Abbie Hoffman

• Born: November 30, 1936
• Birthplace: Worcester, Massachusetts
• Died: April 12, 1989
• Place of death: New Hope, Pennsylvania

Activist, writer, and environmentalist

A major political activist of the 1960’s, Hoffman was skilled at manipulating the media to bring attention to his anti-Vietnam War, antigovernment protests. He helped define a performance-based style of protesting designed to embarrass the government.

Areas of achievement: Activism; social reform

Early Life

Abbie Hoffman (A-bee HAWF-mihn) was born to middle-class Jewish parents in Worcester, Massachusetts. His father, Johnnie, a local Jewish community leader, tried hard to be accepted by Gentiles. His son disapproved of that attitude, always maintaining it was better to remain the Jewish outsider than to be assimilated. An excellent student, Hoffman earned a B.A. in psychology from Brandeis University in 1959. At Brandeis his belief that he was an outsider was strengthened by his experiences with teachers who held radical left political views. He earned his M.A. in psychology from the University of California, Berkeley, and returned in 1960 to work at Worcester State Hospital as a psychologist.

During this time, he began writing political and social commentary for The Worcester Punch, an underground newspaper. Some of Hoffman’s Brandeis friends were involved with the Civil Rights movement, traveling to the south as Freedom Riders and Freedom Schoolteachers from 1960 to 1964; Hoffman, unhappy that he had not gone with them, was finally able to go as a member of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) in 1965. This was the beginning of his lifelong career as an activist.

Life’s Work

Hoffman wrote letters to The Worcester Telegram and Gazette, chronicling his experiences in Mississippi. These were analytical, third-person narratives with the byline Abbott Hoffman. In 1966, he moved to New York to run Liberty House, a store selling goods handmade by southern blacks, and continued his involvement in SNCC.

However, in 1966, Stokely Carmichael kicked all whites out of SNCC. A disgusted Hoffman published “SNCC: The Desecration of a Dream,” in The Village Voice, condemning Carmichael and the other militants for hijacking the organization. This article marked a radical change in Hoffman’s writing style. The name Abbie Hoffman appeared for the first time as his byline. Writing in the first-person, instead of his previously formal analytical style, he wrote more personally and emotionally, interspersing Yiddish into his work. Within a year he was a hippie using drugs and beginning his antiestablishment protests.

In 1967, Hoffman began a series of pranks designed to showcase the U.S. government’s hypocrisy. He cofounded the Youth International Party (YIP) and staged his first major event at the New York Stock Exchange. While on a tour, he and some friends tossed dollar bills onto the trading floor. Many traders made a mad dash for the money, and trading was suspended. Although Hoffman had not alerted the media, the story made the news, and the event went down in protest history. Realizing the usefulness of manipulating the media, he took advantage of it from then on. Later that year Hoffman and fifty thousand followers attempted to levitate the Pentagon three hundred feet to rid it of evil spirits. In 1968, Hoffman published his first book, Revolution for the Hell of It.

In order to protest President Lyndon Johnson’s war policies, YIP mounted a protest in Chicago at the 1968 Democratic Convention. Violence erupted, and hundreds of people were beaten and arrested. This resulted in the notorious trial of the Chicago Eight, in which Hoffman and seven others were arrested on conspiracy charges, increasing his popularity with the counterculture. In 1969, while awaiting trial, Hoffman published his second book, Woodstock Nation. In 1970, Steal This Book was published. However, because of its title, many bookstores refused to carry it.

In 1974, Hoffman was arrested for intent to distribute cocaine. He claimed he was framed and jumped bail, had plastic surgery, changed his name to Barry Freed, and lived underground for six years. While in hiding, he remained politically active. He used his organizational skills to spearhead his community’s suit against the government to clean up the St. Lawrence River. While underground he also testified at Senate subcommittees on the environment, was the magazine Crawdaddy’s travel editor, appeared on television, received a citizenship commendation from New York’s governor, published more books, wrote thirty-five articles, and was appointed to a federal water resources commission. He gave himself up in 1980 and served only four months of a one-year term. He was never prosecuted for the alleged cocaine possession, nor was he given the usual sentence for bail jumping. Although suffering from bipolar disorder, Hoffman continued to write books, give lectures, and work for change until his untimely death by suicide in 1983. In 1992, he was posthumously awarded the Courage of Conscience Award for his lifetime commitment to social justice by the Peace Abbey.

Significance

Hoffman’s deep love for America and his fear that the America he loved was being destroyed by greed, stupidity, and disinterest led him to champion a multitude of social causes. From his early work in the Civil Rights movement, through his performance-art-based attacks against the military-industrial complex during the Vietnam War, his attacks against rampant consumerism, and his struggle to help preserve the environment, Hoffman dedicated his life to making people aware of the world around them and asking them to get involved to effect change. His enthusiasm and hope spoke to many people, young and old, and helped to motivate many Americans to take a stand for the protection of liberties and the environment.

Bibliography

Farber, David. Chicago ’68. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1994. Traces the events at the 1968 Democratic Convention that led to the trial of the Chicago Eight. Provides a great deal of information on the underground groups involved in the events.

Hoffman, Abbie. The Autobiography of Abbie Hoffman. 2d ed. Introduction by Norman Mailer. Afterword by Howard Zinn. Cambridge, Mass.: Da Capo Press, 2000. Includes new photographs and an afterword discussing Hoffman’s legacy.

‗‗‗‗‗‗‗. Revolution for the Hell of It: The Book That Earned Abbie Hoffman a Five-Year Prison Term at the Chicago Conspiracy Trial. Rev. ed. Cambridge, Mass.: Da Capo Press, 2005. Includes new introduction and foreword to the book originally published in 1968.

Jezer, Marty. Abbie Hoffman: American Rebel. New Jersey: Rutgers University Press, 1993. Presents a balanced picture of the man and his philosophies.

Raskin, Jonah. For the Hell of It: The Life and Times of Abbie Hoffman. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1998. A member of the Yippie party, Raskin focuses on Hoffman’s importance to the protest movement and his genius as a strategist. It provides definitive versions of many controversial stories about Hoffman.

Sloman, Larry. Steal This Dream: Abbie Hoffman and the Countercultural Revolution in America. New York: Doubleday, 1998. Using more than two hundred interviews, Sloman provides commentary on Hoffman’s role as an activist.

Weiner, Jan, ed. Conspiracy in the Streets: The Extraordinary Trial of the Chicago Eight. New York: New Press, 2006. Using an abridged transcript of the trial, Weiner provides commentary and information to show the miscarriage of justice that occurred.