The Mifflin Street Block Party is coming up soon. If I remember correctly, the block party is pretty fun, but then again, anyone who says they can remember being at the Mifflin Street Block Party obviously wasn't there.
I want to talk about the fact that music may be in jeopardy at the block party this year, but first let's start with the history of the Mifflin Street Block Party.
The first block party was in 1969. The gathering was originally a venue for political demonstration. During one of the first block parties, students lined the streets in opposition to the convoys of police in attendance. The scene devolved into a tumultuous battle between rock-throwing, barricade-building and fire-starting block partygoers and the police armed with clubs and tear gas. The incidents spread onto adjacent streets and lasted for days. The resulting violence seems to be the most publicized aspect of the early Mifflins, but that isn't what the event was, is or should be about.
The space itself represented an area where like-minded people could come together to demonstrate, talk, eat, drink and (I'm sure) smoke copious amounts of cannabis. It was an exhibition in the fact that young people could come together spontaneously, in large numbers and without the express permission of city bureaucracy. The first block party was more about asserting the right of those people to assemble than simply getting drunk.
At heart, the block party began as a protest against the war in Indochina, but let's not kid ourselves - it was a party, too. The original participants no doubt enjoyed themselves, but the majority of them never lost sight of the core message. Perhaps the wartime circumstances loomed heavier over their heads than ours. Perhaps it was also the fact that many of the men graduating during those years became eligible for the draft. After '71, deferments for college students were severely curbed - making all undergraduate men initial draftees.
The Mifflin Street Block Party has undoubtedly changed much since the first one in '69. These days, you're much more likely to see drunk college students posing for pictures with police than erecting makeshift barricades and throwing beer bottles at them.
Obviously, that's good. Perhaps the students have changed a bit. The Madison Police Department has changed quite a bit as well. At the block party, they still arrest people for drinking in the street, but that is a far cry from the overtly violent tactics used to forcefully disperse the crowds during the first block parties.
This year, for example, the most pressing student-police issue is the volume of the music. These redacted and much more lenient policies by the MPD toward student gatherings are a direct result of the political and social ramifications of student gatherings like the original Mifflin. Even if that spirit is seemingly gone from the gathering, it is something of which we should at least be aware. But, I digress.
In the past few decades, the political nature of the block party has fallen by the wayside. The block parties of recent years have consisted of pouring as much beer down your gullet as possible - that's OK, but it's not for everybody. There's that, and some bands.
That's right, I'm here to talk about the bands. In the last few years, the MPD has been fining houses for hosting bands. I've always enjoyed having bands at the block party. Sometimes the bands play well - something that is always fun to watch. Other times the bands are terrible - something that is always funny to watch. At the very least, the bands provide something other than drinking (although combining the two can also be fun).
The MPD has been fining the houses based on a city ordinance that prohibits excessively loud noise - which, in layman's terms, means if you're playing music that can be heard three houses down, you will be fined. The ordinance makes sense on most days, but perhaps it should be disregarded during the Mifflin Street Block Party. The intent of the ordinance is to protect the people on the block from disturbances, but I doubt many people that live on the street or visit the street during the block party would describe the music as disturbing. If anything, I think it adds to the carnival-like atmosphere that Mifflin has come to represent. The political nature has already been drained from Mifflin, and now the live music aspect of Mifflin is in jeopardy. All that will be left is an all-out tribute to binge drinking.
The city is well within its rights to enforce the ordinance. After all, the Mifflin Street Block Party has no street use permit. The time has long passed to acquire a permit for this year, but residents of the Mifflin Street area should show up to voice their concerns at the annual neighborhood meeting that precedes the block party. May I suggest, as many already have and undoubtedly more will, that perhaps it would be a gesture of good faith if the MPD decided to let the music play at its appropriate (yet somewhat louder than generally accepted) volume, or at least use its best discretion as to what actually constitutes a disturbance during the often outlandish street parties?
As for next year, there needs to be a much more serious and organized drive by the residents of the Mifflin area to obtain a street permit. This would give the people who live on Mifflin Street much more autonomy and discretion in choosing when and where bands will play, a methodology for beer and food distribution, and other general neighborhood issues. Maybe we could even walk across the street with an open container without a several-hundred-dollar fine. This avenue may be quite a change from the traditional impromptu, hands-off approach of Mifflin, but, then again, you'd be hard-pressed to find something else about Mifflin that hasn't changed over the years.
Matt Jividen is a senior majoring in history. Please send responses to opinion@dailycardinal.com.
