Lyr Add: Peace Isn't Treason (Malvina Reynolds)

Subject: Lyr Add: PEACE ISN'T TREASON
From: GUEST
Date: 15 Nov 02 - 08:56 AM

Continuing the search for suitable music for current anti-war efforts, I've stumbled across a few things. I didn't find Malvina Reynolds song "Peace Isn't Treason" in the DT.

I came across a reference to it when I was doing a web search for anti-war songs, in the Library of Congress collection donated by Barbara Dane and Irwin Silber:

AFC 1980/001: Forty-three 10-inch, eighty 7-inch, and thirty-five 5-inch tapes containing events, instrumentals, interviews, and songs. Recorded primarily by and for Barbara Dane and Irwin Silber at various locations in Canada and the United States, 1952-78, including the "Sing Out!" radio program on WBAI-FM, New York City. The collection includes one and one-half linear inches of content lists, correspondence, notes, photocopies of original tape boxes, and transcripts. [Note: the logs are incomplete, therefore there may be additional material related to the Vietnam War not mentioned here]

SR46: One 7-inch tape containing "It's Gonna Be Awful" sung by Bessie Jones of St. Simon's Island, Georgia, "Napalm" sung by Michael Cooney, "Guns of Our Cities" sung by Mark Spoelstra, "Soon Born Baby" sung by Bob Cohen, and "Lambarene Time," "Bitter Rain," "Only a War," "Peace Isn't Treason," "I Believe," and "No Town," sung by Malvina Reynolds, as well as comments. Recorded and subsequently submitted for use at "Sing-In for Peace," the first major anti‑Vietnam War demonstration in New York City, September 24, 1965. (Fifty minutes; RXB 0027)

The LOC website address is here:

http://www.loc.gov/folklife/guides/vietnamwar.html

I finally located a set of lyrics for the song at the September 11th Families for Peaceful Tomorrows website at this address:

http://www.peacefultomorrows.org/40days/index.shtml

Peace isn't treason,
Peace is good reason,
Peace is heaven's will.
"Peace on earth!" is what He said,
And I believe it still

Wars there have always been,
We walk the same old way,
We walk the way our fathers went
When they have gone astray
When they have gone astray

Peace isn't treason,
Peace is good reason,
Peace is heaven's will.
"Peace on earth!" is what He said,
And I believe it still

Though the voice of reason speaks
Unreasoned voices rage,
And so we add another line
To history's bloody page,
History's bloody page

Peace isn't treason,
Peace is good reason,
Peace is heaven's will.
"Peace on earth!" is what He said,
And I believe it still

We must learn to live with peace
And take it as our friend,
We must learn to live with peace,
Or all the world will end,
All the world will end.

Peace isn't treason,
Peace is good reason,
Peace is heaven's will.
"Peace on earth!" is what He said,
And I believe it still

Malvina Reynolds song, "Peace Isn't Treason," 1967

The song can be found in Sing Out v.15#4

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Peace Isn't Treason
From: Mudlark
Date: 15 Nov 02 - 05:48 PM

Thanks for tracking this down, Guest....it's a good song, and a timely one.

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Peace Isn't Treason
From: GUEST
Date: 15 Nov 02 - 06:08 PM

My pleasure. It is a great song, and I'd never heard of it before! Anyone know of a tune for it?