Updates as of February 3, 2006:
Bill Durland's report on the trial and constitutional implications
Brian Hildebrandt trial wtill go to court as city has another motion denied
Suit will be appealed in 10th Circuit Court in Denver
Judge Matsch throws out suit; decides no 1st amendment in 21st CenturySean Paige op/ed piece against NATO protesters
Bill Sulzman and Mark Lewis' Letters to the editor in rebuttal
Mark Lewis' letter to editor in INDY without editingStatement from Bill on Friday, July 8, after end of testimony.
Rocky Mountain News coverage from July 8
Gazette coverage from July 8
Rocky Mountain News coverage from July 7
Gazette coverage from July 7
Jim Spencer, of Denver Post OP/ED piece from July 6
Gazette coverage from July 6
Rocky Montain News coverage from July 6
Denver Post coverage from July 5
By Diane Carman
Denver Post Columnist
DenverPost.com
The next time you write an angry letter to your congressman or put a bumper sticker on your car or read this newspaper, thank Bill Sulzman.
The intrepid (some say outlandish) Colorado Springs free-speech activist is willing to go to jail to protect the First Amendment so you don't have to.
"I guess I'm not someone who would run from the label of political radical," said the 67-year-old former Catholic priest, who parted ways with the church over a run-in with police at an Air Force Academy demonstration in the 1970s. "We subpoenaed the archbishop, who came to court as a hostile witness."
It was not exactly a brilliant career move.
Sulzman is hardly motivated by traditional notions of success like fame or money, though. "I live low on the pole," he said. He works with the homeless, has a part-time position with the organization Citizens for Peace in Space, and gets financial help from his siblings. "I'm from a big family, and some of my brothers and sisters like what I do."
He's proud of the fact that his income is so low it's not taxed.
What he lives for is the peace/antipoverty/free-speech crusade that captivated him in the 1960s.
He's helped organize farmworkers, protested weapons systems, advocated for the world's poor and rallied in defense of the three Dominican nuns who were convicted of obstructing national defense by protesting nuclear weapons at a missile silo in Weld County in 2003.
He's been arrested "I don't know, two or three dozen times over the last 35 years," he said, mostly for expressing his opinions when they weren't appreciated.
And he's nonpartisan. "I was arrested and did time in jail during the Clinton years" as well as during various Republican administrations, he said.
"It's usually for civil-disobedience, civil-resistance kind of things. But my ordinary daily life is not that much different than your average Republican's."
Not that there's anything wrong with that. But when he sees an injustice, he is compelled to bear witness.
Sulzman is still agitating about what happened at the NATO meeting in Colorado Springs in October 2003.
A month before the meeting of delegates from NATO nations was to be held, city officials announced that a security zone would be enforced around the convention center. Demonstrators would not be allowed within three blocks of the meeting. Even residents whose homes were inside the perimeter had to pass armed guards to go home.
Sulzman said that before the meeting, Citizens for Peace in Space submitted a written request for a one-hour period in which they could display signs at the convention center.
"Actually, I seriously thought we were giving away too much in our letter," he said. "It was such a short time, and we were agreeing to not actively leaflet. It would have been government-approved speech if they decided to go for it."
They didn't.
So Sulzman decided it was just the kind of oppression that should be challenged.
The civil lawsuit, Citizens for Peace in Space vs. the City of Colorado Springs, is scheduled to be heard in U.S. District Judge Richard Matsch's courtroom on Tuesday. It claims the city violated the First Amendment when citizens were not allowed to communicate their views to the NATO delegates. Sulzman's group is represented by the American Civil Liberties Union.
If people acquiesce to the limits, the rules, the ideological screening of demonstrators and the free-speech zones, they are giving up too much, he said. "That kind of thinking has to be challenged so we don't lose our free- speech rights. We didn't want a precedent to be set here."
The day before the hearing, Sulzman plans to participate in the annual ACLU Liberty Run at Washington Park.
He figures he has to stay in shape.
"I would like to see some big sweeping changes in our country and our church," he said. "Lately I don't see much evidence we're moving in that direction.
"But I'm not quitting."
Diane Carman's column appears Sunday, Tuesday and Thursday. She can be reached at 303-820-1489 or dcarman@denverpost.com.