BATAVIA — Ten protesters were forcibly removed from House Speaker Dennis Hastert's district office lobby Thursday for disrupting business there by singing peace songs.
The group — which included a nun, a mother, two senior citizens and some Northern Illinois University students, among others — kneeled and clung to each other, refusing to go unless they heard that Hastert would delay a congressional vote on the declaration of war against Iraq.
Cele Meyer, 79, a retired school social worker with the DeKalb Interfaith Network, grasped tighter onto a chair inside the speaker's office, resting her head down when Police Chief Dennis Anderson urged her to give in and walk outside.
"I haven't gone limp since the civil rights movement," Meyer informed him, referring to the practice of letting one's body go limp in order to make it more difficult to carry.
Meanwhile, inside the lobby, officers worked to untangle a group of four — David Meade, 80, a retired journalist who once worked at the Chicago Daily News; Dave Martin, 46, with the DuPage Peace Through Justice Coalition; Pat Bergen, with the Sisters of St. Joseph of LaGrange; and Kim Dubose, 29, of DeKalb Interfaith Network.
"You are the leader of this group," Cmdr. Gregory Thrun told Martin. "You should be able to talk to us, not just sing."
The demonstrator continued singing Oh Healing River and We Shall Overcome. All the while, they were picked up by officers who grasped them under their armpits and picked them up like sacks by the arms and legs.
In the end, nobody was arrested. The afternoon finished peacefully with the tired and emotionally drained protesters sitting in a circle outside the building, praying and singing more songs under the watchful eyes of a police officer.
Anderson said police were called out by Hastert's staff members when the protesters refused to leave.
Technically, the demonstrators could have been charged with trespassing, since they were on private property, or resisting arrest, Anderson said.
But the intention wasn't to punish them, he said.
The afternoon's events brought out Mayor Jeff Schielke, who commented that people have the right to do what they want, but proper care must be taken.
More than 70 people had arrived in the afternoon from a coalition of groups — Concerned Citizens of DuPage, Kane, DeKalb and Cook counties; DuPage Peace through Justice Coalition; Iraq Peace Pledge; Fox Valley Pledge of Resistance; DeKalb Interfaith Network; Pax Christi of DuPage; and the Chicago Area Chapter of Fellowship of Reconciliation.
The protesters came from throughout the Chicago area, but there were some from the Fox Valley such as Jeff Saras, of Batavia, who was bearing a sign that read "Don't attack Iraq."
"This is more about oil interests than fighting weapons of mass destruction," said Jim Weaver, 62, of St. Charles.
There were speakers, such as Laurel Severns of the American Friends Service Committee, who told of the poverty she witnessed when she visited Iraq.
"We would like to get rid of that guy (Saddam Hussein)," Severns said the Iraqis told her. "But we don't want you (America) to do it. We want your support."
Then a smaller group, the one that was later forcibly removed, entered the building to request an audience with Hastert's staff.