Conspiracy to Riot: The Life and Times of One of the Chicago 7 by Lee Weiner (review)

Reviewed by: Conspiracy to Riot: The Life and Times of One of the Chicago 7 by Lee Weiner Frank Kusch Conspiracy to Riot: The Life and Times of One of the Chicago 7 By Lee Weiner (Cleveland, Ohio: Belt Publishing, 2022. Pp. 176. Clothbound, 26. 00. ) More than a half-century has passed since the battles that gripped parts of the nation in 1968. While those particular clashes on college campuses and on the streets are long over, their legacies endure. In Conspiracy to Riot: The Life and Times of One of the Chicago 7, the essential elements of that period are visceral and present. Lee Weiner, one of the Chicago 7 who was tried on federal conspiracy charges in 1969, revisits his life through that lens, capturing a time when he was not only on trial, but when the entire anti-war movement was symbolically hauled into court. The details of why he and others were tried matter less than why their actions were significant to those who tried them: the Chicago 7 and their supporters had the audacity to counter the prevailing narrative on war, on justice, on peace, and on the nation's place in the world. Thoughtfully and clearly written, Weiner's memoir takes us through his beginnings on Chicago's south side End Page 180 and how his experiences there in the 1960s shaped his early activism. He recounts life in his predominantly Jewish neighborhood (or their "side of the street") and recalls how he and his younger sister would gaze at lighted Christmas trees in apartment windows across the street from their home. "In Chicago, that was about as much cultural diversity as you were going to get and still be sure you were safe" (pp. 13–14). He recalls a seminal moment on a bus trip he took at age fifteen from Chicago to New Orleans when, in silence, all the Black passengers began to move from the front to the back of the bus between St. Louis and Memphis. Witnessing the effect of Jim Crow laws when he was "too young and weak to do anything" about it "stayed with him forever" (p. 24). Weiner's desire to challenge what he perceived as an unjust application of power drew him and thousands and others to the streets of Chicago for the 1968 Democratic National Convention. The convention itself became almost "irrelevant" when compared to the reality of trying to assemble on the streets (p. 61). He and his fellow defendants had acted as individual citizens who believed they had a right to protest for political and social change. Weiner recounts his surprise when the Justice Department of new president Richard Nixon "deliberately chose to indict a collection of people who they thought embodied all the anti-war activists and counterculture that enraged them" (p. 67). His indictment in March 1969 on federal conspiracy charges brought the possibility of ten years in prison. Despite that threat, Weiner believes that his commitment to political and social change offered few alternatives, even though he expected that his participation would result in a "vindictive, punishing trial" (pp. 70, 72). Indeed, at one point while held at the Cook County jail, Weiner and his fellow defendants had their long locks sheared off, later to be displayed "as a glorious war trophy at a Republican political fundraising dinner" (p. 115). Acquitted of all charges, Weiner was ultimately set free. The author describes his post-trial mix of fame and notoriety, and the challenges of making a living as one of the Chicago 7. His recounting of joining Abbie Hoffman and Jerry Rubin at the Democratic National Convention in Miami in 1972 is illuminating. Provided with passes to the convention floor, Weiner describes the experiences as "degeneracy, " as, unlike Chicago four years earlier, "there were a lot of women and a lot of drugs and very little politics. " The experience "was a turning point, " as too many people he knew "had gone way, way off the rails" believing they were still "doing important political work" (p. 127). Weiner concludes that the political and cultural needle has not moved much since the 1960s, as the country is still experiencing "tribal. . .