VOL. 7, NO. 2 FREE SUMMER 1985 ____
il Bistro Bar” by Billy King 10 year anniversary edition of 20 b/w linoleum block prints image size: 24"x22" Printed on LENOX 100 Archival Paper at M.Oren Press, Seattle. Price per print $200 Hand Colored $300 Direct inquiries to Billy King Designs 1518 Western Seattle or call 382-1001 for viewing/ appointment 2 Clinton St. Quarterly
Clinton St. VOL. 7, NO. 2 Quarterly SUMMER 1985 STAFF CONTENTS vo-editors Jim Blashfield Lenny Dee David Milholland Associate Editor Peggy Lindquist Design and Production Jim Blashfield Production Assistants David Milholland, Sharon Niemcyzk Gail O’Neill Ad Production Stacey Fletcher Joyce Fletcher Lorna Dawson Camerawork Laura DiTrapani Typesetting Archetype, Harrison Typesetting Marmilmar, Sherry Swain Ad Sales—Seattle/Port Townsend Scott Wilson, Jennifer James Doug Milholland Ad Sales—Portland/Eugene Dru Duniway, Sandy Wallsmith Lynn Wilson Development Lenny Dee Contributing Editors Paul Loeb, Michael Helm Contributing Artists Tim Braun, John Callahan Stewart Holbrook, Fay Jones Jack McLarty, Steve Winkenwerder Contributing Photographers Nicholas Blair, Richard J. Brown Dennis Eichhorn Printing Tualatin-Yamhill Press Thanks Linda Ballantine, John Bennett Kate Blakeslee, Bill Fletcher Tyra Lindquist, Melissa Marsland Laurie McClain, Lola Maria, DNA Alana O’Brien, Anne Reiniger Debra Turner, Loring Vogel Oregon Historical Society, The Oregonian The Clinton 500 EDITORIAL rhe eighties have been widely heralded as an era of increasing conservatism, as evidenced by the high youth vote for Reagan last November, and the emergence of that new pop group, the “Yuppies.” It’s a logical stereotype of television’s instant analysis, a trivialization of our reality that lulls us into accepting as real what is hypothetical. Such potent symbols are dangerous when they become role models, as if the media is giving us permission to “be” in tune with our age. How the era will evolve is far from clear at present. For just as the sixties began sometime in 1964 with the Beatles’ invasion and the escalation of the Vietnam War, the real eighties may still lie on the horizon, waiting for a triggering event. And the crystal ball is cloudy, because* reality always eludes the catchphrases which come to characterize such periods. The standard rundown of our recent history has the Roaring Twenties rudely interrupted by the Crash of ’29, followed by the grim depression thirties, the war-years forties, the “I Like Ike”—McCarthy Era fifties, the social MEATLOAF VACATION RESIDENCE Lake Chelan, Washington Coming this fall in CSQ, “Current Trends in Architecture,” by Steve Winkenwerder and Jim Blashfield protest-psychedelic sixties, and last, usually least, the retrenchment, Me- decade seventies. As an overview, it neatly provides compartments for people and events, and discourages deeper exploration. What it misses, of course, is the amazing variety and complexity of human behavior—the divergence from the “norm” that provides texture in the real world. Think of the much-maligned seventies, now characterized as a time when the nation did a double-take and stepped away from activism into retreat, complacency and self-absorption. While it is true that these nutshells describe some reality, they prevent us from considering what did take place, which was far from nonpolitical and may ultimately turn out to be more significant. The seventies saw the development of both the women’s and the gay rights movements, both of which have redefined how we see ourselves and relate to those around us. In their wake, we have rape-relief hotlines, day-care centers, a response to the battered-wife syndrome, women’s sports, legislation against sex-related job discrimination and an overall sensitizing to the misuse and abuse of language. The anti-nuclear power movement came into its own in the seventies. And the era saw the widespread application and evolution, of such “sixties” principles as cooperation, egalitarianism, non-violence and small-is-beautiful appropriate- technology. It is true that in either era, the vast majority of the populace was only peripherally touched by such activism. For every flower child who made it to San Francisco, a dozen or more stayed in Dubuque and Dallas, got married, got jobs and raised families. And for every anti-nuclear warrior, many more settled cozily into jobs with the government and the companies so often blamed for our dilemma. The cover-all stereotype cleverly glosses over much of what happened then and is happening now. At present, we can see the parallel development of both entrenched consumerism and of a deep-reaching movement for peace and improved human relations. If events turn in Central America, today’s “Yuppie” might become active tomorrow. Though, no doubt, it would be in a different style than we “expect” such protest to take. And that career-oriented college student is already concerned about South African apartheid. Our largely secular age accepts the media models because we lack a higher authority on how to be. But the media has no useful moral authority. They are describers, who too often are accepted as guides. Now, as before, there are people who live to make a difference on the planet—role models, if we need them. Ultimately our own actions define who we are, and thus nature the nature of the world. DM It was over 200 years ago that our Founding Fathers met in Philadelphia to lay down the principles upon which our new country would be based. If the Clinton St. Quarterly had been around then, you can bet your boots that these dedicated American patriots would have turned to it time and time again for reference and inspiration as they painstakingly worked out the ideas contained in the Constitution and the Bill of Rights. OK. So they might not have had much use for “Christmas Gifts for Chickens” or the story of the woman who divorced her husband and married her bowling ball. But what about the other stuff? You know, the political stuff. They’d have read that, wouldn’t they? Of course! Yeah, sure! And might they have picked up their copies of the West Coast’s favorite journal of fiction, features, political writing, humor and eyeball-snagging graphics on street corners in Seattle, Portland, Eugene and points nearby? Of course not! It would have been a long ride by horseback and canoe. Many would have died. It wouldn't have been worth it. Instead, they'd have subscribed to the Clinton St. Quarterly and had it delivered by postal employees, many of them wearing shorts in the summer. That's how they'd have done it. Our forefathers loved America. If you love America you’ll be like them and subscribe to the Clinton St. Quarterly. Four issues a year for only $6.00. Get the picture? Stop being a squalling left-wing panty- waist. Be an American. Subscribe now. OK. And send me a pointed hat like Paul Revere if you’ve got any. Do you? Or don’t you? Is this a trick? Name Address Send only $6 for first subscription, $5 for each additional one to: The Clinton St. Quarterly P.O. BOX3588 Portland, OR 97208 Cove r Tim Braun Nazi Vacation—A Visit to the Idaho Reich Dennis Eichhorn ...................................... 4 Talking with Derrick Bell Marcia Mint Danab.................................9 A True Life Story of Miami Teri Hein ...............................................12 Mr. Otis Stewart Holbrook .................................16 Stewart Holbrook Peggy Lindquist David Milholland......................................18 Alice Walker—Listening to the Inner Voices Leonie Caldecott......................................23 Going in with the Guerrillas Robert Ellis Gordon............................25 My Life With Pets John Callahan.......................................26 A Letter From Africa Nicholas Blair......................................28 The Clinton St. Quarterly is published in both Oregon and Washington editions by CSQ—A Project of Out of the Ashes Press. Washington Address: 1520 Western Avenue, Seattle, WA 98101, (206),682 2404; Oregon address: P.O. Box 3588, Portland, OR 97208, (503) 222 6039. Unless otherwise noted, all contents copyright© 1985, Clinton St. Quarterly. For a Friend? Name Address 1520 Western Avenue Seattle, WA98101 Clinton St. Quarterly T3
A/jaijeno is UOIUI/J P
T“ Story and Photos by Dennis Eichhorn You really can’t go home again. That’s especially true if you’re from Idaho, like me. Now that the neo-Nazis have moved in, something new has been added, and something old has been taken away. In other words, things have changed. Like I said, I’m from Idaho. I’ve always felt comfortable there. I grew up in Boise, partied in Sun Valley and McCall, played football at the University in Moscow. I fought forest and range fires from one end of the state to the other, tended bar and bucked bales and raised hell all over Idaho. I know what Idaho is all about, and it doesn’t surprise me that the white supremacists and neo-Nazis have established a beachhead in the northern part of the state. For one thing, Idaho has always been lily-white. People have moved there for years to get away from the cities and people of color. The Mormon Church, with its understated policy of racial discrimination, is a bowerful force in Idaho. In some ways, Idaho is much like a Southern state. In 1960, it was the only state west of the Mississippi to cast a majority of votes for George Wallace. There are plenty of ex-Southern crackers in them thar hills. Racist jokes abound in Idaho. The John Birch Society and the Minutemen have long been vocal, visible presences. Now there are more American Nazi party members and Ku Klux Klansmen than ever before. I remember right-wing billboards everywhere. You’ll be driving along enjoying the scenery, when suddenly you'll come upon a huge red-white- and-blue billboard adorned with the image of a stern Uncle Sam that reads “THEY’LL PRY MY GUN FROM MY DEAD, COLD FIST.” Welcome to Idaho. Guns, and the right to own and keep them, are a big issue in Idaho. People there cherish their shootin' irons. Ranchers are always getting caught with barns full of artillery, everything from automatic rifles to anti-aircraft guns. Nobody thinks much about it, because nearly everyone has gun collections of their own. These are ail factors that led to the invasion of the neo-Nazis. But probably the biggest draw was the Code of the West, Idaho-style. It’s a simple code: Live and let live. You mind your business and I'll tend to mine. Do what you like, but don't have sex in front of my kids or impose your moral values on me or mine. Don’t get in my face, and if you do, be prepared for the consequences. Don't bother me and I won’t bother you. The neo-Nazis and white supremacists have taken full advantage of Idaho’s lais- ser-faire cultural attitudes. They started organizing the state’s northern Panhandle region in the early 1970s. The first evidence of this was the emergence of the Posse Comitatus, an anti-tax vigButler and his Aryan Nations’brethren claimed the region as part of their “Territorial Imperative,’a large portion of the United States and Canada, to be set aside as a bastion for the white master race. ilante group that spread nationally and found fertile ground in Idaho. Spearheaded by Richard Butler and other outspoken white supremacists, the Posse began to attract hundreds of gun- totin’ members who were anxious to defend themselves from the ravages of big government. The authorities took note, but let things slide. After all, the Posse was pro-gun, anti-taxes and white as the driven snow. They fit right in. Richard Butler, a former aircraft engineer from California, became the leader of the nouveau racists. Butler had discovered the white supremacist movement in 1960 when he met Wesley Smith, the founder of the Church of Jesus Christ Christian, a rabidly racist group. Butler was Smith’s protege, becoming the group’s titular leader after Smith’s death in 1971. Butler moved the movement’s headquarters to Northern Idaho in 1973, buying land in the Hayden Lake area and adopting the name of Aryan Nations. Racists from all over the country began moving to the Idaho Panhandle, and before long there was a sizeable contingent of white supremacists operating out of the sylvan Northern Idaho countryside. Northern Idaho is part of what is called the Inland Empire: 32 counties in Northern Idaho, Eastern Washington and Western Montana with a combined population of just over one million. Ninety-five percent of the Inland Empire’s citizenry is white, with the majority of blacks living in Spokane County. Less than one percent are Jewish. Butler and his Aryan Nations brethren seized on these demographic facts as a fait accompli, claiming the region as part of their so-called “territorial imperative,’ which they designated as a large portion of the United States and Canada, to be set aside as a bastion for the white master race. The Aryan Nations' doctrines of anti- Semitism and racial superiority seemed to fit the area. Hurling invectives works when the people you’re attacking aren’t around to respond. The local residents let the racist rhetoric go unchallenged...after all, the neo-Nazis were white and pro-gun, just like the overwhelming majority of the population. The problem was intensity, not ideology. The Aryan Nations, with about 60 true believers and a mailing list of more than 6,000, did more than just rant and print hate literature. They organized, constantly reaching out for more converts and seeking to build a broader base of support. Efforts were made to unite with local residents who opposed the legalization of gambling, an annual issue in revenue-hungry Idaho. Neo-Nazis aligned with ratepayer groups determined to stop the incursions of the Washington Public Power Supply System and its legacy of nuclear power indebtedness. The neo-Nazi outreach 'intensified. Butler’s Aryan Nations bought ads in magazines like Shotgun News and Easyriders. A prison recruiting program was developed, and links were forged with the Aryan Brotherhood, a loose-knit white gang with thousands of members within the American and Canadian penal systems. Locally, attempts were made to attract like-minded cohorts from the ranks of the Inland Empire’s elected officials. Aryan Nations propaganda, hate mail and racist disinformation was mailed to local politicos. One announcement of a “shoot” was accompanied by a “Running Nigger" target, with a Spokane synagogue listed as the return address. Splinter groups emerged, some more militant than others. The most notorious offshoot is the Bruders Schweigen or Silent Brotherhood, also known as The Order. This faction was organized in 1983 by Robert J. Matthews and other dissatisfied neo-Nazi militants who wanted to escalate racial disharmony to a new level. Perhaps three dozen men and women joined The Order, vowing to die, if necessary, to further the cause of white supremacy through violence. Their program is based on the book The Turner Diaries, a fictional account of a futuristic race warthat is instigated and won by a dedicated band of neo-Nazis also called The Order. First published in 1978, The Turner Diaries was ghost-written and copyrighted by William L. Pierce (also known as Luther Pierce), a former University of Oregon professor who was leader of the now-defunct National Alliance, a white supremacist cadre with international affiliations. The Turner Diaries is well-written, and provides a semi-plausible blueprint for the disruption of American society in preparation for a bloody coup by The Order. It's a comprehensive primer for modern urban guerrilla warfare, focusing ClintQTTSt. Quarterly' 5,
on essential details such as communication networks and internal security, the theft and stockpiling of weapons and explosives, fund-raising through counterfeiting and armed robbery, selective assassinations and finally terrorism on the grand scale...all spelled out and underscored with virulent anti-Semitism and racial hatred that leaves nothing to the imagination. This was exciting fodder for members of The Order, and they set out to make the neo-Nazi dream a reality. Recruiting from the hate groups that were allied with the Aryan Nations, The Order made stringent demands on its prospective members. Sodium Pen- tathol, lie detectors and voice- stress analyzers were reportedly used to ensure that only those who hated Jews and non-whites in their heart of hearts were admitted into its ranks. They believed that white supremacy and genocide were the true path, and swore an oath of allegiance that bound them to accept all direct orders from their leaders, upon point of death. Moving swiftly from rhetoric to direct action, The Order began to lash out at the System, as the powers-that-be are called in The Turner Diaries. Alan Berg, a Jewish radio personality, was one known victim, gunned down in front of his Denver, Colorado home in mid-1984. Robberies of armored trucks and banks in Washington and California netted millions of dollars for The Order’s war coffers, as did a massive counterfeiting scheme. A shootout between the FBI and a suspected member of The Order in Northern Idaho led to a series of exchanges that culminated in the incineration of leader Robert Matthews by FBI agents in December, 1984, at an Order hideout on Whidbey Island, Washington. A nationwide manhunt followed, resulting in more than two dozen arrests in several states. But although several large caches of armaments and stolen money were uncovered while tracking members of The Order down, several million dollars still remain unaccounted for. One person, wholeheartedly dedicated to the tenets of racial superiority and willing to kill for his beliefs, is a lone psychopath. Three dozen racial fanatics, bound together in a subversive group and controlled by the threat of death, are something else altogether. As the news poured forth on The Order, I began to wonder how such an organization could have been tolerated by the rustic Idaho citizenry. Were they giving up their outdoor sports and digging bunkers instead? Were the Idaho schools filled with neo-Nazi brownshirts? Were the loggers and farmers graduating from chummy racist jokes to organized anti-Semitism and murderous bigotry? I wanted to know. My Own Private Idaho Like most natives of Idaho, I’ve always carried a piece of the state’s vast Primitive Area in the back of my mind as a safe mental refuge that I could dream of whenever the forces of the modern world overwhelmed me. The neo-Nazis had despoiled my illusion of Idaho as a sanctum sanctorum. I found myself planning a trip back to my old stomping grounds to view the aftermath of this bombardment of hatred. Before long I was driving into Hayden, Idaho. Hayden is a small town of about 2500, adjacent to the resort area of Hayden Lake. Both communities are about 30 miles east of Spokane, Washington and five miles north of Couer d'Alene, Idaho. I’d lived there before, so I thought I knew what to expect. In 1971, some friends and I had gotten involved with the production of a Summer rock festival at Farragut State Park, a large recreation area a few miles north of Hayden. An enraged local resident, filled with fury over the imagined hordes of drug-crazed hedonists due to invade the park, decided to do something about it. He rented an airplane used to spray crops and arranged to load the tanks with undiluted pesticide, intending to direct the pilot to fly over the park’s ampitheatre when the crowd was at its largest and spray them with poison. The pilot, understandably nervous about the plot, turned his client in and he was stopped by the county police. Another group of local rednecks had chosen to take up positions in the hills across the lake from a nude swimming beach, with the intention of sniping at a few hippies. An alert waitress, hearing ITS TIME FOR A NEW CRUSADE I AMIN NATIONS ■1^^ Directions of alien occupation drives Alien Invasion of North America In all the world's history never has a strong, productive, advanced Racial Nation of people, occupying a geographical territory,separated in the main by great oceans from the earth’s diverse, primitive peoples, been invaded and occupied by these regressive alien hords with such impunity' Aryan technology (Fulton’s steamboat, Wright brother’s airplane) plus Aryan treason made possible what was impossible for these mongrel peoples to accomplish. They, who have never dreamed of steam or jet power, land on our shores daily. Skilled Aryan captains, piloting Aryan-conceived craft, bring the alien hords to our shores in "4" luxury beyond the wildest imagination of ancient kings. Neo-Nazi literature the plan discussed in a Plummer, Idaho cafe, had alerted the authorities. The propensity for violence has always been present in the Idaho Panhandle; it has merely lacked direction and organization. Now, however, the leadership is there. I checked into a local motel, described in the tourist brochures as “offering a beautiful view in a restful, quiet atmosphere.” Then I looked the town of Hayden over. It had grown, of course. Instead of being a tiny crossroads settlement on Highway 95, Hayden had expanded considerably. There were a few bars, cafes, gas stations and small businesses. There was even a small mall. Many lakeside homes in Hayden Lake are maintained for vacation use by Spokane residents, lending a vague resort-town atmosphere to the area. The Hayden Lake golf course is still one of the best in the state. Despite the changes, Hayden looked much the same as I remembered it. The differences were more subtle. I got my first hint of them when I stepped into the tiny bar at my motel and plopped down on a stool. The conversation in the tavern absolutely stopped, as everyone directed hostile stares in my direction. I ordered a drink and sipped it in near-perfect silence. No one said anything for half an hour, until I thanked the bartender and left. As soon as I went outside, the buzz of voices resumed. This was strange stuff. I went to two other bars, with exactly the same results. You could have sliced the fear and paranoia with a knife; everyone acted as if they had something to hide, like a town full of coke dealers. After buying some gas from a silent service station attendant and a newspaper from a mute 7-11 clerk, I drove two miles south to the neighboring hamlet of Dalton Gardens to visit some old friends who live there. Ben and Carrie acted like they were glad to see me. Married for years, they seemed to be relatively prosperous residents of the community. Their house, similar to many others on their rural road, was large and set on a sizeable chunk of real estate. A chest-high chain-link fence separated them from the rest of the world. Ben has been a trader and swap-meet organizer for years. He knew many of the long-time locals on a first-name basis. “What’s the matter with people around here?” I asked him, as we sat in the living room watching their baby playing on the shag rug. “Everybody clams up as soon as I come around. It didn't use to be like this.” “People are playing it close to the vest," Ben told me. “There are 50 FBI agents running around here...that's one agent for every 50 residents. You know that these rednecks have never particularly liked the cops, especially the feds. And we’re all pretty sick of the publicity too. There have been dozens of reporters coming in and dredging up information about the neo-Nazis, and Hayden is getting a bad name. Everyone that lives here resents that. Most folks here think that the neo-Nazis are totally fucked; they stay away from them and mind their own business. When a stranger shows up, the locals figure that he’s either a cop, a reporter, or maybe a right-wing nut. We don’t say much, because you never know who might be listening. “But really, most people dislike the neo-Nazis. I’ve got an 18-foot Nazi flag that I bought at a flea market a couple of years ago, and I’ve been thinking about putting it on display and charging people a dollar to take a whack at it with a knife. I could give the money to charity.” “I’d like to see that,” I told him. “By the way, where is the neo-Nazi encampment? It’s not right near Hayden, is it?” Carrie shook her head. “No, it’s about eight miles north of town. Most people don’t even know exactly where it is. Come on, let’s drive out and take a look. You can see for yourself.” We drove north through Hayden and got on Highway 95, turning right at the Garwood Tavern. A mile or two more, and then another right onto Rimrock Road; then another half mile, and there it was, on the right side of the road, a wooden fence and gate with a sign: ARYAN NATIONS—Whites Only. It wasn’t much to look at. “How many people gather here?” I asked. “About 75, max,” Ben said. “They have services every Sunday morning, and that’s when all the local members get together. There are a few living out here all the time, Butler and a few of his zombies. 6 Clinton St. Quarterly
And this is where they have their Aryan Congress every July. About 300 people from all over the world show up for that one.” As we drove back toward Hayden, my friends told me that the annual neo-Nazi convention attracts a few older people from Europe. “There’s some old European money financing part of this movement,” Ben said. “It just takes one or two old Nazi widows writing checks to Butler every Summer to keep things rolling.” Were Butler and the neo-Nazis, ever the opportunists, milking the dregs of the Third Reich? Perhaps the strident bleats of the Aryan Nations were nothing more than the dying gasps of a fading Teutonic dream. I dropped my friends off and went into Couer d’Alene. I looked up Phil, another friend who had lived in the Idaho Panhandle all his life. When I brought up the subject of neo-Naziism, Phil had plenty to say. “This part of the state was a logical place for them to settle," he told me. “This area is fairly isolated and sparsely populated...there are only about 60,000 people in this county, and Spokane is the nearest real city. Our local police departments are under-funded. And the people hereabouts are three shades: white, whiter, whitest; good Aryan stock. “People have always been tolerant of lifestyles around here. But now there’s a feeling of suppressed anticipation. This neo-Nazi thing has been blown all out of proportion. It’s no wonder everyone is uptight in Hayden. Who wants the cops poking around? A lot of people have guns around, and they don’t want the police trying to take them away." “Is it easier to buy a gun here now than it used to be?” I asked him. “You know it’s always been real easy,” Phil said. “Come in here...I’ll show you mine.” We went into an adjoining room, where there were several rifles, shotguns and pistols in plain view. “Look at this one,” Phil continued, opening a drawyer and taking out what appeared to be a camouflage-colored plastic rifle stock. Peeling off the rubber butt, Phil pulled a barrel, trigger mechanism and clip of bullets from inside the stock, assembling the weapon in less than a minute. “See?" he said, handing the rifle to me. “It’s a .22. I paid a guy $50 for it back in 1971. He and his friends have a few barrels full of guns like these buried out on the Rathdrum Prairie. It’s not very accurate, but you could kill somebody with it. The survivalists like them because they’re easy to smuggle and hide. It’s made by Armalite.” Putting the gun aside, we went back into the front room. “The guy I bought that rifle from doesn’t like the neo-Nazis at all,” Phil said. “He thinks that the best thing to do would be wait until they’re having their big summer fascist jamboree and then hit the compound with a small neutron bomb.” I told Phil about Ben’s plan to sell slashes at a Nazi flag. “I'll bet he'd only get four or five takers,” Phil responded. “But you never know. Parts of this area are in the ’80s. For instance, I know a man of Japanese descent who works for the local telephone company. When Butler and the Aryan Nations moved in, they applied for telephone service, and my friend was sent out on the call. Butler refused to let him on the grounds! He made a hell of a stink about it, but the phone company refused to send out anyone else. It took two years, but finally Butler gave in. After all, he needed his telephone.” We talked for a while longer and then called it a night. Driving back to my motel in Hayden to soak up more atmosphere, it suddenly struck me how far out of the mainstream this neck of the woods had drifted. This was a place where you actually had to think about the pros and cons of desecrating a Nazi flag! You never knew what the Nazi nuts might do, just as people feared in pre-WWII Germany. I pulled into my parking slot and went into the bar, just to make sure that I wasn’t missing anything important. Things were normal. The conversation froze into apprehensive mutterings. I bought a pack of peanuts and went back to my room. This seemed like a good time to reread The Turner Diaries. I’d gotten a copy by sending $5.55 to The Thunderbolt, Marietta, Georgia, and had first read it in one sitting. It’s one of the most powerful books I’ve ever come across, and probably unique in American literature: racist science fiction, artfully crafted and Breakfast in Hayden, Idaho seething with the purest hatred ever to reach print. It’s the kind of book you should read just to find out what we’re up against. The book recounts the adventures of Earl Turner, a militant white supremacist who bands together with others of his ilk in the 1990s and topples the American government, laying the groundwork for a completely Aryan world. The author “When a stranger shows up, the locals figure that he’s either a cop, a reporter, or maybe a right-wing nut. We don’t say much because you never know who might be listening.” makes the message perfectly clear: kill the Jews, kill the blacks and all people of color, stop the mongrelization of the white race; anything goes in the fantasy war between the species. The Order comes out swinging against the System. They destroy FBI headquarters with a bomb; they rob, counterfeit and kill dispassionately, all in the name of white supremacy. They launch a mortar attack on Congress, contaminate a nuclear power plant, and manage to instigate a limited nuclear exhange between the superpowers. As I re-read The Turner Diaries, I realized that the veiled agenda of the neo-Nazis is nothing but the precipitation of fear. Viewing the American populace as nothing but a sodden mass of beerswilling, TV-opiated cretins who sold out to the System years before. “There is no way we can destroy the System without hurting innocent people—no way,” the fictional Turner writes. The neo-Nazis regard the American citizenry as nearly neutralized already; all that is needed to keep them cowering in their homes is a good healthy dose of fear. It seemed to be working in the real world. I read to the point where The Order sets out to murder a few newspaper editors to intimidate the media and then fell asleep. The next morning I had breakfast at a cafe in Hayden. I knew from news accounts that Butler and the other neo- Nazis often frequented the establishment. When I went in, the atmosphere was the same as that in the other local establishments. Hostile, antagonistic stares and withdrawn silence filled the cafe. I ordered the German Plate, a superman-sized portion of scrambled eggs and potatoes. The waitress served it with a grim expression on her face—a somber way to start the day. In the parking lot outside the restaurant ■ a pickup truck displayed a bumper sticker that read, “They stole our gold and silver—now let’s give them some lead.” I got in my car and drove into Couer d’Alene to visit another friend whom I hadn't seen for years, wondering all the way who “they” were. The Many Faces o f“They” Julie had moved to Northern Idaho after graduating from college, and when her brother joined a Moonie sect in the area she had become involved with the Couer d’Alene Cult Awareness Center. “What exactly does the Cult Awareness Center do?" I asked her as we sat at the kitchen table drinking instant coffee. “Did you start it yourself?” “Oh no,” Julie laughed. “There are 60 Cult Awareness Centers nationwide, all part of the Cult Awareness Network. We're not deprogrammers; what we do is keep track of groups that we believe to be destructive cults as a resource for families who lose members to their influences.” There have always been tall tales of weird cults living in the Idaho Panhandle. Stories abound of strange rituals and grotesque murders and mutilations. When I’d lived there years before, I’d noticed a reclusive sect that locals referred to as the “Blue Army,” and hear rumors of many more. “How many cults are there around here, anyway?” I asked Julie. “We’ve identified 21,” she said matter- of-factly. “Destructive cults, that is. We have ten characteristics that we use to identify destructive cults. In general, they exhibit deception, coercion and mind control.” “Do you consider the Aryan Nations to be a destructive cult?” “Without a doubt. Besides the Aryan Nations, some of the neo-Nazi spin-off groups are destructive. The Order is one, of course. And there’s another white supremacist cult called the Social Nationalist Aryan People’s Party/Restored Church of Jesus Christ. It's in Post Falls, and the leader is a man named Keith Gilbert. He’s got about a dozen followers, and they are definitely dangerous.” I had already heard of Keith D. Gilbert, a full-blown racist who spent several years in a California prison for an abortive plot to kill Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Locally, Gilbert had gotten in trouble in Couer d’Alene for spitting at two dark- skinned children and attempting to run over them with his car. Arrested in 1985 on charges of welfare and tax fraud, Gilbert was cooling his heels in a Wallace, Idaho jail cell. “What about the ‘Blue Army'?” I asked. “Are they still around?” You mean the Fatima Crusade, or Tridentine Latin Rite," she said. “Yes, they’re still around, though most of them have moved to a monastery they bought near Spokane. There are several very active cults around here, but no more than you’d find in any rural, sparsely- populated area.” Just then the doorbell rang. Julie had a visitor, a sociology professor from an Idaho university who was in the area collecting information for a book about the Aryan Nations and their galaxy of hate groups. He was there to compare notes with Julie, who had a great deal of detailed background information on the neo-Nazis. The professor spread his thick sheaf of notes and research data out on the table as he spoke with Julie. It was impressive. He had compiled a list of 128 people who had been identified as members of the Aryan Nations and their allied groups, as well as biographical data and criminal records. “What are you trying to find out?” I asked him. “I want to know what common social factors made these people turn to white supremacy," the professor said, “and what made the members of The Order Clinton St. Quarterly 7
take the route they did. There really don’t seem to be any common denominators...they are from all parts of the social spectrum. I’d like to know more about Robert Matthews, the founder of The Order. He’s something of an enigma.” The professor was right about that. Matthews, credited with founding The Order, is the Lee Harvey Oswald of this bizarre story. He's almost too good to be true, leading to the speculation that Matthews may have been a government plant, inserted into the white supremacist movement to draw the militant faction out and intd violent action. Proponents of this view believe that the Symbionese Liberation Army, a group responsible for the kidnapping of newspaper heiress Patty Hearst in the 1970s, was the result of an intelligence agency’s dirty trick which mushroomed out of control. Originally intended to polarize, confuse and discredit the militant left, the authorities solved the problem of possible embarassment by burning the SLA alive. The Order, so the theory goes, couldn’t have gotten off the ground without Matthews; his background is professionally clouded, and his political orbit managed to intersect with virtually every major American white supremacist. Matthews and The Order may have been a device to draw out and defuse the militant rightwingers, and Matthews may have been snuffed to ensure his silence. “How many members of The Order have you identified?” I asked the professor. “So far, 33. That’s all I know of. At first I thought that the Aryan Nations’ prison recruiting program might ,have brought some people with records of criminal violence into The Order, but that doesn’t appear to be the case. But there is plenty of violence among these 128 people on my list. Between them, they’ve been convicted of 42 murders since 1970.” School Daze and Soldier Tales The next morning I got up early and The Futon Defined. futon /fu-tone/11 (Japan) 1: a bed 2: a couch 3. a healthy, . - firm mattress 4: an inexpensive sleeping system 5: a unique alternative for those folks who like their houses to look a little bit different from everyone else’s 6: the Americanized style of futon, thicker, more resilient, guaranteed to last 7: found at Unfoldings, Seattle’s foremost manufacturer of futons, along with flannel sheets, blankets, cushions and tatami mats. Unfoldings. The bed has never been better. 2107 N. 34th Mon-Fri 10-6 Sat 10-5, Sun 11-4 drove to Couer d’Alene High School, where I was scheduled to be a guest lecturer to the senior creative writing class. The school was a microcosm of the community. Of the more than 1,700 students, three were black. I found the right classroom and was introduced to the class by the teacher. I’d never lectured to high school students before, and I was surprised at how adult and aware they were. Two students, I discovered, had written their term papers on the Aryan Nations. I asked to see their work, and when I opened the folders, found them stuffed full of white supremacist literature. Tina and Jerry, the two students, had gone out to the Aryan Nations’ compound and interviewed Eldon “Bud” Cutler, a former Apparently the paranoia of the elders hadn’t yet permeated the school system. The kids were more interested in getting two pieces of cake than they were in destroying an international Zionist conspiracy. Idaho GOP conservative who had joined the neo-Nazis and worked his way up to chief of security. Cutler had been more than happy to chat with the youngsters, and had supplied them with numerous pamphlets and leaflets that outlined the Aryan Nations' basic philosophies. “Identity Theology” was mentioned several times. This is merely perceiving oneself as a white person, instead of a member of the human race. The amount of melanin in the skin becomes all-important. From that tenet it’s a short hop to the twin doctrines of white supremacy and anti-Semitism. In its nether regions, Aryan theology insists that Jesus Christ was not a Jew, and that the Holocaust in Nazi Europe never occurred. A generous sampling of Biblical and Talmudic quota1 block N . of Gas Works Park 6344)630 ' tions served to prove their thesis that the international Jewish conspiracy is responsible for the world’s evils. The neo- Nazi message was well wrapped in the mantle of Christian fundamentalism and tied off with the American flag. It was an incredible collection of mindless hate, reminding me more of the occult ramblings of Aleister Crowley than anything else. It didn’t seem to have found a receptive audience among the high school students, who had a sizable portion of juvenile cynicism for just about everything. The two reports basically parroted the white supremacist rhetoric without drawing any conclusions. Neither student appeared to have been converted. “I enjoyed your paper,” I told Jerry. “What did you think of the Aryan Nations' compound?” “At least I know where it is now,” he said. “Most kids in the school don’t know. Everyone pretty much stays away from there and leaves the neo-Nazis alone." “Well, they do have guns out there,” I commented. “So what?” Jerry said. “Everybody has guns. I’ve got two myself.” Lunch at the school was enjoyable, not because the spaghetti was good, but because there was conversation taking place around me. Apparently the paranoia of the elders hadn’t yet permeated the school system. The kids were more interested in getting two pieces of cake than they were in destroying an international Zionist conspiracy, and they didn’t have any dark secrets to hide from the outside world. After lunch I called Sid Rosen. Rosen, one of the area’s few Jewish residents, had once operated a restaurant called Chef Rosen’s at the north end of Hayden. Someone had scribbled swastikas and anti-Semitic slogans on the building’s outside walls, and not long afterwards Rosen had sold the business. I asked him if that was why he’d sold his restaurant. “No, not at all,” Rosen told me. “I was planning on getting out of business anyway. The way I look at it, it was just a few crazy drunks acting up. My neighbors offered to help me clean the paint off. It wasn’t that big of a deal.” But hadn’t that incident, coupled with the attack on the Coeur d’Alene children, prompted the Idaho State Legislature to pass a malicious harassment bill? “Yes, it did. But that’s all ancient history. I live in this community; I don’t want to dredge up all this old stuff.” Later that day, I stopped at the Hayden gun shop. A man and a woman were sitting at a table talking when I walked in. They instantly shut up and stared at me intensely. The proprietor, a lean man on metal crutches came out of a back room and asked me what I wanted. “Just looking,” I told him. “Do you buy guns?” “You bet,” he assured me. “If you’ve got any, bring them in. I’m in a buying mood these days. Keep me in mind.” I assured him that I would and then left. Paranoia seemed to be good for the gun business. Going into the next-door second-hand book store, I browsed through their stock. It was about like any other used paperback store except for the vast selection of adventure stories about mercenaries and war-trained anti-heroes. The Execution er, the Destroyer, the Death Merchant, the Mercenary, Soldier for Hire, the Liquidators, Able Team, the Survivalist, the Specialist, the Terminator...all those series, and many more. I bought a few to read and went back to the motel. One For The Road The next morning was check-out time. I packed my bags, loaded my car, and left the key on my bedside table. Goodbye, motel. I turned the ignition key, breathed my daily sigh of relief because no car bomb had exploded, and drove through Hayden for the last time. One thing that I wanted to do before I left was get a haircut. I pulled to a stop in front of a barber shop that I’d been told was the oldest in Hayden, and went inside. A middle-aged barber was clipping a man’s hair, while another barber stood idly behind an empty chair. All three of them stopped talking and shot suspicious stares at me. I was well used to this sort of reaction by then. I knew that I could chill out a tavern or restaurant by merely walking in, but this was the first time I’d managed to frost up a barber shop. I sat down in the empty chair, glancing over at the other customer on my right. He glared back with a look of pure, unadulterated hatred; a beefy, heavy-set man in his 50s, with an iron-gray crewcut and bushy eyebrows. , “How do you want your hair cut?” my barber asked in a flat monotone. “Shorter all the way around,” I told him. He draped a sheet around my neck and upper torso and went to work. No one said another word for fifteen minutes. Most barbers have a standard repertoire of pleasantries and banalities, but these guys weren't even going through the motions; the place was as quiet as a morgue. The silence would have been uncomfortable, but by now I was used to the ways of Hayden and didn't care much one way or another. I was leaving and they were staying; let them stew in their own juices as long as they wanted. The neo-Nazis were 20 years too soon with their big push to topple the establishment, I decided. There were still too many people alive who remembered the atrocities of the Third Reich, who had put their lives on the line to save the world from Hitler’s brand of Naziism. But they were in the right spot to develop their plans for the future. Although Naziism is basically European in its rhetoric (Native Americans are completely overlooked in the hateful diatribes), the transplanted neo-Nazi hybrid was taking firm root in the good ol’ boy loam of the American Northwest. After all, the West was won through genocide, and the Reagan administration has softened Americans up for the neo-Nazi sucker punch. As long as people are looking for scapegoats, neo-Naziism will have a chance to survive. It’s nothing more or less than a religion of hatred. “Should I trim your eyebrows while I'm at it?” the other barber asked his customer, breaking the lengthy silence. “Might as well,” the man rumbled. No more was said. Naziism offers simple solutions to complex problems, I told myself. It has an eternal appeal to those who yearn for the days gone by, and imagine a return to safer, less complicated times. The neo-Nazis, supreme opportunists that they are, have taken advantage of Northwest culture. The local Panhandle residents, by respecting the white supremacists' freedom of expression, have lost a large chunk of their own freedom of speech through fear and ingrown paranoia. They're afraid of everyone, afraid of themselves. The Code of the West has mutated into a sullen, resentful omerta, a xenophobic code of silence that permeates the community. The other barber finished and removed the sheet from his customer, who paid and left without another word, throwing me one final hostile stare as he stalked out. I wondered if he was a Nazi. Could be. The Aryan Nations’ ruling junta had probably graced these chairs with their holy alabster bottoms many times before. “That’s it,” my barber said, undoing the sheet. “That’ll be five dollars.” I paid him and left. That was it, all right. No “Thanks, come again,” no anything. It had been the quietest haircut of my life, as well as the worst. At least it would give me something to remember Hayden by. I got in my car and drove quickly out of town, turning west onto the freeway back to the Coast. I knew that I was going to miss Idaho more than ever. There’s no place like home, especially when it doesn’t exist any longer. Dennis Eichhorn is a writer who lives near Seattle. He is a frequent contributor to the CSQ, and writes regularly for The Rocket and Stars, a magazine for young Americans. 8 Clinton St. Quarterly
Talking with DERRICK BELL TVThen Derrick Bell became Dean of tbe University of Oregon Law School m W 1981, he warned his faculty that to have a black person in charge of a mainly white institution was abnormal in this society He also made it clear that he would continue to work on and speak out about civil rights issues. Bell resigned his deanship in February of this year over a hiring dispute. Some law schoolfaculty members objected to hiring an Asian woman who he believed was well qualifiedfor a teachingposition at the law school. In hisparting words to Interview by Marcia Mint Danab Clinton St. Quarterly 9
the University of Oregon s law students, Bell said: “1saw a part of my role here as teaching by example that which I consider essential to the successfulprofessional: a willingness to speak and act in accordance with one’s beliefs even when those views cast you in an unpopular minority. ” Bell is aformer Deputy Director ofthe U.S. Department ofHealth Education and Welfare’s Office of Civil Rights. He served as a staffattorney with the NAACP Legal Defense and Education Fund and as director of the Western Center on Law and Poverty. He taught law at Harvard University from 1969 through 1980 and litigated civil rights cases throughout the South in the 1960s. Bell is also well known for his writings on racism and poverty and specifically on the long-term effects offoowo vs. Board of Education, the landmark Supreme Court decision that ordered the desegregation o fpublic schools. Clinton Street Quarterly: Last month the Washington Post ran an article that talked about how although blacks appear to be more integrated into American society in the eighties, the actual statistics show that blacks aren’t better off today than twenty years ago. What are your views about this? What do you say to people who think that the battle against racism in this country has been won? Bell: The article is correct. Not only are we not better integrate^, we are not better off, and they're almost two different things. I guess at this point if the statistics didn’t show the tremendous gap in unemployment between blacks and whites, the tremendous gap in income, health, mortality, infant mortality, I wouldn’t really mind that we are not integrated. That would still be a challenge, but it would be one we would be prepared to undertake. The fact is that those of us in the civil rights movement, the lawyers and what have you, adopted the principle of equal opportunity as the answer to overt segregation and discrimination—no blacks hired, no blacks admitted, no blacks wanted. We felt that was all we would need. We could have a color-blind Constitution. We ignored two things. First, we ignored the serious impact of generations of overt discrimination that had left their mark in the skills, the abilities, the internal affliction that comes when a society tells an individual or a group that you’re nothing over a long period of time. You couldn’t just bring people up to the starting line and say, “Everyone’s equal now, go.” The second thing is that we ignored the cause of all the discrimination that had gone before. That cause was not segregation. Segregation was just one method of carrying out the policy, as slavery was before that. And when we got rid of slavery and we got rid of segregation, we naively felt that that’s all there was, and we said equal opportunity. Well, we now find that equal opportunity is being used as a replacement for segregation to maintain blacks in a subordinate, exploitable position in our society. Many of us who helped bring that about have an awful lot of debt to pay. The article was absolutely right, and if it suggested that in many ways blacks are worse off than we were twenty years You can say, “Well, Derrick Bell made it. How come the rest of them can't? And here's a Superintendent of Schools in Portland and he’s black, and the Music Director of the Oregon Symphony, he's black. They made it. The opportunities must be open. ” Well that's crazy. ago, I think that a strong argument could be made that that is correct too. Sure we didn’t have blacks as deans of major white law schools and we didn’t have blacks running around television as star athletes and entertainers, in ones and twos, in this position and that across the land. We do have a larger black middle class than we had then. But overall, I think the argument can be made that we are, in fact, worse off now than we were twenty years ago. CSQ: Can you give an example of how equal opportunity has been used? Bell: It simply builds on what was before. And because memories of Americans are short—particularly having to do with our historical wrongdoings—it seems infinitely unfair to treat everybody alike and to ignore, if you ever knew, how maltreated blacks and other minorities were before the equal opportunity rationale was adopted by the courts, by the legislatures, by the society. So now we have a situation in which the signs are down, in which any memory of overt discrimination is fast fading if not already gone, and any .suggestion that blacks should be treated differently than anybody else creates a wealth of debate, whether you’re in the ivory tower or at the local corner bar. Twenty years ago everybody knew—who wanted to know-how badly blacks were treated. Being the last to be hired and first to be fired even from menial work. Now these things tend to be fading and the dire plight of blacks is somehow made the fault of blacks. Their morality is not up to it. There was just a public outcry to fire a woman who co-authored a book suggesting that it was the jungle mentality or something like that which was responsible for all of this. It’s very easy. It fits right into the traditional stereotype that has never been worked out. And as opposed to dealing with these problems seriously, it’s much easier to at least say, covertly, well that’s why most of them don’t succeed. The fact that a few blacks here and there have done well provides another rationalization for doing nothing. You can say, “Well, Derrick Bell made it. How come the rest of them can’t?” And here’s a Superintendent of Schools in Portland and he’s black, and the Music Director of the Oregon Symphony, he’s black. They made it. The opportunities must be open. And if the rest of them really work, they could make it too. Well that’s crazy. Often the blacks who make it are twice as good as the whites who are competing with them. Or it’s just circumstances that enable one or two to get ahead. But I know from my own experience in legal education, it’s one thing to get the first black hired on a faculty of a law school in this country; it’s another thing to get the second black hired, or the third. There are no signs any more, and in many ways it’s more difficult, because everyone feels that we’re doing these things on the basis of merit. And if you don’t meet our standards of merit then of course you can’t be hired, you can’t be promoted and you’re out of it. You need to bring yourselves up the way my grandparents did, as the Irish, or Italian or Poles would say. Of course the world has changed a great deal since their grandparents came over. When their grandparents came over we didn't have a civil service. People got jobs because you promised to vote the right way. There were jobs to be gotten where you used a pick and shovel. You didn’t need much training or skills for that. That’s all changed now. So that you have a tremendous amount of unemployment—an awful lot among blacks and even more among whites—in which people are becoming technologically unemployed. They may never get jobs again. Industries in which they had skills pack up, close down, move away. Taiwanese Continued on page 20 Photographs (Except Herrick Rell) by Richard J . Bro wn 10 Clinton St. Quarterly
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