Bernardine Dohrn

Bernardine Rae Dohrn (née Ohrnstein, born January 12, 1942) is an American former leader of the 1969–1980 radical organization Weather Underground. She is an Associate Professor of Law at Northwestern University School of Law and the Director of Northwestern's [http://www.law.northwestern.edu/cfjc/ Children and Family Justice Center] .

Personal life

Bernardine Dohrn was born Bernadine Ohrnstein in Milwaukee, Wisconsin in 1942 and grew up in Whitefish Bay, Wisconsin, an upper-middle-class suburb of Milwaukee.Grathwohl, Larry, and Frank, Reagan, "Bringing Down America: An FBI Informant in with the Weathermen", Arlington House, 1977, page 103] Her father, Bernard, changed the family surname to Dohrn when Bernardine was in high school. [Lear, Patricia [http://www.chicagomag.com/Chicago-Magazine/May-1993/Rebel-Without-a-Pause/index.php?cp=2&si=1 Rebel Without a Pause] , "Chicago", May 1993, last accessed October 9, 2008.] . Her father was Jewish and mother, Dorothy, was Christian Scientist with a Swedish background. [http://books.google.com/books?id=sCXig_6abwkC&pg=PA278&lpg=PA278&dq=ohrnstein+Dohrn&source=web&ots=6pO9JyI5wk&sig=xGmUaZOyvJjuEvBzeA8HTKnWaP4&hl=en&sa=X&oi=book_result&resnum=1&ct=result] [ [http://www.chicagomag.com/Chicago-Magazine/May-1993/Rebel-Without-a-Pause/index.php?cp=1&si=0#artanc Rebel Without a Pause - Chicago Magazine - May 1993 - Chicago ] ] Dohrn graduated from Whitefish Bay High School where she was a cheerleader [http://omega.cohums.ohio-state.edu/mailing_lists/CLA-L/2003/02/0066.php] , treasurer of the Modern Dance Club, a member of the National Honor Society, and editor of the school newspaper. She attended Miami University for one year, then transferred to the University of Chicago, where she graduated with honors with a B.A. in Political Science in 1963, and with a J.D. from the University of Chicago Law School in 1967. [ [http://www.law.northwestern.edu/faculty/clinic/dohrn/dohrn.html Bernardine Dohrn, Bluhm Legal Clinic, Faculty Profiles, Faculty & Research, School of Law, Northwestern University ] ] She moved to New York to work for the National Lawyers Guild in 1967.

Early radical history

Dohrn became one of the leaders of the Revolutionary Youth Movement (RYM), a radical wing of Students for a Democratic Society (SDS), in the late 1960s. The ninth annual national SDS conference was held in Chicago in June 18-22, 1969, and the SDS collapsed in an .

Dohrn led the Weatherman faction in the SDS fight and continued to be a leader afterward. [Chepesiuk, Ron, "Sixties Radicals, Then and Now: Candid Conversations With Those Who Shaped the Era", McFarland & Company, Inc., Publishers: Jefferson, North Carolina, 1995, "Chapter 15: Bernardine Dohrn: From Revolutionary to Children's Rights Advocate", pages 223 and 224: "Dohrn, a leader of the Weather Underground" (p 223); "she then proceeded to lead the faction in the takeover of the organization's headquarters and the seizure of its assets"] Montgomery, Paul L., [http://select.nytimes.com/search/restricted/article?res=F4091EFA3B5D0C768EDDA90994D9484D81 "Last of Radical Leaders Eluded Police 11 Years"] , article, "The New York Times", October 25, 1981, retrieved June 8, 2008]

In July 1969, Dohrn, Eleanor Raskin, Dianne Donghi, Peter Clapp, David Millstone and Diana Oughton, all representing "Weatherman", as Dohrn's faction was now called, traveled to Cuba and met with representatives of the North Vietnamese and Cuban governments.Fact|date=October 2008

Controversial statement about Tate-LaBianca murders

Dohrn was criticized for a comment she made about the Charles Manson led Tate-LaBianca murders in a speech during the December 1969 "War Council" meeting organized by the Weathermen and attended by about 400 people in Flint, Michigan: "Dig it! First they killed those pigs and then they put a fork in their bellies. Wild!" Dohrn also charged that her fellow left-wingers showed themselves to be scared "honkies" for not burning down Chicago when Black Panther leader Fred Hampton was killed, and urged her audience to arm themselves and be "a fighting force alongside the blacks".Franks, Lucinda, [http://select.nytimes.com/search/restricted/article?res=F00B1FFF3D5C0C718EDDA80994D9484D81 "The Seeds of Terror"] , article, "New York Times Magazine", November 22, 1981, retrieved June 8, 2008] Dohrn's husband Bill Ayers has written that Dohrn was being ironic when she made the statement:Ayers, Bill, [http://billayers.wordpress.com/2008/03/03/im-sorry-i-think/ "I'M SORRY!!!! i think ...."] , blog post, "Bill Ayers" blog, March 3, 2008, retrieved June 8, 2008]

:I didn't hear that exactly, but words that were close enough I guess. Her speech was focused on the murder just days earlier of our friend Fred Hampton, the Black Panther leader [...] She linked Fred's murder to the murders of other Panthers around the country, to the assassinations of Malcolm X and Patrice Lumumba, the CIA attempts on Fidel's life, and then to the ongoing terror in Viet Nam. "This is the state of the world," she cried. "This is what screams out for our attention and our response. And what do we find in our newspapers? A sick fascination with a story that has it all: a racist psycho, a killer cult, and a chorus line of Hollywood bodies. Dig it! ..."

Ayers wrote in 2008 that he always thought Dohrn's controversial statement was uttered to make a political point, "agitated and inflamed and full of rhetorical overkill, and partly as a joke, stupid perhaps, tasteless, but a joke nonetheless", and similar he said to jokes about Charles Manson that were being made by Hunter S Thompson and Richard Pryor. Ayers said he had been present at interviews with reporters in which Dohrn had tried to put her statement in context but the reporters had dismissed her explanation.

In 2001 David Horowitz contested Dohrn's and Ayers' contention that she was not serious. She at least appeared that way to others, he wrote: "In 1980 I taped interviews with thirty members of the Weather Underground who were present at the Flint War Council, including most of its leadership. Not one of them thought Dohrn was anything but deadly serious". [Horowitz, David, [http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/Read.aspx?GUID=63512670-BF7C-42A0-B41D-5D0FB9E09C09 "Allies in War"] , FrontPageMagazine.com, September 17, 2001, accessed June 10, 2008]

Later radical history

A founder of the Weatherman group, Dohrn was a member of the "Weather Bureau" (name later changed to "Central Committee"). Larry Grathwohl, an FBI informant who was with the Weatherman from autumn 1969 through spring 1970, considered her one of the two top leaders of the organization, along with Bill Ayers.Grathwohl, Larry, and Frank, Reagan, "Bringing Down America: An FBI Informant in with the Weathermen", Arlington House, 1977, page 110: "Ayers, along with Bernardine Dohrn, probably had the most authority within the Weatherman."]

During this period, the group organized the October 1969 Days of Rage riot in Chicago, which Dohrn ledKushner, Harvey W., [http://books.google.com/books?id=ZOfkAoDb_2IC&pg=PA108&dq=Dohrn+Weatherman&ei=2GDBSIbiI5WKyQSVn9SIDg&sig=ACfU3U3ODwbojAzl9F-jFi5x34vkPj421w "Encyclopedia of Terrorism"] , Sage Publications Inc, 2003, pp 108-109, ISBN 0761924086, ISBN 9780761924081 ; retrieved via Google Books, September 5, 2008] During the 1970s, the Weathermen bombed federal buildings and police stations.Sheppart, Nathaniel, Jr., "Chicago Home of a Friend was Refuge for Miss Dohrn", "The New York Times", December 5, 1980, p A22] Prior to the March 6, 1970 Greenwich Village townhouse explosion, in which three members of the group were killed as a bomb was being constructed, all members of Weatherman went underground. The group then changed its name to Weather Underground.

Dohrn went underground in early 1970, engaging in bombing activities. In a 1994 interview, Dohrn said that while the group carried out some bombings of buildings, it did not target people, and the group's actions were justified as a proper response to violent government actions: "We only did a couple, and they were carefully done. They involved property and were not meant to harm anybody. They were symbolic and done so that everyone would instantly recognize what was being said. It was 'armed propaganda'. Sure, it was violent, and it's hard to justify twenty years later, but it was extremely restrained and a highly appropriate response to the level of violence being rained nationally and internationally". [Chepesiuk, Ron, "Sixties Radicals, Then and Now: Candid Conversations With Those Who Shaped the Era", McFarland & Company, Inc., Publishers: Jefferson, North Carolina, 1995, "Chapter 15: Bernardine Dohrn: From Revolutionary to Children's Rights Advocate", pages 223 and 224: "Dohrn, a leader of the Weather Underground", p 235;"Acknowledgements" section is dated by the author "Summer 1994" indicating interviews took place before that]

Role in policymaking, ideology and public statements for Weather Underground

Dohrn was a principal signatory on the group's "Declaration of a State of War" in 1970 that formally declared "war" on the U.S. Government, and completed the group's transformation from political advocacy to violent action. Dohrn also co-wrote and published the subversive manifesto "Prairie Fire" in 1974, and participated in the covertly-filmed "Underground" in 1976.

In late 1975, the Weather Underground put out an issue of a magazine, "Osawatamie", which carried an article by Dohrn, "Our Class Struggle", described as a speech given to the organization's cadres on September 2 of that year. In the article, Dohrn clearly stated support for Communist ideology: [http://foia.fbi.gov/weather/weath1a.pdf "Weatherman Underground / Summary Dated 8/20/76 / Part #1"] , 1976, pp 23-24, FBI website, retrieved June 8, [2008]

:We are building a communist organization to be part of the forces which build a revolutionary communist party to lead the working class to seize power and build socialism. [...] We must further the study of Marxism-Leninism within the WUO [Weather Underground Organization] . The struggle for Marxism-Leninism is the most significant development in our recent history. [...] We discovered thru [sic] our own experiences what revolutionaries all over the world have found — that Marxism-Leninism is the science of revolution, the revolutionary ideology of the working class, our guide to the struggle [...] "

According to a 1974 FBI study of the group, Dohrn's article signaled a developing commitment to Marxism-Leninism that had not been clear in the groups previous statements, despite trips to Cuba by some members of the group before and after Weather Underground was formed, and contact with Vietnamese communists there.

Leaving the underground

While on the run from police, Dohrn married another Weatherman leader, Bill Ayers, with whom she has two children. During the last years of their underground life, Dohrn and Ayers resided in the Logan Square neighborhood of Chicago, where they used the aliases Christine Louise Douglas and Anthony J. Lee.

double image|left|Young Dohrn profile sketch.jpg|45|Bernardine Dohrn.jpg|50|Sketch and photograph of Dohrn (c. 1960s) [Photo on right is Katherine Anne Powers, not Dohrn] In the late 1970s, the Weatherman group split into two factions — the "May 19 Coalition" and the "Prairie Fire Collective" — with Dohrn and Ayers in the latter. The Prairie Fire Collective favored coming out of hiding, with members facing the criminal charges against them, while the May 19 Coalition continued in hiding. A decisive factor in Dohrn's coming out of hiding were her concerns about her children.

The couple turned themselves in to authorities in 1980. While some charges relating to their activities with the Weathermen were dropped due to prosecutorial misconduct [http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9F02E1DE1438F932A2575AC0A9679C8B63&sec=&spon=&pagewanted=print No Regrets for a Love Of Explosives; In a Memoir of Sorts, a War Protester Talks of Life With the Weathermen - New York Times ] ] (see COINTELPRO), Dohrn pled guilty to charges of aggravated battery and bail jumping, receiving probation. [ Milwaukee Sentinel, Jan. 14, 1981 ] She later served less than a year of jail time, after refusing to testify against ex-Weatherman Susan Rosenberg in an armed robbery case. Shortly after turning themselves in, Dohrn and Ayers became legal guardians of the son of former members of the Weather Underground, Kathy Boudin and David Gilbert, after they were convicted of murder for their roles in a 1981 armored car robbery.Fact|date=February 2007

Later life and career

From 1984 to 1988, Dohrn was employed by the prestigious Chicago law firm Sidley Austin. [http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9F02E4D71739F933A25751C0A963948260 FOLLOW-UP ON THE NEWS; Hurdle for Dohrn - New York Times ] ] She was hired by Howard Trienens, the head of the firm at that time and someone who knew Thomas G. Ayers, the father of Dohrn's husband. "We often hire friends," Trienens told a reporter for the Chicago Tribune.Grossman, Ron, "Family ties proved Ayers' point", commentary article with reporting (a column?), "Chicago Tribune", May 18, 2008, retrieved via newsbank.com online archive (subscription only), June 8, 2008] However, Dohrn's criminal record has prevented her from being admitted to either the New York or Illinois bar, according to "The New York Times". "Dohrn didn't get a [law] license because she's stubborn," Trienens told the "Chicago Tribune" reporter in 2008. "She wouldn't say she's sorry."

In 1991, she was hired by Northwestern University School of Law in Chicago, as an adjunct professor of law, with the title "Clinical Associate Professor of Law". Trienens said he did not get her that job, although he sat on the board of trustees of Northwestern, as did Dohrn's father-in-law, who was chairman of the board until 1986, when Trienens succeeded him in that position. Robert Bennett, dean of the law school, had hired Dohrn, according to Trienens. Because Dohrn was hired as an "adjunct", her appointment did not need to be approved by the faculty, and no vote on it was ever taken. When law school officials were asked whether or not the dean hired Dohrn or the board of trustees approved the hiring, the school issued a statement in response stating "While many would take issue with views Ms. Dohrn espoused during the 1960s, her career at the law school is an example of a person's ability to make a difference in the legal system."

In 1994, Dohrn said of her political beliefs: "I still see myself as a radical." [Chepesiuk, Ron, "Sixties Radicals, Then and Now: Candid Conversations With Those Who Shaped the Era", McFarland & Company, Inc., Publishers: Jefferson, North Carolina, 1995, "Chapter 15: Bernardine Dohrn: From Revolutionary to Children's Rights Advocate", p 239;"Acknowledgements" section dated by the author as "Summer 1994" indicating interview took place before that]

Dohrn now serves on the board of numerous human rights committees and teaches comparative law. Since 2002, she has served as Visiting Law Faculty at the Vrije Universiteit in Amsterdam. Her legal work has focused on reforming the much criticized juvenile court system in Chicago and on advocating for human rights at the international level. Dohrn is director and founder of the Children and Family Justice Center which supports the legal needs of adolescents and their families.Fact|date=June 2008

Dohrn and Ayers recently resurfaced into news headlines as presidential candidate John McCain and his running mate Sarah Palin alleged that there were ties between Ayers and presidential candidate Barack Obama. [Bumiller, Elisabeth and Healy, Patric. [http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/10/us/politics/10campaign.html?ref=politics McCain Joins Attacks on Obama Over Radical] , "The New York Times", October 9, 2008, last accessed October 10, 2008. ] [Cooper, Michael. [http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/05/us/politics/05palin.html?bl&ex=1223352000&en=97a61d8ecb16e341&ei=5087%0A Palin, on Offensive, Attacks Obama's Ties to '60s Radical] , "The New York Times, October 4, 2008, last accessed October 10, 2008.]

References

External links

* [http://www.law.northwestern.edu/faculty/profiles/BernardineDohrn Her biography at the Northwestern Law site, with a link to her CV]
* [http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/weather/radicals_8-22.html Transcript of interview in 1996 with Bernardine Dohrn and Bill Ayers]
* [http://www.pbs.org/independentlens/weatherunderground/today.html PBS Article "The Weathermen Today"]
* [http://www.mugshots.com/Historical/Bernardine+Dohrn.htm Mugshot From Chicago PD Files]

Articles by Dohrn

* [http://www.monthlyreview.org/0703dohrn.htm Homeland Imperialism: Fear and Resistance, by Bernardine Dohrn - Monthly Review]
* [http://www.monthlyreview.org/0104dohrn.htm She Challenged the Rules, by Bernardine Dohrn - Monthly Review]