Amherst

Table of Contents

1. Introduction
2. News, and Other Relevant Links
3. Related Organizations and Resources
4. Featured Resolutions

Since the Vietnam War, Amherst, Massachusetts, has demonstrated consistent, intense effort to fight for nuclear disarmament through divestment, policy changes, and special town hall meetings. 

Amherst laid the groundwork for its future anti-nuclear activism through city protests of the Vietnam War. In 1984, Amherst became the first city in the United States to establish weekly vigils for peace and justice, including ones that called for war tax resistance and information rallies. The Valley Peace Center was also established there in the summer of 1967, a group of college students and Amherst residents that opposed the Vietnam War, the use of nuclear or biological weapons, and advocated for a decrease in power for the “military-industrial complex.” This activism led the way for Amherst’s peaceful anti-nuclear war programs. In 1984, Amherst declared itself a nuclear-free zone and barred municipal investments in and contracts with companies involved with nuclear weapon production. At this point, Amherst was the largest community in the United States to devote itself to both of these goals. 

Later, in 2006, Amherst held a special town meeting to discuss the war in Iran. The meeting was centered on urging Iran not to build nuclear weapons and to uphold its commitment to the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT). Unfortunately, the motion proposed at this council meeting was defeated in a 53-76 vote.

In 2018, the Amherst City Council passed a resolution entitled “Back from the Brink: A Call to Prevent Nuclear War,” which highlighted the dangers of nuclear weapons and called for the eradication of nuclear weapon development and for all nations to align with the Treaty on the  Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons. 

Amherst’s role in the nuclear deterrence movement was shaped by the work of activist Daniel Ellsberg, whose time living, studying, and advocating in Amherst became a hallmark of the city’s stance on nuclear weapons. Today, the University of Massachusetts Amherst hosts the Daniel Ellsberg Initiative for Peace and Democracy, an initiative aimed at increasing public awareness of alternatives to militarism, authoritarianism, and environmental degradation, which includes the Ellsberg Archives project, a primary archival resource on Ellsberg’s study and activism around nuclear weapons. One of Ellsberg’s key contributions was consulting with Presidents Dwight D. Eisenhower and John F. Kennedy and advocating that nuclear deterrence is not a safe solution to conflict. He also gave thousands of speeches on nuclear deterrence. The Ellsberg Initiative also hosts the Existential Threat Project, which examines the intersection of climate change and nuclear weapons, using the Ellsberg papers as a call to action. Ellsberg’s ongoing activism served as an inspirational catalyst for Amherst’s longstanding nuclear deterrence efforts.