(NAME-MCE) Mother's Day

[MCCANN3 at aol.com]

Thought I would pass along a little history about Mother's Day. Mark 
 
 
 
 
Mothers' Day Proclamation: Julia Ward Howe, Boston,  1870

Mother's Day was originally started after the Civil War,  as a protest to the 
carnage of that war, by women who had lost their sons. Here  is the original 
Mother's Day Proclamation from 1870, followed by a bit of  history (or should 
I say "her  story"):


Arise, then, women of  this day! Arise all women who have hearts, whether our 
baptism be that of water  or of fears!

Say firmly: "We will not have great questions decided by  irrelevant 
agencies. Our husbands shall not come to us, reeking with carnage,  for caresses and 
applause. Our sons shall not be taken from us to unlearn all  that we have been 
able to teach them of charity, mercy and patience.

We  women of one country will be too tender of those of another country to 
allow our  sons to be trained to injure theirs. From the bosom of the devastated 
earth a  voice goes up with our own. It says "Disarm, Disarm! The sword of 
murder is not  the balance of justice."

Blood does not wipe our dishonor nor violence  indicate possession. As men 
have often forsaken the plow and the anvil at the  summons of war, let women now 
leave all that may be left of home for a great and  earnest day of counsel. 
Let them meet first, as women, to bewail and commemorate  the dead.

Let them then solemnly take counsel with each other as to the  means whereby 
the great human family can live in peace, each bearing after their  own time 
the sacred impress, not of Caesar, but of God.

In the name of  womanhood and of humanity, I earnestly ask that a general 
congress of women  without limit of nationality may be appointed and held at some 
place deemed most  convenient and at the earliest period consistent with its 
objects, to promote  the alliance of the different nationalities, the amicable 
settlement of  international questions, the great and general interests of  
peace.

Julia Ward Howe
Boston ,  1870

*************************************************************

 
Mother's Day  for Peace - by Ruth Rosen. 
Honor Mother  with Rallies in the Streets. The holiday began in activism; it 
needs rescuing  from commercialism and platitudes.

Every year, people snipe at the  shallow commercialism of Mother's Day. But 
to ignore your mother on this holy  holiday is unthinkable. And if you are a 
mother, you'll be devastated if your  ingrates fail to honor you at least one 
day of the year.

Mother's Day  wasn't always like this. The women who conceived Mother's Day 
would be  bewildered by the ubiquitous ads that hound us to find that "perfect 
gift for  Mom."  They would expect women to be marching in the streets, not 
eating  with their families in restaurants.  This is because Mother's Day began  
as a holiday that commemorated women's public activism, not as a celebration  
of a mother's devotion to her family.

The story begins in 1858 when a  community activist named Anna Reeves Jarvis 
organized Mothers' Works Days in  West Virginia.  Her immediate goal was to 
improve sanitation in  Appalachian communities.  During the Civil War, Jarvis 
pried women from  their families to care for the wounded on both sides. 
Afterward she  convened meetings to persuade men to lay aside their hostilities.

In  1872, Julia Ward Howe, author of the "Battle Hymn of the Republic", 
proposed  an annual Mother's Day for Peace.  Committed to abolishing war, Howe  
wrote: "Our husbands shall  not come to us reeking with carnage... Our sons shall 
not be taken from us to  unlearn all that we have been able to teach them of 
charity, mercy and  patience. We women of one country will be too tender of 
those of another  country to allow our sons to be trained to injure theirs".

For the  next 30 years, Americans celebrated Mothers' Day for Peace on June  
2.

Many middle-class women in the 19th century believed that they bore  a 
special responsibility as actual or potential mothers to care for the  casualties of 
society and to turn America into a more civilized nation.   They played a 
leading role in the abolitionist movement to end slavery.   In the following 
decades, they launched successful campaigns against lynching  and consumer fraud 
and battled for improved working conditions for women and  protection for 
children, public health services and social welfare assistance  to the poor. To the 
activists, the connection between motherhood and the fight  for social and 
economic justice seemed self-evident.

In 1913, Congress  declared the second Sunday in May to be Mother's Day.  By 
then, the  growing consumer culture had successfully redefined women as 
consumers for  their families.  Politicians and businessmen eagerly embraced the 
idea of  celebrating the private sacrifices made by individual mothers.  As the  
Florists' Review, the industry's trade journal, bluntly put it, "This was a  
holiday that could be exploited."

The new advertising industry quickly  taught Americans how to honor their 
mothers - by buying flowers.   Outraged by florists who were selling carnations 
for the exorbitant price of  $1 apiece, Anna Jarvis' daughter undertook a 
campaign against those who "would  undermine Mother's Day with their greed." But 
she fought a losing  battle.  Within a few years, the Florists' Review 
triumphantly announced  that it was "Miss Jarvis who was completely squelched."

Since then,  Mother's Day has ballooned into a billion-dollar industry.

Americans  may revere the idea of motherhood and love their own mothers, but 
not all  mothers.  Poor, unemployed mothers may enjoy flowers, but they also 
need  child care, job training, health care, a higher minimum wage and paid 
parental  leave.  Working mothers may enjoy breakfast in bed, but they also need  
the kind of governmental assistance provided by every other industrialized  
society.

With a little imagination, we could restore Mother's Day as a  holiday that 
celebrates women's political engagement in society.  During  the 1980's, some 
peace groups gathered at nuclear test sites on Mother's Day  to protest the 
arms race.  Today, our greatest threat is not from  missiles but from our 
indifference toward human welfare and the health of our  planet.  Imagine, if you 
can, an annual Million Mother March in the  nation's capital.  Imagine a Mother's 
Day filled with voices demanding  social and economic justice and a 
sustainable future, rather than speeches  studded with syrupy platitudes.

Some will think it insulting to alter  our current way of celebrating 
Mother's Day.  But public activism does  not preclude private expressions of love and 
gratitude. (Nor does it prevent  people from expressing their appreciation 
all year round.)

Nineteenth  century women dared to dream of a day that honored women's civil  
activism.  We can do no less. We should honor their vision with civic  
activism.

Ruth Rosen is a professor of history at UC  Davis.
Reprinted with  permission





**************Wondering what's for Dinner Tonight? Get new twists on family 
favorites at AOL Food.      
(http://food.aol.com/dinner-tonight?NCID=aolfod00030000000001)