Tag: Peace

Mother Jones with The Mill Children, & More, in Peace & Justice History for 7/7

July 7, 1863
The first military draft was instituted in the U.S. to provide troops for the Union army in the American Civil War. Once called, a draftee had the opportunity to either pay a commutation fee of $300 to be exempt from a particular battle, or to hire a replacement that would exempt him from the entire war.
July 7, 1903

The March of the Mill Children  watch a video – highly recommended
Labor organizer Mary Harris “Mother” Jones led the “March of the Mill Children” over 100 miles from Philadelphia to President Theodore Roosevelt’s Long Island summer home in Oyster Bay, New York, to publicize the harsh conditions of child labor and to demand a 55-hour work week. It is during this march, on about the 24th, she delivered her famed “The Wail of the Children” speech.
Roosevelt refused to see them.
“Fifty years ago there was a cry against slavery and men gave up their lives to stop the selling of black children on the block. Today the white child is sold for two dollars a week to the manufacturers.” –from Mother Jones’s autobiography
 
Read more about Mother Jones 
July 7, 1957
Convened at the onset of the Cold War, a group of scientists held their first peace conference in the village of Pugwash, Nova Scotia, Canada. The mission of the Pugwash Conference was to “. . . bring scientific insight and reason to bear on threats to human security arising from science and technology in general, and above all from the catastrophic threat posed to humanity by nuclear and other weapons of mass destruction . . . .”

Bertrand Russell
Wealthy industrialist and Pugwash son Cyrus Eaton had invited the world’s greatest minds to his family home in Nova Scotia and address the emerging threat of nuclear war. The Conference became the basis for an ongoing organization that deals with issues of weapons of mass destruction. The 1995 Nobel Peace Prize was awarded to Joseph Rotblat (one of the original signatories of the Pugwash Manifesto) and to the Pugwash Conferences on Science and World Affairs.
Albert Einstein
Pugwash home 

Fifty years later . . .
25 scientists, diplomats and former military officers from 15 countries gathered for a “Revitalizing Nuclear Disarmament” strategy workshop. The meeting was held near the Thinkers’ Lodge, the site of the first meeting in 1957.
“Fifty years ago from Pugwash, Nova Scotia, nuclear scientists helped alert the world to the dangers of nuclear weapons, and especially the newly developed hydrogen bomb,” said Paolo Cotta-Ramusino, Secretary General, Pugwash Conferences on Science and World Affairs. “Today, we are working with experts from around the world for global action to revitalize nuclear disarmament and the final elimination of nuclear weapons.”
Senator Roméo Dallaire, Honorary Patron of the Pugwash Peace Exchange, said “It is appalling to observe the increasing potential for many regional nuclear arms races, shameless plans to modernize nuclear arsenals and bald-faced threats of pre-emptive nuclear use,” said Senator Dallaire. “Only by revitalizing discussion and implementation of disarmament leading to abolition can we ensure that these genocidal devices will never again be used.”
July 7, 1977
The United States conducted its first test of the neutron bomb. The neutron bomb was a tactical thermonuclear weapon designed to cause very little physical damage through limited blast and heat but was designed to kill troops through localized but intense levels of lethal radiation.
A neutron bomb explosion at a test site
July 7, 1979
2,000 American Indian activists and anti-nuclear demonstrators marched through the Black Hills of western South Dakota to protest the development of uranium mines on sacred native lands.

https://www.peacebuttons.info/E-News/peacehistoryjuly.htm#july7

Irene Morgan, Anne Frank, & More, in Peace & Justice History for 7/6

July 6, 1892
In one of the worst cases of violent union-busting, a fierce battle broke out between the striking employees (members of the Amalgamated Association of Iron and Steel Workers) of Andrew Carnegie’s Homestead Steel Company and a Pinkerton Detective Agency private army brought on barges down the Monongahela River in the dead of night. Twelve were killed.
Henry C. Frick, general manager of the plant in Homestead, near Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, had been given free rein by Carnegie to quash the strike. At Frick’s request, Pennsylvania Governor Robert E. Pattison then sent 8,500 troops to intervene on behalf of the company.
Read more  (2 links)
July 6, 1942

In Nazi-occupied Holland, thirteen-year-old Jewish diarist Anne Frank and her family were forced to take refuge in a secret sealed-off area of an Amsterdam warehouse under threat of arrest and deportation to a concentration camp by the Einsatzgruppen (Task Force), a part of the German Gestapo.
The Anne Frank Center for Mutual Respect
July 6, 1944
Irene Morgan, a 28-year-old black woman, was arrested for refusing to move to the back of the bus eleven years before Rosa Parks did so. Her legal appeal, after her conviction for breaking a Virginia law (known as a Jim Crow law) forbidding integrated seating, resulted in a 7-1 Supreme Court decision barring segregation in interstate commerce.

Irene Morgan
More about Irene Morgan 
June 3, 1946: Morgan v. Commonwealth of Virginia Zinn Ed Project
July 6, 1965
As many as 500 students in Berkeley, California, attempted to block trains carrying troops destined for Vietnam along the Santa Fe Railroad tracks; there were no casualties. Organized by the Vietnam Day Committee, this was the first civil disobedience at UC-Berkeley against the Vietnam War.

https://www.peacebuttons.info/E-News/peacehistoryjuly.htm#july6

Hmmm.

(I think we’ve seen the long cut of this riff, before. This short popped up last night. Enjoy! -A.)

Emancipation, Pullman Strike & Boycott, & More, in Peace & Justice History for 7/5

July 5, 1827
The newly freed African-American population of New York, led by men on horseback, marched in an Emancipation Day Parade from the Battery at the foot of Manhattan to City Hall.
Follow the route of the parade 
July 5, 1894
Buildings erected for the 1892 Columbian Exposition in Chicago’s Jackson Park were set ablaze, seven reduced to ashes. The fire was part of the chaos in reaction to President Grover Cleveland’s calling out federal troops to end the Pullman Strike.
The Pullman Palace Car Company produced the sleeping cars used by most of the railroads. The contingent of federal, state and local forces equalled the number of striking workers.The Pullman employees, who lived in company-owned housing in Pullman, Illinois, had suffered massive layoffs and pay cuts averaging 25%. The company refused to cut the rent on the housing its employees were required to occupy, nor would it bargain with workers’ representatives.

Federal troops guarding the Arcade Building in Pullman, Illinois.
The Pullman workers’ cause had been taken up by Eugene V. Debs, the leader of the American Railway Union, who helped organize a nationwide boycott of any train that included a Pullman car.
The Pullman Strikers’ Statement 
More on the Great Pullman Strike 
July 5, 1934

Bloody Thursday, July 5, 1934, near Rincon Hill.
On “Bloody Thursday,” police armed with machine guns opened fire against striking longshoremen and their supporters, killing two, wounding 32 more by gunfire, and injuring 75 others at Rincon Hill in San Francisco.
July 5, 1935
The National Labor Relations or Wagner Act (named for New York’s Senator Robert Wagner) became law, recognizing workers’ rights to organize and bargain collectively. It was signed into law by President Franklin D. Roosevelt.
Read more about the act 
July 5, 1989
   
Former National Security Council aide Oliver North received a $150,000 fine and a suspended prison term for his part in the Iran-Contra scandal. The scandal was a secret arrangement directed from the Reagan White House that provided funds to the Nicaraguan Contra rebels (despite specific congressional prohibition) from profits gained by selling arms to Iran (at war with Iraq at the time) in hopes of their releasing hostages, despite President Reagan’s claim that he would never negotiate with hostage-takers.
North’s conviction was later overturned because evidence revealed in the congressional Iran-Contra hearings had compromised his right to a fair trial.
The real details on Ollie North’s activities   (It’s still up! -A.)

A Nice Little Video

I just ran across this in my SBTB email. It belongs here. Doesn’t look like it embedded (it didn’t on SBTB, either,) so click through on “View this post…” and make sure the sound is on. A very worthy click.

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Jacob Witzling (@jacobwitzling)

Baby Strikers, Barbara Gittings, & More in Peace & Justice History, 7/3, 7/4

July 3, 1835
Children employed in the silk mills at Paterson, New Jersey, went on strike for an eleven-hour workday and a six-day workweek rather than 12-14 hour days. With the help of adults, they won a compromise settlement of a 69-hour week.
More on the Baby Strikers 
July 3, 1966
4000 Britons chanting, “Hands off Vietnam,” demonstrated in London against escalation of the Vietnam War. U.S. warplanes had recently bombed the North Vietnamese capital of Hanoi as well as the port city of Haiphong. Police moved in after scuffles broke out at the demonstration outside the U.S. Embassy in Grosvenor Square; 31 were arrested.

Actress Vanessa Redgrave joins 25,000 two years later at Anti-Vietnam war protest, Grosvenor Square.
Read more 
July 3, 1974
At the Moscow Summit talks between President Richard Nixon and President Leonid Brezhnev, the United States and the Soviet Union agreed to hold bilateral talks on the prohibition of chemical weapons.
July 4, 1776

The United States declared its independence from King George III and Great Britain, thus beginning the first successful anti-imperial revolution in world history. Signed in Philadelphia by 56 British subjects who lived and owned property in thirteen of the American colonies, the document asserted the right of a people to create its own form of government. The signers of the Declaration of Independence were members of the 2nd Continental Congress which had voted two days earlier to separate from the British crown.
Read the Declaration
see some quotes on nationalism and patriotism
July 4, 1827
Slavery was outlawed in New York State as the result of the Gradual Emancipation law passed ten years earlier. This freedom applied only to those who had been 18 at the time of its passage. Enslaved children born during the subsequent ten-year period were not be freed until they reached the age of 21.
At the urging of Reverend William Hamilton, a freedman and carpenter, and others, the end of slavery was celebrated in churches. The Fourth of July had in the past been marred by young white men attacking black Americans.
More on William Hamilton  and others
July 4, 1829
Speaking at Boston’s Park Street Church, newspaper editor and abolitionist William Lloyd Garrison gave a seminal speech on “Dangers to the Nation.” Though Massachusetts had banned slavery in 1781 and there was strong anti-slavery sentiment, most understood that a national ban of slavery would threaten the union of the states. Compensation to slaveholders and return of the enslaved to Africa was considered the best solution.
Garrison, on the other hand, called attention to the hypocrisy of celebrating the the day the document was signed declaring, “All men are created equal” while two million were in bondage. He proposed four propositions that day to guide the abolitionist movement:
1. Above all others, slaves in America deserve “the prayers, and sympathies, and charities of the American people.”
2. Non-slave-holding states are “constitutionally involved in the guilt of slavery,” and are obligated “to assist in its overthrow.”    
3. There is no valid legal or religious justification for the preservation of slavery.
4. The “colored population” of America should be freed, given an education, and accepted as equal citizens with whites.

William Lloyd Garrison
July 4, 1894
The Republic of Hawaii was proclaimed with Sanford B. Dole as president. It was recognized immediately by the United States government under President Grover Cleveland. This was the result of the successful overthrow of the Hawaiian monarchy, then held by Queen Lydia Liliuokalani, and the support by white Americans involved in the sugar trade on the islands for annexation by the United States. Shortly after she had come to office, she had promulgated a new constitution which increased the power of the monarchy and that of native Hawaiians.
July 4, 1965

Barbara Gittings at the Philadelphia picket
The first of an annual picket in front of Philadelphia’s Independence Hall was held by gay and Lesbian Americans. Jack Nichols and Frank Kameny and members of the New York and Washington Mattachine Society and the Daughters of Bilitis had earlier demonstrated in Washington, and wished to change the general perception that homosexuals were perverted or sick.

“By those protesters coming out publicly, and placing themselves very strategically in front of the building that evoked the Declaration of Independence and the idea that all men are created equal, it suggested it [gay rights] was no longer a moral or national security or psychiatric issue … it was a civil-rights issues,” 
David K. Johnson wrote in The Lavender Scare: The Cold War Persecution of Gays and Lesbians in the Federal Government.
July 4, 1966
The Freedom of Information Act, P.L. 89-487, became law. It established the right of Americans to know what their government is doing by outlining procedures for getting access to internal documents.
July 4, 1969

“Give Peace a Chance” by the Plastic Ono Band was released in the United Kingdom.
The song was recorded May 31, 1969, during the “Bed-In” John Lennon and Yoko Ono staged at the Queen Elizabeth Hotel in Montreal as part of their honeymoon. John and Yoko stayed in bed for 8 days, beginning May 26, in an effort to promote world peace.
Some of the people in the hotel room who sang on this were Tommy Smothers, Timothy Leary, Allen Ginsberg, and Petula Clark. Smothers also played guitar. This event promoting peace received a great deal of media attention.“All we are saying . . .”  
watch & listen – give it a chance
July 4, 1969
A national anti-war conference in Cleveland, Ohio, mapped out activities against the Vietnam War and resulted in the founding of New Mobe (mobilization).
More about the Mobes
July 4, 1983
The Women’s Encampment for a Future of Peace and Justice began an eight week stay on a farm just outside the Seneca Army Depot near Romulus, New York. The purpose of the gathering was for the women to learn about and together protest the escalation of militarism and the weapons build-up being led at the time by the Reagan administration.
visit PeaCe eNCaMPeNT HeRSToRy PRoJeCT 
July 4, 2007
The first of several Peace Caravans (Caravanes de Paix) set out from South Kivu and traveled across Africa’s Great Lakes region, including the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Burundi and Rwanda. The Scout Associations of the countries in the violence-ridden area trained hundreds of young people in conflict resolution through their focus on education for peace.

Members of the Caravan for Peace in Burundi
The classes and the caravans included hundreds of young people in Scouts and Girl Guides from many ethnic groups (often with a history of mutual hostility) who act as community mediators.
https://www.peacebuttons.info/E-News/peacehistoryjuly.htm#july3

Hi, All!

I didn’t get any posts set up last night for today. Ollie got a little overheated yesterday during our walk, and I wanted to watch over and care for him to make sure he’s all right. I just didn’t get to setting up posts. (I feel as if that will be a relief for eyes on the blog! But anyway.) He is fine; he’s not taking the fireworks real well, and for some reason doesn’t want his morning walk today, either, which is different, but I’m letting him lead on that. Fireworks don’t begin until 10AM here, so so far, so good on that. Anyway, that’s what’s up here. I hope all are managing to stay healthily cool enough, and taking good care to hydrate well, and screen the UV rays. And that the fireworks aren’t irritating! 🎆

NJ, VT Get With The Program Again, & More, in Peace & Justice History for 7/2

July 2, 1776
New Jersey became the first British colony in America to grant partial women’s suffrage. The new constitution (temporary if there were a reconciliation with Great Britain) granted the vote to all those “of full age, who are worth fifty pounds proclamation money,” including non-whites and widows; married women were not able to own property under common law.
July 2, 1777
Vermont became the first of the United States to abolish slavery.
July 2, 1809
Alarmed by the growing encroachment of whites squatting on Native American lands, the Shawnee Chief Tecumseh called on all Indians to unite and resist. By 1810, he had organized the Ohio Valley Confederacy, which united Indians from the Shawnee, Potawatomi, Kickapoo, Winnebago, Menominee, Ottawa, and Wyandotte nations.
For several years, Tecumseh’s Indian Confederacy successfully delayed further white settlement in the region.

Chief Tecumseh
Tecumseh’s efforts 
July 2, 1839

Slave ship
Early in the morning, captive Africans on the Cuban slave ship Amistad, led by Joseph Cinquè (a Mende from what is now Sierra Leone), mutinied against their captors, killing the captain and the cook, and seized control of the schooner. Jose Ruiz, a Spaniard and planter from Puerto Principe, Cuba, had bought the 49 adult males on the ship, paying $450 each, as slaves for his sugar plantation.
 More about Amistad
  
Joseph Cinquè
July 2, 1964

Jobs and Freedom march April 28, 1963, Washington DC
U.S. President Lyndon B. Johnson signed the Civil Rights Act of 1964 into law, thus barring discrimination in public accommodations (restaurants, stores, theatres, etc.), employment, and voting.
The law had survived an 83-day filibuster in the U.S. Senate by 21 members from southern states.

“I think we just delivered the South to the Republican party for a long time to come,” said President Johnson to his press secretary,
Bill Moyers later that day.
He anticipated a shift in white southern voting from the Democratic to the Republican party in response to the law.
Massive demonstrations a year earlier ensured passage of the Act.
July 2, 1992
President George H.W. Bush (the elder) announced that the United States had completed the worldwide withdrawals of all its ground- and sea-launched tactical nuclear weapons [see September 27, 1991].

https://www.peacebuttons.info/E-News/peacehistoryjuly.htm#july2

Resource & Information for Grief Processing

Several of us have/have had older pets. Maybe this can come in handy. From the MUTTS blog.

On Pet Loss and the Rainbow Bridge: A Conversation With Animal Chaplain Patricia Denys About Grief and Healing

Losing a pet is a unique kind of heartbreak, one that can feel both profound and invisible. To help bring comfort, we spoke with Patricia Denys, MFA, a compassionate voice in the world of pet grief and healing.

Patricia is an artist, animal activist, creative director of Animal Culture magazine, educator, yogi, vegan, and an interfaith, interspecies animal chaplain ordained by the Compassion Consortium. She’s also a great friend of MUTTS.

In this conversation, Patricia shares her perspective as an animal chaplain on navigating loss, offering support, and finding gentle ways to honor the journey. Whether your pet recently crossed the Rainbow Bridge or you’re reflecting on a loss from long ago, we hope this conversation brings you some clarity,  comfort, and connection.

Understanding the Role of an Animal Chaplain

Can you explain what an animal chaplain does?

An animal chaplain helps animals live their fullest lives and helps them transition when it is time. They offer help to animal parents, animal care workers, and animal people in general, navigate stress, grief, and compassion fatigue. Animal chaplains also encourage stronger human-animal (interspecies) bonds, individually and communally. Animal chaplains offer help with end-of-life care, decisions and rituals (interfaith), and bereavement support. An animal chaplain is also there for celebrations and victories for all animals and our planet! 

How did you become an animal chaplain, and what drew you to this work?

Our magazine, Animal Culture, interviewed Reverend Sarah Bowen, co-founder of Compassion Consortium and Executive Director of their Animal Chaplaincy Training Program. The program is interfaith, interspiritual, and interspecies, which was important to me. Sarah was a wonderful interviewee, and I became quite interested in the program after connecting with her. It seemed intriguing and intelligent, and an organic next step on my path of a lifetime working with animals. It was quite a commitment of study and well worth it. My fellow students were amazing, compassionate people. It was a very positive experience.

What kinds of support do you offer to people who are grieving the loss of a pet?

The first thing is listening, while being a calming presence for different needs from different people. Using gentle questioning to see what arises for someone. Reminding people that laughter is good and healthy, and part of healing. And, working on realizing that one does not stop loving someone after the transition. 

Hospice and Palliative Care for Companion Animals, edited by Amir Shanan, Jessica Pierce, and Tamara Shearer, is an excellent book. In one of the essays, the writer calls mourning, “…a transition from loving in presence to loving in absence.” We work on that as animal chaplains.

Why Saying ‘Goodbye’ to a Pet Is So Painful

Why do we often feel that losing a pet is just as painful — if not more so — than losing a human loved one?

Those of us who have experienced the pain of the loss of a companion animal, or any animal, know this pain all too well. Humans have intense bonds with an animal they love or one that is a part of their lives somehow. Animals’ lives are shorter than humans’. The shock of that short life being over can be very hard to process.  

Companion animals also demonstrate stability and routine. A big void is created when these things come to an end. Animals are sentient. They are aware. We see that time and time again. We want to be with them and protect them; they are our family. 

How can we respond to people who say, “It was just an animal” or who don’t understand pet grief?

It is very disappointing to hear, “It was just an animal,” from anyone, especially someone you respect or that is close to you. It is the last thing anyone wants to hear since it is so insensitive to one’s feelings and to the memory of the one who has passed. What someone grieving needs is validation that their feelings of loss for such a profound bond with an animal, are understandable and real. You may choose to say that or not.

What are some healthy ways to process and express grief after losing a pet?

Definitely seek support from friends, family, your veterinarian, and/or an animal chaplain. Animal grief is in our mainstream now. There is no shame in asking for help, ever. One needs to talk about the loss. It’s real. 

Consider taking a workshop on animal loss or creating a shrine, memorial, art piece, or photo book. Volunteering is also a great, healthy way to heal.

Do you have any advice for someone who feels stuck in their grief or like they should have “moved on” by now?

“Moving on” is a very individual thing. There is no time limit on processing through one’s grief. Accepting the loss and adjusting one’s life accordingly takes time. You need to take your time. If you feel that you are experiencing symptoms of prolonged grief, a therapist can be of help. 

Helpful Ways to Honor a Pet’s Memory

How can rituals or memorials help with healing? Do you have any suggestions for meaningful ways to honor a pet’s memory?

Oh, there are so many wonderful things you can do! Humans have always embraced rituals. It is a way to connect to something. A ritual may be something within your religious practices, your own spirituality that you find comforting, or the daily ritual of taking a walk with your dog. That is a ritual for both of you!

A memorial can be a powerful took for healing. It is a coping tool. It is a way to process. Creating an altar on a table for the one you have lost that includes photographs, something that was meaningful for that animal such as a toy, or adding flowers can be a positive expression of your feelings of loss. Re-wilding a small garden that encourages other animals to visit, or creating a small shrine you can carry with you are other ideas. Keeping a journal of your thoughts or sketches can also have a profound effect on healing. The simple act of writing to your loved one — what they meant to you, how much they are missed, what you enjoyed most about them, for example, is often a comfort.

As an artist and a teacher of art, I know creating art can be cathartic and healing, I conduct art workshops on loss and celebration of animals and the planet. They are for non-artists especially. It has been an incredible experience to see what people can create as a way to work out their feelings, and usually, how anxious they are to share with each other. It is a bonding experience about the power of love.

(snip-a bit MORE; click through on the title above)

The US Ratifies The 26th, Spain Got With The Program, & More, in Peace & Justice History for 6/30

Also, to commemorate the final day of PRIDE month 2025, here’s an historic dance music video to celebrate. No matter what, we should never not dance again! 🎶 🌈 🎶 🫶

June 30, 1966
The first GIs—known as the Fort Hood Three, U.S. Army Privates James Johnson, Dennis Mora and David Samas—refused to be sent to Vietnam. All were members of the 142nd Signal Battalion, 2nd Armored Division stationed at Fort Hood, Texas. The three were from working-class families, and had denounced the war as “immoral, illegal and unjust.” They were arrested, court-martialed and imprisoned. The Pentagon reported 503,926 “incidents of desertion” between 1966 and 1971.
1961-1973: GI resistance in the Vietnam War 
View their pamphlet
 Ballad of The Fort Hood Three  Pete Seeger
June 30, 1971
The 26th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, lowering the minimum voting age to 18 in all elections, was ratified after ¾ of the 50 state legislatures had agreed to it, a mere 100 days after its passage by Congress.
June 30, 1974
The Selective Service law, authorizing the draft, expired, marking the official end of conscription in the U.S. and the beginning of the all-volunteer armed forces.
June 30, 2005
Spain legalized same-sex marriage by a vote of 187-147 in parliament. Such couples were also granted the right to adopt and receive inheritances. Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero spoke in support of the bill, “We are expanding the opportunities for happiness of our neighbors, our colleagues, our friends and our relatives. At the same time, we are building a more decent society.
Read more