The Value of Dissent

An open letter asking for leniency for Jeremy Hammond

Dear Judge Preska:

I am writing from Tunisia on the matter of the sentencing of Jeremy Hammond.

I am an American journalist, and have come to this place to tell the story of a nation trying to reinvent itself. Tunisia is trying to become a free nation after a heroic revolution threw out an autocratic dictator. It is, to say the least, a hard job. Activists and artists still routinely face jail time here. It is apparent that learning to be a free nation is a difficult and never-ending job.

Our respect for political activism, art, and dissent is something beautiful in the American story. We have always differentiated between law breaking for gain, and law breaking for principle, even when we disagreed with the principle. It is my hope we always will.

Even when the crime is severe, we tell a different story about our political criminals. We remember Al Capone and the James brothers differently from the stories of John Brown or Eugene V. Debs. This is to our credit as a nation and culture, and a beautiful message to the world.

It is without question that Hammond broke the law. But it is also indisputable that he did so in the quest to make a better America. We may or may not agree with Hammond’s vision of that better America, but the competition of these visions are what nourish our nation. Lawbreaking by the likes of civil rights protesters and suffragettes is why we have a biracial president, and why you and I can vote.

I covered Anonymous and the Occupy movement extensively during the time of Hammond’s crime. The rhetoric of both groups was sometimes unrealistic and often sophomoric, but in an age where life or death policy and politics is often a matter of lobbying and horsetrading, I found these activists had a rare heart. Anons called each other brother and sister. They argued and fought and grandstanded to each other, but they cared, and they were willing to put their lives and honor on the line. It was the courage that makes better worlds that I witnessed in those spaces, if not yet careful political thinking. But all things start immature.

We may not approve of the methods people like Hammond have used, but we need the meaning of it in this ossified and halted American political discourse. We need to teach the next American generation to dissent; that dissent is our way.

Hammond’s fate is already demonstrating that law breaking in the pursuit of political ends isn’t tolerated. Let us not use him as a symbol of the breaking of dissent and the quelling of unconventional thought. If Hammond’s ideas are wrong for America, let them lose in the marketplace of ideas, and not to the suppressive force of the state.

Your Honor, I will be in Tunisia for a little while longer. These people have expressed thanks to the Anonymous participants who supported them in their revolution, which I believe from my research and the reading of the indictment may have included Hammond. Let me turn to them in the next weeks and say this: America may punish law-breaking, but we support dissent, and that’s what Tunisia should do, too.

Thank you,

Quinn Norton