Anti-nuclear protests in the United States (not complete, but interesting)

http://www.nuclear-heritage.net/index.php/Anti-nuclear_protests_in_the_United_States 

Anti-nuclear protests in the United States

This is a list of notable anti-nuclear protests in the United States. Many anti-nuclear campaigns captured national public attention in the 1970s and 1980s, including those at Seabrook Station Nuclear Power Plant, Diablo Canyon Nuclear Power Plant and those following the 1979 Three Mile Island accident.^[1]

The largest anti-nuclear demonstration to date was held in New York City on September 23, 1979 when almost 200,000 people attended. The New York rally was held in conjunction with a series of nightly “No Nukes” concerts given at Madison Square Garden from September 19 through 23.

Anti-nuclear protests preceded the shutdown of the Shoreham, Yankee Rowe, Millstone I, Rancho Seco, Maine Yankee, and about a dozen other nuclear power plants.^[2]

Nevada Test Site

From 1986 through 1994, two years after the United States put a hold on full-scale nuclear weapons testing, 536 demonstrations were held at the Nevada Test Site involving 37,488 participants and 15,740 arrests, according to government records.^[64] These are just a few details:

• January, 1987: The actor Martin Sheen and 71 other anti-nuclear protesters were arrested at the Nevada Test Site in a demonstration marking the 36th anniversary of the first nuclear test there.^[65]
• February 6, 1987: More than 400 people were arrested, when they tried to enter the nation's nuclear proving grounds after nearly 2,000 demonstrators, including six members of Congress, held a rally to protest nuclear weapons testing.^[66][67]
• September 30, 1987: 110 demonstrators, including seven pediatricians, were arrested for civil disobedience; charges were later dropped.^[68]
• March 20, 1989: 75 protesters, including Louis Vitale, were arrested for trespassing in a peaceful Palm Sunday demonstration.^[69]
• April 20, 1992: 493 anti-nuclear protesters were arrested on misdemeanor charges, as demonstrators clashed with guards at an annual Easter demonstration against weapons testing at the remote desert site.^[70]
• August 6, 1995: 500 people gathered to mark the fiftieth anniversary of the bombing of Hiroshima.^[71]
• 1997: Over 2,000 people turned out for a demonstration and 700 were arrested.^[72]
• August 2005: About 200 peace activists, including actor Martin Sheen, gathered for a nonviolent demonstration outside the gates; dozens were given citations and released after crossing police lines.^[73]
• May 2006: 200 activists protested the Divine Strake explosives test, and 40 were arrested.^[74]
• April 2007: Nevada Desert Experience protest, where 39 people were cited by police.^[75]

400 Arrested In Big Protest At Nev. Test Site, 1987

By David Kelley, United Press International (Inquirer staff writer Linda Loyd contributed to this article.)

POSTED: February 06, 1987

MERCURY, Nev. — More than 400 protesters, including entertainers and scientists, were arrested yesterday at the Nevada Test Site during an anti-nuclear demonstration.

Entertainers Robert Blake, Kris Kristofferson and Martin Sheen were among those handcuffed and taken to nearby Beatty, Nev., where they were booked on trespassing charges and released for trial in March.

Astronomer-author Carl Sagan, his wife, Ann Druyan, and peace activist Daniel Ellsberg also deliberately walked onto government property and were arrested.

The protest, 65 miles northwest of Las Vegas, had been planned for weeks and was designed to coincide with the first U.S. nuclear weapons test of 1987, an explosion the Soviet Union said would end its 18-month unilateral test moratorium.

The Department of Energy carried out the test Tuesday - two days early. A department spokesman acknowledged that the planned mass protest yesterday was a motivating factor in moving up the test.

Demonstration organizers said their ranks were 2,000 strong. The Department of Energy estimated the crowd at 750.

The protest was the largest in more than six years of demonstrations at the 1,800-square-mile test site, where 660 nuclear weapons have been detonated since 1951.

A total of 438 demonstrators deliberately walked onto the site and were arrested, authorities said. All were charged with trespassing, except for five people accused of resisting arrest.

"It certainly was the largest demonstration in the history of the nuclear testing site," Sagan said. "It is an indication of the growth of our movement."

Meanwhile, a group of 30 Philadelphia physicians yesterday called Tuesday's nuclear test "an unconscionable use of our scarce resources" at a time when important government health programs and other human services were being slashed.

The physicians - in a statement read at a Center City news conference by Lewis W. Bluemle Jr., president of Jefferson Medical College - called for an end to nuclear testing and expressed concern that the test endangered international health by squandering an opportunity to slow the arms race.

Bluemle and the doctors are members of the Philadelphia chapter of Physicians for Social Responsibility, the U.S. arm of International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War, which won the 1985 Nobel Peace Prize.

1987 Poster!

 

American Peace Test: Stop Nuclear Testing: Demonstration

• poster
 
• work on paper

1987

• OFFSET LITHOGRAPH
 
• PAPER

17 in HIGH x 11 in WIDE
(43.18 cm HIGH x 27.94 cm WIDE)

All Of Us Or None Archive. Fractional and promised gift of The Rossman Family.

2010.54.1335

Inscription: Bottom edge has yellow text: "The American Peace Test P.O. Box 26725 Las Vegas, Nevada 89126 (702) 636-7780" and a small logo of people for hte American Peace Test. Yellow box in right corner has a black stamp for Livermore Action Group with address.

Poster is printed on yellow paper and has a background of a black a Joshua Tree silhouetted against an orange and yellow sky. Behind the Joshua tree is a yellow sun that is about to set. The poster reads, "American peace Test/ Stop nuclear testing/ January 26-27. 1987/ Nevada test Site and Washington D.C./ demonstration and non-violent Civil disobedience."

http://collections.museumca.org/?q=collection-item/2010541335 

438 PROTESTERS ARE ARRESTED AT NEVADA NUCLEAR TEST SITE, 1987

438 PROTESTERS ARE ARRESTED AT NEVADA NUCLEAR TEST SITE

By ROBERT LINDSEY, Special to the New York Times
Published: February 6, 1987

More than 400 people were arrested today when they tried to enter the nation's nuclear proving grounds here after nearly 2,000 demonstrators, including six members of Congress, held a rally to protest nuclear weapons testing.

In a scene that at times recalled the antiwar protests of the 1960's, 438 demonstrators, some carrying American flags, were arrested as they marched past the entrance to the 1,350-square-mile Nevada Test Site. Among those arrested were the astronomer Carl Sagan and the actors Martin Sheen, Kris Kristofferson and Robert Blake.

The protesters who were arrested were taken in buses to nearby Beatty, Nev., where they were booked and released. A spokesman for the Department of Energy said 433 of those arrested were charged with trespassing and five were charged with resisting arrest. They will face trial at a later date.

The march came after a rally protesting the Reagan Administration's resumption of nuclear weapons testing despite a Soviet moratorium on the testing of new weapons. The demonstration at the desert test site 65 miles north of Las Vegas was organized by a consortium of groups that included Greenpeace, the American Peace Test, Physicians for Social Responsibility and the Peace Committee of the American Public Health Association. Test Moved Up Two Days

The demonstration was initially called to protest the nation's first nuclear test of the year, which had been scheduled for today. But the Department of Energy rescheduled the test, in part because of the demonstration, and detonated the weapon Tuesday.

Standing beneath a banner that read ''Nuremberg Requires That We Act,'' Representative Pat Schroeder, a Colorado Democrat, assailed what she called President Reagan's ''Rambo-type foreign policy.''

She said, ''I think the President's pushing the test two days ahead of schedule when the American people didn't want to test, when Congress didn't want to test, when the world didn't want to test, was the most arrogant exercise of power I've seen in a long time.''

Five other Democratic members of Congress also attended the rally. They were Representatives Thomas J. Downey of Suffolk, Mike Lowry of Washington and Jim Bates, Leon E. Panetta and Barbara Boxer of California. They left before the demonstrators entered the test site.

''We came basically to make sure that the people protesting here know they are not alone, that their message is being heard in Washington,'' Mr. Downey said in an interview.

One demonstrator, Hugh DeWitt, a physicist at the Lawrence Livermore Laboratory in California, said he and other technical specialists here had concluded from seismic measurements that Tuesday's test was ''of extremely low yield, equivalent to less than five tons of TNT,'' far smaller than any other announced test.

''Either it completely fizzled or it was experimental in nature,'' he said.

Owen Chamberlain, a University of California professor and winner of the 1959 Nobel Prize for Physics, said he was puzzled not only that so small a weapon had been tested, but also that ''they had gone out of their way to make an announcement about it.'' Such a step, he suggested, was likely to goad the Soviet Union into ending its 18-month moratorium on nuclear testing. A Highly Organized Protest

Although today's protest scene at the Nevada Test Site was reminiscent of the 1960's, it was unlike the often disorganized, spontaneous peace demonstrations of that era and, indeed, was marketed with a promotional flair befitting Madison Avenue.

In recent weeks, news organizations have received numerous announcements and telephone calls about the event. Representatives of the sponsoring groups have appeared on network television shows in recent weeks, and today's arrests, which took place at 10 A.M., Pacific standard time, were timed to gain maximum publicity.

''Why do you think they scheduled the arrests at 10 o'clock?'' said Don Oliver, a correspondent for NBC News. ''So they could make the evening news.'' U.S. NUCLEAR TEST DEFENDED GENEVA, Feb. 5 (Special to The New York Times) - Kenneth L. Adelman, director of the United States Arms Control and Disarmament Agency, today defended the decision to conduct a nuclear test Tuesday despite warnings that the Soviet Union would end a self-imposed moratorium on nuclear testing with the first United States test of this year.

''If the Soviets want to resume tests, as I understand that they do, let them resume tests,'' he said.

Mr. Adelman also asserted that the timing of the test, which had initially been scheduled for today, was not connected with the start Tuesday of the 1987 session of the 40-nation Geneva Conference. Soviet officials implied that the test was ''cynically timed'' to coincide with the opening of the conference.

Soviet officials here echoed comments from Moscow that the Soviet Union would resume nuclear testing, but would only say that the tests would begin again at an ''appropriate time.''

Photo of Kris Kristofferson and Martin Sheen (AP)