#PublicPersuasion #Method44 Political protest has been expressed in the form of a 'funeral' for some principle which the demonstrators cherish and which they accuse the opponent of violating. It may take the form of a mock funeral procession in which the participants seek to symbolise the seriousness of the protest by restrained and serious demeanour and by including some of the items of a funeral procession such as the use of black and carrying caskets. Such a protest was held in Newport, Rhode Island when the Stamp Act was to go into effect on November 1st 1765. On November first, in order to forestall any possible riot, the Sons of Liberty attempted to divert popular feeling into an orderly demonstration by staging a 'grand funeral of freedom' A procession of mourners marched through the streets to the burial ground following a coffin marked old freedom. Upon arrival at the place of internment, according to the description in the vMercury. "A Son of Liberty emerging from the horrid Gloom of Despair, addressed himself thus: 'Oh LIBERTY! the Darling of my Soul! GLORIOUS LIBERTY! admir'd ador'd, by all true Britons LIBERTY dead! it cannot be!' A groan was then heard as if coming from the coffin; and upon closer attention, it proved to be a trance, for old FREEDOM was not dead, The Goddess Britannia had order'd a guardian angel to snatch Old FREEDOM from the jaws of frozen death, to the orb of the rising sun, to remain invulnerable from the attacks of lawless tyranny and opression. After this agreeable diversion the afternoon wa spent in rejoicing, with bells ringing and the courthouse ornamented in flags. Similar mock funerals were also held on the same occassion in portsmouth, New Hampshire, Baltimore, Maryland and Wilmington, North Carolina. In November 1961 after the detonation of a Soviet superbomb, antitest demonstrators in Oslo, Norway, walked in a mock funeral procession with burning torches and black flags to the soviet embassy. In march 1965 af...