- Ralph DiGia
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name=Ralph DiGia
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birth_date=December 13 , 1914
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death_date=February 1 , 2008
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known_for=pacifism
education=City College of New York
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spouse=Karen
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footnotes=Ralph DiGia (
December 13 ,1914 –February 1 ,2008 ) was aWorld War II conscientious objector , lifelong pacifist and social justice activist, and staffer for 52 years at theWar Resisters League .Born in the
Bronx to a family of Italian immigrants in 1914, DiGia grew up onManhattan 'sUpper West Side . A 1927 rally for Italian anarchistsNicola Sacco andBartolomeo Vanzetti set him on the path he would follow for 80 years.At the
College of the City of New York , where he was studying bookkeeping, DiGia signed the “Oxford Pledge,” refusing to participate in the coming war. In 1942, when theSelective Service System ordered him to report for induction, he said he was aconscientious objector . But his objections to war were based on ethics, not religion, and the draft board had no category for secular COs. TheU.S. Attorney 's office referred him to pacifist lawyer Julian Cornell, at theWar Resisters League ; Cornell lost his case, and DiGia spent the next three years in federal prisons.At
Danbury Federal Correctional Institution inConnecticut , and later atLewisburg Federal Penitentiary inPennsylvania , he met other draft resisters, likeDave Dellinger , who four decades later would be a defendant in theChicago Seven case, and Bill Sutherland, who would move toAfrica after the war and eventually become a pan-Africanist advocate for nonviolence. While in prison, DiGia and other COs conducted hunger strikes to compel the prison system to integrate its dining halls. They succeeded.Opposition to the Cold War
After his release, he joined a
New Jersey commune with Dellinger. In 1951, DiGia, Dellinger, Sutherland, and fellow CO Art Emery bicycled from Paris to Vienna, handing out antiwar leaflets as they went, urging Cold War soldiers everywhere to lay down their arms and refuse to fight. [cite journal |last=McReynolds |first=David |title=Ralph DiGia, 1914-2008 |journal=TheCatholic Worker |year=2008 |volume=LXXV |issue=March-April |pages=6 ] In the early 1950s, he left the commune and moved to the Manhattan area that would later be called Soho, where he lived for the rest of his life, and in 1955 he joined the War Resisters League staff as a bookkeeper. In the early 1960s, he was arrested more than once for not taking shelter during the "civil defense" drills. In 1964 he served four weeks in jail in Albany, Georgia (with, among others, the late peace theoristBarbara Deming ) in the Quebec-Washington-Guantánamo Peace Walk organized by theCommittee for Nonviolent Action .Opposition to the Vietnam War and Anti-Nuclear Efforts
During the
Vietnam War , DiGia did necessary office work at WRL but also organized demonstrations and counseled draft resisters. In 1971 he was among 13,500 arrested in the May Day antiwar actions inWashington . When the Vietnam War ended, WRL took on antinuclear work; in 1977, he protested nuclear power at theSeabrook Nuclear Power Station inNew Hampshire , he was there. In 1978 he was arrested on theWhite House lawn, demanding nuclear disarmament. He was in New York'sCentral Park in June 1982 when a million people said “No Nukes!” He was at dozens of demonstrations at theUnited Nations .In the 1990s, he traveled frequently to Bosnia with his wife, Karin DiGia, and worked with her relief agency Children in Crisis, which Karin created, but also continued to demonstrate for peace and justice at home. In 1996, he became a volunteer instead of a paid staffer at WRL, but continued to work there five days a week. In 1998, he was arrested in Washington at WRL's "A Day Without the Pentagon" in 1998 and at the mass protests against the acquittal of the
New York City police officers who shot Guinean immigrantAmadou Diallo in 1999. He continued his work at the WRL office through his 93rd birthday in December, 2007. He often said he was even an activist at the ball park: An ardentNew York Mets fan, he remained seated—on principle—during the national anthem.In 1996, the Peace Abbey, the multi-faith retreat center in
Sherborn, Massachusetts , gave DiGia its Courage of Conscience award "for his example as a conscientious objector and for over forty years of dedicated service at the War Resisters League." In 2005, WRL gave the 40th annualWar Resisters League Peace Award to DiGia and his longtime colleague, former photographer Karl Bissinger.Opposition to the Iraq War
Ralph DiGia continued his war opposition, including opposing the
Iraq War . [cite journal |last=Barry |first=Dan |title=A nation at war: at wat at home; as wars come and go, Ralph keeps protesting |year=2003 |journal=New York Times |issue=March 22 |url=http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=990CE6D91F31F931A15750C0A9659C8B63&&scp=9&sq=%22War%20Resisters%20League%22&st=cse |accessdate=2008-07-22]Death
In the winter of 2007-2008, after a fall and
hip fracture , he developedpneumonia and died February 1.Memorials
* [http://www.ralphdigiafund.org Ralph DiGia Fund for Peace and Justice]
References
*The Daily Kos, [http://www.dailykos.com/story/2008/2/4/1647/01709/194/449314]
*Interview by Philip Metres, [http://www.philipmetres.com/content/view/43]
*"Direct Action: Radical Pacifism From the Union Eight to the Chicago Seven", by James Tracy (1996, University of Chicago Press).
*"A Few Small Candles: War Resisters of World War II Tell Their Stories", by Larry Gara (1999, Kent State University Press).
*"Radical Pacifism: The War Resisters League and Gandhian Nonviolence in America, 1915-1963", by Scott H. Bennett (Syracuse University Press, 2003).
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