Organizing the Continental Walk for Disarmament and Social Justice (1976)

Tomorrow, January 21, the CT Committee on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons will demonstrate in downtown New London in support of the UN’s Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons on its 1-year anniversary, and against the continued construction of nuclear submarines in our community. VPT is a founding member of this coalition and has been active in organizing the event. This is the second in what is becoming an annual protest — last year, the group demonstrated on the day the Treaty came into force (January 22) to thank the 51 countries that had initially ratified it. It just so happens that the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons came into force one day before the anniversary of the start of the 1976 Continental Walk for Disarmament and Social Justice.

(See our post from last year for an overview of the Continental Walk and its connections to VPT, including VPT members’ direct participation in the Walk)

On January 23, 1976, four hundred people gathered in the San Francisco Bay Area for a women’s rally in support of an ambitious peace project: a walk across the continental US as a demonstration against war and to demand greater investment in social justice causes. One week later, roughly 800 people would leave the city together on foot to start the action that would last 10 months and cross 34 states. They were partly inspired by another long protest walk: the San Francisco to Moscow Walk for Peace (1960-1961), the idea for which was initially conceived in New London, CT (see our posts from the last several weeks for more on that Walk).

The participants of the 1976 Walk carried a simple message: with the Vietnam War finally over, haven’t we learned our lesson about war? Isn’t it time to divert our resources from the military and commit them to addressing the many historical injustices and ongoing social inequities in this country? It is both an urgent and perennial question demanded by the peace movement. It is the same question that the CT Committee on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons will ask in New London tomorrow, very near the Hygienic where the idea for the first major Walk for Peace was born. 

(Click either image below to download the PDF version of the original pages)

Take Action

To celebrate the one-year year anniversary of the UN’s Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons, the CT Committee on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons has organized a demonstration in New London, CT for Friday, January 21, 2:45-4:00pm. Folks will line up along Howard St with signs and banners provided by the Committee. Visit the Facebook event page and RSVP by clicking the flier image below. For more information including how to participate, please get in touch with us on Facebook at facebook.com/voluntownpeacetrust or email us at [email protected]​

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Source

Leonard, Vickie and Tom MacLean, Ed. The Continental Walk for Disarmament and Social Justice. Continental Walk for Disarmament and Social Justice, 1977. ​