Antiwar protestors will hold rallies and meetings throughout the Boston vicinity today and on Saturday as part of a nationwide emergency moratorium.
The Peoples Coalition for Peace and Justice PCPJ--along with several other Boston peace groups--is organizing the action. The groups plan rallies between noon and 1 p.m. today, and antiwar meetings in all communities this evening.
There will also be a mass rally at the Boston Common on Saturday, following several coordinated marches to the Common.
Scheduled speakers at the rally include Clifton Caldwell, international vice president of the Amalgamated Meat-cutters Union. Howard Zinn, professor of Government at MIT, Ngo Vinh Long, a fourth-year graduate student in East Asian Studies and the official representative of the National Student Union of South Vietnam, and a representative of the Pan African Liberation Committee (PALC).
Far Too Long
Everett I. Mendelsohn, professor of the History of Science, is one of the sponsors of the moratorium. Mendelsohn said last night. "As Americans, we've let this war continue far too long, and in doing so have failed in our obligations to the people of Indochina. The least we can do is take several full days to express our feelings in a variety of actions and remind the people what is happening."
Caldwell, who will speak today at an antiwar rally in Market Square in Pittsburgh, said yesterday that he hoped more happening in Vietnam.
The national moratorium has called on the U.S. government to: stop all bombing throughout Indochina; set a specific date for the immediate withdrawal of all American forces from Indochina; and end all American support and economic aid for the Thieu regime in Saigon.
Continuing Reaction
Rita Paine, president of the Newton-Weston branch of. Womens International League for Peace and Freedom, said her organization plans antiwar meetings in Weston during the day. "It is important that we keep on reacting to crises as they come up," Paine said last night.
"In various Boston area communities, groups will be setting up tables along the streets, to talk with friends and passers-by about the war." Paine said she also hopes that people will write to their representatives in Congress.
Last night a service for peace was held in Memorial Chapel. Approximately 75 people heard Mendelsohn and Dieter Georgi, Frothingham Professor of Biblical Studies at the Divinity School, call for an end to U.S. involvement in Southeast Asia.
Mendelsohn asked people to demonstrate against all industries making war-related products, as well as military installations. He also urged all individuals to write to Congress, demanding that funds used to carry on the war be cut off, and that only funds used to bring home American soldiers be continued.
