Leftist historian Howard Zinn will speak at Brown University's Salomon Hall on Thursday, November 14, as the Rhode Island peace movement continues to organize opposition to a US invasion of Iraq. In recent weeks, peace groups held vigils and speaking events in seven Rhode Island communities and organized people to take part in massive demonstrations in Boston and Washington, D.C.

After Zinn's 4 p.m. speech, a teach-in against the war, featuring University of Rhode Island professor Scott Molloy, Warwick minister Duane Clinker and DARE executive director Sara Mersha, will be held at 8 p.m. at Brown's List Auditorium. Meanwhile, peace leaders are organizing a statewide meeting on November 20 at 7 p.m., at Woodridge United Church of Christ on Budlong Road in Cranston, to plan educational presentations at churches and union halls and other events. All three programs are open to the public.

"I haven't seen anything start like this since I was an undergraduate at [the University of] Illinois in 1965," says Paul Buhle, a Brown professor of history and American civilization, who is coordinating Zinn's visit.

In the wake of President George Bush's "attack first" doctrine, Rhode Island peace activists have seen interest in their events balloon. In April, 400 people attended an American Friends Service Committee conference at Rhode Island College to promote nonmilitary responses to the September 11 terrorist attacks. Hundreds more signed a subsequent statement, demanding an end to violence, which appeared in numerous Rhode Island newspapers on the anniversary of the attacks.

Next, a late September anti-war rally at the State House drew close to a 1000 people just as Congress prepared to authorize an attack on Iraq. Later, 91 Rhode Island ministers and religious leaders wrote US Senators Jack Reed and Lincoln Chafee and US Representatives Patrick Kennedy and James Langevin, urging them to oppose Bush's war resolution. (Only Kennedy voted for it.) Then, on October 30, the Rhode Island Peace Mission, a coalition of 24 religious and community groups, organized vigils and anti-war meetings in Wakefield, Westerly, Providence, Warwick, Newport, Barrington, and Block Island.

In the time since, Act Now to Stop War & End Racism (ANSWER) organized four busloads of Rhode Islanders to attend a huge anti-war rally in Washington attended by more than 100,000 people. Rhode Islanders also joined a 15,000-person peace march in Boston last Saturday, November 2.

Local peace vigils are being held Fridays at 12:30 p.m. at Manning Chapel at Brown, 5:30 p.m. at the Westerly Post Office, and at 4:30 p.m. at the federal building in Kennedy Plaza in Providence. In addition, folk singer and peace activist Joyce Katzberg holds a daily lunchtime vigil at the World War I memorial on South Main Street, across from Superior Court, in Providence. "We need," says Karina Wood, coordinator of Rhode Island Peace Action, "to stop this [Bush] administration from going to war all over the world."

Issue Date: November 8 - 14, 2002