In a misguided attempt to identify potentially violent protestors, undercover New York police officers infiltrated numerous activist groups posing as political sympathizers. The idea was to identity potential protestors planning to disrupt the 2004 Republican National Convention.

The problem is, files were kept not only on violent or disruptive crowd members but on peaceful protestors too, including members of street-theater companies and church groups, according to a recent article in The New York Times.

This is symbolic of a larger problem that is pervasive in today's world of political protest. The right to peaceably assemble is guaranteed by the First Amendment and is one of Americans' most sacred rights. Unfortunately, this right seems to be increasingly threatened as, ironically, protests become more innocuous.

The Vietnam-war era was punctuated by many protests – some peaceful, but others violent. Yet the more people who were willing to stand up for a political cause, the more often a protest saw results.

Today's protests are a mere shadow of what they once were. Seattle's recent marches on the fourth anniversary of the Iraq war saw only two arrests and a remarkably tame crowd. When protestors were expected to march in the thousands, the actual crowd turnout was in the hundreds.

As citizens of the United States, we are arguably honor-bound to sensibly express our political opinions, to be involved in the political process. Yes, actions need to be taken to prevent violence, but elected officials and the police need to respect and honor the proud American tradition of protesting, not attempt to stifle it. Police infiltration of activist groups is only going to discourage protest attendance more.