WRL'S Continental Walk took place during the U.S. bicentennial year. WRL was also active with the anti-establishment July 4th Coalition, which highlighted the American Revolution's unfinished business to create a just and equal society.
Former WRL staffer and longtime pacifist activist Wendy Schwartz reflects on the People's Blockade of the Earle Naval Ammunitions Depot in spring 1972, the arrests of protestors, and her father's work to bail out jailed protestors.
How can you portray 100 years of nonviolent resistance to war and the causes of war? If you’re the 100-year-old War Resisters League, you create a traveling exhibit and book chock-full of photos and stories reflecting that century of activism. Arnie Alpert gives a taste of the book and exhibit and shares some of his own experiences with WRL in an essay in "Waging Nonviolence."
Jim Haber reflects on creating the 2008 War Resisters League calendar, Salaam, Shalom, Solh: Nonviolence and Resistance in the Middle East and Beyond in this week's #WRLcentennialhistoryblog. The calendar's 52 weekly entries provide a snapshot of grassroots, nonviolent organizing in the region in the mid-2000's. Jim says, "The calendar is relevant today so we feel connected to a global lineage of peaceworkers."
Where there is war, there are also people who bravely and conscientiously refuse to participate. That is true in the Ukraine, in Israel, in the U.S., and around the globe. International Conscientious Objectors Day, observed on the 15th of May, is a time to promote the right of conscientious objection and to support those who refuse war. This year, WRI is launching the international action #RefuseWar!
As students demonstrate in support of Palestine and a ceasefire in Gaza on university campuses across the U.S. and beyond, this week's WRL 100th History blog looks back at the student actions of May 1970.
With the slogan “If the government won’t stop the war [in Vietnam], we’ll stop the government,” the largest mass arrests in U.S. history – 13,500 – occurred in May 1971 as hundreds of autonomous affinity groups from around the country converged on Washington, DC.
It’s been more than 50 years, but I still remember the ITT demonstration as one of the most creative and dramatic WRL actions of that furiously turbulent time in the antiwar movement. It was also one of the most fun.
WRL's 100th Anniversary Project Coordinator Mary McClintock shares a WRL story she heard in response to the letter she wrote for WRL in fall 2023. She wants to hear your WRL story.
