December 12
1916
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.
1958
Reverend Maurice McCrackin sentenced to 6 months for war tax resistance.
December 10
International Human Rights Day
“Let us be clear: torture can never be an instrument to fight terror, for torture is an instrument of terror. […]
Today, on Human Rights Day, let us recommit ourselves to the principles of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, and let us rededicate ourselves to wiping the scourge of torture from the face of the earth.”
Kofi Annan,
United Nations Secretary-General
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December 9
1949
U.S. Representative John Parnell Thomas, former chairman of the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC), sentenced to 6 to 18 months in federal prison for “padding” Congressional payrolls and using the money himself.
1969
The “Committee of 100” members of the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament, including Bertrand Russell, held demonstrations at various U.S. air and nuclear bases in Britain.
December 8
1886
The American Federation of Labor was founded at a convention of union leaders in Columbus, Ohio.
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Sources: Peace Buttons and War Resisters League Calendar
December 7
1941
Japanese bomb Pearl Harbor, leading to U.S. entry into WWII
1964
A leader of the Berkeley Free Speech Movement, Mario Savio, was arrested. One-third of the 27,000 students, 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 to 115) supporting the rapidly growing Free Speech Movement.
(Sources: Peace Buttons and War Resisters League Calendar)
December 5
1955
Five days after Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat 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 over 1 year (54 weeks) until the buses were integrated.
(Sources: Peace Buttons and War Resisters League Calendar)
December 4
1916
Five members of a Woman’s Suffragist group unroll a banner from the visitor’s gallery during President Wilson’s address to Congress, asking, “Mr. President, What will you do for woman suffrage?”
(Sources: Peace Buttons and War Resisters League Calendar)
December 3
Viola Liuzzo and Bhopal Union Carbide plant leak.
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(Sources: Peace Buttons and War Resisters League Calendar)
December 2
1942
Enrico Fermi, the Italian-born Nobel Prize-winning physicist, directs and controls 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.”
Deanna Dee-Dee Taylor 