Conduct Echoes a History of Stifling Political Dissent 1. COINTELPRO. 2. Infiltration/Discrediting of Radical Environmental Groups C. Industry Groups' Motivation is Protection of Corporate Profit, Not Protection of Citizens VI. CONCLUSION I. INTRODUCTION

   We want to destroy environmentalists by taking their money and their members.... No one was aware that environmentalism was a problem until we came along. (1) Facts don't matter, in politics, perception is reality.

   Ron Arnold, Father of the Wise Use Movement and Creator of the Term "Ecoterrorism" (2)

   Terrorism is anything that stands in the face of what we want to do ... people's movements of resistance against deprivation, against unemployment, against the loss of natural resources, all of that is termed 'terrorism.'

   Edward Said, Columbia Professor of English & Comparative Literature (3)

   In August of 2002, as I sat high in an old ponderosa pine to protest destructive logging on public lands in the Bitterroot Valley, federal agents began to cut the tree down from the top while I sat below their saw. After sawing off most of the branches, they tied one end of a rope to the trunk of the tree, and tied the other end of the rope to the bumper of a truck eighty feet below us. They would saw off a five foot section of the tree trunk, the truck would pull the rope, and the section of the tree trunk would crash to the ground. When they had cut the trunk of the tree down to where I was sitting, they lifted me into a cherry picker bucket and brought me to the ground.

   Before they could take me to jail, they had to take me to the hospital. For the previous two weeks the federal agents had set up a twenty-four hour, four-person surveillance team--with four high powered spotlights--to enforce severe dehydration, starvation, and sleep deprivation upon me and my companion tree-sitter in a neighboring tree. When I arrived at the hospital to receive a three hour intravenous injection of fluids, the police officer handcuffed me to the hospital bed.

   As I sat in the hospital bed, sediment from aggressive post-fire logging continued filling Rye Creek, the Bitterroot River tributary adjacent to the protest site. The bull trout, a species listed under the Endangered Species Act, (4) used to live in Rye Creek. (5) By the time the logging was completed that summer, the sedimentation it caused had obliterated the bull trout's habitat in Rye Creek. Bull trout can no longer be found in Rye Creek. (6)

   My companion tree-sitter and I were convicted by a Western Montana jury whose members were all connected to the logging and wood products industry, the U.S. Forest Service, or law enforcement institutions. My sentence for engaging in a peaceful protest on public lands was thirty days locked in a halfway house in Butte, Montana, three years of supervised federal probation, and restitution for the cherry picker and my emergency room hospital bill. The conditions of my probation dictated that I could not enter any National Forest in the entire country unless it was an official wilderness area, and that I could not engage in any protest nor leave the state without permission from the federal government. My tree-sitting companion received a similar punishment. I believed that these were draconian sentences, but was not shocked by them. What I was shocked by was the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals' decision on our criminal appeal, which implied that we were "ecoterrorists" for peacefully sitting in trees. (7)

   Unfortunately, the branding of radical environmentalists as terrorists is not a new phenomenon. This Comment will specifically examine the law, policy, and procedure which have been enacted to paint radical environmentalists as terrorists. More generally, it will examine the origins of this legal phenomenon, and why the policy has been embraced and codified by lawmakers. Section II of this Comment will briefly examine how contemporary environmental problems have catalyzed the birth of the radical environmental movement in the United States. Part III of this Comment examine the corresponding development and use of the term "ecoterrorism" by extractive industry advocates and government officials sympathetic to those types of special interests. Part IV of this Comment Hill examine how the acceptance and use of the term "ecoterrorism" by the mainstream media has affected activists, specifically post September 11, 2001. Part V Hill suggest why the term "ecoterrorism" should not be used to paint radical environmental activists as terrorists.

2. THE CATALYST FOR RADICAL ENVIRONMENTAL ACTMSM

   1. Ecological Problems

      Over the past four decades, U.S. citizens have been forced to realize the detrimental effects of our collective lifestyle on the planet. The amount of environmental devastation faced by present generations of humans is overwhelming. Species are going extinct at a rate 100 to 1000 times the rate found in the fossil record (8) and one-half of all of the planet's species are estimated to be extinct by the year 2100. (9) The polar ice caps are melting and sea levels are rising, (10) the effect of which is already eliminating the homelands of island dwellers. (11) There is a massive hole in the ozone layer. (12) Acid rain is falling out of the sky. (13) Toxic chemicals and substances are poisoning our drinking water, our food, our blood, and our lungs. (14) These are only a few examples for illustration; the complete extent of the current crisis is probably impossible to fully document or even comprehend. (15)

   2. Rise of Environmental Legal Tools

      In response to awareness of these environmental problems, the U.S. Congress passed a series of environmental laws in the 1960s, 1970s, and 1980s. Congress passed the Wilderness Act in 1964 (16) and the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) in 1969. (17) In 1970, an Executive Order established the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) (18) and Congress passed regulatory amendments to the Clean Air Act (CAA). (19) In 1972, Congress passed the Clean Water Act (CWA), (20) followed by the Endangered Species Act (ESA) in 1973. (21) In 1976, it passed the National Forest Management Act (NFMA) (22) and in 1980 it passed the Comprehensive Environmental Response and Cleanup Liability Act (CERCLA). (23)

      Citizens took hold of these legal tools and as they utilized them to preserve our environment, the collateral impacts of enforcement on private industry began to surface. One example is the aftermath of the U.S. Supreme Court's decision in Tennessee Valley Authority v. Hill, (24) in which the Court refused to ignore the ESA's legal protections for species on the brink of extinction. (25) The Court recognized that the species in question was a small fish, and that enforcement of the law would permanently stop a dam project in which the Army Corps of Engineers had already invested more than $100 million. (26) Nonetheless, the Court held that the dam could not close (and thereby destroy the river ecosystem) because the value of an endangered species is "incalculable." (27) This decision and its repercussions on industries that exploit natural resources have led organizations like the conservative Pacific Legal Foundation to denounce the ESA as helping to "devastate entire industries." (28) In the same vein, "free market" groups like Ron Arnold's Center for the Defense of Free Enterprise have called NEPA a "procedural, bureaucratic, punitive, dangerous obstruction to the social and economic requirements of present generations of Americans." (29)

      Another example is the case of Love Canal, New York where, after historic dumping of billions of tons of hazardous waste, the industrial owners of the dumping ground sold their land to the local school district for $1.00. (30) In 1978, after a school and 100 homes were built on the dumping ground, a carcinogenic sludge began seeping into homes. Eventually, 1000 families were forced to abandon their homes. (31) The publicly led outcry in response to this disaster led to the enactment of CERCLA by the U.S. Congress. (32) CERCLA forces any...