On April 20th at 4:20 pm activists from Keene, Manchester and the rest of the state converged on the State House in Concord New Hampshire. State Representatives Mark Warden and Mike Sylvia were also in attendance. There were also dozens of people there that are not Free Staters. Considering this was also Easter Sunday, there was a good turn out. The purpose of the event was to act in civil disobedience to the law regarding marijuana. Even though marijuana is legal in Colorado and Washington, it is not yet legal in New Hampshire and is still regarded as contraband. It is time for prohibition to end so that peaceful people can be left alone. Hopefully in the near future people like the organizer of the event Rich Paul will not see the inside of a cage again for simply selling or possessing a plant.
After the 420 celebrations had hit Keene and Manchester in 2009 on a daily basis, liberty activists created semi-yearly 420 events at the Concord state house, one on November 5th, the other on April 20th. The April event turned five this year, and dozens gathered on the steps of the state house to smoke cannabis in defiance of the insane “war on drugs”.
As has been the tradition NH natives and Free State Project participants first held signs and conversed out by Main Street before walking to the state house steps to officially kick off the event.
FSP early mover Rich Paul, the event organizer, who was absent last year due to being incarcerated for selling the illegal flowers, once again took the helm and megaphone to issue his standard call to action,
“We smoke these in remembrance of lost liberties and in hope for a day when the people do not fear their government, because the government fears the people! Smoke ’em if you got ’em!”
Cannabis was smoked by many and even a couple of NH state representatives got into the action, including Mike Sylvia, who had pledged to toke up if there were enough people wearing fancy outfits to the event. Kudos to Mike and all the others who had the courage to come out and face possible misdemeanor charges for possession of a plant. Of course, as with previous years, the police left us alone – this year not even making an appearance besides driving by on Main St.
It’s time for drug prohibition to end. If you love freedom, please move to NH and get active! Already in NH? Check out the 420 Foundation and NH NORML as well.
As has occurred annually since 2010, the 4/20 celebration is organized to proceed as usual on the state house lawn in Concord, New Hampshire. The disobedience rally in the supreme political venue provided by the state house originally occurred at the revered time on Guy Fawkes Day of 2009, and became a yearly occurrence when a larger group held a celebration in April of 2010. Free Concord has covered the event in 2011, 2012, and 2013, and is expected to collect content from the ritual again. Check out the facebook event page for details on the upcoming festivities.
On Sunday April 6th, 2014 a US census worker approached the Rebel Love studios in Manchester NH. She appeared at the door in order to gather information for the United States government on intimate details about the people that allegedly live at this location. The following video is the interaction between myself and the agent of the state.
On the morning of March 20th, 2014, Joe “Liberty Carrots,” Nemi Jones, Riaz Kahan and I went to the Manchester-Boston Regional Airport to support the First and SecondAmendments to the United States Constitution. Joe was the creative star of this activism effort, stopped multiple times by airport security and threatened with arrest for handing out free copies of the monthly liberty newspaper FPPNews from Free Press Publications.
No airport security agents or police questioned the fact that Joe was open-carrying a rifle. They did, however, take great issue with our exercise of free speech and expression:
