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When John Lennon was a political force

BY GENE SEYMOUR | Newsday Staff Writer

September 15, 2006

To the many dubious deeds that Strom Thurmond has to answer for in the afterlife, one can now add his suggestion to the Nixon White House in February 1972, that it neutralize John Lennon's powerful impact on the politics of America's youth by getting him deported back to England. So began a protracted four-year legal battle, which found the former Beatle and his artist wife Yoko Ono in and out of courtrooms and the halls of Congress in pursuit of a green card.

"The U.S. vs. John Lennon," a documentary co-directed by David Leaf and John Scheinfeld, shows that this vendetta climaxed a series of tussles between Lennon and cultural conservatives. These went back to the near-hysterical reaction to Lennon's remark that the Beatles were "more popular than Jesus," through his provocative demonstrations for peace and his support for Yippies and Panthers, black and white.

Indeed, the documentary contends that the government's war on Lennon was set in motion after his performance at a benefit seeking to release "White Panther" John Sinclair from a 10-year jail sentence for passing two joints to undercover cops. Sinclair's release, pending appeal, came shortly after Lennon's appearance, thus certifying his potential threat to Nixon's administration.

For every incident examined by the movie, there are several others glossed over or shortchanged. The late United States Sen. Gaylord Nelson, who was instrumental in bringing Lennon's cause to congressional attention, isn't mentioned. One also wonders whether it was Lennon and Ono's embrace of Black Panther Bobby Seale, and their performance at an Apollo Theater benefit on behalf of families of prisoners shot during the 1971 Attica uprising, that especially raised the hackles of Thurmond, onetime "Dixiecrat" senator and presidential nominee. Those are the kinds of missed connections that make this film more misty-eyed reverie than tough-minded inquiry.

Yet what gives the film its spine is the presence of Lennon himself as an articulate, earnest and magnetic social conscience. He had the savvy rock star's instinct for framing his persona. But it's the mental agility he showed within that frame that earns abiding admiration - and a wistful yearning for someone, anyone today carrying even a fraction of his puckish mojo.