Happiest of Mother’s Day to all you mamas out there. When judging mothers is something of an American pass-time, I hope you can enjoy this day and be celebrated!
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Throughout the history of the women’s movement, there are been elements that have used an appeal to womanhood, to motherhood, to build movements for peace and justice. I’m not one to celebrate essentialist notions of gender, or to presume there is anything innate to women that should make us more peace-loving than other genders. But my political stance on that withstanding, I do want to take a minute to share some history from that side of the feminist movement — the radical anti-war mamas who started the tradition that is now known as Mother’s Day.
Here’s a poem that serves as a rallying cry to mothers to oppose the Franco-Prussian war:
A Mother’s Day Proclamation
Julia Ward Howe, 1870
Arise then…women of this day!
Arise, all women who have hearts!
Whether your baptism be of water or of tears!
Say firmly:
“We will not have questions answ
ered by irrelevant agencies,
Our husbands will not come to us, reeking with carnage,
For caresses and applause.
Our sons shall not be taken from us to unlearn
All that we have been able to teach them of charity, mercy and patience.
We, the women of one country,
Will be too tender of those of another country
To allow our sons to be trained to injure theirs.”
From the voice of a devastated Earth a voice goes up with
Our own. It says: “Disarm! Disarm!
The sword of murder is not the balance of justice.”
Blood does not wipe our dishonor,
Nor violence indicate possession.
As men have often forsaken the plough and the anvil
At the summons of war,
Let women now leave all that may be left of home
For a great and earnest day of counsel.
Let them meet first, as women, to bewail and commemorate the dead.
Let them solemnly take counsel with each other as to the means
Whereby the great human family can live in peace…
Each bearing after his own time the sacred impress, not of Caesar,
But of God –
In the name of womanhood and humanity, I earnestly ask
That a general congress of women without limit of nationality,
May be appointed and held at so
meplace deemed most convenient
And the earliest period consistent with its objects,
To promote the alliance of the different nationalities,
The amicable settlement of international questions,
The great and general interests of peace.
Here’s a great post outlining the story: http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2014/05/11/the-radical-history-of-mother-s-day.html
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And on a lighter note, I’m looking forward to spending today with my Mother, who is ever my hero and my inspiration. I hope you, dear reader, have a restorative and beautiful day.
