On the fourth day of anti-war demonstrations, protesters assembled in the afternoon on the grounds of the state capital building. After an hour-long rally, the march permit expired and police ordered the crowd to disperse. Groups then marched toward a cathedral near the convention site, but were stopped by police lines at several bridges leading over an interstate highway.
Blocked by officers wearing body armour and brandishing long wooden sticks, the protesters stood off against the officers.
The demonstrators chanted anti-war anthems and directed their ire at the officers they said had deprived them of their rights to peaceful protest.
"When my city becomes a police state I have to say something," said Jim Sazevich, a St Paul historian. "We're being treated like criminals while the criminals are corralled in the Xcel centre," he said, referring to the hall where the Republican convention is taking place.
Police made sporadic arrests of demonstrators who crossed their lines, but both sides held back from direct violent confrontation.
More than 150 police departments from several states are providing security for the Republican convention. The St Paul and Minneapolis departments, which led law enforcement efforts at the protests, have arrested 430 people in the last several days.
Last night, a number of people pouring out of a Rage Against the Machine concert clashed with police, who arrested more than 100.
Today, the roving, morphing mass of protesters, who numbered fewer than 1,000, shut down the streets in a swath of St Paul across an interstate highway from the Xcel centre as police sought to contain them. Bridges over the highway were blocked to foot traffic.
At one intersection, protesters and demonstrators stared each other down for more than an hour before the demonstrators moved to another intersection to join a separate action.
"I think it's our right to be here," said Tim, a protester who declined to give his last name. "We're trying to be peaceful. We should be allowed to go where we want".
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