Colorado lawmakers debated Tuesday morning whether 38 climate protesters should have been arrested last week for delaying the governor’s State of the State speech in the Capitol.

Rep. Jonathan Singer, D-Longmont, told House members that the punishment of being arrested and — in some cases held for more than 24 hours — did not fit the crime. The protesters “didn’t present any physical danger to this building with the possible exception — I saw some leaflets — and there may have been paper cuts.”

He vowed to hold office hours so both the protesters and the authorities who arrested them can share their views.

Rep. Hugh McKean, R-Loveland, was brought up as a Quaker and said he recognizes the importance of civil disobedience, but it’s also important to keep decorum in the state building.

“You pick your time and place where your voice has the most effect, and then you accept the consequence if that is a place that it shouldn’t be,” he said.

The protesters were arrested on suspicion of charges including trespassing, disrupting a lawful assembly and obstruction of a peace officer, but the Denver District Attorney’s Office is still waiting on all the arrest reports from police before coming to any resolutions, said district attorney spokesperson Carolyn Tyler. The five juveniles will not face charges, she said.

“At the end of the day, it’s our sergeants who are trying to uphold this institution, trying to follow the rules, but when you see kids and 18-year-olds charged and put into jail for over 24 hours with no idea what they’re being charged with, when you see them assembled on the west steps waiting to be carried away, not resisting arrest, being put into cars where there weren’t enough seat belts, I don’t think the punishment fits the crime today,” Singer said.

If they are prosecuted, he said, the role of civil disobedience inside and outside the Capitol building “will forever be chilled.”

Rep. Adrienne Benavidez, D-Commerce City, said she’s not convinced the protesters committed a crime and they should only have been escorted out of the building. She said they were bringing to light real issues in their communities, citing the school in Greeley that had to dismiss children because of a high level of cancer-causing benzene as well as the recent release of chemicals from a Suncor refinery in Commerce City.

But Republican Rep. Colin Larson of Littleton painted the protest as part of a broader lack of civility in society.

“Do not assault the governor of this state from the balcony,” Larson said. “Do not assault your elected representatives on the street. Do not assault your neighbors because they are of a different political persuasion than you.”