In Graffin's book, "Anarchy Evolution," he describes the bad taste in his mouth when a riot took place at one of their early shows and how violent in general the scene was in the early 80's. It seems to me to be a song that looks back at that time and to warn against people who join a cause for the sake of joining a cause. If you believe in something, stand up for it wholly, not just to try and fit in with what you think is right.

Seems like the comments here are bit off. It appears that "Empty Causes" is a reflection on the nature of causes that humans feel compelled to devote themselves to. And, that if so many causes prove hollow in the end (the hippie, punk movements, and so on) then where does this continued desire come from? Are we just being selfish and need something to pass the time? He seems to allude to the comforting quality of having something to fight for, but acknowledges its fleeting and ultimately unsatisfying quality.

"Everywhere you looked...utopian love."--The so-called revolutions of the 1960s (NOT the 1970s; there was no revolution in that decade, just a loosening of morals) were nothing more than a distant dream with no basis in reality, created by people out of touch with their own lives.
"Everyone shrouded in purple haze...older, meek, and conformed."--A reference to Jimi Hendrix, a psychedelic guitar master that furthered the idea that the hippies were somehow better than the trillions of high-minded youth before them, gives way to the dawning realization of my parents' generation that they failed to change a damn thing, and all their work only served to galvanize the extreme right into a political force to be reckoned with.
1st Chorus--The empy causes of the left in the 1960s were little more than a mental drug for a generation that couldn't get enough psychedelia.
"Well, the shots...fuck the government."--When Ronald Reagan was shot (not fatally), everyone in the left-wing underground loved it. But to paraphrase Fidel Castro, we should never rejoice at an assassination/attempt, for systems, not people, are the enemy.
"The mohawk-chain...scene died away."--I'm aware that I've already addressed a couple of these lines, but I feel that there's a double purpose: the scene was corrupted, first in the 1980s by thugs that saw in punk a scene to be co-opted into just another gang war, then in the 1990s by fake punks just trying to buy into the punk culture of alienation. We saw this same phenomenon, and still see it, today with the current punk pop bands like Good Charlotte and New Found Glory.
2nd Chorus--The empty causes of the punk scene made people think that they were accomplishing something, fighting someone, and being different, when all they were doing was playing right into the Man's hands.
"Could it be...retinue"--People will start movements just to get a following.
"And that causes...little to do."--Protesting and demonstrations are all just ways for rich American WASPs to think they're doing something when they're bored.
I'm starting to think that The Gray Race was largely an attack on the problems of the left wing. See my posts on other Gray Race songs.

Just a guess, but 'the shots rang out like popcorn and the chief was hit and rushed out of site' always makes me think of JFK, back in the 60's. The part about 'someone cried out f--k the government, his friends couldn't define what he meant', to me, seems to be a reference to the general response to the assassination and the belief that the government was somehow behind it. It's just the first thing that comes to me when I hear the lyric.

You don't get the second part? Seriously? It's the punk movement. Mohawks... chains... leather. Your stereotypical punks. Some (John Lydon for one) say that the punks ruined punk by adopting a uniform and basing their idea of what punk is about on the likes of Sid Vicious. It seems to state that not everyone understood what punk was/is about (I guess they were just in it for the sake of being different). I'm not sure who or what the Chief is a reference to.

Empty Causes is another straight forward song with not a lot of hidden meaning and poetic devices. I think that overall the point is that humans find and act upon certain fundamental ideas, morals and beliefs that we individually hold in high regard although as time passes on tend to abandon them, hence an empty cause. The first phase of the song I believe Greg is speaking about the social revolution in the 60's and even 70's, mainly the hippies and political activism. Talks about 'righteous revolutionaries' but then 'they found themselves no more at peace than before, older, meek, and conformed.' So in this case the it can be seen as an empty cause because the VAST majority of hippies and tree-huggers eventually conformed to the exactly system they had hoped to mold and reform. I can't even begin to speculate what he's talking about with the chief being shot...Mohawks rejoicing...probably some historical US event that Captain Cook will tell us all about sooner or later.