While the war was still in progress, I was visited by a sudden feeling of the cruel and unnecessary character of the contest. It seemed to me a return to barbarism, the issue having been one which might easily have been settled without bloodshed. The question forced itself upon me, Why do not the mothers of mankind interfere in these matters, to prevent the waste of that human life of which they alone bear and know the cost? I had never thought of this before. The august dignity of motherhood and its terrible responsibilities now appeared to me in a new aspect, and I could think of no better way of expressing my sense of these than that of sending forth an appeal to womanhood throughout the world, which I then and there composed.
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About Julia Ward Howe
Julia Ward Howe was a 19th-century American abolitionist, social activist, and poet. Julia Ward Howe was an American author and poet, known for writing the "Battle Hymn of the Republic" as new lyrics to the song "John Brown's Body," and the original 1870 pacifist Mothers' Day Proclamation. She was also an advocate for abolitionism and a social activist, particularly for women's suffrage. Read more on Wikipedia →