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Parade of Lassos and Nooses

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The Parade of Lassos and Nooses was a series of marches carried out by cadres of the Humanist Vanguard outside academic institutions in Cárdenas and Parap, and outside the home of Sofia Reyes during mid to late 1758 AN.

Throughout the year of 1758 AN, the youth arm of the Federal Humanist Party, the Vanguard, had been teaching practical skills including knot tying to an advanced level. Past the midpoint of the year, this new skill began to be evidenced in torchlit parades, undertaken outside and through the academic quarters of the major cities of the Federation, especially Cárdenas and Parap, where Vanguardistas proudly demonstrated their evident proficiency with newly knotted lassos and nooses fashioned from the lengths of rope with which they had been issued for the purposes of instruction. The marchers had been accompanied by hired light trucks piled high with beer kegs and sound systems rigged to play energetic dance music interspersed with militantly patriotic songs. The parades frequently crossed the line from carnivalesque to rowdy, yet notably the Gendarmerie kept their policing distinctly light touch.

The campaign was considered to be a show of strength, ahead of the election year of 1759 AN and following on from the defeat of an effort to impose term limits of the Humanist premier.

The action had reportedly received the personal blessing of Vice-Premier Fred Strong.

Court order and aftermath

In XIV.1758 AN, the Federal Capital District Court granted Reyes a protective order against assemblies outside her Cárdenas home and directed the Gendarmerie to enforce it. Reyes applied for the order eight years after she had been injured during Operation Faun, when a mounted gendarme lassoed and dragged her during a protest at the Royal University of Parap.[1]

Commissioner General Manuel Aristegui y Campos ordered the marches broken up within a day of the ruling and referred the Gendarmerie's earlier handling of them to its Bureau of Professional Integrity. Officers dispersed a gathering in the Cárdenas academic quarter that evening and another in Parap the following night. The Gendarmerie reported no injuries and a small number of detentions for public-order offenses.[1]

During the dispute, Strong's office confirmed the earlier report that he had personally blessed the campaign. He declined to retract his support, and the FHP publicly defended both Strong and the marches. Leader of the Opposition Marcos Ferreira Gonçalves described the affair as a failure of government, while Federal Consensus Party leader Francisco Gabaza focused his criticism on the Gendarmerie's delayed intervention.[1]

Polling by the Institute of Public Opinion found majorities opposed to the marches in every reported group, including among FHP voters, and a plurality who believed that the Gendarmerie had failed in its duty. The dispute became part of the civil-liberties debate before the 1759 general election.[1]

Parliamentary response

The controversy produced a formal censure filing in the Federal Assembly. On 29.XIV.1758 AN, Gonçalves filed the Motion to Censure the Vice-Premier with 258 endorsements: 216 AJNA Deputies, ten CGA Deputies, all 25 Aldurian independent Deputies, and the seven other independent and unaligned Deputies.[2] The resolution would censure Strong, call upon him to withdraw his endorsement and apologize, and call upon the President of the Government to recommend his dismissal from the Council of State if he refused.

On 30.XIV, Speaker Carolina Mendez classified the filing as a private-member resolution under Standing Orders 6(1) and 6(2). She ruled that 263 endorsements were required, leaving the filing five short, and declined to bring it forward for debate. The resolution remained in the Hopper pending further endorsements; the ruling did not address its merits, and no debate or vote took place.[3]

Gonçalves responded in a Morning Speech that he respected the ruling and would seek the five additional names. He said the government should not treat a procedural reprieve as vindication and repeated his demand that Strong withdraw his endorsement and apologize.[4]

The controversy also prompted fresh legislation. On 6.I.1759 AN, independent Deputy Piti Gándara introduced the Public Order (Paramilitary and Intimidatory Displays) Act, 1759 in the Federal Assembly as a private member's bill, which would prohibit paramilitary and intimidatory displays at or near public assemblies and dwellings while preserving the right of peaceful assembly.

As the 1759 campaign opened, Gándara pressed the bill to the front of the race, asking every party to say whether it would pass her measure against paramilitary and intimidatory display in the next Cortes.[5]

See also

References

  1. ^ a b c d NBC Newsfeed, 11.XIV.1758.
  2. ^ Federal Assembly Hopper filing.
  3. ^ Ruling of the Chair.
  4. ^ Gonçalves statement in Morning Speeches.
  5. ^ "Gándara makes civil liberties a test of the campaign", NBC Newsfeed, 22.VII.1759 AN.
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