In the 1975 film Posse, Amsterdam, NY native Kirk Douglas (who directed the film) plays an unscrupulous U.S. Marshal running for U.S. Senate who leads an elite posse in pursuit of a gunslinger to further his political career. In the final scenes the posse has to reassess whose side they are really on. The echos of recent events are uncanny.
The word posse is a shorted form of posse comitatus meaning “power of the county.” It refers to the power of local officials to grant policing authority to local people to assist in criminal justice activities. It’s a powerful authority, easily manipulated by unscrupulous actors and has been frequently abused throughout American history by local (and a few times national) officials, especially to racially target minorities. [Read more…] about US Military in Our Streets: Posse Comitatus in Historical Perspective