1972 Republican National Convention - Protest Activity

Protest Activity

The convention was targeted for widespread protests, particularly against the Vietnam War, and the Nixon administration made efforts to suppress it. In 2005, files released under a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit showed that the Federal Bureau of Investigation even monitored Beatle John Lennon after he was invited to play for Yippie protests. The monitoring of Lennon later concluded that he was not a dangerous revolutionary, being "constantly under the influence of narcotics."

The U.S. Justice Department indicted Scott Camil, John Kniffen, Alton Foss, Donald Perdue, William Patterson, Stan Michelsen, Peter Mahoney and John Briggs—collectively known as the Gainesville Eight—on charges of conspiracy to disrupt the Convention. All were exonerated.

Oliver Stone's film Born on the Fourth of July, based on Ron Kovic's autobiography of the same name, depicts Kovic and fellow Vietnam Veterans Against the War activists Bobby Muller, Bill Wieman and Mark Clevinger were spat upon at the convention. The scene was actually not in Kovic's autobiography, but was taken almost frame for frame and word by word from a documentary film made at the 1972 Republican Convention in Miami 1972 titled "Operaton Last Patrol" by filmmaker and actor Frank Cavestani and photo journalist Cathrine Leroy.