By

_ PACIFIC TRIBUNE—MARCH 7, 1 969—page 6

O

-Women in the struggle for a new wor

stony ~~ The meaning

March 8

Today, mankind and womanhood, as
symbolized by the heroic conqueror of
the starry sky, Valentina Tereshkova,
have the knowledge and resources to
transform completely the conditions of
life on our planet—the area known to
be able to support human life. The
technology exists, the planning is poss-
ible, on a vast international scale to
eradicate poverty and ignorance, star-
vation, disease and war.

Nevertheless, the ever escalating
arms race, consumes over $14 million
an hour on nuclear, biological and other
weapons which could destroy us all. It
costs the United States alone half a
billion dollars to kill one Vietnamese,

‘while millions in the world go hungry.

War today can mean the loss of hun-
dreds of millions of people, the destruc-
tion of the fruits of creative efforts of
dozens generations. It can reduce to
ashes on the entire planet much of
what is referred to as civilization.

In 1969 the world’s women’s move-
ments, uniting participants irrespective
of color of skin or political and relig-
ious conviction, will be called upon to
speak louder and louder on the vital
question of our day—the preservation
of peace and strehgthening of the forc-
es to attain this goal. The voice of the
women of the world can be decisive on
the question of today—are we to have
life and happiness or are we to face
want and the possibility of extinction.

This will be the main concern and
the challenge for action in unity of pur-
pose for sanity and survival as the
hundreds of millions of women through-
out the world gather to mark Interna-
tional Women’s Day this March 8th.

How did International Women’s Day
come about?

It arose out of the early struggles of
women in the industrial countries for
their rights as workers, as mothers and
as citizens. It was on March 8, 1908
that women textile workers in New
York went on strike against the exploi-
tation and the intolerable conditions in
the fire-trap sweatshops with placards
bearing the slogans, “Votes for Wo-
men,” “Higher Wages for Women,”
“We want bread and roses.” Joined by
immigrant mothers of the slum tene-
ments of New York’s east side and by
the socialist women who were cam-

paigning fer votes for women and for.

women to join the needle trade unions,
they gathered and marched on the
streets in huge demonstrations,

Jane Addams, the founder in 1899 of
the first settlement house in the United
States, author of Peace and Bread and
outstanding humanitarian, gave leader-
ship and support to the abolition of the
sweatshop system and the organization

of women workers in unions, realizing
that world peace could only be assured
under conditions of economic justice.
Even though she was denounced, slan-
dered and above all, isolated because
of her stand for peace, she refused to
accept the inevitability of war and dir-
ected her most powerful crusades
against the stupidity, cruelty and waste
of war. It was on her conviction of the
need for ensuring the principles of eco-
nomic justice and world peace, that, in
1915 she founded the International
League for Peace and Freedom. .

Jane Addams was one of the most
outstanding ahd vigorous supporters
for setting in motion the principles of
this demonstration, for unionization,
the demand for protective legislation
such as workmen’s compensation, un-
employment and old age insurance,
safety and health laws, as well as child
labor, wage and hours laws.

The strike of the New York textile
workers and the success of the demon-
strations came to be felt throughout
the United States and other parts of
the world. Its effectiveness was recog-
nized at the Second International Con-
ference of Socialist Women in Copen-
hagen in 1910 attended by women from
17 countries, when Clara Zetkin, the
great European socialist champion of
women’s rights and of peace, and lead-
ing figure in the Conference, proposed
that March 8 be set aside each year by
the women of the world, as Internation-
al Women’s Day, a day in which wo-
men everywhere should demonstrate
their solidarity against militarism and
war, for full equality for women and
for the security of the family.

The celebration of March 8 has thus
become a great historical tradition—a
demonstration of international impor-
tance in the unity of purpose for wo-
men everywhere in the struggle for the
attainment of a world at peace.

But for March 8 to have reached its
present dimensions and international
importance, the women in the move-
ments in the different countries have
had to carry on long, courageous and
often heroic, self-sacrificing struggles.

March 8, 1911 saw the first Inter-
national Women’s Day celebrated in
several countries. :

March 8, 1912 saw the celebration in
Basle which heard Clara Zetkin con-
demn the war preparations. An appeal
was issued to the women of Germany
to support the slogan “war on war.”

March 8, 1917 was marked by the
women of Petrograd and Moscow with
street marches alongside the men with
slogans ‘Down with Imperialist Wars,”
“Our Husbands must leave the Trench-
es,” “Bread for our Children.”

id

March 8 in the period between the
two world wars and in the economic
crisis which took place in different
countries saw the growing unity of wo.
men in different countries, demonstrat.
ing for economic and social betterment,
demanding bread for their children,
employment and women’s rights.

The growing political awareness and
consciousness of women increased the
numbers of demonstrators and they as-
sumed a more militant character when
fascism and the threat of war appear.
ed on the horizon. International Wo.
men’s Day demonstrations showed the
desire of women to take action to-
gether to prevent war—but their efforts
were crushed by the perpetrators of the _
Second World War.

March 8, 1945 was celebrated as yet
illegally by millions of women. There
were anti-fascist gatherings. Many wo-
men were arrested. Women from all
the countries in Europe were in con- —
centration camps.

Rose Thaelmann, widow of Ernst
Thaelmann and member of the Peo-
ple’s Chamber of the German Democra- —
tic Republic, who had been imprisoned —
in Ravensbruck concentration camp —
described the International Women’s
Day celebration in that camp in these
words: .

“On March 8, at 5 in the morning the
sirens tore us from our sleep, as it did
every day—instead of saying ‘get up’ a
Czechoslovakian woman political lead-
er in the block said loudly, ‘I greet you
today.’

“The women embraced and kissed
one another .. . in all languages we
cried out ‘Long Live March 8 our Inter-
national Women’s Day.’ Heads were
close together for one comrade in each
group spoke on the significance of In-
ternational Women’s Day.

“Our hope and our strength for free-
dom grew. We swore that we women, if
we lived, would fight to prevent this —
ever happening again.”

Since the end of the Second World
War, which brought the defeat of naz
ism, the women’s international move
ment grows stronger from year to year.

May 1945 saw the greatest impetus
in the women’s movement immediately
on the heels of the victory over fasc- —
ism, when in the spirit expressed by
the women in Ravensbruck concentra-
tion camp to end war for all times,
women from 14 countries came togeth- —
er in Paris to form the first interna
tional women’s congress at which the
Women’s International Democratic
Federation was born, pledging to mobil-
ize the women of the world for a last-
ing peace in the world, to defend the
rights of women and to struggle cease-
lessly for the protection of the family
and children.

The Women’s International Democra
tic Federation is continuing in its
pledge and to date has succeeded in
mobilizing over 200 million women from
80 different countries in its ever proad-
ening program for unity in the strug
gle for peace, for freedom and indepen-
dence of people, for equal status of wo-
men in economic life, for the security
of the home and the human rights ©
children.

Leadership of the Women’s Interna
tional Democratic Federation in many
parts of the world and especially in the
colonial and semi-colonial countries,
particularly those which have only t®
cently won their independence, 45
Asia and Africa, has served to help
women to stand up in millions to 4&
mand their full rights as they 849
awareness of their own dignity F
strength as human beings, as women
and as mother’s of the world’s childre™ —

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