PEACE MOVEMENT

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXIII, Issue 22401, 23 April 1936, Page 5

PEACE MOVEMENT

WORK IN UNITED STATES STEADY PROGRESS MADE "To the average woman the possibility of war and the pressing need for an established world peace are merely topics of conversation that do not really touch her life or cause her to think at all deeply, but if every woman to-day realised, as we who were concerned in the Great War realise, what war actually means, and how close it can come to tlio personal life of every living person, there would be 110 111010 war," said Mrs. W. Rothe-Brown, who arrived at Auckland yesterday by the Wanganella. Mrs. Rothe-Brown, whoso home is in San Francisco, is a member of the Northern California Committee of "The Cause and Cure of War," and, after spending a fortnight in Australia, will make a brief tour of the North Island before returning home. She leaves today for Waitomo and Rotorua. During her stay in Australia Mrs. Rothe-Brown has visited and spoken at various women's clubs in Sydney and Melbourne, and said that she had found Australian women keenly interested in peace work. She had also heard that there were women in Now Zealand who were also working for the saino objective. The number, however, actively interested in the cause of peace was comparatively small. Those really working i'or the cause could possess no satisfactory power until all women were as vitally interested as they themselves. It was of little use introducing the peace cause as a side-line to the closer activities of a club or organisation. An Organised Campaign Describing the progress of the movement in the United States, Mrs. RotheBrown said that it was a well-known characteristic of American women that they never did things by halves. They were progressing rapidly in their work for peace. It had been found that the establishment, of various clubs and organisations solely interested in that one object made an excellent base all over the country for their work and they also endeavoured to interest organisation which brought women in contact with each other, in their own great interest. In San Francisco there were several small district peace unions affiliated with a central body which was in turn only one of the many established all over California and the rest of the United States. In addition, these unions worked through all kinds of other bodies, circulating literature and giving addresses on world affairs and the cause and effect of war. A Jewish Advocate Shortly before Mrs. Rothe-Brown left San Francisco a "Peace Week" had been held in the city in conjunction with the Western Inter-State Conference of the National Council of Jewish Women, when Mrs. Arthur Brin, of Minneapolis, Minnesota, national president of the Council of Jewish Women, addressed a large variety of women's organisations. Mrs. Brin was recognised as one of the outstanding advocates for peace and also as a woman who possessed an unusual flair for leadership. Her public life, said Mrs. Rothe-Brown, was dedicated to the work of bringing the peace movement to a definite reality and to doing what she could to solve the Jewish problems in America and abroad. She had recently spent a 1 long period in Europe making an in- ■ tensive study of the two great problems which motivated her life. Her addresses to the various women's organisations in San Francisco had included information on the National Conference on the Cause and Cure of War held in Washington in January and advanced ideas for the more effective functioning of peace advocates. "I suppose your young people are reading as ruefullly as ours the often repeated statement that the young must be made interested," said Mrs. Rothe-Brown. It was, she added, rather a serious problem with which to saddle young people, bu-t one which was unfortunately necessary, because they were the ones who could do most to further the desire for peace and those who would suffer most in the event of war. The Northern California Committee on the Cause and Cure of War included such organisations as the League of Women Voters, the Young Christian Association, the Women's Cliristian Temperance Union, the Business and Professional Women's Clubs, the American Association of University Women, the Federation of Women's Clubs, the Federation of Women's Board of Foreign Missions in America and the Council of Women for Home" Missions.