After Nov. 2 no one, not even its opponents, could deny that the nuclear freeze campaign had become a genuinely grassroots and enormously popular social movement in this country. On that day 19 million Americans voted on the freeze, and 60 per cent of them voted in its favor. It was the closest thing to a national referendum the United States has ever had.
The freeze's victory was the result of a virtual "peace army" of volunteers who worked tirelessly at the local level taking petitions door to door.
Last Aug. 5, a freeze resolution missed passing in the House of Representatives by only two votes, an outcome that couldn't have been dreamed of just a year before. With the changes brought about by the fall congressional elections, a victory for the freeze is likely in the House as early as this spring.
Public sentiment against nuclear weapons continues to grow. Almost every day new organizations and constituencies are becoming involved in the struggle to stop the arms race. And the strongest constituency for peace is in the churches. In many Protestant denominations, peacemaking programs represent seeds of healthy new life. Many evangelical Christians are being converted by what the Bible says about peace. And Roman Catholic bishops have not only supported the freeze but are moving toward the adoption, in May, of a pastoral letter that goes beyond it.
The freeze's latest victory took place in the United Nations. On Nov. 23 the first committee of the General Assembly overwhelmingly passed a resolution in support of a comprehensive bilateral freeze between the U.S. and the Soviet Union. The measure, introduced by Mexico and Sweden, was heavily supported by the non-aligned and neutral nations.
Significantly, the Soviet Union itself voted in favor of the freeze resolution, marking the first time the Soviets have officially supported a comprehensive bilateral freeze on nuclear weapons production, testing, and deployment. Also significantly, and unfortunately, the U.S. voted against the resolution and instructed its NATO allies to do the same. That move led to parliamentary crises in a number of West European countries, particularly Denmark, Norway, and the Netherlands, which were under heavy pressure from their own indigenous peace movements.
The Soviet Union is now on record in support of a bilateral nuclear freeze, undoing the often-made argument that the Soviet Union would never accept a freeze. The Reagan administration remains the chief obstacle to the first step in stopping the arms race.
The administration's intransigence raises a serious problem for the freeze campaign. The Reagan personality and presidency is firmly committed to an unrestrained military buildup aimed at establishing U.S. superiority over the Soviet Union. All of Reagan's new weapons systems are going ahead full steam, including the MX, the Pershing II, the cruise, Trident II, and the B-l.
This new generation of weapons includes counterforce, or first-strike, weapons that, if deployed, will put nuclear war on a hair trigger. The Soviets have stated that if the Pershing II and cruise missiles are deployed in Europe at the end of 1983 as scheduled, the USSR will move to a launch-on-warning posture. In short, these new weapons are destabilizing and, if deployed, could make the freeze virtually meaningless.
The freeze campaign has significant support at the grassroots level and in Congress. But Congress cannot implement a freeze. Under the U.S. constitution only the president can make foreign policy, treaties, and arms control agreements. Even after the freeze resolution passes the House, and perhaps the Senate, which is less likely, all we will have is a non-binding resolution in favor of the freeze, while the first-strike weapons speed toward deployment.
The freeze campaign must not allow itself to be trapped by the present impasse. It cannot continue to gain passed resolutions and signatures that translate into nothing. If it does it will wither and die.
But such a fate is not inevitable. While Congress does not have the constitutional power to make treaties or conduct arms control negotiations, it does have the power of the purse, of appropriations. A determined Congress could delay, obstruct, and postpone the new weapons systems, thus frustrating the president's plans. Or better yet, Congress could begin to implement, the freeze by simply cutting off funds for the new weapons. In light of the U.N. developments indicating Soviet willingness to agree to a freeze, a congressional cutoff could no longer be seen as a "unilateral step."
But Congress will not act without strong and persistent pressure from the public. The strength of the freeze has always been its grassroots popular appeal. The freeze campaign should continue to set the terms of the nuclear weapons debate as it has this past year. Pressure on Congress to follow the spirit of the freeze resolution by stopping first-strike weapons should be increased.
Beyond these congressional tactics, people can begin implementing the freeze themselves. They can consider withholding their tax money for nuclear weapons or for all military expenditures. Action campaigns already going on at various nuclear facilities, especially those involving the new generation of weapons, can be strengthened while new ones are begun. And if the present impasse holds, mass efforts such as blockades, sit-ins, and vigils can be undertaken to block the new weapons.
All these activities call for the deepening involvement of the churches. Local congregations must begin talking more and more about the biblical basis for peacemaking. Peace will only be possible when people are willing to pay the price, take the risks, and make the necessary sacrifices. These risks must be fervently called for within the churches and the religious community, the constituency most likely to pay the high price of peacemaking.
As the freeze proposal moves into the mainstream of the nuclear debate, it faces the danger of being co-opted by some of its new-found allies among the politicians and arms control experts. Many moderate-to-liberal politicians claim to support a nuclear freeze but say it must be accompanied by massive increases in conventional arms. However, recent technological innovations have resulted in conventional weapons so destructive that they blur the line between conventional and nuclear weapons.
And among the politicians and arms control experts are those who will want to "negotiate a freeze." Such negotiations could take years while new weapons systems would continue to be built and deployed. Key to the freeze proposal's strength is its psychological impact. It is a clear break from the cycle of the arms race, including the bankrupt and hopeless bilateral arms control process. If it becomes bogged down in superpower negotiations it will die the death of a thousand qualifications. We must demand an immediate freeze as the prerequisite for negotiations that will reduce arsenals and abolish nuclear weapons altogether.
The freeze campaign at this point suffers from a lack of clarity about its ultimate aim. Is its goal the reduction of nuclear weapons or their abolition? I am convinced that most of the grassroots support for the freeze campaign is rooted in the growing public sentiment against all nuclear weapons and a commitment to their abolition. A freeze alone will not remove the threat of nuclear war.
It makes no sense to heighten people's awareness of the danger of nuclear weapons by showing movies about what would happen if one weapon exploded over San Francisco or Detroit and then indicate that we are willing to live with a lower level of nuclear weaponry. If we are not willing to live with 50,000 of them, are we willing to live with any level of nuclear weapons? If the answer is no, then we must commit ourselves to their abolition. A freeze would be an important first step. But the freeze is meaningful only if it is a step toward the abolition of nuclear weapons.
For many of us this has become a spiritual issue. For us, nuclear weapons are an intolerable evil, and as Christians we cannot cooperate with their production or use. We are not just demanding the reduction of nuclear weapons, we are calling for their elimination. We are the new abolitionists.
It is crucial that the churches take up the abolitionist call for the sake of the gospel and for the sake of the country and campaigns like the freeze. The abolition of nuclear weapons may not become a political possibility until the call for it is rooted in faith. It will require a radical re-examination of the concept of weapons as a basis for security. It will require breaking the stranglehold of fear of the Russians that enslaves many Americans. And it will require raising the basic questions of justice for the world's poor who are daily robbed by nuclear weapons.
The abolition of nuclear weapons may seem like a goal so distant that it is beyond useful discussion. But we should recall that the original abolitionists struggled against slavery for nearly half a century, and throughout much of that time they were considered absurd idealists. The new abolitionist struggle may not have that much time. But we must undertake it with that kind of long-range perspective if the threat of nuclear war that hangs over our world is to be banished once and for all.
Jim Wallis was editor of Sojourners when this article appeared.
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