The Right to Party

A few years ago, when I was a reporter in Chicago, I did a story on a phenomenon I called "The New Prohibition." The city, for various reasons, was shutting down neighborhood bars. In poor black neighborhoods, taverns were the targets of moralistic church crusaders. In gentrifying neighborhoods, they were the bête noire of noise-averse yuppies. What was wrong with Mayor Daley? I asked. Didn't he want Chicago to be fun anymore?

The article garnered a bit of local attention. I appeared on an episode of a nightly public-affairs show. For once, a piece of mine actually got a few letters to the editor. And I decided to take it further. I did a local NPR radio commentary in which I called, tongue-in-cheekly, for a new political party, "The Party Party," that would campaign to make Chicago the freewheeling town I imagined it had once been.

Oh, how naïve I was then, and how foolish I feel now! Those little tavern raids and precinct vote-dry initiatives were nothing, a little internecine tap-dance, compared to the assault on fun currently being waged by the federal government. Our right to party is being attacked by forces far more powerful, more sinister, and more organized than Mayor Daley's liquor-law enforcement bureaucracy. Everything fun about America is under serious threat.

Let's review the evidence of the last few months.

In late February, DEA and Department of Justice officials arrested 55 people and seized thousands of dollars of drug paraphernalia during "Operation Pipe Dreams." The arrests mainly targeted online bong dealers, who attorney general John Ashcroft claimed had "invaded the homes of families across the country without their knowledge." But also included in the arrests were employees of several head shops in Pittsburgh, where the investigation was centered. The feds even raided the California home of Tommy Chong, who in mid-May pleaded guilty to conspiring to sell drug paraphernalia. The most stunning quote from the whole affair came from acting DEA chief John Brown, who said, "People selling drug paraphernalia are in essence no different than drug dealers. They are as much a part of drug trafficking as silencers are a part of criminal homicide.''

The government is equating Tommy Chong with murderous criminals. Perhaps next they'll haul in Rodney Dangerfield and the inflatable pilot from Airplane! Something is wrong. Very wrong.

In March, Senator Joe Biden of Delaware managed to sneak the RAVE act through as an attachment to a bill establishing a national warning system about child abductions. RAVE stands for, amazingly, Reducing Americans' Vulnerability to Ecstasy. But its main targets are concert promoters and club owners, whom the act holds to an absurd standard.

According to the law, it is illegal to "manage or control any place, whether permanently or temporarily, either as an owner, lessee, agent, employee, occupant, or mortgagee, and knowingly and intentionally rent, lease, profit from, or make available for use, with or without compensation, the place for the purpose of unlawfully manufacturing, storing, distributing, or using a controlled substance."

This definition was derived from a 20-year-old federal law that permitted raids on "crackhouses." The law is so broad that you could have 10 people over for dinner, put on some loud music, and you've got yourself a rave. If someone lights a joint at your "rave," and the neighbors complain about the music, and the police are in a bad mood that night, you face decades in prison. Suddenly everyone is a potential drug criminal and it's doubly dangerous if there's dancing involved.

And this just in: In late May, a DEA agent in Montana threatened a venue owner with a $250,000 fine, under the RAVE Act, if she hosted a joint benefit for the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws (NORML) and Students For Sensible Drug Policy. The event was canceled. The RAVE Act has officially arrived.