Nashville Handles Blocked Roads, Freeways Differently than Portland: Hot Chocolate, Bottled Water, No Arrests

It’s worth pointing out the experience Nashville has had with Ferguson protesters who were determined to take the streets and even block freeways—even while keeping away from scandalous actions like looting and vandalism, just like in Portland.

A national blog run by a former (and apparently decorated) TV journalist posted a local TV station’s footage of a press conference with Nashville Police Chief Steve Anderson from a few days ago.

The post summed up the nine-minute interview if you don’t want to watch. Essentially, Nashville police didn’t challenge protesters who set out to block Interstate 24—even though it was inconvenient for drivers—because Anderson decided a heavy-handed cure would be worse than the illness. The march in Nashville moved on after 25 minutes, instead of hanging around for a longer, tenser standoff with riot cops.

They also handed out hot chocolate and bottled water.

In Portland, police have been blocking off bridges and on-ramps pre-emptively—keeping protesters off of them, denying marchers the satisfaction of claiming infrastructure, but still inconveniencing drivers and achieving protesters’ central aim of disruption. Police here on Tuesday also arrested a handful of marchers who surged past mounted patrol officers and riot cops on their way over a barrier onto freeway ramps.

Nashville’s chief said he’d been phoned by someone complaining about being delayed, but he said that didn’t trump First Amendment expression and suggested the person who complained was overreacting.

Chief Anderson’s police force met protesters with hot chocolate and bottled water, rather than tear gas, marched alongside them, and ran the type of security that one might expect in a civic parade, communicating on an ongoing basis with protest leaders. At one point, protesters charged up an on-ramp and took over Interstate 24 over the objections of Nashville police. Chief Anderson made a controversial real-time decision, opting not to arrest protesters, and ordered officers to shut down I-24 temporarily, allowing demonstrators to make their statement by lying down on the roadway while drivers waited. Consequently, protesters were cleared off the roadway within twenty to twenty-five minutes. Anderson acknowledged that the incident did inconvenience Nashville drivers, but no more so than a car accident or other situation in which police sometimes block the roadway to protect citizens’ safety.

“We could have moved in and made arrests, but to do that you have to do that one by one in a very careful manner… We would have been there two to three hours,” said Chief Anderson, explaining his decision not to arrest protesters for taking over I-24 in comments to WKRN-TV 2. “Last night’s event went very well and I hope that all of Nashville is proud of not only the law enforcement response, but the response of the citizens involved and that we have set an example for the nation.”