THE CAMDEN 28

On August 11, 1971 28 courageous individuals, roughly termed as members of the Catholic left, broke into the Federal Building in Camden New Jersey that contained the draft board office, and destroyed the draft records for Americans slated to be sent to Vietnam to serve in the War. This weekend I have been graciously viewing the documentary called The Camden 28, after experiencing some difficulty getting the title from Netflix. These are moral people, and some of them are even priests, but they were united against the War enough that they chose to intervene to stop it. One confederate, a Judas to the cause, turned on them, and they were arrested the night of the break in. "When the killing is started, then you want to stop it." (Michael Doyle) Further: "The money spent on bombs could be spent on buildings in Camden." The initial image on the screen is of a soldier putting a lighter to a grass hut in a village in Vietnam. This is the startling metaphor for the atrocities perpetrated by Americans there. Slides of burned out villages against slides of burned down structures of Camden. The Camden 28`s role models were the Berrigan Brothers and their public burning of draft cards as the Catonsville Nine. I believe that you should see this little known production, because you learn much about how these people were able to make a contribution to stopping this horrible War, especially by way of targeting the draft board, a blatant symbol of the War effort. I have studied the Vietnam War myself as a little hobby, and have learned much here; the Camden 28 were acquitted and by that time many Americans were glad that they had broke into the draft board. Also, the FBI was exposed in the press and the way that they had entrapped these activists. IntelPro was discussed in the extras, and this was the systematic undermining of war protesters by the government. The American people were not aware of the extent of government surveillance, and the trials of the Camden 28 helped to bring this to light. A great thing just happened to me this week! I have been invited to the COME BACK TO GARRISON! program put on by the Department of History at the University of Texas at Austin on February 1st. Apparently, Garrison has been renovated, so I will be looking forward to seeing the changes. The hall was kinda dingy in my day, back in the early Seventies. One workshop that I will attend is "Rewriting the Vietnam War: New Evidence from the Johnson Library", presented by Mark Lawrence. That will be interesting. So don`t hesitate to give this DVD a look at, if you can get your hands on a copy!