Vanleer man to Haslam: Keep supremacists out of TN park

A Dickson County native, and the student organization he belongs to, delivered a petition to Gov. Bill Haslam Wednesday morning to stop a white supremacist group from meeting at Montgomery Bell State Park this weekend.

Haslam's spokesperson David Smith confirmed reception of the petition.

"Montgomery Bell State Park is a public park and state-owned," Smith said. "We can't discriminate against who can and can't use the park's facilities as long as groups and individuals follow the park's policies and rules."

Preston Gilmore is a member of the Clarksville Students for a Democratic Society, which has organized a rally protesting American Renaissance's 3rd annual conference at Montgomery Bell State Park. Gilmore is from Vanleer, and graduated from Dickson County High School in 2005.

The SDS-Clarksville chapter conducted a press conference Wednesday at 9 a.m. at the capital to deliver the petition asking state officials to "take action" in preventing the AmRen conference at the state park. A governor's aid received the petition, Gilmore reported.

"We told (the aid) why we felt (the petition) was important," Gilmore added, "and we'd like to see the state take action to protect the community."

But there's not much state officials can do to stop the AmRen conference at the public park, explained Mark Potok, a Southern Poverty Law Center senior fellow. The government has to act in a "viewpoint neutral way," Potok said.

"If you are a government agency and you rent space to the public, venues of one kind or another, you can't decide to rent to one group that you like and not to another that you don't like," Potok continued.

Parks officials field "a number of calls" about the AmRen conference every year, said Kelly Brockman, Tennessee Department of Environment and Conservation spokesperson.

"Our primary goal is to just make sure that patrons understand we value them and that we're working with them," Brockman noted, "but they've chosen the park as the place for their conference and we don't turn anyone away."

SDS v. AmRen

The current SDS is a nod to the '60s-era organization with the same name. The Clarksville chapter is a "student activist organization" based out of Austin Peay State University.

"We're not only fighting against wars and for education rights, but against racism, sexism and oppression of all kinds," Gilmore said.

The new SDS describes itself as a "radical, multi-issue" organization that's "working to build power in our schools and communities," not unlike the "progressive" and distorted campaign of AmRen. The domestic terror group, the Weathermen branched off from SDS in the late '60s.

The difference between the two organizations however, is "pretty clear cut," Gilmore noted. SDS champions "the rights of all people to a good education, food, health care and all the things they need to live their lives," he said.

According to the Southern Poverty Law Center, AmRen is a "self-styled think tank that promotes pseudo-scientific studies and research that purport to show the inferiority of blacks to whites — although in hifalutin language that avoids open racial slurs and attempts to portray itself as serious scholarship."

Gilmore claimed AmRen condones genocide, murder and violence against immigrants, the LGBTQ community and minorities by affiliation with prominent white supremacists, who've advocated for violence or inflicted it.

"It's an issue of public safety really, in light of the recent brutal slayings in Kansas City by white supremacist and terrorist Frazier Glenn Cross," Gilmore said. "He can be connected directly back to AmRen, who'll be at Montgomery Bell."

Guilty by association?

Frazier Glenn (Miller) Cross, a former Klan leader, is charged with the shooting deaths of three people two weeks ago at two Jewish community sites in Overland Park, Kan.

Gilmore reported that Cross is a follower and admirer of David Duke, a neo-Nazi, Klan leader and Holocaust denier. Duke has attended and spoke at AmRen conferences, Gilmore said.

Gilmore pointed to Don Black as a past AmRen conference attendee too.

Black is a former Klan leader, who runs the largest white supremacist web forum in the world right now, Potok noted. Black served time in prison for plotting and attempting to invade Dominica to establish a "white man's country," Potok added.

Potok confirmed Duke's and Black's attendance at AmRen conferences, but described Gilmore's linking of violence to the organization as "a little bit attenuated."

"All these things are true, but none of it means that (state officials) could refuse to allow (AmRen) to meet," Potok said.

Potok reported AmRen has "absolutely no history of violence at all."

"I mean I am not fond of American Renaissance," Potok continued. "They are absolutely a white supremacist hate group, but they are completely unlike Frazier Glenn Miller.

"They have not engaged and their members have not engaged in killing," he added.

'Hundreds' sign petition

SDS started an online petition in February, seeking signatures to stop Montgomery Bell State Park from hosting the AmRen conference. The petition garnered 58 signatures as of press time, from people across the state, country, world and three Dickson County residents.

SDS also gathered petition signatures in handwriting, Gilmore said, bringing their total to "several hundred" signatures.

"This is really important to me personally," Gilmore noted. "I don't want my hometown to be known for a white supremacist conference.

"It's not what Dickson is about to me," he added. "There are good folks there. It's a welcoming community and not what we stand for."

Free speech

Constitutionally protected free speech must be allowed in public forums, Potok noted, no matter the message.

"It's a decision we've made as a country. We have very robust protections of free speech," he continued. "There's no question that this speech is completely protected in the United States."

A "couple exceptions" would be speech that meets the standard of "criminal incitement" or a "true threat," Potok explained. Criminal incitement "is directly inciting somebody to do something illegal," he added.

"But I will tell you that that's a very narrow exception," Potok said. "It's not enough for me to say, 'You should kill the Jews tomorrow.' That is not criminal incitement… there has to be an element of immediacy, like I'm sitting there urging you to kill a certain person right now, a certain person we're looking at across the street."

True threat is determined by a jury and describes speech that is "not simply an idle threat" or "bar talk," Potok noted.

"It's got to be personal. It's not 'all the Jews or all black people or all white people,'" Potok said. "It's got to be you… there's no such thing as a group threat or group defamation."

Weekend rallies

The AmRen conference begins Friday and continues through Sunday at the park inn and conference center.

SDS will lead a rally protesting AmRen Saturday at 4 p.m. outside the inn. Several speakers are scheduled, including representatives from Dream Defenders; Industrial Workers of the World; One People's Project; and local "community leaders."

"We're calling on everyone to join us, all thinking people who stand for justice and equality," Gilmore said, "and help us try to change this and get these Nazis out of our community."

Brockman reminded park patrons the park's golf course, restaurant, campsite, playgrounds, etc., will be open for "business as usual,"

"There's going to be other people out there enjoying their weekend, with kids," she continued. "We just want to make sure people come and are civil."