User:Mlsteenwx13/Matthew landy steen

Matthew Landy Steen is a biograph and history of a founding member of the Weatherman and Weather Underground Organization

One of the few West Coasters associated with WUO, Steen attended Merritt College in the Oakland flatlands from 1966-68, first joining the Black Student Union and working closely with founders of the Black Panther Party and later joining the local SDS chapter. First arrested, and expelled from Merritt, for aiding in the kidnap of faculty and grand theft of property, this action involved the seizing of the entire college bookstore with free textbook distribution, a joint action of the Black Student Union, Black Panther Party and SDS. Steen was elected vice-president of Merritt SDS and later attended the SDS national convention in June 1969 in Chicago. Before walking out with other RYM2 SDS members, Steen was a member of the People's Park Organizing Committee, was arrested multiple times and shot by Alameda County sheriffs as part of the riots over People's Park in Berkeley, California. As a result, Steen was purged from Merritt SDS for deviating from the party line; at that time, in 1969, many SDS chapters across the country had been taken over or heavily infiltrated by members of the Progressive Labor Party, the primary challenger to the national SDS leadership in the upcoming national election in June. cite Abe Peck, etc

Steen was later arrested during the trial of Los Siete de la Raza for possession of tear gas bombs in a San Francisco superior court in 1969 then possession of firebombs in Alameda the day after the Kent State shootings. He was prosecuted by the future Attorney General of the United States under Ronald Reagan, then district attorney Ed Meese.cite Senate/FBI reports. From late 1968 through late 1970 Steen was a reporter, graphic artist, photographer and editor of The Berkeley Tribe and a correspondent with the Underground Press Syndicate and Liberation News Service    Upon returning from the Chicago SDS convention Steen was selected as co-editor of The Berkeley Tribe and participated in the ongoing student strikes at San Francisco State University and the TWLF strike at UC Berkeley, which established the current College of Ethnic Studies within the statewide University of California system.

During this time Steen traveled to Mexico to join members of the second contingent of the Venceremos Brigade