United States Department of Peace
Encyclopedia : U : UN : UNI : United States Department of Peace
The United States Department of Peace (or DoP) is a proposed cabinet-level department of the executive branch of the U.S. government. The original idea of a Peace Department in the United States dates back to the administration of George Washington, but has been most recently proposed by Rep. Dennis Kucinich in 2001 and formed a part of Kucinich's presidential campaign platform in 2004. A bill for this purpose, HR 3760, was introduced in the House of Representatives, with more than 60 co-sponsoring members of Congress, on September 14 2005.
On September 22 2005 Minnesota Senator Mark Dayton introduced a senate version of the Department of Peace legislation, bill number S.1756. This bill has one co-sponsor, Senator Jim Jeffords of Vermont.
The US Department of Peace is also an independent grassroots political movement that operates autonomously and that has continued to gain momentum after Kucinich's bid in the 2004 presidential election. The ongoing movement is co-led by Kucinich and the author and popular motivational speaker Marianne Williamson. This movement actively lobbies for the endorsements of congressional leaders. It has local grassroot chapters in over 200 congressional districts, and to date over 60 members of Congress have co-sponsored Kucinich's bill.
The Kucinich proposal
In July 2001, Ohio Rep. Dennis Kucinich introduced Department of Peace legislation to Congress though it is unclear how similar his version of a Department of Peace would be to that of the founding fathers. The September 11 attacks several months later put the idea on hold.Kucinich proposed a Peace Department again (House Resolution 1673) in April 2003; the legislation then gained over 30 co-sponsors and was endorsed by groups including Amnesty International and the National Organization for Women. Highlights of the legislation include tying the budget of the department to a fixed percentage of the budget of the Defense Department and creating a "Peace Academy" parallel to the U.S. military academies.
This bill appears to include many proposed mandates which are nearly identical with the existing mandates of the federal agency, the United States Institute of Peace, however it also includes several additional proposed mandates which would go beyond the existing mandates of the US Institute of Peace. Some highlights amongst the areas of proposed additional responsibility include:
- Monitoring of all domestic arms production, including non-military arms, conventional military arms, and of weapons of mass destruction,
- Making regular recommendations to the US President for various arms reductions strategies,
- Assumption of a more pro-active level of involvement in the establishment of international dialogues for international conflict resolution (as a cabinet level department),
- Establishment of a US Peace Academy, which amongst other things would train international peace-keepers,
- Development of an educational media program to promote non-violence in the domestic media,
- Monitoring of human rights, both domestically and abroad,
- Making regular recommendations to the President for the maintenance and improvement of these human rights,
- Receiving a timely mandatory advance consultation from the Secretaries of State, and of Defense, prior to any engagement of US troops in any armed conflict with any other nation,
- Establishment of a national Peace Day,
- Participation by the Secretary of Peace as a member of the National Security Council,
- Expansion of the national Sister City program,
- Significant expansion of current Institute of Peace program involvement in educational affairs, in areas such as:
- Drug rehabilitation,
- Policy reviews concerning crime prevention, punishment, and rehabilitation,
- Implementation of violence prevention counseling programs and peer mediation programs in schools,
Kucinich continues to energetically promote and lobby for this legislation. Williamson sometimes makes comparisons between this movement and the anti-slavery Abolition movement, or to the Woman's Suffrage movement as a demonstration of her belief of both the worthiness of this goal, and of her belief that due to its worthiness, it cannot do anything other than to eventually pass in congress.
Criticisms of the Department of Peace proposal
The bill appears to include an amazingly broad purview of responsibilities. Interestingly, this bill would give the US Department of Peace the authority to monitor and make recommendations to restrict the entire US arms industry, yet it provides no counter-balancing mandates to enable the proposed department to directly monitor any non-domestic arms production.
The seemingly random groupings of responsibility, and their closeness with Liberal and Democratic causes have caused some conservative observers to criticize the idea, claiming that these responsibilities overlap the responsibilities of the Secretary of State, Secretary of Defense, Drug Czar, and Secretary of Health and Human Services and that the list was thrown together in an effort to create a department that would have clear liberal leanings and intent. The inclusion of drug rehabilitation, prison reform, and the claims that these are “peace-related activities” have drawn criticism causing some to label it the "Department of Liberalism" or the "Department of Socialism".
Similar proposals in history
The idea for the establishment of a U.S. Department of Peace can be traced back to debates by the framers of the U.S. Constitution. The first formal proposal for the establishment of a U.S. Department of Peace dates to 1792. This was the product of efforts by architect and publisher Benjamin Banneker and physician and educator Dr. Benjamin Rush. Their proposal called for the establishment of a "Peace Office" which was to be on equal footing with the "War Department". Their proposal also noted what it referred to as the urgent need for the establishment of, "an office for promoting and preserving perpetual peace in our country," in order to maintain the greater welfare of "these United States."The novel 1988 (a fictional work about the upcoming 1988 presidential election published in 1985) by then-Governor of Colorado Richard Lamm, includes a very similar proposal where the third-party presidential candidate in the novel proposes a cabinet-level Agency for Peace and Conflict Resolution with a Secretary of Peace who could challenge the Secretary of Defense when necessary.
See also
External links
- [United States Institute of Peace Website]
- [The Peace Alliance Campaign for a US Department of Peace]
- [Representative Dennis Kucinich's Personal Site Discussing this Legislation]
- [Senator Mark Dayton's Press Release]
- [Marianne Williamson's Personal Intro and Link to the Peace Alliance]
- State campaign websites:
- * [Arizona Department of Peace campaign]
- * [California (Southern) Department of Peace campaign]
- * [Maine Department of Peace campaign]
- * [Massachusetts Department of Peace campaign]
- * [Michigan Department of Peace campaign]
- * [New Jersey Department of Peace campaign]
- * [New York City Department of Peace campaign]
- * [South Carolina Department of Peace campaign]
- [Canada Department of Peace]
- [International People's Initiative for Departments of Peace]
From Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia. Original article here. Support Wikipedia by contributing or donating.
All text is available under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License See Wikipedia Copyrights for details.