GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE WHAT IF THEY GAVE A WAR AND NOBODY CAME? FRIEND JOHN R. KELLAM, WORLD WAR II PRISONER OF CONSCIENCE UPDATE, MAY 2012: Despite the fact that he has never smoked, John now has Stage 4 lung cancer and, given the fact that he has reached the advanced age of 94½, has evidently decided that it would be better not to attempt dramatic chemotherapy or radiation treatment. He is at home surrounded by friends and family and is alert, cogent, and somewhat sardonic. Stay tuned. HDT WHAT? INDEX JOHN R. KELLAM PRISONER OF CONSCIENCE GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE The direct quotations of John R. Kellam herein originated in an interview with Caroline Besse Webster of Canaan CT, a member of the South Berkshire Monthly Meeting of the Religious Society of Friends (Quakers), in Massachusetts during the year 2001. Other historical material are from the “Stack of the Artist of Kouroo” project of Austin Meredith, considered by him to be relevant to the interviewee’s life history, philosophy, and spirituality, resulting in his determination to remain a nonparticipant in any kind of warfare whatever. John says: “I’m far enough along in age so that it is my hope that my experiences might be widely shared. It is important to me whether a generation or two of young men —and women?— can be helped to realize that there are various alternatives to letting ourselves be conscripted into warfare and a lifetime of devastating memories and guilt. Perhaps I can still be a contributor to the educational process.” HDT WHAT? INDEX JOHN R. KELLAM PRISONER OF CONSCIENCE GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE 1673 August 13, Wednesday (Old Style): The General Assembly of Rhode Island allowed exemption from military service on the basis of conscience (during WWI and WWII, however, the state of Rhode Island and Providence Plantation’s citizens would be imprisoned by the US federal government, on the basis of conscience): Noe person nor persons (within this Collony), that is or hereafter shall be persuaded in his or their Conscience, or Consciences (and by him or them declared) that he nor they cannot nor ought not to trayne, to learne to fight, nor to war, nor kill any person nor persons ... shall at any time be Compelled against his or their Judgment and Conscience to trayne, arme, or fight, to kill any person ... at the command of any officer of this Collony, civil or military ... nor shall suffer any punishment, fine, distraint, pennalty, nor imprisonment.... MILITARY CONSCRIPTION The exemption from military activity on the basis of conscience extended even to such quasi-military activities as standing unarmed watch in order to give alarm. Those whose consciences would not allow this could not be compelled to stand watch. Instead, they could be compelled only to come to the aid of other noncombatants: Such said persons who cannot fight nor destroy men it beinge against their Conscience, and is not against their Conscience to doe and perform civill service to the Collony though not martill service, and can preserve (so farr as in them lies) lives, goods and cattell ... then it shall be lawful for the civill officers ... to require such said persons ... to conduct or convey [noncombatants in need of assistance] out of the HDT WHAT? INDEX JOHN R. KELLAM PRISONER OF CONSCIENCE GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE danger. RELIGIOUS SOCIETY OF FRIENDS NOBODY COULD GUESS WHAT WOULD HAPPEN NEXT John R. Kellam “Stack of the Artist of Kouroo” Project HDT WHAT? INDEX JOHN R. KELLAM PRISONER OF CONSCIENCE GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE HDT WHAT? INDEX JOHN R. KELLAM PRISONER OF CONSCIENCE GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE 1780 On account of Mother Ann Lee’s pacifism and her refusal to take an oath of allegiance, she was imprisoned for a few months by the American government on the charge of treason. CIVIL DISOBEDIENCE (This was not the first time, nor would it be the last, that an inability to assent to the value of war would be regarded as treasonous.) MILITARY CONSCRIPTION THE QUAKER PEACE TESTIMONY “HISTORICAL PERSPECTIVE” BEING A VIEW FROM A PARTICULAR POINT IN TIME (JUST AS THE PERSPECTIVE IN A PAINTING IS A VIEW FROM A PARTICULAR POINT IN SPACE), TO “LOOK AT THE COURSE OF HISTORY MORE GENERALLY” WOULD BE TO SACRIFICE PERSPECTIVE ALTOGETHER. THIS IS FANTASY-LAND, YOU’RE FOOLING YOURSELF. THERE CANNOT BE ANY SUCH THINGIE, AS SUCH A PERSPECTIVE. John R. Kellam “Stack of the Artist of Kouroo” Project HDT WHAT? INDEX JOHN R. KELLAM PRISONER OF CONSCIENCE GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE 1834 In New-York, Harper & Brothers put out a new edition of Friend Jonathan Dymond’s ESSAYS ON THE PRINCIPLES OF MORALITY, AND ON THE PRIVATE AND POLITICAL RIGHTS OF MANKIND. At Harvard College in 1837, student David Henry Thoreau would consult this volume while preparing an essay for Professor Edward Tyrrell Channing’s class. PRINCIPLES OF MORALITY The London publishing house of Harvey and Darton reprinted extracts from Friend Jonathan’s ESSAYS ON THE PRINCIPLES OF MORALITY ... retitled as THE CHURCH AND THE CLERGY: SHOWING THAT RELIGIOUS ESTABLISHMENTS DERIVE NO COUNTENANCE FROM THE NATURE OF CHRISTIANITY AND THAT THEY ARE NOT RECOMMENDED BY PUBLIC UTILITY: WITH SOME OBSERVATIONS ON THE CHURCH ESTABLISHMENT OF ENGLAND AND IRELAND, AND ON THE SYSTEM OF TITHES / BY JONATHAN DYMOND. READ THIS BOOK Also, Friend Jonathan’s AN INQUIRY INTO THE ACCORDANCY OF WAR WITH THE PRINCIPLES OF CHRISTIANITY: AND AN EXAMINATION OF THE PHILOSOPHICAL REASONING BY WHICH IT IS DEFENDED, WITH OBSERVATIONS ON SOME OF THE CAUSES OF WAR AND ON SOME OF ITS EFFECTS / BY JONATHAN DYMOND, PHILANTHROPOS / PUBLISHED BY WILLIAM BROWN, PRINTER. READ THIS BOOK THE QUAKER PEACE TESTIMONY WAR RESISTERS LEAGUE ESSENCES ARE FUZZY, GENERIC, CONCEPTUAL; ARISTOTLE WAS RIGHT WHEN HE INSISTED THAT ALL TRUTH IS SPECIFIC AND PARTICULAR (AND WRONG WHEN HE CHARACTERIZED TRUTH AS A GENERALIZATION). John R. Kellam “Stack of the Artist of Kouroo” Project HDT WHAT? INDEX JOHN R. KELLAM PRISONER OF CONSCIENCE GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE 1836 3d English edition of Friend Jonathan Dymond’s ESSAYS ON THE PRINCIPLES OF MORALITY: AND ON THE PRIVATE AND POLITICAL RIGHTS AND OBLIGATIONS OF MANKIND / BY JONATHAN DYMOND (Printed for Hamilton, Adams). Courage is not indicated most unequivocally by wearing swords or by wielding them. Many who have courage enough to take up arms against a bad government have not courage enough to resist it by the unbending firmness of the mind, — to maintain a tranquil fidelity to virtue in opposition to power; or to endure, with serenity, the consequences which may follow. THE QUAKER PEACE TESTIMONY READ A LATER EDITION Another edition of Friend Jonathan’s AN INQUIRY INTO THE ACCORDANCY OF WAR WITH THE PRINCIPLES OF CHRISTIANITY, &C. THE ACCORDANCY OF WAR ESSENCE IS BLUR. SPECIFICITY, THE OPPOSITE OF ESSENCE, IS OF THE NATURE OF TRUTH. John R. Kellam “Stack of the Artist of Kouroo” Project HDT WHAT? INDEX JOHN R. KELLAM PRISONER OF CONSCIENCE GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE 1848 January 26, Thursday: The Daily Hartford Courant carried the following editorial about the deranged dentist and recreational drug user Horace Wells who had committed suicide in prison: The Late Horace Wells. The death of this gentleman has caused profound and melancholy sensation in the community. He was an upright and estimable man, and had the esteem of all who knew him, of undoubted piety, and simplicity and generosity of character. Bronson Alcott wrote about Henry Thoreau in his journal (JOURNALS. Boston MA: Little, Brown, 1938, page 201): Heard Thoreau’s lecture before the Lyceum on the relation of the individual to the State — an admirable statement of the rights of the individual to self-government, and an attentive audience. His allusions to the Mexican War, to Mr. Hoar’s expulsion from Carolina, his own imprisonment in Concord Jail for refusal to pay his tax, Mr. Hoar’s payment of mine when taken to prison for a similar refusal, were all pertinent, well considered, and reasoned. I took great pleasure in this deed of Thoreau’s. Thoreau delivered “The Rights and Duties of the Individual in Relation to Government”: [W]hat is once well done is done forever…. [T]he world is not governed by policy and expediency…. [F]or thinkers, and those who legislate for all time, he [Daniel Webster] never once glances at the subject [of government]. HDT WHAT? INDEX JOHN R. KELLAM PRISONER OF CONSCIENCE GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE We do not know whether the lecture at this early point already contained the famous words: “RESISTANCE TO CIVIL GOVERNMENT”: After all, the practical reason why, when the power is once in the hands of the people, a majority are permitted, and for a long period continue, to rule, is not because they are most likely to be in the right, nor because this seems fairest to the minority, but because they are physically the strongest. But a government in which the majority rule in all cases cannot be based on justice, even as far as men understand it. Can there not be a government in which majorities do not virtually decide right and wrong, but conscience? — in which majorities decide only those questions to which the rule of expediency is applicable? Must the citizen ever for a moment, or in the least degree, resign his conscience to the legislator? Why has every man a conscience, then? I think that we should be men first, and subjects afterward. It is not desirable to cultivate a respect for the law, so much as for the right.