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A View from the Interior: Policing the Protests at the Wisconsin State Capitol
In 2011, recently elected Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker introduced his version of “dropping a bomb” with the Budget Repair Bill. A View from the Interior covers the thirty tense days following his announcement that would put an end to public unions in Wisconsin. One and a half million people descended upon the Capitol building in Madison, jamming its hallways and flooding its grounds to protest.
Author Susan Riseling, Chief of Police, University of Wisconsin-Madison, offers this compelling insider’s perspective of those protests, based on hundreds of pages of actual police reports and other documents from those history-making days.
Author Susan Riseling, Chief of Police, University of Wisconsin-Madison, offers this compelling insider’s perspective of those protests, based on hundreds of pages of actual police reports and other documents from those history-making days.
Unknown Binding
First published October 1, 2012
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
October 16, 2013
Bought this on Sunday night at UW-Madison Chief of Police Sue Riseling's reading at Mystery to Me bookstore on Monroe St. in Madison. Came home, started reading and had trouble putting it down. (The book is so hot off the press it appears the cover image isn't in GR files yet). Riseling writes well, managing to distill 4,000 pages of notes down to just under 400 pages of text.
She's very straightforward and doesn't pull any punches when it comes to describing the law enforcement events behind the scenes. Who was there, what they did and said — and did not do or say — is all here. Some folks gain from this telling and some don't fare as well. Yet Riseling always just tells the facts; she doesn't seem vindictive or as if she has a personal agenda to push. If there is a drawback to the book it is that there are a lot of major players and groups to keep track of; luckily there is a guide to the people and the acronyms.
Given that I live in Madison and was at the Capitol many times over the days that the book covers, I found myself reading it like a mystery wondering what would happen next. I knew what the protestors were going to do and I knew what Scott and company were going to do. But the law enforcement team was hundreds of cops from different branches (State Police, Capitol Police, UW Police etc.) as well as 198 different state jurisdictions who all had to suddenly come together and function as a team in the face of an event that was huge, historic and nothing any of us had ever seen before.
The logistics of trying to keep everyone safe, have the government continue to function and allow citizens to demonstrate their First Amendment rights all at the same time in the same place was certainly more complex than those of us protesting probably ever considered. It began with lots of cops in one place and no one exactly in charge and no plan of action to say anything of computers, internet, pens and paper or even a map of the inside of the Capitol to help them do the job.
Riseling wound up being the person in charge and I think the citizens of Wisconsin were the luckier for that happening. She never rushed, she looked at all the options and contingencies and what ifs — and she never lost sight of the fact that the people inside and outside the Capitol had a right to be there petitioning their government.
The only thing better than reading this book is hearing Chief Riseling talk about these events in person. Buy the book and then hope she does more local readings!
Disclaimer: My husband (now retired) worked for UW Police on the Security side for 34 years and Sue was his boss for most of that time. A number of the pictures he took at the Capitol during those days are in the book, including the first and last images. We purchased our copy of the book.
She's very straightforward and doesn't pull any punches when it comes to describing the law enforcement events behind the scenes. Who was there, what they did and said — and did not do or say — is all here. Some folks gain from this telling and some don't fare as well. Yet Riseling always just tells the facts; she doesn't seem vindictive or as if she has a personal agenda to push. If there is a drawback to the book it is that there are a lot of major players and groups to keep track of; luckily there is a guide to the people and the acronyms.
Given that I live in Madison and was at the Capitol many times over the days that the book covers, I found myself reading it like a mystery wondering what would happen next. I knew what the protestors were going to do and I knew what Scott and company were going to do. But the law enforcement team was hundreds of cops from different branches (State Police, Capitol Police, UW Police etc.) as well as 198 different state jurisdictions who all had to suddenly come together and function as a team in the face of an event that was huge, historic and nothing any of us had ever seen before.
The logistics of trying to keep everyone safe, have the government continue to function and allow citizens to demonstrate their First Amendment rights all at the same time in the same place was certainly more complex than those of us protesting probably ever considered. It began with lots of cops in one place and no one exactly in charge and no plan of action to say anything of computers, internet, pens and paper or even a map of the inside of the Capitol to help them do the job.
Riseling wound up being the person in charge and I think the citizens of Wisconsin were the luckier for that happening. She never rushed, she looked at all the options and contingencies and what ifs — and she never lost sight of the fact that the people inside and outside the Capitol had a right to be there petitioning their government.
The only thing better than reading this book is hearing Chief Riseling talk about these events in person. Buy the book and then hope she does more local readings!
Disclaimer: My husband (now retired) worked for UW Police on the Security side for 34 years and Sue was his boss for most of that time. A number of the pictures he took at the Capitol during those days are in the book, including the first and last images. We purchased our copy of the book.
August 2, 2015
Incredibly interesting and detailed account of the protests that took Madison by storm in 2011. I thoroughly enjoyed reading about the protests from the point of view of the men and women sworn to preserve first amendment rights, while protecting clashing factions of protestors.
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May 3, 2018It took me a couple of chapters to get into this book and I kept liking it more and more as I went. At first, it seemed like a lot of "this happened, then that happened," but as Riseling let the story evolve, i got more into the whole police supervision of the 1.5 million protestors who showed up at the Wisconsin State capitol after Governor Scott Walker tried to break the public unions. Issues of meals, sleeping, bathrooms, medications for very sick people (some didn't care if they died there, the cause was so important), keeping the capital secure and with not so many people inside it was a fire hazard, making sure capitol employees could work, answering journalists' questions, sorting out conflicting orders from different authorities, and all the time with the police officers intensely aware that 1.5 million people were exercising their first amendment rights. Quite a read.
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews