Editing Bertrand Russell (section)

===Political causes===
{{Main|Political views of Bertrand Russell}}

Bertrand Russell was opposed to war from a young age; his opposition to World War I was used as grounds for his dismissal from Trinity College at Cambridge. This incident fused two of his controversial causes, as he had failed to be granted fellow status which would have protected him from firing, because he was not willing to either pretend to be a devout Christian, or at least avoid admitting he was agnostic.

He later described the resolution of these issues as essential to freedom of thought and expression, citing the incident in [[Free Thought and Official Propaganda]], where he explained that the expression of any idea, even the most obviously "bad", must be protected not only from direct State intervention but also economic leveraging and other means of being silenced:

{{blockquote|The opinions which are still persecuted strike the majority as so monstrous and immoral that the general principle of toleration cannot be held to apply to them. But this is exactly the same view as that which made possible the tortures of the [[Spanish Inquisition|Inquisition]].<ref name="free">{{Cite web |last=Russell |first=Bertrand |title=Free Thought and Official Propaganda |url=http://www.gutenberg.org/files/44932/44932-h/44932-h.htm |access-date=14 May 2019 |via=Project Gutenberg |archive-date=4 January 2018 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180104073140/http://www.gutenberg.org/files/44932/44932-h/44932-h.htm |url-status=live }}</ref>}}

Russell spent the 1950s and 1960s engaged in political causes primarily related to [[nuclear disarmament]] and opposing the [[Vietnam War]]. The 1955 [[Russell–Einstein Manifesto]] was a document calling for nuclear disarmament and was signed by eleven of the most prominent nuclear physicists and intellectuals of the time.<ref name="Manifesto">{{Cite web |last1=Russell, Bertrand |last2=Albert Einstein |author-link2=Albert Einstein |date=9 July 1955 |title=Russell Einstein Manifesto |url=http://www.ppu.org.uk/learn/texts/doc_russelleinstein_manif.html |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090801154612/http://www.ppu.org.uk/learn/texts/doc_russelleinstein_manif.html |archive-date=1 August 2009 |access-date=17 February 2008}}</ref> In October 1960 "[[Committee of 100 (United Kingdom)|The Committee of 100]]" was formed with a declaration by Russell and [[Michael Scott (priest)|Michael Scott]], entitled "Act or Perish", which called for a "movement of nonviolent resistance to nuclear war and weapons of mass destruction".<ref>{{Cite web |url=https://rethinkingsecurity.org.uk/2020/10/16/committee-of-100-and-extinction-rebellion/ |title=Nonviolent Direct Action: The Committee of 100 and Extinction Rebellion |date=16 October 2020 |access-date=24 November 2023 |archive-date=10 September 2024 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240910144125/https://rethinkingsecurity.org.uk/2020/10/16/committee-of-100-and-extinction-rebellion/ |url-status=live }}</ref> In September 1961, at the age of 89, Russell was jailed for seven days in [[HM Prison Brixton|Brixton Prison]] for a "breach of the peace" after taking part in [[Committee of 100 (United Kingdom)#1961|an anti-nuclear demonstration]] in London. The magistrate offered to exempt him from jail if he pledged himself to "good behaviour", to which Russell replied: "No, I won't."<ref>Bertrand Russell Peace Foundation, ''Bertrand Russell, 1872–1970'' [1970], p.&nbsp;12</ref><ref>{{Cite book |last=Russell, Bertrand |title=The Autobiography of Bertrand Russell, Vol. 3 |publisher=Little, Brown |year=1967 |page=157}}</ref>

From 1966 to 1967, Russell worked with [[Jean-Paul Sartre]] and many other intellectual figures to form the [[Russell Tribunal|Russell Vietnam War Crimes Tribunal]] to investigate the conduct of the United States in Vietnam. He wrote many letters to world leaders during this period.

Early in his life, Russell supported [[eugenics|eugenicist]] policies. In 1894, he proposed that the state issue certificates of health to prospective parents and withhold public benefits from those considered unfit.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Griffin |first=Nicholas |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=hV7bHY0fTCoC&pg=PA125 |title=The Selected Letters of Bertrand Russell: The Private Years, 1884–1914 |date=2002 |publisher=Routledge |isbn=978-0-415-26014-5 |pages=588 |access-date=5 April 2021 |archive-date=10 September 2024 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240910140918/https://books.google.com/books?id=hV7bHY0fTCoC&pg=PA125#v=onepage&q&f=false |url-status=live }}</ref> In 1929, he wrote that people deemed "mentally defective" and "feebleminded" should be sexually sterilised because they "are apt to have enormous numbers of illegitimate children, all, as a rule, wholly useless to the community."<ref>{{Cite book |last=Russell |first=Bertrand |title=Marriage and Morals |date=1929 |publisher=H. Liverwright |language=en}}</ref> Russell was also an advocate of [[population control]]:<ref>{{Cite book |last=Pandey |first=V. C. |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=_eI5avFlStYC&pg=PA211 |title=Population Education |date=2005 |publisher=Gyan Publishing House |isbn=978-81-8205-176-8 |pages=211 |language=en |access-date=8 March 2021 |archive-date=10 September 2024 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240910140853/https://books.google.com/books?id=_eI5avFlStYC&pg=PA211#v=onepage&q&f=false |url-status=live }}</ref><ref name="Impact">{{cite book | last=Russell | first=Bertrand | title=The Impact of Science on Society | publisher=Routledge | publication-place=London ; New York | date=2016 | isbn=978-1-138-64115-0 | page=}}</ref>{{blockquote|The nations which at present increase rapidly should be encouraged to adopt the methods by which, in the West, the increase of population has been checked. Educational propaganda, with government help, could achieve this result in a generation. There are, however, two powerful forces opposed to such a policy: one is religion, the other is nationalism. I think it is the duty of all to proclaim that opposition to the spread of birth is appalling depth of misery and degradation, and that within another fifty years or so. I do not pretend that [[birth control]] is the only way in which population can be kept from increasing. There are others, which, one must suppose, opponents of birth control would prefer. War, as I remarked a moment ago, has hitherto been disappointing in this respect, but perhaps bacteriological war may prove more effective. If a [[Black Death]] could be spread throughout the whole world once in every generation survivors could procreate freely without making the world too full.}}

On 20 November 1948, in a public speech at [[Westminster School]], addressing a gathering arranged by the New Commonwealth, Russell shocked some observers by suggesting that a preemptive nuclear strike on the [[Soviet Union]] was justified. Russell argued that war between the United States and the Soviet Union seemed inevitable, so it would be a humanitarian gesture to get it over with quickly and have the United States in the dominant position. Currently, Russell argued, humanity could survive such a war, whereas a full [[nuclear warfare|nuclear war]] after both sides had manufactured large stockpiles of more destructive weapons was likely to result in the [[extinction]] of the [[Human|human race]]. Russell later relented from this stance, instead arguing for mutual disarmament by the nuclear powers.

In 1956, before and during the [[Suez Crisis]], Russell expressed his opposition to European imperialism in the Middle East. He viewed the crisis as another reminder of the pressing need for an effective mechanism for international governance, and to restrict national sovereignty in places such as the [[Suez Canal]] area "where general interest is involved". At the same time the Suez Crisis was taking place, the world was also captivated by the [[Hungarian Revolution of 1956|Hungarian Revolution]] and the subsequent crushing of the revolt by intervening Soviet forces. Russell attracted criticism for speaking out fervently against the Suez war while ignoring Soviet repression in Hungary, to which he responded that he did not criticise the Soviets "because there was no need. Most of the so-called Western World was fulminating". Although he later feigned a lack of concern, at the time he was disgusted by the brutal Soviet response, and on 16 November 1956, he expressed approval for a declaration of support for Hungarian scholars which [[Michael Polanyi]] had cabled to the Soviet embassy in London twelve days previously, shortly after Soviet troops had entered [[Budapest]].<ref>''Collected Papers of Bertrand Russell'' (Psychology Press, 2005)</ref>

In November 1957 Russell wrote an article addressing US President [[Dwight D. Eisenhower]] and Soviet Premier [[Nikita Khrushchev]], urging a summit to consider "the conditions of co-existence". Khrushchev responded that peace could be served by such a meeting. In January 1958 Russell elaborated his views in ''[[The Observer]]'', proposing a cessation of all nuclear weapons production, with the UK taking the first step by unilaterally suspending its own nuclear weapons program if necessary, and with Germany "freed from all alien armed forces and pledged to neutrality in any conflict between East and West". US Secretary of State [[John Foster Dulles]] replied for Eisenhower. The exchange of letters was published as ''The Vital Letters of Russell, Khrushchev, and Dulles''.<ref name="ref1">''Yours Faithfully, Bertrand Russell'' (pp. 212–213).</ref>

Russell was asked by ''[[The New Republic]]'', a liberal American magazine, to elaborate his views on world peace. He urged that all nuclear weapons testing and flights by planes armed with nuclear weapons be halted immediately, and negotiations be opened for the destruction of all [[hydrogen bombs]], with the number of conventional nuclear devices limited to ensure a balance of power. He proposed that Germany be reunified and accept the [[Oder-Neisse line]] as its border, and that a neutral zone be established in Central Europe, consisting at the minimum of Germany, Poland, Hungary, and [[Czechoslovakia]], with each of these countries being free of foreign troops and influence, and prohibited from forming alliances with countries outside the zone. In the Middle East, Russell suggested that the West avoid opposing [[Arab nationalism]], and proposed the creation of a United Nations peacekeeping force to guard Israel's frontiers to ensure that Israel was prevented from committing aggression and protected from it. He also suggested Western recognition of the People's Republic of China, and that it be admitted to the UN with a permanent seat on the [[UN Security Council]].<ref name=ref1/>

He was in contact with [[Lionel Rogosin]] while the latter was filming his anti-war film ''[[Good Times, Wonderful Times]]'' in the 1960s. He became a hero to many of the youthful members of the [[New Left]]. In early 1963, Russell became increasingly vocal in his disapproval of the Vietnam War, and felt that the US government's policies there were near-[[genocidal]]. In 1963, he became the inaugural recipient of the [[Jerusalem Prize]], an award for writers concerned with the freedom of the individual in society.<ref name="jerusalem prize">{{Cite web |title=Jerusalem International Book Fair |url=http://www.jerusalembookfair.com/main.html |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080122165019/http://www.jerusalembookfair.com/main.html |archive-date=22 January 2008 |access-date=1 October 2011 |publisher=Jerusalembookfair.com}}</ref> In 1964, he was one of eleven world figures who issued an appeal to Israel and the [[Arab world|Arab countries]] to accept an [[arms embargo]] and international supervision of [[nuclear plant]]s and rocket weaponry.<ref>{{Cite web |date=26 February 1964 |title=Bertrand Russell Appeals to Arabs and Israel on Rocket Weapons |url=http://www.jta.org/1964/02/26/archive/bertrand-russell-appeals-to-arabs-and-israel-on-rocket-weapons |publisher=Jewish Telegraphic Agency |access-date=5 January 2014 |archive-date=10 September 2024 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240910144140/https://www.jta.org/archive/bertrand-russell-appeals-to-arabs-and-israel-on-rocket-weapons |url-status=live }}</ref> In October 1965, he tore up his [[Labour Party (UK)|Labour Party]] card because he suspected [[Harold Wilson]]'s Labour government was going to send troops to support the United States in Vietnam.<ref name="Gallery" />