What is it with parades in Jefferson City? Yesterday, a Labor Day parade (think about that for a second).

The evil red t-shirt:

We received the following account via e-mail:

Members of Jefferson City Moms Demand Action went to the Jefferson City Labor Day parade Saturday, September 8th in our red t-shirts to split up and march with the various candidates for public office who have earned our Gun Sense Candidate of Distinction designation.

I was told by a parade organizer that we were not welcome to wear our t-shirts in the parade. I thought maybe he had misunderstood our presence and thought we were planning to march as a contingent without a permit. I went over and over the distinction with him to no avail; he wasn’t budging. The police were consulted and threatened us with a citation if we wore our shirts without turning them inside out or covering them with a jacket.

We complied because we didn’t want to cause a scene which would reflect poorly on our candidates or our organization.

It is surely unconstitutional for anyone to have to give up their freedom of speech to participate in a parade supported by city funding for police presence and logistics.

As a private citizen (not a Moms Demand official), I have demanded a public apology from the mayor, city council, and chief of police; and a public reprimand of the parade organizers and police department be printed in the newspaper on the editorial page post haste and repeated in the subsequent Sunday edition. I have also submitted my complaint to ACLU Missouri.

Sue Gibson
Jefferson City

Somebody has some explaining to do.

Labor Day, huh? What ever happened to solidarity?

And, well, newspapers never do anything they don’t want to do.

Previously:

On understanding what it is to be patriotic (July4, 2018)