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Proposal Details

Proposal ID	962
Proposal	Resolution to Encourage Green Party Candidates to Sign Green Party Peace Pledge
Presenter	Green Party Peace Action Committee GPAX
Floor Manager	Andrea Merida
Phase	Closed - Adopted
Discussion	07-01-2019 - 07-14-2019
Voting	07-15-2019 - 07-21-2019
Presens Quorum	Two Thirds of Active Accredited States/Caucuses
Consens Quorum	A Majority of Yes and No Votes

Background

Note: Quorum is 32 states/caucuses at this time.

Pursuant to section 6-1.2, 6-2.2(b) and 6-4 of the GP-US Rules and Procedures, the Green Party Peace Action Committee proposes that the following Resolution, with attachments, be adopted by GP-US through a vote by the Green Party National Committee adopting the resolution. This proposal was adopted by consensus of the Peace Action Committee by its membership on June 4, 2019.

Proposal

Adopt following resolution:
Resolution to Encourage Green Party Candidates to Sign Green Party Peace Pledge

Whereas nonviolence is one of the Green Party’s pillars and Ten Key Values;

Whereas it serves the party’s interest to strongly identify the Green Party as a party devoted to the cause of global peace, a party that stands on principle against militarism and U.S. military and other unlawful intervention in the affairs of other nations;

Whereas it is in the interest of the Green Party to have its candidates for federal office advocate for our values and our platform; and

Whereas an end to U.S. military intervention and other unlawful intervention in the affairs of other nations, and a major reduction in military spending, will help allow our society to address the climate crisis, fund a Green New Deal and otherwise serve the public and environmental good;

Therefore, be it resolved that the Green Party of the United States shall encourage Green Party candidates for U.S. House of Representatives, U.S. Senate and President of the United States to sign on to the attached “Peace Pledge” for their respective offices;
That the GP-US shall make the attached Peace Pledges available online, for candidates to sign by that means, with a link listing all candidates who have signed;
That the Peace Pledge shall be made available to candidates of other political parties, and independent candidates, as well as Greens; and
That the Green Party of the United States shall publicize the Peace Pledge as part of a broader effort to make its demand to end war, militarism and unlawful intervention in the affairs of other nations a central issue in the 2020 election campaign.

Further rationale: Regarding the provision that the Peace Pledge be made available to non-Green candidates, one of the purposes of this provision is to help expose the fact that few, if any, corporate party candidates will be willing to sign the Pledge. This will help our candidates answer the ubiquitous “spoiler” argument by pointing to the fact that their opponents will not even go so far as to promise not to use the federal government to murder people or intervene in the affairs of other sovereign nations, and, therefore, that they are not qualified to hold office and do not deserve our votes. In the event that a handful of maverick non-Green candidates do sign the Pledge, the Green Party can still justly take credit for taking leadership on this issue and making peace, anti-militarism and anti-intervention a central issue in 2020.

Even where no Green is running for office, Greens and other peace activists can confront corporate party candidates at public events with a demand that they sign the Pledge, and, when they refuse, help expose them as being pro-militarist and pro-imperialist. The Pledge, with its links, can also serve as an educational tool for voters and get more voters to be thinking about issues of peace, militarism and opposition to imperialism.

Resources

This will require a commitment of a few hours for our website administrators to publish the Peace Pledges, the Coordinated Campaign Committee to publicize the Pledges to our candidates, and occasional work by our Media Coordinators to publicize the Pledges. Beyond that, it is anticipated that our candidates, campaign teams and peace activists in the party will further publicize the Pledges and use them for campaign purposes. It is further proposed that the Peace Pledges remain on the website and be utilized as a campaign, peace action and educational tool through the November 2020 General Election. The Pledge could then be revisited, revised if needed, and re-tooled for use in 2022, but that determination could be made after evaluating its utility in the 2020 election cycle.

Contact: Rita Jacobs, 517 694-8109 rjacobs@arq.net and Wesson Gaige, 214-906-2909 wesgaige@mac.com, Co-Chairs; Rich Whitney, 618-967-0840, richwhitney@frontier.com, principal author.

References

The Peace Pledges themselves are available at https://gpax.gpus.org/peace-pledges. General references on the subject matter may be found at https://gpax.gpus.org/. The references to international law contained in the Pledges were reviewed and approved by Francis A. Boyle, professor of international law at the University of Illinois College of Law.

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