In some cases, drawing the line between permissible and impermissible forms of public protest can be difficult. But the Canadian “Freedom Convoy” that occupied downtown Ottawa until Sunday wasn’t one of those cases. Thousands of anti-vaccine-mandate protesters, many of them driving trucks, took over a large portion of Canada’s capital for more than three weeks, clogging roads and co-opting public spaces for their daily protests and nightly partying. In the early stages of the protest, in particular, the truckers leaned on their horns, and some protesters acted boorishly, turning many residents against their cause.

My own view is that the protest should have been treated as a legitimate political spectacle on Friday, January 28th, when the truckers first rolled into Ottawa, and perhaps even during the weekend that followed; but that, by the time Monday arrived, the police had every right to clear the protesters out. There isn’t a government on Earth that would permit its political nerve centre to be occupied indefinitely by protesters, and Ottawa’s police would have had national public opinion behind them if they’d moved decisively to resolve the situation before the whole saga became an international disgrace.

Unfortunately, the police bungled the situation by letting hundreds of massive trucks create facts on the ground within congested city streets—a mistake that became obvious when area tow-truck operators refused government pleas to remove the offending vehicles. (When the convoy passed through Toronto, on the other hand, that city’s larger, better prepared, and more professionally equipped police force completely pre-empted this kind of problem by simply blocking off the marquee protest areas in advance with large sanitation vehicles.)