Seattle has record of rough treatment for presidents and presidential candidates



less Anti-Trump protesters Gregory Vernon Enera III, left, and Krystafer Oliver at an August 2016 rally for the Republican presidential candidate in Everett. Presidents and presidential candidates have encountered big protests, and bad happenings, for years during appearances in Western Washington. Anti-Trump protesters Gregory Vernon Enera III, left, and Krystafer Oliver at an August 2016 rally for the Republican presidential candidate in Everett. Presidents and presidential candidates have encountered ... more Photo: GENNA MARTIN, SEATTLEPI.COM Photo: GENNA MARTIN, SEATTLEPI.COM Image 1 of / 12 Caption Close Seattle has record of rough treatment for presidents and presidential candidates 1 / 12 Back to Gallery

Just over 80 years have passed since James A. Farley, political strategist for President Franklin D. Roosevelt, famously joked in 1936: "There are 47 states in the union, and the Soviet of Washington."

The Evergreen State, and Seattle in particular, has given a rough ride to presidents and presidential candidates ever since. The walkouts and protests that will greet Donald Trump's inauguration on Friday have plenty of precedent.

Some high/low points in history:

-- President Ronald Reagan rolled into Seattle Center to address the 1983 convention of the American Legion. A pickup musical group, the Ad Hoc Anti-Fascist Marching Band, played "Three Blind Mice" and the "Mickey Mouse Club" theme as the Gipper's motorcade arrived.

An egg struck the presidential limousine as it left the Center. The next Reagan visit, to Weyerhaeuser HQ in Federal Way, was much more controlled.

-- Vice President George H.W. Bush, soon to win the White House, delivered a 1988 speech on government ethics in Campion Hall at Seattle University.

"George Bush, listen to me!" shouted a man in clerical garb, standing in the audience. It was Jesuit priest Bill Bichsel, a Tacoma anti-poverty and anti-war activist, delivering a scorching denunciation of U.S. policy in Central America. Bichsel was on morning network TV the next day.

-- President Bill Clinton was visiting a job training program at Shoreline Community College on a "non-political" visit early in 1996. The 41st president greeted what looked like a friendly crowd.

Suddenly, a contingent of environmentalists stood and gave Clinton what-for over his Northwest Forest Plan. The plan protected almost all remaining ancient forests on federal land. Not enough, said the protesters.

-- President Gerald Ford came via Elliott Bay to a big 1976 campaign rally at the Seattle waterfront, back in days when Republicans did stage rallies in the Emerald City. (Donald Trump received less than 10 percent of the city's vote in 2016.)

However, a line of fishing boats tried to block the Coast Guard cutter carrying America's 38th president. The fisher folk were protesting Judge George Boldt's decision giving 50 percent of the area's salmon catch to treaty Indian tribes. The cutter did manage to maneuver through the blockade.

-- Vice President Hubert Humphrey faced the largest anti-war protest of his 1968 campaign at what was then the Seattle Center Coliseum. A crowd of 500 demonstrators shouted down the veep.

Humphrey tried calling the demonstration leader to the podium. Didn't work. The event is credited with helping to prompt a shaken Humphrey to deliver his Salt Lake City speech calling for an end to the bombing of North Vietnam.

Similarly, bad things have happened to presidents during stops here. Best examples:

-- President Jimmy Carter had a successful, campaign-closing rally at Boeing Field in 1980, with a crowd of 3,000 people lustily cheering the 39th president.

Carter boarded Air Force One to be greeted with news from his pollster: Public opinion was swinging sharply toward Reagan, and Carter was likely to lose in a landslide. He would carry just six states.

-- President Warren G. Harding was exhausted and near collapse as he went through outdoor events in Seattle, including a speech at Sicks Stadium on a very hot day.

Such were his last public appearances. Harding boarded a train and died a few days later in San Francisco.

-- President Franklin D. Roosevelt was delivering a 1944 wartime speech to shipyard workers in Bremerton when he suffered an angina attack. Roosevelt stumbled but managed to finish his speech.

The president whispered to son Jimmy that he needed a place to lie down. Roosevelt seemed to recover, but it was evidence of the rapid deterioration of his health that was concealed from the public as FDR ran for a fourth term.

President-elect Trump was, of course, greeted by hordes of demonstrators when he appeared last August at Xfinity Arena in Everett. At a May appearance in Lynden, pro- and anti-Trump forces lined up on opposite sides of the road leading to the Northwest Washington Fair and Event Center.

Officers from the Washington State Patrol stood in the middle of the street, keeping their cool and their humor as well as keeping the peace.

We have a lot of experience with that in this corner of America's "Left Coast."