Honoring Emily Greene Balch

A few words about Emily Greene Balch (left), whom today's guest blogger, Chimène Keitner, has chosen to honor:
Born in 1867, Balch was a member of the 1st class to graduate from Bryn Mawr College; thereafter she studied sociology and economics in Europe and, eventually, back in the United States. She started teaching at Wellesley College in 1896, and became a Professor there 15 years later. During this time she was active in movements for women's suffrage, racial justice, and fair treatment of immigrants.
When World War I broke out in 1914, she found her life's calling; that is, "furthering humanity's effort to rid the world of war." Among many other activities, Balch:
► took part in the 1915 International Congress of Women at The Hague;
► helped to found what's now known as the Women's International League for Peace and Freedom;
► collaborated with Jane Addams and others on Women at The Hague: The International Congress of Women and Its Results (1915); and
► participated in the work of the League of Nations that was formed in the wake of World War I.

(credit for photo below right of American delegation to the 1915 Hague Conference; Balch is standing at far left in the 3d row from the front, while Addams is sitting 2d from left in the front row)
By the time that Balch was named a Nobel Peace Prizewinner in 1946, she had altered "her strong pacifistic views" somewhat on account of the "the excesses of nazism." She came "to defend the 'fundamental human rights, sword in hand'" in World War II, even as she "concentrated on generating ideas for the peace, most of them characterized by the common denominator of internationalism." Today Balch, who died in 1961 at the age of 94 years + 1 day, joins Addams -- her friend and a 1931 Peace Prizewinner -- and other distinguished women on IntLawGrrls' transnational foremothers list at right, just below our "visiting from ..." map in our righthand column.

On this day

On March 24, ...
... 1890, Agnes Campbell Macphail (right) was born at Proton Township, Grey County, Ontario, Canada. While a schoolteacher Macphail became an activist on behalf of farmers in her community. In 1921, the year that women 1st were permitted to vote in federal elections, She became the 1st woman elected to Canada's Parliament. An MP until 1940 and a member of Ontario's provincial legislature for 2 terms thereafter, Macphail worked to establish pension protection and equal pay legislation, against militarism, and for prison reform. (This last achievement -- part of which included founding of Canada's Elizabeth Fry Society -- is marked in this docudrama video clip.) She was the 1st woman to serve in Canada's delegation to the League of Nations. Although a member of the Women's International League for Peace and Freedom, Macphail "reluctantly" voted in favor of Canada's entry into World War II. Macphail, who died in Toronto in 1954, suffered no fools. When she 1st joined Parliament, it's been reported:

Not all of her colleagues welcomed her. One tried to embarrass her by asking, 'Don't you wish you were a man?'
'No,' Macphail replied. 'Don't you?'

... 1978 (30 years ago today), Amoco Cadiz, which several days earlier had run aground off France's Brittany coast (left), was split in 2 in turbulent seas, with the result that all of its "220,000-ton cargo will have escaped into the sea" in what was the worst oil tanker spill to date. An oil slick 18 miles in width and 80 miles in length polluted about 200 miles of coastline and killed much marine life. A dozen years later on this day, as we've posted, another spill, from the Exxon Valdez, occurred in Alaska. (photo credit)

On September 6, ...

...1974, in Zambia, leaders of Portugal and of the liberation front known as FRELIMO signed a treaty known as the Lusaka Agreement establishing Mozambique as an independent nation-state, and so ending more than 400 years of Portuguese colonial rule. This week Forbes magazine named Mozambican Prime Minister Luisa Diogo the 89th most powerful woman in the world.
... 1860, Jane Addams was born in Cedarville, Illinois, the 8th of 9 children in a family "with Quaker roots" who counted among its friends President Abraham Lincoln, who'd served in the Illinois Senate with Addams' father. "Lincoln's creed of the equality of men became Miss Addams's ideal as a child," the New York Times wrote on the occasion of her death in 1935. It must be supposed that a contemporary reporter would insert "and women" after "men," given this passage from her 1931 Nobel Peace Prize biography:

Jane Addams was an ardent feminist by philosophy. In those days before women's suffrage she believed that women should make their voices heard in legislation and therefore should have the right to vote, but more comprehensively, she thought that women should generate aspirations and search out opportunities to realize them.

The opportunity that she seized was founding of Hull-House, a "settlement house" where Chicago's poor were given access to health care, job leads, education, exercise, and the arts. Over time Addams became active in civic and pacifist movements at home and abroad. She spoke at the 1913 ceremony opening the Peace Palace at The Hague, for instance, and served as President of the Women's International League for Peace and Freedom established there 2 years later. Because of her opposition to World War I, the Daughters of the American Revolution expelled Addams from its ranks. Addams' memoir Twenty Years at Hull-House (1910) is an inspiration. (photo of Addams, holding a peace banner at right, with a flag-holding woman believed to be Mary McDowell, courtesy of Library of Congress.)