Young people filled the main streets of Ferguson, Missouri on Thursday night, but not in angry protests, and not to dodge the rubber bullets and tear gas fired by militarized cops.  The kids are celebrating because the governor of Missouri relieved local authorities of their duties and turned security over to the State Police, after several nights of unchecked police violence.

Ferguson resembled a town that just won a big sporting contest.  People drove the main drag honking horns, and walking around in groups.  No one was hurt.  Nothing was looted or vandalized.  No one was arrested.

Twenty-four hours earlier, cops were arresting journalists and intimidating camera operators, tear-gassing journalists and politicians, unilaterally declaring arbitrary and unofficial curfews, and firing flash-bang bombs, rubber bullets, and gas grenades at citizens protesting the death of Michael Brown earlier in the week.  The college-bound teen was shot dead in the middle of a street by a cop that officials refuse to identify, even though Missouri has clear and inviolable disclosure laws requiring public access to official documents including police reports.

Earlier on Thursday, Governor Jay Nixon received a phone call from US President Barack Obama.  He then came out to announce a series of steps to reduce the tension in Ferguson, a suburb of Saint Louis with a predominantly black population and a predominantly white police department and city hall. 

First among those measures was to take control of Ferguson’s security from the local cops – from four different agencies, locking a center of control, dressed not in police blues but in military combat gear, and most not wearing badges or nametags.  Nixon put the State Police in charge under the command of Captain Ron Johnson, a black fellow from the area, and now the most popular man in Ferguson.

“I grew up here and this is clearly my community and my home.  Therefore, this means a lot to me personally,” Johnson said.  “I understand the anger and fear that the citizens of Ferguson are feeling, and I understand and respect both of those.”

The first thing Captain Ron Johnson did in Ferguson was to lead 300 citizens in a peaceful march protesting the killing of Michael Brown, the thing that set the local cops off into a rage, armed to the teeth in their hand-me-down military gear provided by misguided policies hatched in America’s post-9/11 paranoia.

Around the country, protests against the killing of Michael Brown were held in major American cities.