Bertrand Russell’s Work for Peace [to 1960

Abstract

�rticles BERTRAND RUSSELL’S WORK FOR PEACE [TO 1960] Bertrand Russell and Edith Russell Bertrand Russell may not have been aware of it, but he wrote part of the dossier that was submitted on his behalf for the Nobel Peace Prize. Before he had turned from the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament to the Committee of 100 and subsequent campaigns of the 1960s, his wife, Edith, was asked by his publisher, Sir Stanley Unwin, for an account of his work for peace. Unwin’s purpose is not known, but it is not incompatible with the next use of the document. Lady Russell responded: You have set me a task which I am especially glad to do, and I enclose a screed made up of remarks which I have extracted (the word is deliberate!) from my husband since the arrival of your letter. If there is any more information about any part of his work for peacez—zwhich has been and is, much more intensive and absorbing than this enclosure sounds as if it werez—z I should be glad to provide it if I can and if you will let me know. (7 Aug. 1960) The dictation, and her subsequent completion of the narrative (at RA1 220.024190), have not previously been published, though the “screed” was used several times. She had taken the dictation on 6 August 1960 and by next day had completed the account. Russell corrected her typescript by hand. Next we learn that Joseph Rotblat, Secretary-General of Pugwash, enclosed for her, on 2 March 1961, a copy of the “ex­ tracts” that were “sent to Norway” (RA1 625). The extracts were nearly the complete text, with the Wrst person voice converted to the third. The timing and destination make it right for the deliberations of the Nobel Peace Prize committee. There are indications that Russell’s name was submitted again in 1962 and again in 1963. None of this can be conWrmed until the expiry of the Norwegian Nobel committee’s rolling 50-year embargo on its Wles. The prizewinners in 1961–63 were Dag Hammarskjöld, Linus Pauling, and the Red Cross. Russell promptly congratulated Pauling on his second Nobel prize. Finally the document was retyped from Rotblat’s copy and used inz Into the Tenth Decade, the programme of tributes to Russell on his 90th birthday. Edith added a list of Russell’s speeches in 1961 to the new typescript. Much of the document was the basis for much of the section “Bertrand Russell’s Struggle for Peace”, but with updates on russell: the Journal of Bertrand Russell Studies n.s. 29 (summer 2009): 5–12 The Bertrand Russell Research Centre, McMaster U. issn 0036-01631; online 1913-8032 December 2, 2009 (5:28 pm) E:\CPBR\RUSSJOUR\TYPE2901\russell 29,1 060 red.wpd E:\CPBR\RUSSJOUR\TYPE2901\russell 29,1 060 red.wpd 6 bertrand and edith russell his new struggles until May 1962 and a certain amount of rewriting. E.g., where Russell said he “protested vehemently” in 1926 when British soldiers Wred upon unarmed crowds of Chinese students, the birthday document states that Russell “led protests” against the Wring. Did Bertrand Russell deserve the Nobel Peace Prize? This question devolves into whether he deserved it in 1961, for his work for peace since 1955 (for the Manifesto, Pugwash and the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament); in 1962 (for the addition of the Committee of 100 and his related imprisonment in 1961); or 1963 (for his role in the Cuban Missile and Sino-Indian Crises). There is no sign that Russell’s name was ever again submitted for the prize, though his work against the war in Vietnam and establishing the Peace Foundation (with its emphasis on international concilia­ tion and the freeing of political prisoners that Amnesty wouldn’t touch) constitute a remarkable supplement to the original account that follows.z Russell didn’t shy away from radical solutions, and doubtless his International War Crimes Tribunal was too controversial to be considered for the Peace Prize.—zK.B. I have never been an absolute paciWst in the sense of condemning all wars. But nuclear weapons have made war so immeasurably more...