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the fight for freedom...is at home! Strike! Nov. 14 March on Washington & San Francisco Nov. 15 : Bring All The GIs Home.
Washington, D.C., [ca. 1969]. Illustrated single sheet poster, black on purple background, 22” x 17”. CONDITION: Very good, old folds, moderate wear, a few minor chips and tears. A scarce and vivid poster announcing marches on Washington D.C. and San Francisco, produced by the Student Mobilization Committee To End The War In Vietnam. The rousing phrase “the fight for freedom…is at home!” accompanies a photo-illustration showing a large group of African American men and women participating in a protest. The head of a single police officer, seen from behind, appears in the lower left corner and effectively represents the oppression against which the students protest. Many of the protesters raise their clenched fists in the style of the Black Panther salute and appear to be chanting. The poster effectively appeals to African Americans to engage in protesting the War as a means of simultaneously combating racial inequality in America. The U.S. saw extensive protests surrounding its involvement in the Vietnam War, many of which were organized by the Student Mobilization Committee (SMC, est. 1966), a nationwide organization of students who sought to end the war. For their events, SMC created brochures, posters, buttons, and stickers. SMC worked with other anti-war mobilization committees in the late ‘60s such as the Washington D.C.-based Vietnam Moratorium Committee (VMC), which sponsored anti-war moratoriums around the world in the fall of 1969. The VMC’s first organized moratorium took place on October 15th 1969 and the second on November 15th, in which over half a million activists marched on D.C. and demonstrated throughout the U.S. and the world. The November 15th event followed on the heels of the “March Against Death” demonstration held on November 14th, when people marched down Pennsylvania Ave in Washington D.C. hoisting signs with the names of dead U.S. soldiers and destroyed Vietnamese towns. The protest on the 15th featured a rally at the White House in which chanting demonstrators called for a peaceful end to the war. One of the most influential student-led nonviolent protest groups in U.S. history, the SMC began to disband in the early ‘70s as American combat troops stationed in Vietnam started to withdraw and return home. OCLC records only one copy, held at Harvard. Google searches yield a copy held by the National Museum of African American History & Culture. A striking poster reflecting the opposition of Black students to the Vietnam War and dovetailing with the ascendance of Black Power. REFERENCES: Aufderheide, Ingrid. “Student Mobilization Committee to End the War in Vietnam: A Pivotal Moment in Student Protest” (2023) at The Nonviolence Project online; “Nov. 15, 1969: Second Anti-War Moratorium” at Zinn Education Project online.
Item #9608
Price: $950.00
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