Uh oh....

[Nebrios]

Radio host and activist Adam Kokesh plans to lead an armed march from the Arlington National Cemetery in Virginia all the way to the White House and back.

According to a Facebook event posted by Kokesh, titled “Open Carry March on Washington,” he plans to lead a peaceful march July 4th “across the Memorial Bridge, down Independence Avenue, around the Capitol, the Supreme Court, & the White House, then peacefully return to Virginia across the Memorial Bridge.”

Kokesh states that “this is an act of civil disobedience,” but stresses “This will be a non-violent event, unless the government chooses to make it violent.”

“There’s a remote chance that there will be violence as there has been from government before, and I think it should be clear that if anyone involved in this event is approached respectfully by agents of the state, they will submit to arrest without resisting.”

An update states that Kokesh is already coordinating with authorities in the DC area and is encouraging them to honor their oaths and help escort the march along their route.

Libertarian and political commentator Lew Rockwell, on the Monday edition of the Alex Jones Show, warned that the march is equivalent to entering the gates of Mordor, and agreed with Alex that the event could easily be provocateured to demonize the growing liberty movement.

Below is the Facebook post in full:


On the morning of July 4, 2013, Independence Day, we will muster at the National Cemetery & at noon we will step off to march across the Memorial Bridge, down Independence Avenue, around the Capitol, the Supreme Court, & the White House, then peacefully return to Virginia across the Memorial Bridge. This is an act of civil disobedience, not a permitted event. We will march with rifles loaded & slung across our backs to put the government on notice that we will not be intimidated & cower in submission to tyranny. We are marching to mark the high water mark of government & to turn the tide. This will be a non-violent event, unless the government chooses to make it violent. Should we meet physical resistance, we will peacefully turn back, having shown that free people are not welcome in Washington, & returning with the resolve that the politicians, bureaucrats, & enforcers of the federal government will not be welcome in the land of the free.

There’s a remote chance that there will be violence as there has been from government before, and I think it should be clear that if anyone involved in this event is approached respectfully by agents of the state, they will submit to arrest without resisting. We are truly saying in the SUBTLEST way possible that we would rather die on our feet than live on our knees.

You are welcome to attend unarmed as a supporter, or armed with a recording device.

We especially invite law enforcement officers to stand with us armed however they feel is appropriate.

If this page gets to 10,000 attendees by June 1st, & we have the critical mass necessary to pull this off, (1,000 actual attendees) we will march. Please spread the word, share this event, & invite all your friends.

UPDATE 130506 Now that it’s undeniable that this is going to happen, allow me to make clear how. There will be coordination with DC law enforcement prior to the event. I will recommend that they do the best they can to honor their oaths and escort us on our route. Failing to provide that commitment to safety, we will either be informed that we will only be allowed up to a certain point where we would be arrested. If this is the case, we will approach that point as a group and if necessary, I will procede to volunteer myself to determine what their actual course of action with someone crossing the line will be at which point fellow marchers will have the choice of joining me one at a time in a peaceful, orderly manner, or turning back to the National Cemetery.

[E_]

Awesome, I don't know if I yet have the balls for that but it is getting close.

[Nebrios]

this has all the makings for a mass scale martial law....

[Lock5]

If they actually do it, there will be enough cameras around to document any misbehavior by either party.

[Fall Creek]

It's about time someone got this started!

[Nebrios]

WASHINGTON, July 3, 2013 — Adam Kokesh, the Libertarian anti-war and Second Amendment activist, has called off his July 4 armed march on Washington D.C.

Kokesh had planned to amass thousands of protestors to march from Virginia into the District of Columbia on the Fourth of July with loaded rifles on their backs to gain support for the Second Amendment on Independence Day, even though open carry is illegal in the city.

Washington D.C. has some of the strictest firearm restrictions in the country and does not allow either concealed or open carrying of firearms. All firearms in Washington D.C. must be registered with the police in accordance with the Firearm Control Regulation Act of 1975.

The same law previously prohibited the possession of handguns, even in private citizens’ own homes, unless they were registered before 1976. However, the handgun ban was struck down by the United States Supreme Court in 2008 in District of Columbia v. Heller.

The Supreme Court ruled that the Second Amendment acknowledges and guarantees the right of the individual to possess and carry firearms, and therefore D.C.’s ban on handguns was unconstitutional.

Based on the Heller decision, Washington D.C. enacted new firearm laws. Now handguns are permitted in residents homes. All handguns must be registered with the police undergo a background check, submit their fingerprints, take a gun safety class and pass a written test on the cities laws. There is a firearms registry where photographs of each applicant are kept and finally, the applicants must report where their handguns are going to be stored.

Washington D.C.’s Police Chief, Cathy L. Lanier, had made it clear that an armed march into the District would be an obvious violation of the laws of the city.

The Chief said that the armed protesters would be met on the bridge as they crossed from Arlington, Virginia into the District of Columbia by two police forces carrying their own weapons.

Kokesh had previously launched a Facebook page promoting his armed march, an event which he had hoped would draw enough attention to have 1,000 people attend. The Facebook page had more than 5,000 committed attendees.

Kokesh detailed how he and others planned to march across the Memorial Bridge, which separates Washington from Virginia, while openly carrying firearms. Kokesh told Buzzfeed that the event would be non-violent and said, “We’re not going to resist government by force in any way. This will be a non-violent event, unless the government chooses to make it violent.”

On May 18, 2013, Kokesh was arrested in Philadelphia by federal park rangers at the marijuana legalization rally known as Smoke Down Prohibition. The Smoke Down had occurred in downtown Philadelphia once a month, every month since January 2013.

On Monday May 20 the protesters were charged with assaulting a federal officer and resisting arrest. Wide speculation on the internet claimed that the Federal government seeks to harass and intimidate activist, Kokesh possible due to the scheduled march in Washington.

On May 24, 2013, Kokesh’s charges were reduced from federal charges to violations and he was released.

On the day of his release, Kokesh called off the planned armed march in Washington and instead called for the “Final American Revolution” to take place at the state capitals.

Now, instead of the originally planned protest, Kokesh has called on people to gather in all 50 state capitals to protest gun regulations. “Please don’t come to Washington, D.C., this now an appeal to the state level and I think it’s much more appropriate given the gravity of the situation,” Kokesh said “We shouldn’t be begging the federal government to change, we shouldn’t be hoping that they respect our rights because it’s clear that they don’t.”

In a press release Kokesh called for “A new American revolution” where “the American Revolutionary Army will march on each state capital to demand that the governors of these 50 states immediately initiate the process of an orderly dissolution of the federal government through secession and reclamation of federally held property.” Kokesh also gave the federal government a one-year deadline to comply with his demands before possibly taking violent action, writing, “Should one whole year from this July 4th pass while the crimes of this government are allowed to continue, we may have passed the point at which non-violent revolution becomes impossible.”

Reactions by the gun-rights community had been divided over the proposed armed march. Some felt that the only way to be heard was to show strong, peaceful unity but to do something radical enough to garnish attention while others felt like by holding a march without the proper permits and intentionally breaking the city’s restrictive laws was making gun-rights activists look like rabble rousers and were asking for trouble.

Adam Kokesh currently has 50 Facebook events pages open, one for a march on each state capital. It is not clear where Kokesh is planning on being for July 4, 2013.