Women's International League for Peace & Freedom
The Women's International League for Peace & Freedom is based in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania and was founded in 1915 during World War I. Jane Addams was its first president.
About
Laurie Belton is the WILPF Director of Operations and Theta Pavis is the WILPF Peace and Freedom editor.[1]
The WILPF publishes Peace and Freedom Magazine.[2]
The League has also operated out of a Washington legislative office formerly shared with Women Strike for Peace. It has cooperated in WPC and WIDF projects to such an extent that WILPF last year was made a WPC affiliate. WILPF has a tax-exempt "educational" arm, the Jane Adams Peace Association. WILPF leaders include Yvonne Logan, president; Libby Frank, executive director and Betsy Sweet, program director.
The heavy-handed pro-Soviet stance of many WILPF activists includes participation in the WPC and USPC by Disarmament Coordinator Katherine Camp; frequent sponsorship of exchange visits with the Soviet Women's Committee; and a call for a campaign against "anti-Sovietism" in the media-defined as any suggestion that the USSR may be responsible for the arms race or pose a threat to the United States. WILPF's "star" petition campaign utilizes an old WPC slogan, "Stop the Arms Race."[3]
Mission
WILPF it aims to promote peace through,
- "world disarmament, full rights for women, racial and economic justice, an end to all forms of violence, and to establish those political, social, and psychological conditions which can assure peace, freedom, and justice for all."[4]
National Board
The following are members of the WILPF National Board, as of March 18, 2010:[5]
- Nancy Munger, Co-President (Cape Cod)
- Laura Roskos, Co-President (Cape Cod)
- Deb Garretson, Secretary (Southern Indiana)
- Ellen Schwartz, Treasurer (Sacramento, CA)
- Carol Urner, Program Committee Co-Chair (Portland, OR/Los Angeles, CA)
- Georgia Pinkel, Program Committee Co-Chair (Portland, OR)
- Mary Zepernick, Personnel Committee Chair (Cape Cod, MA)
- Pat O'Brien, Nominating Committee Chair (Boston, MA)
Ex-Officio Members
- Ann Chalmers Pendell, Jane Addams Peace Association Board President (At Large/Utah/JAPA)
- Audley Green, International Board Representative (Boston, MA)
United for Peace and Justice
WILPF is affiliated with the United for Peace and Justice.[6]