Underground Incorporated

SAN FRANCISCO, June 12 — Eldridge Cleaver, the Black Panther leader, was released from the California medical facility prison at Vacaville this afternoon on a court order that criticized the cancellation of his parole.

He had been held since April 7 as a parole violator. But Solano County Superior Court Judge Raymond J. Sherwin ordered his release on a $25 nominal bail. Judge Sherwin was critical of the California Adult Authority for ordering the parole revoked.

Cleaver, a minister of information in the Black Panthers, was arrested April 6 after a gun battle between his followers and the Oakland police. He was charged with assault with intent to kill.

When his gunshot wound in the foot was treated, he was taken to the Vacaville prison with his parole canceled. He had been paroled a year ago after serving nine years of a 14-year sentence for assault with intent to kill.

BERKLEY CALIF, June 10 — An explosion heavily damaged a Selective Service office early Monday after what may have been dynamite was apparently tossed through a window, the police said.

The police said that no one had been injured. All windows were shattered on the ground floor of the multistory office building a half-block from a police station.

PORTLAND, OR. (LNS) — Two hundred recent recipients of the nation’s most prestigious award for graduate study in the United States and Canada have pledged to refuse induction “for the duration of the Vietnam conflict.”

The 200 newly named Woodrow Wilson Fellows pledged either to refuse induction, or in the case of females, stated that they would refuse induction if they were eligible for the draft. 106 signers are male, 94 are female.

CHICAGO (LNS) — The Chicago Tribune destroyed a million copies of its weekly book review recently after officials found the review of The Naked Ape to be in “bad taste.” The review, published in “Book World,” quoted a few lines from the book comparing the size of a man’s penis with that of apes. The Tribune then reprinted a new Book World without mentioning the book at all. The cost of the reprint was about $100,000.

SPOLETO, Italy (LNS) — Allen Ginsberg, the poet, was acquitted of obscenity charges arising from his recital of poems last year at the Spoleto “Festival of Two Worlds.” The court ruled the poems were not obscene when viewed in the context of Ginsberg’s protest against conformity and the technological society.

The American Civil Liberties Union has asked the commanding officer of Camp Pendelton, a California Marine Corps base, to set aside the court-martial convictions of two Negro Marines who have been sentenced to ten year and six year prison terms for criticizing the war in Vietnam, and advocating a black separatist policy as an answer to racial injustice in America.

“The central feature of these convictions,” said Melvin L Wulf, ACLU Legal Director, in a letter to Major General Lewis J. Fields, “is that the defendants were convicted not for doing something, but only for saying something”.

Representative statements made by the two, which were the basis of the charges against them were: “Vietnam [is] a white man’s war and that therefore black men should not fight there; ...black and white races should be separated by force because they could not get along; that [a] black man should not fight in Vietnam because [after the war he] would have to come back and fight the white man in the United States.”

Rudi Dutschke, head of the German SDS, who was shot a week after the assassination of Martin Luther King is recovering well according to philosopher Herbert Marcuse.

Dutschke’s shooting was the spark for a wave of German student demonstrations against the Springer publishing chain which the students held responsible for creating the atmosphere in which the shooting occurred.

Dutschke underwent five hours of surgery to remove the bullet from his brain and was on the critical list for five days.

Marcuse also reported that the student leader was suffering from some inability to remember concrete facts, but he was able to deal with abstract problems very well. Complete recovery is expected.

“Red Rudi” is planning a visit to the U.S. as soon as he is able.

SAN FRANCISCO (LNS-SCN) — David Harris, Joan Baez’s husband and a leader of the Resistance, was found guilty for refusing induction and was sentenced to three years in jail. The judge told Harris that he was “the most willful violator of the law I have ever seen,” and he said the sentence was for “purely punitive reasons” since Harris was “not rehabilitative.” Harris replied, “Thank you.” Harris is free pending appeal for a re-trial on the basis that the first trial was unfair.

WASHINGTON, DC, May 30 (LNS) — The serviceman’s newspaper Vietnam GI has been banned on several East Coast Army bases, GI contacts have told the paper. GIs from Forts Dix, Gordon, Benning, and Marines from Parris Island and Cherry Point have reported that a written directive has come down warning soldiers not to accept or read Vietnam GI under threat of Article 15 punishment.

Vietnam GI is an anti-war monthly newspaper published by Vietnam veterans for GIs, many in Vietnam itself. Over 15,000 copies are now distributed free to servicemen every month. Supporting subs for civilians are $10.00. If interested in distributing the paper to GIs or making a contribution, write Vietnam GI, PO Box 9273, Chicago 60690.

FORT ORD, Cal (LNS) — Two servicemen, Ken Stolte and Dan Amick, were convicted recently by a General Court Martial of charges of uttering disloyal statements and conspiring to commit acts prejudicial to the good order and discipline of the Army. They were each sentenced to four years at hard labor (at Leavenworth) and dishonorable discharges. Their attorney, Francis Heisler, of Carmel, Cal., is appealing.

The charges were based on a one-page anti-war leaflet which the two men wrote and distributed in February.