Fifth Estate 34, July 15-31, 1967 Add to the Bookbuilder

The infamous Grimshaw kite case has reached its first conclusion, with an astounding miscarriage of justice.

The case, as you may recall, concerned a kite, made out of an American flag, with the inscription: “Fuck America—Go Fly a Kite” and an Egyptian peace eye symbol. The kite was hanging from a light fixture in The Sun office, 4863 John Lodge.

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Letters were mailed July 12 inviting hundreds ‘of Detroit area activists in the peace, civil rights, civil liberties and religious reform movements to a testimonial dinner honoring the Rev. David M. Gracie.

The Dinner will be held on July 21, 1967, at U.A.W. Local 174 Hall at 6495 W. Warren (at Livernois) at 7:00 p.m.

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Nearly 4,000 young people jammed Into the Ford Auditorium on Friday June 30 to hear the Jefferson Airplane.

Three thousand, nine hundred and ninety-nine people enjoyed themselves.

The Detroit News didn’t.

Their reporter came on like a middle aged Brenda Starr equipped only with platinum hair and a super-hostile attitude towards rock and roll, folk-rock and Grace Slick:

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A number of Detroit lawyers have indicated to Detroit LEMAR (Legalize Marijuana) that they would be interested in setting up a legal aid service for busted marijuana users if a general fund could be set up which would insure a nominal fee for those attorneys involved.

Their suggestion was that interested heads and sympathetic persons pledge a dollar or two per month to such a fund so that a backlog of available money would be made available in cases of arrests on marijuana charges.

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The SEE, the new concerthouse opened last month by Trans-Love Energies Unlimited of Detroit, closed its doors after only two weekends in operation.

The hippy-run coffeehouse, which featured music by the MC-5, the Spikedrivers, the Passing Clouds, Billy C. and the Sunshine, and the Charles Moore Ensemble during its brief history, along with lights by the Magic Veil Light Company, ran into business snags that made operation of the cooperative concerthouse impossible, according to former manager and Fifth Estate staff member John Sinclair.

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A good peace never did come easy.

One of the real tough things about involvement in a resistance movement is your total lack of power. When LBJ (of “Hey, Hey” fame) addressed a thousand-dollar-a-couple Democratic Party fund raising dinner in L.A. a few thousand people gathered outside to tell Lyndon they didn’t like his policy in Vietnam.

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The monitors were doing a hell of a job maintaining order; the cops, on the other hand, were looking more and more uptight, and more and more of them were showing up from somewhere.

A man who identified himself as a physician kept saying they can’t stop us from exercising our rights of free speech.

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The honor of launching the 1968 Presidential election campaign fell to the Los Angeles Police Department as Lyndon B. Johnson, fresh from meetings with his Communist counterpart, dropped in on June 23 at the Century Plaza Hotel in Los Angeles to grab a quick meal.

L.A. Police Chief Reddin summed up the day’s events succinctly as he debriefed his heroes in the evening: “A perfect police exercise; I am very satisfied. You can’t imagine how good you looked,” he told them, obviously deeply moved. “We’ve got many movies of this, because it’s some thing that’s never happened in this country before... We proved to them that WE own this city, not the rabble.”

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As the result of an appeal brought on June 23 of the court-martial of the Fort Hood Three, Pvt. First Class Jimmy Johnson, Pvt. David Samas and Pvt. Dennis Mora, the sentences of Jimmy Johnson and Pvt. David Samas were reduced from five years to three. Dennis’ original sentence was three years.

They were the first GIs to publicly refuse orders to go to Vietnam, and challenged the right of the government to send them to an “illegal, immoral and unjust war.” They were court-martialed and are serving their sentences at Ft. Leavenworth.

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Ed Sanders, 1960s

In a unanimous decision, a three-judge panel dismissed obscenity charges against Ed Sanders, editor and publisher of “Fuck You/a magazine of the Arts” and owner of the Peace Eye Bookstore in Manhattan. New York City judges Ringel, Sherwin and Hoffman ruled that “Fuck You” is not obscene and does not violate the New York State Obscenity code (section 1141) and is protected by constitutional guarantees of freedom.

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It looks like straight people will do just about anything in their power to keep the love organism from growing and spreading, just because they can’t “understand’ it and don’t know what’s happening in the world around them. If you haven’t noticed, straight people are always putting love people down, sending their kids to psychiatrists to get “straightened out, calling the police on their kids, beating hippies who try to start honest and loving business operations, stealing from hippies and terrorizing their homes and gathering places, hitting and kicking people who have no eyes to fight back, and things like that. I’m tired of it, for one, and I just wish these people would wake up and start seeing what their stupid lives are all about and how vile they are being in their relationships with each other and with us.

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LA Free Press — First of all, please forget everything you’ve heard about the Diggers, because it’s mostly a bunch of crap.

To begin with, the Diggers are what happened when the Hell’s Angels met LSD and got turned off violence to psychedelic love.

The central cadre running the hippie hostels day by day is made up of guys with names like Motorcycle Richie, Tobacco, Little Wolf, Apache and Tiny.

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from L.A. Free Press (UPS)

Last week President Johnson signed into law the 1967 draft law extension thereby allowing the government to impress young men into involuntary servitude ‘til at least 1971.

In every respect the revision intensifies the coercive and regimentive features of the old law. Here are the gruesome details of the extension, which will be in effect.

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a review of

The Diary of Anais Nin: Vol. 1 (1931–1934) and Vol. 2 (1934–1939). Edited by Gunther Stuhlmann. Swallow Press/Harcourt, Brace & World. $6.95 each.

“Creation,” says Anais Nin, “is a source of action, a directive which alters the course of human life.”

And anyone who reads these diaries will find them revolutionary, destined to take their place with the great transcendental works.

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Somewhere in Washington D.C. there resides a President’s Crime Commission, and on this Commission there is a man called Dr. Richard H. Blum. Dr. Blum is one of six doctors reporting on narcotics and drug abuse in the United States.

In his report, Blum stated that he thought alcohol the most dangerous drug Americans use, that smoking “Marijuana may be less harmful than drinking,” and “there is no strong evidence that marijuana (or any other drug) is a cause of crime.”

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The dangerous MC-5, Detroit’s heroic “avant-rock” band considered by many the musical electronic equivalent of STP, has been run through the mill lately and may yet come out of it smelling like roses.

Their current trouble started when Uncle Russ Gibb booked the San Francisco rock band the Jefferson Airplane for a Ford Auditorium concert the end of June. The MC-5, who had been promised an appearance with the Airplane when they arrived in Detroit, were informed that they couldn’t play the concert without joining the American Federation of Musicians local in Detroit.

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If there’s anything more disgusting than a person who has no guts, its a person who has half-guts.

For example, Rep. John Conyers, Jr. For the past several weeks I’ve been writing about the wonderful job he was doing in fighting passage of that horrible “flag-burning” bill.

I suggested to producers of the Lou Gordon TV show on Channel 50 that this would be an excellent topic for a debate. They agreed. Rep. Conyers agreed to appear at first, but when his opposition was going to be Richard Durant, the highly articulate ex-Birchite and present chairman of the 14^th District GOP, Conyers welched.

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By withholding our participation, we are saying ‘No’ to the continuing barbarism of the Vietnam War. We are responsible for our actions. We openly say ‘No’ to conscripted military service.

Our refusal to participate in the madness of the Vietnam War in no way implies a renunciation of our country.

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Attendance at the 2^nd Detroit Triple Fan Fair the weekend of June 17 and 18 peaked at approximately 150 and audience enthusiasm burned with a hard, gem-like flame, despite program changes and setbacks.

Buck Rogers comics were among many at convention

The purpose of the Fair was succinctly set forth: “To preserve rare material and to further the appreciation of Comic Strips, Films, and Fantasy Literature as genuine Art Forms.” Many fans at the Park Shelton Convention were therefore rather testy about the illustration from former EC artist Wally Wood’s Witzend, which accompanied my earlier pre-Fair article in a recent Fifth Estate. The panel depicted Wood’s Animan defrocking a stacked lovely. When I mentioned that he had drawn the pornographic centerfold (Orgy at Disneyland) in the current Realist, Wood’s stock sank even lower at the dealer tables.

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The first meaning in The American College Dictionary defines “reform” as “...the improvement or amendment of what is wrong, corrupt, etc.; social reform.”

But how does Governor Romney define the term? One can only assume from the public position he has taken that reform is the furthest thing from his mind. Ever since Con-Con, Romney’s gubernatorial launching pad, his opposition to a state graduated income tax has been patently clear. But now when the state supposedly needs money, he doesn’t fight the addition of this new tax to the polyglot of provincial personal state taxes already in existence.

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The calendar is prepared by Fifth Estate calendar girls Karen Kovac and Naomi Epel with cooperation from Detroit Adventure. Copy deadline is the 6^th and 22^nd of each month and should be sent to the Fifth Estate, Calendar 1107 W. Warren, Detroit, Michigan 48201.

SUN the 16^th

HEAL along with Oral Roverts at Cobo Hall. Sponsored by North American Baptist Convention. Call Cobo for ticket info. 8/16

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The San Francisco Mime Troupe is now in the process of planning to tour the United States and Great Britain during the Fall and Winter of 1967–68 with its anti-war commedia dell’arte, “l’Amant militaire.”

Sandra Archer as Corallina and Peter Cohon as Pantalone in the S.F. Mime Troupe’s L’Amant Militaire. Photo: Erik Weber

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Send to: The Fifth Estate, 1107 W. Warren, Detroit, Mich. 48201, phone 831–6800

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