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Revision as of 20:55, 29 March 2006
Domestic terrorism was considered rare in the United States, by those who do not its history well. As a result, the Oklahoma City bombing was at first thought by some journalists to be the work of external actors, possibly from the Middle East. In reality there have been acts of domestic terrorism since the 19th century, most perpetrated by Irish-Americans.
1) The Civil War Draft Riots (1863) -- the worst riots in American history; by far outstripping anything in Oakland, Watts, Attica, etc., with hundreds dead, maimed and injured. Suspected of being pre-planned (premeditated) for the purpose of gaining more political power in NYC from the Protestants who then ran the city.
2) (As per New York Daily News, October 2005): The bombing of the Los Angeles Times on October 1, 1910, which killed 21 people. Some of the involved were not Irish, but anarchists of Eastern European or Jewish descent. However, the brains of this crime were John and Jim McNamara, two Irish-American brothers, who wanted to "unionize" the paper, and who were only caught after a dogged, relentless search by a private investigator using his own funds. Samuel Gompers tearfully insisted that no one associated with the labour movement could have done such a thing. The McNamara brothers were defended by Clarence Darrow, who soon realized they were guilty. They were amazingly lucky that Darrow convinced the judge to allow them to withdraw their "not guilty" pleas, and to find a jury open-minded enough to not automatically sentence them to death. Jim got life in jail for having planted the bomb, and elder brother, John, got 15 years imprisonment. Darrow never again represented organized labor.
3) The attack on the Oklahoma City Federal Building by the now deceased (via public execution)Timothy McVeigh, an Irish-American Catholic. His known associate Terry Nichols was not Catholic, nor was he sentenced to death. There do not appear to be any sectarian motives, but it should be pointed out that the Oklahoma City (a city to which he had no known connections)building had scarcely any Catholics, while New York and Boston would have been quite the opposite. But it is possible that Oklahoma City was chosen for having the laxest security.
The revelation that the attack had been carried out by an American came as a shock to the country and the rest of the world, and served as an embarrassment to some sections of the news media.
The Patriot Act designates domestic terrorism as a crime. However, the Patriot Act does not give the meaning of domestic terrorism as designated as a crime, leaving the intepretation of the acts, statements or preparations which may constitute domestic terrorism to whomever may wish to interpret them.
For this reason, certain types of civil disobedience can be interpreted as domestic terrorism, thus having a chilling effect on public participation and freedom of expression, a reasonable serious fear under the extreme right-wing government of George W. Bush.