Return to our awkward liberal sentence. Why “demonstration” and why “mostly unimpeded”? I mean of course demonstration in the broadest sense—nonviolent social action that moves a discussion from the coffeehouse to the avenue. In our day, these include social media storms and YouTube protest videos and, occasionally, cable television programming at night. But I also mean demonstration in the very literal sense that became familiar in the sixties and continues today: large numbers of people taking to the streets in nonviolent protests to show the depth of their desire for reform.
