Kelsey Juliana

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Overview

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Kelsey Juliana born Eugene, OR March 18, 1996. Teenage climate activist. Filed suit against US for climate damage, 2016.

Quotations

“This work must be done out of love. Motivation and activism and advocacy cannot come from rage or anger or hopelessness. These feelings are unsustainable, short-lived and detrimental for those harboring them, which will then, most likely, be reflected in one's work and therefore inhibit true, lasting positive change. We cannot push society towards more positive, inclusive, sustainable directions without LOVE as the main driver of activism because you cannot burn out of love.” (Americans Who Tell the Truth; photo billmoyers.com)

Emily Johnston

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Overview

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Emily Johnston born San Diego, CA August 9, 1974. Nonviolent environmental activist; editor and poet. Protested Vietnam War. Organized blockade of oil trains, Anacortes, WA, 2014. Arrested for closing pipeline, Clearbrook, MN, 2016; shutting pipeline, Brevard, FL, 2018.

Quotations

“I’m not courageous or brave. . . I’m just more afraid of climate change than I am of prison.” (New York Times Magazine, Feb. 13, 2018)

“One of our biggest challenges—not just as poets and teachers, but as human beings—is finding ways to face violence with compassion; to allow violence to open us to recognizing our inevitable, irreversible connections with one another.” (“Women Write Resistance”, Spoon River Poetry Review, Dec. 2013; photo Grand Forks Herald)

Rosemarie Jackowski

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Overview

Rosemarie Jackowski born Luzerne, PA March 20, 1937. Advocacy journalist and teacher. As one of the “Bennington Twelve,” arrested for peaceful Iraq War protest, Bennington, VT, 2003; conviction overturned by state supreme court.

Quotations

“My protest was really and truly one of the most difficult things I've ever done. I didn't do much, just stood in silence, but it was excruciatingly difficult to stand up to authority like that. Next time will be easier. . . I think everyone should be protesting until we get all of the soldiers home, all of them." (Times-Argus, Nov. 23, 2006; photo mwcnews)

Helen Hunt Jackson

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Overview

Helen Hunt Jackson born Amherst, MA October 15, 1830 (d. 1885). Poet and author; defender of Native American rights; opposed Indian wars.

Quotations

"Wiping out the disgrace to us of the present condition of our Indians (requires that) cheating, robbing, breaking promises—these three are clearly things which must be done. . . and. . . the refusal of the protection of the law to the Indian's rights of property, 'of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.'" (Century of Dishonor, p. 342; photo NYPL wiki pd)

Betty Muther Jacob

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Overview

Betty Muther Jacob born September 5, 1900 (d. 1993). Quaker "Godmother of Peace Studies" Univ. of Hawaii; founded Matsunaga Institute for Peace 1986, International Center for Democracy; assistant to executive directors of UNRRA, 1945-46, UNICEF, 1947-54.

Quotations

"Above all nations is humanity." (motto of Matsunaga Institute; photo Star Bulletin)

Janet Rosenberg Jagan

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Overview

Janet Rosenberg Jagan born Chicago, IL October 20, 1920. Socialist; jailed for Guyana's independence, 1954; UN delegate 1993; awarded Gandhi Peace Prize, 2003; first female president of Guyana, 1997.

Quotations

"Women must join in the struggle to bring about political and socio-economic changes so that there will be equal opportunities for all, so that we can end unemployment, poverty and hunger, so that genuine democratic institutions can flourish, so that our women can be free and equal citizens in the countries in which they live." (Barbados, Sept. 1975; photo Daily Grand & Sundry)

Ada James

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Overview

Ada Lois James born Richland Center, WI March 23, 1876 (d. 1952). Leading Wisconsin suffragist and progressive reformer. Active in WILPF, War Resisters League. Supported League of Nations. Staunch pacifist, critic of wartime work like Red Cross. Opposed both world wars; against National Guard, ROTC, and state militia.

Quotations

On the Red Cross: “[It] makes me actually sick. . . the psychology of women who respond to war work when they never are interested in other forms of patriotic service.” (Linda K. Schott, Reconstructing Women’s Thoughts, 1997, p. 71; photo Danish Peace Academy)

Selma James

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Overview

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Selma James (née Deitch) born Brooklyn, NY August 15, 1930. Socialist reformer. Active in West Indian independence, 1960; first Organizing Secretary for Campaign Against Racial Discrimination, 1965; International Coordinator for grassroots women's network Global Women's Strike, who demand military budgets be returned to community starting with women via the motto: "Invest in Caring Not Killing," 2000.

Quotations

"Revolutions are notorious for allowing even non-participants—even women!—new scope for telling the truth since they are themselves such massive moments of truth, moments of such massive participation." (The Ladies and the Mammies: Jane Austen and Jean Rhys, ch. 1, 1983; photo Clarke Forum, Dickinson)

Laura Jamieson

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Overview

Laura Jamieson born Park Head, Ontario, Canada December 29, 1888 (d. 1964). Judge; journalist; politician; feminist; Socialist leader of WILPF.

Quotations

"Men's predominant instinct was for struggle and competition. In women the predominant instinct is maternal and humanitarian. This quality was of such supreme value that it makes women potentially superior to males." (Vancouver Women's School for Citizenship, Susan Walsh thesis 146; 1916 photo TML Daily)

Ann Maria Reeves Jarvis

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Overview

Ann Maria Reeves Jarvis born Culpepper, VA September 30, 1832 (d. 1905). "The Mother of Mothers Day" founded Mothers' Friendship Day for peace and reconciliation after Civil War 1865 Pruntytown, WV; this became inspiration for her daughter Anna Jarvis who made Mothers Day official 1914.

Quotations

"[I pledge] To make a sworn-to agreement between members that friendship and good will should obtain in the clubs for the duration and aftermath of the war. That all efforts to divide the churches and lodges should not only be frowned upon but prevented." (1861, wvgenweb.org/taylor/mothersday/mother.htm; photo Library of Congress)

Mary Evelyn Jegen

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Overview

Mary Evelyn Jegen born Chicago, IL February 15, 1928 (d. 2014). History professor; Catholic scholar; Sister of Notre Dame de Namur. Began peace advocacy while helping students register as conscientious objectors against the Vietnam War; first executive director Bread for the World Educational Fund, 1976. Founded Pax Christi USA, 1975; National Director of Pax Christi USA, 1979-82; Vice-president of Pax Christi International, 1984-90. Maintained 24-day prayer vigil at White House during Gulf War, 1990; arrested in Iraq War sit-in, Cincinnati, 2006.

Quotations

"Our vocation is to make visible God's own response to violence. . . It is God who wants to express love, justice, mercy and forgiveness in us. Making God's love visible means inventing ways to let others know that we really care about them, will really labor for their happiness." (Pax Christi, Nancy Small, July 9, 2014; photo Pax Christi)

Eddie Bernice Johnson

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Overview

Eddie Bernice Johnson born Waco, TX December 3, 1935. Psychiatric nurse and politician. US Representative for Dallas, 1993. As head of Black Caucus led opposition to Iraq War; opposed Kosovo bombing; voted to exit Afghanistan and Iraq. Supported a Department of Peace and Nonviolence, 2007; supported immigrants' rights.

Quotations

“I strongly believe that the administration has not provided evidence of an imminent threat of attack on the United States that would justify a unilateral strike.” (to Congress, Oct. 8, 2002; photo northdallasgazette.com)

Mary Ann White Johnson

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Overview

Mary Ann White Johnson born Westmoreland, NH August 24, 1808 (d. 1872). Abolitionist; lecturer on physiology. Founding member of world's first nonviolence group, New England Non-Resistance Society, Boston, 1838. As matron at Sing Sing Prison, became advocate for prison reform.

Quotations

“We demand for women equal freedom with her brother to raise her voice and exert her influence directly for the removal of all evils that afflict the race.” (Pennsylvania Freeman, June 12, 1852, in Beverly Palmer, ed., Letters of Lucretia Mott, p. 121; photo Mass. Hist. Soc.)

Carla Brooks Johnston

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Overview

Carla Brooks Johnston born Rochester, NY April 2, 1940 (d. 2011). Civic reformer; professor of public policy; environmentalist. Led reform of Somerville, Massachusetts politics, 1966-72; co-founder and historian of Nuclear Freeze, 1980; mayor of Sanibel, Florida, 2005-07.

Quotations

"History tells us that women can be instrumental in creating a more equitable peacetime world, in redefining heroism, and in using fresh, creative, vital ideas to remold the intransigent institutions which have brought us war rather than conflict resolution." (Reversing the Nuclear Arms Race, p. 148; photo captivasanibel.com)

Mary Johnston

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Overview

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Mary Johnston born Buchanan, VA November 21, 1870 (d. 1936). Popular novelist; pacifist opponent of World War I; member of WILPF; member of Fellowship of Reconciliation; suffragist; pioneer against lynching; Theosophist.

Quotations

"We experienced family love, village, and tribal love, nation love, world love." (1919, Michael Forth, p. 322; photo 1901 Lib. Cong.)