Despite their overblown rhetoric to the contrary, armed protestors at a national wildlife refuge in remote Southeastern Oregon were not simply occupying federal land. They were occupying land that belongs to you and your neighbors and your children. They were wrong on their premise and illegal in their actions, but they did succeed in bringing attention to the issue of public lands.
This 41-day absurdist exercise came to a peaceful end Thursday, with the final four occupiers at Malheur National Wildlife Refuge surrendering to authorities with nary a shot fired. The outcome was fortunate, if slow in coming. FBI agents, who quickly took over the law-enforcement side of the issue following the Jan. 2 seizure of the land, demonstrated restraint throughout the tense standoff.
One occupier — LaVoy Finicum — was shot and killed Jan. 26 when FBI agents attempted to apprehend him; video shows that Finicum was reaching inside his jacket, where a gun was found. Aside from that, the six-week ordeal was as peaceful as could be hoped. And while federal agents deserve credit for not escalating the tension, they also brought about questions of how best to handle such an occupation. Does the drawn-out nature of the event embolden future occupations? Does the lack of an aggressive response enable like-minded people who wrongly see themselves as “patriots?”
Only time will answer those questions. The Malheur occupation calls to mind an 81-day standoff perpetrated by the Montana Freemen in 1996, which also ended peacefully. Such an outcome is preferable to violent results at Ruby Ridge, Idaho, in 1992; and Waco, Texas, in 1993. As these events demonstrate, there always will be people who can rally followers against what they view as government oppression. Such dissidence reflects the power of being an American and of embracing the spirit of this nation’s founding. But from the start of the latest occupation, the Malheur gang has been wrong on the law and has harmed their cause in the court of public opinion.
