Women's Peace Activism: Jane Addams on Patriotism and Pacifism After American Entry into World War I, 1917

Addams, Jane. Patriotism and Pacifists in War Time, 1917, records her defense of organized pacifism six weeks after the United States entered World War I, when opposition to the war exposed peace activists to accusations of disloyalty and placed new constraints on their public work. Delivered to the City Club of Chicago on May 15, Addams's address examines how wartime nationalism altered the position of American pacifists and argues that international cooperation remained necessary even after war had been declared. Her position carried immediate personal and institutional consequences: public attacks on her wartime views damaged her standing and cost Hull-House financial support. Addams, Jane. Patriotism and Pacifists in War Time. Chicago: City Club of Chicago, 1917. Reprinted from The City Club Bulletin, Vol. 10, No. 9, June 16, 1917. Four pages, printed double-sided. 7 x 10 inches. The text reproduces Addams's May 15 address and begins by confronting the central difficulty of maintaining pacifist principles after national mobilization: "The position of the pacifist in time of war is most difficult," she writes, describing citizens as "carried out into a high sea of patriotic feeling." She nevertheless insists that peace organizations must survive wartime and points to the Woman's International Committee for Permanent Peace, of which she was chairman, and its communication with branches in belligerent and neutral countries. Addams distinguishes pacifism from passivity and argues that war could display courage and sacrifice while failing to resolve the international disputes that produced it. The published text therefore records both the organizational persistence of the international peace movement and Addams's attempt to reconcile dissent with American patriotism during wartime. The speech appeared during the first months of direct American participation in World War I and before passage of the Espionage Act in June 1917 further intensified the political environment surrounding wartime dissent. Addams continued her peace work despite the hostility it generated; in 1931 she shared the Nobel Peace Prize with Nicholas Murray Butler, becoming the second woman to receive the award. Folds and tears, with tape repairs to tears on two pages; all text remains unaffected and legible. Overall very good. The separate reprint preserves Addams's wartime argument at the point when her longstanding social reform work and international peace activism brought her into direct conflict with the patriotic demands of American mobilization.…