Content area
Full Text
FOLLOWING THE END of World War I5 the Irish and British were at war over Ireland's independence from the British Empire. It was a time about which Jane Addams (1930: 205) recalled: "The Irish in America were relating in grisly detail the atrocities of the Black and Tans and inflaming not only their traditional hostility toward England but also influencing to a very marked degree American opinion in regard to the League of Nations." In response, The Nation, a policy journal, organized the American Commission on Conditions in Ireland to investigate - and in which Jane Addams would play a central role.
For her era, Addams, 1860-1935, was arguably the most stellar and influential sociologist in the world (Deegan 1988, 1991, 2002a, 2007a, b). She founded a vital, international sociology emphasizing women and nonviolence (see Addams 1 907, 1 922/1 960, 1930) and her ground-breaking efforts were recognized by the Nobel peace prize in 193 1 . Her sophisticated theory and practice of pacifism is little understood today, and many of her significant efforts for world peace remain largely unremarked (for exceptions see discussions in Deegan 1988, 2002a, b, 2003, forthcoming; Lengermann and NiebruggeBrantley 1998; and McDonald 1994, 1998).
This essay identifies Addams' service on the American Commission from 1920 to 1922, a public role exemplifying her pacifist philosophy, concern for women, and cooperative, feminist pragmatist approach to conflict resolution.2 I document the formation of the Commission, illustrate its methods, and note Addams' reflections on this vital work. The Irish people responded favorably to this systematic analysis of the violence between them and the English by an outside panel of experts. This work, moreover, brought worldwide attention to many of the difficult problems of the newly emerging Irish Republic.
FORMING THE COMMISSION
Oswald Garrison Villard (1939: 487), the editor of The Nation and the grandson of the abolitionist who founded the strategy of non-resistance and passivism adopted by Addams, recalled the genesis of the idea: "Doctor William J.L. M. Maloney, a bright young Irishman residing in New York, who had served as a surgeon with the British army and been severely wounded and, for a time crippled, at Gallipoli, suggested the formation of an Irish commission by The Nation to call attention to the...