| |
The
International Peace Bureau was launched in Berne, Switzerland,
“...to coordinate the activities of the various peace
societies and promote the concept of peaceful settlement of
international disputes.” |
 |
|
|
Following
the civil war in 1948, Costa Rican president Pepe Figueres
constitutionally abolished the army and the Constitution prohibits
presidential re-election. Money not spent on a military allows
for one of the highest literacy rates in the continent, ninety-four
percent. |
| read
about Costa Rica’s values and attitudes |
|
Rosa
Parks, a black seamstress active in the local NAACP, was arrested
by police in Montgomery, Alabama, after refusing to give up
her seat on the bus to a white man. Mrs. Parks faced a fine
for breaking the segregation laws which said blacks had to
vacate their seats if there are white passengers left standing.
Mrs. Parks had not been the first to defy the Jim Crow law
but her arrest sparked the year-long Montgomery Bus Boycott,
organized by a young Baptist minister named Martin Luther
King, Jr. The Montgomery bus company couldn’t survive
without the revenue from its black passengers who, for the
next year, created car pools and other means to avoid using
the city busses. The boycott was successful and Mrs. Parks
became known as the "mother of the civil rights movement."
read
more about Rosa Parks
 |
|
| 
|
Comedian Dick Gregory was convicted in Olympia, Washington
for his participation in a Nisqually Native American fishing
rights protest.
read
more
 |
 |
|
|
Karl
Liebknecht was the only member of German Parliament to vote
against war with France and Britain.
read
more
Karl
Liebnecht |
|
| Enrico
Fermi, the Italian-born Nobel Prize-winning physicist, directed
and controlled the first self-sustaining fission reaction in
his laboratory beneath the bleachers of Stagg Field at the University
of Chicago. |
|
The result of this experiment made the atomic bomb possible
and ushered in the nuclear age. Upon successful completion
of the experiment, a coded message was transmitted to President
Roosevelt: "The Italian navigator has landed in the new
world." |
 |
|
The
U.S. Senate voted 65 to 22 to censure Senator Joseph R. McCarthy
(R-Wisconsin) for "conduct that tends to bring the Senate
into dishonor and disrepute." |
The condemnation, with all the Democrats and about half the
Republicans voting against him, and was related to McCarthy's
controversial, abusive and indiscriminate investigation of
suspected communists in the U.S. government, military, and
civilian society. The House of Representatives and many states
continued their own investigations.
read
more
|
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|
 |
Following
a year of severely strained relations between the United States
and Cuba, Cuban leader Fidel Castro openly declared that he
is a Marxist-Leninist.
Fidel
Castro |
|
| Thousands
in the Berkeley Free Speech Movement gathered on the steps
of Sproul Hall, the administration building at the University
of California campus to protest four students being disciplined
for distributing political literature. Joan Baez performed.
The next day, police arrested 773 who began a sit-in at Sproul
Hall. 10,000 more students then went on strike and shut down
the school. |
 |
| 
|
The
Free Speech Movement had began in October, when three thousand
students surrounded a police car for 36 hours. Inside the
car was a civil rights worker who had been arrested for distributing
political literature on the UC-Berkeley campus.
What
was the Free Speech Movement?
|
Jack
Weinberg
in
police car. |
|
Biko's
funeral |
A
demonstration erupted outside a South African court after
a magistrate ruled that security police were to be exonerated
in the death of black consciousness leader Steve Biko, who
died while in their custody.
His
funeral had been attended by more than 15,000 mourners, not
including the thousands who were turned away by the police.
|
 Steve
Biko
|
read
about Steve Biko
|
|
| Two
Maryknoll nuns, one Ursuline nun and a lay missionary were
raped, murdered, buried outside San Salvador, and unearthed
shortly thereafter. U.S.-trained and -supported Salvadoran
national guardsmen, widely known to act as death squads, were
suspected.
read
more
|
American Nuns Maura Clarke, Ita Ford and Dorothy Kazel - killed
in El Salvador in 1980. |
| The
Reagan administration, taking office seven weeks later, and
relying in part on the Salvadoran military to rid Central America
of communism, denied the National Guard’s involvement.
General Alexander Haig, the president’s secretary of state,
suggested the nuns provoked the incident, running a roadblock
in Marxist jeeps, and were shot trying to flee. The FBI and
CIA report this is a total fabrication and five national guardsmen
were later convicted of murder. |
|
| An
all-white jury in Alabama convicted three Ku Klux Klansmen
for the murder of white civil rights activist Viola Liuzzo. |
|
Viola
Liuzzo |
The mother of five from Detroit was shot and killed while
driving a young black activist, Leroy Moton, back to the town
of Selma following a protest march to the state capital in
Montgomery earlier in the year. It was later learned that
one of the Klansmen in the car, Gary Thomas Rowe, was an FBI
informant.
read
more
Klansmen
Collie Wilkins, Eugene Thomas and William Eaton at their trial |
|
| Protesters
destroyed files at eight New York draft boards in protest
of the
Vietnam
War. |
|
| In
the early morning hours, one of the worst industrial disasters
in history began when American-owned Union Carbide’s
pesticide plant located near the densely populated city of
Bhopal in central India leaked a highly toxic cloud of methyl
isocyanate into the air. |
|  Bhopal
survivors still demanding justice 2004
|
Estimates of the fatalities vary widely, but of the approximately
one million people living in Bhopal at the time, 2,000 were
killed immediately, at least another 8,000 within a short
time, and hundreds of thousands were injured, many still suffering
today.
The U.S. blocked extradition of Union Carbide officials facing
criminal prosecution in India. Union Carbide has since been
purchased by Dow Chemical which continues to refuse responsibility
for the incident or its victims, and has yet to clean up the
site.
read
more
|
|
| The
International Day of Disabled Persons was declared by the
United Nations. “The annual observance of the International
Day of Disabled Persons ... aims to promote an understanding
of disability issues and mobilize support for the dignity,
rights and well-being of persons with disabilities ....” |
2006
Theme: “E-Accessibility
|
|
| 
|
An
international treaty banning land mines was signed by 122 countries.
It comprehensively prohibits the use, production, trade or stockpiling
of antipersonnel mines. Buried landmines kill about 15,000 people
every year worldwide. The dangerous and time-consuming process
of removal will take centuries at the current rate of landmine
clearance. |
| The
United States and approximately forty other countries have
yet to sign the treaty, and fifteen countries continue to
produce land mines. The Pentagon requested $1.3 billion for
research on and production of two new landmine systems—Spider
and Intelligent Munitions System—between fiscal years
2005 and 2011 but Congress has resisted funding the programs
under pressure from nearly 500 U.S.-based organizations opposing
the weapons. |
|
Read
more about the treaty: |
|
|
Recent
U.S. policy on land mines: |
|
| 
|
The
American Anti-Slavery Society was formed by Arthur Tappan
in Philadelphia. He and his brother Lewis were active abolitionists
throughout their lives, including providing legal defense
for the Africans who mutinied on the slave ship Amistad.
read
more 
Arthur
Tappan |
|
| Five
members of a woman's suffragist group unrolled a banner from
the visitor's gallery during President Wilson's annual message
(state of the union) to Congress, asking, "Mr. President,
What will you do for woman suffrage?" There was no mention
of the issue in his speech. |
 |
|
| National
draft card turn-in. |
|
|
264 were arrested at a military induction center in New York
City during War Resisters League civil disobedience action. |
|
 |
President
Richard Nixon, Vice-President Spiro T. Agnew, and 40 U.S.
governors embarked on a fact-finding mission to discover the
causes of the generation gap. They viewed films of "simulated
acid trips" and listened to hours of "anti-establishment
rock music."
President
Richard Nixon
Vice-President Spiro T. Agnew |
 |
|
| Cesar
Chavez was sentenced to 20 days in jail for refusing to call
off United Farm Workers’ consumer boycott of lettuce.
read
more
Lettuce
& Grape boycott poster |
 |
|
|
United Nations agreed to establish the University of Peace
and a short wave radio station, Radio Peace International,
in
Costa Rica.
Listen
to Radio for Peace International
|
|
Five
days after Rosa Parks refused to give up her
bus
seat to a white man, the African-American community of Montgomery,
Alabama, launched their boycott of the city's bus system. |
 |
|
The
Montgomery Improvement Association (MIA) was formed to coordinate
the boycott with Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., elected as its
president.
Out
of Montgomery’s 50,000 black residents, 30,000-40,000
participated.
The
boycott lasted (54 weeks) until the buses were integrated.
read
more |
|
|
The
American Federation of Labor, which had historically focused
on organizing craft unions, merged with the Congress of Industrial
Organizations, an organization of industrial unions, to form
the AFL-CIO with a membership of nearly 15 million. George
Meany was elected its first president.
read
more |
|
|
| New
York City became the first city to legislate against racial
or religious discrimination in housing (Fair Housing Practices
Law). |
|
| 
|
1,000
anti-war protesters tried to close a New York City military
induction center. 585 were arrested including poet Allen Ginsberg
and Dr. Benjamin Spock. Simultaneous demonstrations occurred
in Madison, Wisconsin, Manchester, New Hampshire, Cincinnati,
Ohio, and New Haven, Connecticut.
Dr.
Benjamin Spock
Allen Ginsberg |
 |
|
The United Nations adopted the charter for the University
for Peace, Costa Rica.
read
more 
The
monument sculpted by Cuban artist Thelvia Marín in
1987, is the world's largest peace monument. |
|
|
|
At
the 100th birthday celebration for Sen. Strom Thurmond (R-South
Carolina), Senate Republican leader Trent Lott (R-Mississippi)
praised Thurmond's Dixiecrat Party 1948 presidential campaign
(official slogan: “Segregation Forever!”).
President
George W. Bush with Sen. Lott and Sen. Thurmond |
| “I
want to say this about my state. When Strom Thurmond ran for
president, we voted for him. We're proud of him. And if the
rest of the country had followed our lead, we wouldn't have
had all these problems over all these years, either.”
The reaction to this sentiment led to Lott's resignation as
Senate majority leader. |
|
Georgia
provided the final vote needed for the 13th Amendment to become
part of the U.S. Constitution, abolishing slavery.
|
|  slave
auction
|
“Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as
a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly
convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place
subject to their jurisdiction.”
read
more
|
 first
vote |
| Two
days before, Mississippi’s legislature had voted to reject
ratification. |
|
| The
voters of Spain approved a new constitution in a popular referendum
by nearly 8-1. It proclaimed Spain to be a parliamentary monarchy
and guaranteed its citizens equality before the law and a
full range of individual liberties, including religious freedom.
While recognizing the autonomy of the regions, it stressed
the indivisibility of the Spanish state.
read
more
|
|
|
In
Venezuela, former Lt. Col. Hugo Chavez, who had staged a bloody
coup attempt against the government six years earlier, was
elected president. As a socialist reformer, Chavez’s
policies have given land to the landless and, using Venezuela’s
oil revenues, increased investment in housing and infrastructure.
read
more
 |
|
|
| 
|
A leader of the Berkeley Free Speech Movement, Mario Savio,
was arrested. One-third of the 27,000 students at the University
of California campus, along with faculty, were on strike protesting
to preserve their first amendment right to distribute political
literature and organize on campus. A faculty resolution passed
824-115, supporting the rapidly growing Free Speech Movement.
more
on Mario Savio
"There
is a time when the operation of the machine becomes so odious,
makes you so sick at heart, that you can't take part; and
you've got to put your bodies upon the gears and upon the
wheels, upon the levers, upon all the apparatus and you've
got to make it stop." - Mario Savio |
|
| The
American Federation of Labor was founded at a convention of
union leaders in Columbus, Ohio.
read
more
|
|
|
Jeanette
Rankin (R-Montana), the first woman elected to the U.S. Congress
in 1916, cast the only vote against U.S. entry into WWII.
She had also voted against the U.S. entering WWI.
read
more
|
|
|
U.S.
President Dwight Eisenhower addressed the United Nations General
Assembly, proposing the creation of a new U.N. atomic energy
agency which would receive contributions of uranium from the
United States, the USSR, and other countries "principally
concerned," and would put this material to peaceful use.
|
 |
The
speech, known later as Atoms for Peace, included: “My
country wants to be constructive, not destructive. It wants
agreement, not wars, among nations. It wants itself to live
in freedom, and in the confidence that the people of every
other nation enjoy equally the right of choosing their own
way of life.” |
|
|
U.S.
President Ronald Reagan and Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev
sign the first treaty to reduce the nuclear arsenals of the
two superpowers. The Intermediate Nuclear Forces (INF) Treaty
eliminated and banned all ground-launched ballistic and cruise
missiles with a range of 300-3,400 miles (500-5,500 kilometers).
By May 1991, all intermediate-range and shorter-range missiles,
launchers, and related support had been eliminated. |
|
Intermediate
Nuclear Force vehicle |
On
the first anniversary of the INF (Intermediate Nuclear Force)
Treaty, twelve Dutch peace activists, calling themselves "INF
Ploughshares," cut through fences to enter the Woensdrecht
Air Force base in The Netherlands. They made their way to
cruise missile bunkers where they hammered on the missiles,
carrying out the first disarmament action in Holland.
read
more
|
|
U.S.
Representative John Parnell Thomas, former chairman of the
House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC), was sentenced
to 6 to 18 months in federal prison for "padding"
Congressional payrolls and using the money himself.
John
Parnell Thomas |
|
|
| Members
of the National Committee of 100, a movement of non-violent
resistance to nuclear war and to the manufacture and use of
all weapons of mass extermination, joined with the Campaign
for Nuclear Disarmament (CND) and held demonstrations at various
U.S. air and nuclear bases in Britain. |
|
|
Members of the Committee of 100, including Bertrand Russell,
considered civil disobedience a legitimate means in their
struggle. The CND avoided all illegal activities.
the
CND is still active today
Bertrand
Russell and the "Committee of 100"
at
an earlier action in 1961. |
|
| Solidarity
trade union founder and leader Lech Walesa won Poland's presidential
runoff election in a 3-1 landslide.
He
thus became the first directly elected Polish leader.
read
more
Lech
Walesa |
 |
|
| The
General Assembly of the United Nations adopted and proclaimed
the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Following this
historic act the Assembly called upon all Member countries
to publicize the text of the Declaration and "to cause
it to be disseminated, displayed, read and expounded principally
in schools and other educational institutions, without distinction
based on the political status of countries or territories."
After 1950 the anniversary of the declaration has been known
as Human Rights Day.
Read
the Declaration of Human Rights
Resolution
25
|
 |
|
| 
|
Detroit-born
U.N. diplomat Ralph J. Bunche became the first Black American
to win the Nobel Peace Prize. The award was in recognition
of his peace mediation during the first Arab-Israeli war in
1948.
read
more
|
From
his acceptance speech in Oslo, Norway.
“There are some in the world who are prematurely resigned
to the inevitability of war. Among them are the advocates of
the so-called "preventive war," who, in their resignation
to war, wish merely to select their own time for initiating
it. To suggest that war can prevent war is a base play on words
and a despicable form of warmongering. The objective of any
who sincerely believe in peace clearly must be to exhaust every
honourable recourse in the effort to save the peace. The world
has had ample evidence that war begets only conditions which
beget further war.” |
|
| Chief
Albert Luthuli, President-General of the banned African National
Congress, appealed for racial equality in racially separatist
apartheid South Africa after accepting the Nobel peace prize
for 1960 in Oslo, Norway. |
| Mr.
Luthuli said he considered the award "a recognition of
the sacrifices made by the peoples of all races [in South
Africa], particularly the African people who have endured
and suffered so much for so long.”
“It may well be that South Africa's social system is
a monument to racialism and race oppression, but its people
are the living testimony to the unconquerable spirit of mankind.
Down the years, against seemingly overwhelming odds, they
have sought the goal of fuller life and liberty, striving
with incredible determination and fortitude for the right
to live as men - free men.”
Albert
Luthuli |
 |
|
| Rev.
Martin Luther King, Jr. was awarded Nobel Peace Prize.
From his speech in Oslo: “After contemplation, I conclude
that this award which I receive on behalf of that [civil rights]
movement is profound recognition that nonviolence is the answer
to the crucial political and moral question of our time --
the need for man to overcome oppression and violence without
resorting to violence and oppression.
Civilization and violence are antithetical concepts.”
Read
the speech: |
|
|
Julia
Butterfly Hill, age 23, climbed "Luna," a 1,000-year-old
California redwood, to protect it from loggers.
read
more
Julia
Butterfly atop Luna |
 |
|
 |
Iranian
democracy activist Shirin Ebadi, the first Muslim woman to
win the Nobel Peace Prize, accepted the award in Oslo, Norway
"for her efforts for democracy and human rights. She
has focused especially on the struggle for the rights of women
and children."
read
more
Shirin
Ebadi |
|
| 
|
The
General Assembly of the United Nations voted to establish
the United Nations International Children's Emergency Fund
(UNICEF) to provide relief and support to children living
in countries devastated by World War II.
UNICEF
history  |
|
| Two
U.S. Army air cavalry helicopter companies arrived in Vietnam,
including 33 Shawnee H-2lC helicopters and 425 ground and
flight crewmen. |
|
They were to be used to airlift South Vietnamese Army troops
into combat, the first direct military combat involvement
of U.S. military personnel. President Kennedy had sent them
to bolster the U.S. advisors in the country since the 1950s,
and the failing of the Government of Vietnam’s armed
forces to resist the Viet Cong insurgency movement and the
Republic of [North] Vietnam.
|
|
|
|
New
Zealand Prime Minister Norman Kirk (Labour Party) announced
withdrawal of his country’s troops from Vietnam and
a phase-out of his country’s draft just three days after
taking office.
Prime
Minister Norman Kirk |
 |
| 
Anti-War
demo Parliament Buildings in Wellington, 1969 |
3,890 New Zealand military personnel had served there, suffering
37 dead and 187 wounded. This gave rise to a large and vocal
anti-war movement.
The
anti-war movement in New Zealand today |
|
More
than twenty thousand women turned out for an anti-nuclear
demonstration at Greenham Common Air Base in England, where
U.S. cruise missiles were deployed. Some tried to rip down
the fence surrounding the base. |
|
a
Greenham Peace Camp scrapbook
Poster
of Broken Missile taped to the fence of Greenham Common by
a protester, 1982.
Greenham
Women |
 |
|
| The
three major U.S. television networks (ABC, CBS, NBC) agreed
on joint standards to limit entertainment violence by the
start of the following season.
read
more about TV violence & children
|
|
| In
the largest Russian military offensive since its 1979 invasion
of Afghanistan, thousands of troops and hundreds of tanks crossed
the border into the Muslim republic of Chechnya. Just two weeks
before, a Russian covert operation to undermine the government
in Grozny, the capital, had been foiled and Dzhokhar Dudaev,
Chechnya’s first elected president, had threatened to
have the perpetrators executed. |
The
Chechens had declared their independence from the Commonwealth
of Independent States, comprised of Russia and most of the
countries previously part of the Soviet Union. Chechnya had
been a Russian colony since 1859, and in 1943 Josef Stalin
had deported the population en masse, their return to their
homeland not allowed until 1957.
Russian
President Boris Yeltsin, who ordered the invasion, would not
deal with Dudaev, and had raised him to the rank of chief
enemy, ignoring Chechen-Russian history.
|
 |
|
|
Joseph
H. Rainey (R-South Carolina) took his seat in the U.S. House
of Representatives, becoming the first black Member of Congress.
read
more
|
|
|
Dr.
Ben Reitman was arrested in Cleveland for organizing volunteers
to distribute birth control information at an Emma Goldman
lecture on birth control. He was sentenced to six months in
jail and a $1,000 fine plus court costs.
read
more
Dr.
Ben Reitman
|
 |
|
| The
United Mine Workers union withdrew from the American Federation
of Labor over its failure to organize workers in the mass production
industries such as textiles, automobiles, steel and rubber. |
|
| The
Philippine Civic Action Group, a 1,350-man contingent from
the Army of the Philippines, left South Vietnam. The contingent
was part of the Free World Military Forces, an effort by President
Lyndon B. Johnson to enlist allies for the United States and
South Vietnam, similar to President George Bush’s “Coalition
of the Willing,” the multi-national force in Iraq.
read
more |
|
|
Seventy
people were arrested in Boston outside a hotel where a "New
Trends in Missiles" trade conference was being held.
Inside the hotel, over 1,000 cockroaches were released to
symbolize the likely survivors of nuclear war.
|
 |
|
|
Plowshares
activists disarmed a Pershing missile launcher in West Germany.
In a statement of intent the four said, "With awareness
of our responsibility we understand that we are the ones who
make the arms race possible by not trying to stop it."
read
more 
From
a pershing plowshares action 1984
|
|
|
Denmark, which was not involved in World War I, recognized
the right to conscientious objection to military service.
Norway had done so in 1900, Sweden in 1920. The Netherlands
went so far as to write it into their constitution in 1922,
and Finland enacted it in 1931.
read
more
|
European
Bureau for Conscientious Objection |
 |
|
| Nazi
propaganda minister Joseph Goebbels recorded in his journal
his contempt for the Italians' treatment of Jews in Italian-occupied
territories. "The Italians are extremely lax in their
treatment of Jews. They protect Italian Jews both in Tunis
and in occupied France and won't permit their being drafted
for work or compelled to wear the Star of David."
|
|
| Poland's
new military leaders issued a decree of martial law today,
drastically restricting civil rights and suspending the operations
of the Solidarinosc (Solidarity) trade union. The union's
activists reacted with an appeal for an immediate general
strike to protest.
read
more
|
|
| At
the United Nations Second Special Session on Disarmament, the
two resolutions for a nuclear freeze (a verifiable end to all
testing, production and deployment of nuclear weapons by the
Soviet Union and the United States) passed 119-17 and 122-16.
The socialist and developing countries voted solidly for a freeze,
while the U.S. and NATO were those who voted against it. |
|
| 
|
In
Belgium, 80,000 labor and anti-globalization activists began
several days of protests at a European Union summit conference
in Brussels.
Despite a massive police presence and unlike other similar
meetings, events remained peaceful.
read
more
|
|
| President
George W. Bush served formal notice that the United States
was withdrawing from the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty
with Russia (then the Soviet Union).
“I
have concluded the ABM treaty hinders our government's ability
| |
