Colonists were required to pay for English stamps on all documents, under penalty of death. This stamp was their response.
WE HAVE THE RIGHT TO ASSEMBLE (PEACEABLY)!
By the time the U.S. Constitution was written, “Americans” had only recently fought and won their independence from what they had perceived to be English “tyranny”. It should come as no surprise, then, that the very people who saw the American Revolution with their own eyes, from beginning to end, would establish a Bill of Rights – a set of laws that was designed to prevent such a scenario from happening, ever again.
And the very first rights – the first thoughts that came to their minds that was immediately inked into paper were these:
“AMENDMENT I
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.”
History is extremely fascinating.
When it comes to the Occupation movements that have swept the globe over the last several weeks, there may be a few features to this unprecedented type of movement that would seem to be controversial or contradictory. Quite a few (very valid) questions have been raised about the movement and even more accusations and skepticism has seemed to follow in the wake of the typical disinformation we can all come to expect from the mass media. 
Today, 12 October 2011, the General Assembly met again at 6:00pm to finalize details on the march this coming Saturday. Roughly 70 to 80 people attended this meeting.
I’ve seen a significant amount of misunderstanding on the concept of the claim that “we are the 99%”. Most of the misunderstanding seems to come from skeptics as to the movement’s purpose and effectiveness (which is rather annoying, actually). So, to combat the confusion, I thought I’d take a little bit of time to explain the concept in a little bit of depth.