Over 5,000 protestors flocked to State Street Saturday to denounce a pending war with Iraq.
State Street was blocked off, and buses were rerouted for over an hour as the crowd marched down to the capitol, chanting, drumming on buckets and waving signs.
State Street employees and shoppers came out of stores to watch the crowd go by, including Chicago residents Mike Broll and Shaun Terranova.
“We’ve been watching them come for at least 15 minutes now,” Terranova said. “There’s all ages here; students, vets, kids and dogs,” she said as a dog in a tie-dyed T-shirt walked by.
Terranova said she agreed with the protestors, but Broll said he is still unsure of his stance.
“I respect their right to be here, but I’m going to wait and see what Colin Powell says when he goes before the [U.N.] Security Council,” Broll said.
“It looks like it’s going to happen. The president is pretty set on it,” West High School senior Liz Miller said. “But if we can’t stop anything, at least we can show how we feel.”
UW senior Sarah Garding agreed.
“We’ve got to put up a fight,” Garding said. “They’re not listening to the people, and you can’t let them walk all over you.”
“Now, this takes me back,” Mayor Sue Bauman yelled, standing on the sidewalk and chanting with the protestors. “This is just like the ’60s.”
At the capitol, a speaker announced to the crowd that the space shuttle Columbia had broken up during its descent. She proceeded to announce that Bush had recently endowed NASA with $1 billion for nuclear space development, and the protestors booed in response.
UW sophomore Amelia West worried that a war could pit the Arab world against the Western world.
“This attack could careen out of control and turn into another World War, because there are so many different viewpoints involved,” West said.
While speeches continued at the capitol, kids made snowmen, threw snowballs and climbed trees along the periphery of the event. Protestors paraded on stilts and wore costumes, shaking the hands of children passing by, while people danced to boom boxes in the street.
Officer Larry Kamholz said although 19 officers were assigned to the area, the protests went smoothly.