Alfred Henry Love

Background

Alfred Henry Love, the son of William Henry and Rachel (Evans) Love, was born on September 7, 1830 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States.

Education

Love graduated from Philadelphia Central High School.

Career

In early ages Love showed a bent for journalism, which later found expression in the periodicals which he edited. From 1853 until his death he was a package woolen commission merchant. When the Civil War came, many Quakers and almost all the members of peace organizations compromised with their principles and accepted the struggle. Unable to make this adjustment, Love defended his position in An Appeal in Vindication of Peace Principles. To support the war seemed to him both unchristian and inhuman, and he pointed to the danger of "becoming absorbed in the enthusiasm of the hour" and of floating along "on the swelling tide, forgetful that popular movements always should be watched, often even doubted. " Though an active and thoroughgoing friend of the negro, Love did not believe that any great good could be achieved for him through war, which, he maintained, would not be a death-blow to "Slavery in its widest sense. " He refused to sell his goods for army use, and his business suffered. In 1863 he was drafted, but he refused to serve or to procure a substitute. William Lloyd Garrison, the high-priest of non-resistance, having accepted the war, wrote to Love that he believed money could be paid in lieu of service "without any compromise of the peace or non-resistance principle", but Love thought otherwise and maintained his position.

Since the American Peace Society had justified the Civil War, a handful of non-resistants felt the need for a new and thoroughly radical peace organization. Love assumed the leadership of this movement which resulted in the formation of the Universal Peace Society, later the Universal Peace Union. Its platform was expressed in its motto, "Remove the causes and remove the customs of war! Live the conditions and promulgate the principles of peace. " Until his death Love was president of the organization and responsible for its periodical. The society worked for a reconciliation between North and South, for a more humanitarian treatment of the Indian, for the rights of women, and for the abolition of capital punishment. It also labored for the peaceful adjustment of disputes, local as well as international.

In the eighties Love became a pioneer in popularizing the idea of the arbitration of disputes between capital and labor, his own services as a mediator in strikes attesting his faith in the efficacy of pacific principles. Love was not unknown to congressmen, secretaries of state, and presidents from Lincoln to Wnson. He urged party conventions and presidents-elect to mention international arbitration in their platforms and messages. He instigated delegations and petitions praying for the outlawry of war by constitutional amendment, for the negotiation of permanent treaties of arbitration, and for an international court. Again and again he wrote vigorously if naïvely to the secretary of state and to foreign governments suggesting peaceful means for preventing a threatening war. His letters and cables on the eve of the Spanish-American war aroused such indignation among certain patriots that he was burned in effigy. His uncompromising pacifism seemed, in the opinion of certain moderate friends of the cause, to injure the peace movement by making it appear unpractical. As the cause became more realistic and scientific Love's work, which he carried on courageously against great odds, appeared to some of the new leaders sentimental and ineffective.

Achievements

• Alfred Henry Love's fame was rested chiefly on his service in keeping alive the high standard of pacifism in the dark, discouraging days during and after the Civil War, and in forcing the question upon skeptical politicians and an indifferent people. He was also known as the founder of the Universal Peace Union. Under his leadership, the society maintained close relations with European peace groups and came to number some ten thousand American adherents. In 1906, Love was nominated for a Nobel Peace Prize by eight United States Senators and Hannis Taylor.

Religion

Love was affilitated with the Society of Friends, although he did not at once become a formal member of a meeting.

Views

Alfred Love was an uncompromising opponent of militarism in all its forms.

Connections

Love married Susan Henry Brown in January 1853. They had two sons and a daughter.

Father:

William Henry Love

Mother:

Rachel (Evans) Love

Spouse:

Susan Henry Brown

References

• Soldiers of Peace: Civil War Pacifism and the Postwar Radical Peace Movement (North's Civil War, No. 22)