What a long, strange--but incredibly fruitful--trip it's been

There’s a now-old adage that goes, “If you can remember the ’60s, you weren’t really there.” Activist, author and former politician Tom Hayden was there — helping shape those historic times. And apparently unlike some folks from those days, Hayden well remembers not only the critical events that defined that pivotal period, but also the resolve required to ultimately change America.

Hayden’s new book posits that this intensely political era — a decade punctuated by the assassinations of progressive leaders John F. Kennedy in 1963, Martin Luther King Jr. in 1968 and Kennedy’s brother, Robert, two months later — never really ended; it simply took all this time to knit together the many social changes sought back then into the everyday fabric of today’s world, culminating,

according to his latest book, “The Long Sixties: From 1960 to Barack Obama,” in the election of President Obama.

“Personally, I can’t completely escape the ’60s and I realized that America as a society can’t escape the ’60s,” explains Hayden, speaking from his Santa Monica home. “The 50th anniversary starts this week, so the concept was the ’60s at 50, and I wanted to build a database of everything that happened in the ’60s and where you could find out more info on it all.

“Without the ’60s there would be no Obama presidency, and to follow the path looking backwards to me is useful,” adds Hayden. “He was attacked for being an associate of ’60s revolutionaries, including his minister, but more importantly, without the civil rights movements that never died since the ’60s, would there have been an opening for him? How many openings were lost in the past?”

Before taking part in the historic events that molded our own era, Hayden first sprang onto the national political stage as a University of Michigan student and primary author of The Port Huron Statement in 1962, a repudiation of racism and war and a call for a more participatory democracy by Students for a Democratic Society.

Six years later, he was a key player in the bloody confrontations between police and protesters during the 1968 Democratic National Convention in Chicago; then was tried as one of what came to be known as the Chicago Seven.
Initially, they were called the Chicago Eight, but Black Panther Party co-founder Bobby Seale, who was bound and gagged during the proceedings and jailed for contempt of court by Judge Julius Hoffman, a former law partner of Chicago’s longtime “Boss,” Mayor Richard Daley, was separated from the others.

Ultimately, all seven remaining defendants were found not guilty of conspiracy. Two were totally exonerated. However, Hayden and four others were convicted of crossing state lines with the intent to incite a riot. In February 1970, the five were each fined $5,000 and sentenced to five years in prison. But by the end of 1972, all of the convictions were reversed by a federal appeals court on the basis that elderly Judge Hoffman, who co-defendant and radical Abbie Hoffman (no relation) frequently chided during the trial as “Julie baby,” was biased in his refusal to permit defense attorneys to screen prospective jurors for cultural and racial prejudice.

Police officers were also accused in the Chicago riots, but those proceedings ended with charges against one officer being dismissed and the remaining seven being acquitted.

Seale, who was accused in 1970 of participating in a murder in what came to be known as the New Haven (Conn.) Black Panthers Trial, was not tried a second time in that case after a jury hung 11-1 in favor of acquittal. Now 73 (one year younger than Judge Hoffman during the Chicago Seven trial), Seale went on to author a cookbook in the late ’80s and serve as a spokesman for Ben & Jerry’s ice cream. He later became involved with youth education and community empowerment programs.

Judge Hoffman, whom during the Chicago Seven proceedings Abbie Hoffman called a “shande fur de goyim,” or a disgrace in front of the gentiles, died in 1983, six days shy of his 88th birthday.

Abbie Hoffman, co-founder of the Youth International Party (Yippies) and frequent critic of the CIA and its questionable methods — which included staging suicides — in 1971 wrote “Steal This Book” about living free of charge by way of stealing. He was arrested for drug possession a few years later and, claiming he was set up by police, went on the lam, organizing environmentalists under the name “Barry Freed” before turning himself in to authorities in 1980 and doing about a year in jail. He resumed speaking out against the CIA and enjoyed a resurgence in popularity with his 1987 book “Steal This Drug Test,” an indictment against the country’s War on Drugs, but committed suicide by overdosing on 150 tablets of Phenobarbital at age 52 in April 1989.

By the early ’70s, Hayden had taken a different path, traveling to Cambodia and North Vietnam to protest against America’s involvement in that war, leading to his high-profile marriage to actress and fellow antiwar activist Jane Fonda, who also traveled to North Vietnam and spoke out against American military involvement there, earning her the moniker “Hanoi Jane” from pro-war forces and some veterans.

And what were the results of all this social and political tumult?

According to Hayden, writing recently at huffingtonpost.com, they were:

•    Voting rights for southern black people and 18- to 21-year-olds, totaling 26 million Americans
•    The end of the Indochina wars
•    The end of the compulsory draft
•    The fall of two presidents
•    New oversight of the imperial presidency, the CIA and the FBI
•    Amnesty for 50,000 draft evaders in Canada
•    Normalized relations with Vietnam
•    The Freedom of Information Act
•    The Media Fairness Doctrine
•    The Roe v. Wade Supreme Court decision legalizing abortion
•    The strongest environmental, consumer and health and safety laws of the past 40 years
•    Democratic reforms of the presidential primary delegate selection rules
•    Union rights for public sector employees
•    Fundamental reform of school and university curriculum
•    Freedom of sexual expression  and lessening of censorship
•    Expanded participatory rights for marginalized minorities, from college students to disabled Americans

“I was certainly an idealist with big dreams in the beginning and I was flexible as to what approach to take, but became more radical as the ’60s continued. I don’t know if it was me that changed, or the war dragging out and forcing more action,” says Hayden. “The achievements are far greater than most people remember, but on the other hand, it’s absolutely true that we fell short of our deepest aspirations.

“I find that it’s a paradox to me — a bittersweet quality to it,” adds Hayden. “That’s what the book is about. I don’t know if we could have achieved those [goals] — like poverty in the US and around the world remains pretty chronic. The income gap between rich and poor has not changed very much, and it’s pretty incredible when you consider all the speeches, strikes and campaigns. It certainly was a central goal of the ’60s to reduce poverty in the US and it just didn’t happen. That’s not to say that it was a failure. The common narrative of the ’60s was that it was much ado about nothing, but I made sure to point out there was much to be happy about.”

In the 1980s, Hayden turned to electoral politics in California, going on to become a five-term member of the state Assembly before earning two terms in the state Senate. But along the way, he suffered a few setbacks — losses in races for governor in 1994, Los Angeles mayor three years later and the Los Angeles City Council in 2001. He has since turned his considerable energy to teaching at Occidental College and Pitzer College and writing books and essays.

Even though he worked for Obama’s election, Hayden sees the young president falling into some of the same traps as his predecessors when it comes to waging war. He acknowledges that compromises are part of “the game” played by any president, but he still sees hope in the renewed activism of the many young people who were a key force in Obama’s election.

“Some of my excitement and astonishment about 2008 has faded as we get back to the hard grind of political realities,” says Hayden. “I thought that the Obama movement of young people was very reminiscent of the ’60s and I had not seen it in the past 40 years. Where it goes from here, who can say? But I believe all the social activism of the future began with the Obama campaign. The baptism for them was in 2008, and we’ll feel that for many, many years.

“I think it had the characteristics of a social movement,” Hayden continues, explaining, “No one predicted it. It was idealistic and no one predicted it. Now it might be confused, divided, exhausted temporarily. But that experience will continue with people for decades — maybe more online than in the streets, but it was a social movement in a new form.”

Perhaps better than most people, Hayden understands how war can change even the most idealistic president, which he sees happening with Obama.

“Over eight years it’ll be another trillion-dollar war and certainly in the next two years another 1,000 soldiers will die in Afghanistan under Obama’s orders,” says Hayden. “Those are very painful measures that need to be opposed. You can’t spend a trillion dollars on war, on health care and to prop up banks. You’ll run up money printing and force inflation. I think most of his supporters are against what he’s doing in Afghanistan, and it’s a strange feeling — we’re no longer on the outside and we’re not where we want to be.”

The America of Hayden’s youth was a different world, but some things never change, and one of those things — hopefully — is Tom Hayden’s seemingly boundless resolve to help initiate positive social and political reform. Considering he has written 19 books since The Port Huron Statement, Hayden, who turned 70 last month, should be able to help lots of people — particularly those who don’t remember because they weren’t there — to better understand both the past and the future of progressive politics in America.

Tom Hayden discusses and signs his book “The Long Sixties: From 1960 to Barack Obama” at 7 p.m. Wednesday at Vroman’s Bookstore, 695 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena. Admission is free. Call (626) 449-5320 or visit vromansbookstore.com.