NOTE: A national Quaker
conference on peace was held in Winona Lake, Indiana in 1917, on the
eve of the United States' entry into World War I. The conference
adopted the following statement and published it in numerous secular
American publications.
A dissenting response to this statement by another group of
Friends is Part II of this series. To read it, click
here.
An FGC pamphlet, also from 1917, upholding
traditional Quaker pacifism is part III of this series.
[Third Month, 1917]
A MESSAGE FROM THE
Religious Society of Friends
(Quakers) in America
To Our Fellow Citizens:
In This time of crisis when our country's highest good is the
common aim of all, we voice this deep conviction of patriotic duty.
We rejoice that even at this time, when the world is crazed by war,
so many men are judging war by moral and, spiritual standards, and by
ideals of sacrifice. The causes for which men fight--liberty, justice
and peace--are noble and Christian causes. But the method of war is
unchristian and immoral. War itself violates law, justice, liberty and
peace, the very ends for which alone its tragic cost might be
justified.
Further, the method of war is ineffective to these ends. Might does
not decide the right, ideals cannot be maintained by force, nor can
evil overcome evil. True national honor is a nation’s own integrity
and unselfish service. Only unswerving honesty and self-control
maintain it. Rights, the rights of all, are securely defended between
nations as between individuals by mutual confidence, not suspicion; by
universal cooperation and law, not by private armed force. The
alternative to war is not inactivity and cowardice. It is the
irresistible and constructive power of good-will. True patriotism at
this time calls not for a resort to the futile methods of war, but for
the invention and practice on a gigantic scale of new methods of
conciliation and altruistic service. The present intolerable situation
among nations demands an unprecedented expression of organized
national good-will.
Unpractical though such ideals may seem, experience has taught that
ideals can be realized if we have faith to practice now what all men
hope for in the future, The American Nation, as a more perfect union
of States, as a melting pot of races, as a repeated victor through
peace, has proved practical the methods of generosity and patience.
Throughout many years of an adventurous belief in the Christian
principle of human brotherhood, the Society of Friends has seen the
triumph of good-will in all forms of human crisis.
The peoples of every land are longing for the time when love shall
conquer hate, when cooperation shall replace conflict, when war shall
be no more. This time will come only when the people of some great
nation dare to abandon the outworn traditions of internationall
dealing and to stake all upon persistent good-will.
We are the nation and now is the time. This is America's supreme
opportunity.
Unflinching good-will, no less than war, demands courage,
patriotism, and self- sacrifice. To such a victory over itself, to
such a leadership of the world, to such an embodiment of the
matchless, invincible power of good-will, this otherwise tragic hour
challenges our country.
Friends’ National Peace Committee
20 South Twelfth Street
Philadelphia, Pa.