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Lee Brown, a UNA Member Who Worked for Peace

Lee Brown, 80, died on Dec. 31, 2010. She is shown here with her husband, Tom. Brown was a longtime member of the Dane County (Wis.) chapter of the United Nations Association of the USA.

According to an obituary published in The Capital Times on Jan. 4, 2011, by John Nichols, Brown’s last published letter to the editor, written in November, just days before she suffered the stroke that would “in a few short weeks claim the life of this activist for peace, diplomacy and disarmament,” was an urgent appeal for Senate ratification of the new Start treaty.” (It was ratified by Congress at the end of December.)

“It was classic Brown: sincere, smart, fact-driven and immediate,” Nichols wrote.

Brown’s letter said, in part, that “this treaty is crucial to creating a nuclear weapons free world -- a goal favored by the vast majority of the world’s people.” She was one of the city’s most impassioned internationalists, writing letters not only to newspapers but also to magazines and Web sites on peace and justice issues.

“Ninety-seven percent of nuclear weapons are held by the United States and Russia,” her letter went, “so when these two powers commit to reducing their respective nuclear weapons stockpiles by 1,500 that is a good beginning to this long process.”

Referring to Republican arguments that the treaty had not been debated enough, Brown wrote: “Since April 8, when President Obama and the Russian president signed the New Start treaty, the Obama administration has been discussing and sharing information about it. In addition to 18 Senate committee hearings, the White House has had 29 meetings, phone calls and briefings or letters involving [the leading Republican critic Arizona Senator Jon] Kyl or his staff.”

She concluded, “So now is the time for bipartisan cooperation in the U.S. Senate so the world’s people can enjoy a safer and more peaceful world.”

Brown was born in rural Michigan, earned a degree in sociology from Albion College in 1952 and an M.A. in international relations from the University of Chicago. In between, she was a missionary, a mother and an activist.

Brown’s work at the Dane County chapter of the UNA was an effort of nurturing, prodding and promoting, focusing on such matters as establishing debates on foreign affairs between 2nd Congressional District candidates, a groundbreaking initiative -- the first ongoing series of foreign-policy-focused debates of their kind in the country – that drew broad community support and continues to this day.

Above all, Brown was a letter writer. These were concise and to the point, sent to editors in Wisconsin and across the country.

A teacher in spirit, Brown used questions to get people thinking. Nichols wrote that his favorite, repeated in many forms, was, “Why is funding for war always secure?”