JEANNETTE RANKIN VOTES AGAINST WAR...ONCE AGAIN
Washington, D.C. (JFK+50) Seventy-six years ago, December 8, 1941, the Congress of the United States voted on a Declaration of War following the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. The attack resulted in the deaths of 2403 Americans and the wounding of 1178.
The vote would have been unanimous except for a single no vote from the first woman to be elected to the House of Representatives, Jeannette Rankin*.
The Congresswoman, first elected in 1916, had been the only NO vote in the Declaration of War against Germany in 1917. When Ms. Rankin's term ended, so did her service in Congress until she was sworn in for another term in 1941.
Despite 388 of her colleagues voting for entry into WWII, Ms. Rankin stood alone against war. She later said...
"As a woman I can't go to war and I refuse to send anyone else."
Although the vote "essentially ended her time in office," Jeannette Rankin continued her pacifist** stand. In 1968, she led a march in protest of the war in Vietnam.
*Jeannette Pickering Rankin (1880-1973) was born in Missoula, Montana. She earned a BS in Biology at the University of Montana & later became a social worker in San Francisco.
JPR helped organize the New York Women's Suffrage Party & was a lobbyist for the National American Woman Suffrage Association.
**Pacifist is defined as a person who believes war & violence are unjustifiable. The word is credited to Emile Arnaud of France. It was adopted by peace activists at the Universal Peace Conference in 1901.
SOURCES
Jeannette Rankin, United States Senate, www.senate.gov/
"Only One Person Voted Against the United States entering World War II", by Kat Eschner, December 8, 2016, SMART NEWS, www.smithsonianmag.com/
Washington, D.C. (JFK+50) Seventy-six years ago, December 8, 1941, the Congress of the United States voted on a Declaration of War following the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. The attack resulted in the deaths of 2403 Americans and the wounding of 1178.
The vote would have been unanimous except for a single no vote from the first woman to be elected to the House of Representatives, Jeannette Rankin*.
The Congresswoman, first elected in 1916, had been the only NO vote in the Declaration of War against Germany in 1917. When Ms. Rankin's term ended, so did her service in Congress until she was sworn in for another term in 1941.
Despite 388 of her colleagues voting for entry into WWII, Ms. Rankin stood alone against war. She later said...
"As a woman I can't go to war and I refuse to send anyone else."
Although the vote "essentially ended her time in office," Jeannette Rankin continued her pacifist** stand. In 1968, she led a march in protest of the war in Vietnam.
*Jeannette Pickering Rankin (1880-1973) was born in Missoula, Montana. She earned a BS in Biology at the University of Montana & later became a social worker in San Francisco.
JPR helped organize the New York Women's Suffrage Party & was a lobbyist for the National American Woman Suffrage Association.
**Pacifist is defined as a person who believes war & violence are unjustifiable. The word is credited to Emile Arnaud of France. It was adopted by peace activists at the Universal Peace Conference in 1901.
SOURCES
Jeannette Rankin, United States Senate, www.senate.gov/
"Only One Person Voted Against the United States entering World War II", by Kat Eschner, December 8, 2016, SMART NEWS, www.smithsonianmag.com/
Jeannette Rankin
February 27, 1917
