2 Brookline Residents Want to Prevent Nuclear War

Edward Loechler and Cornelia van der Zeil want the town of Brookline to get behind them on offering a resolution that calls on Federal leaders to prevent nuclear war.

The advisory committee met at the Brookline Town Hall last Tuesday, to discuss the article before the May Town Meeting for people voting to get behind the resolution.

Loechler provided an explanation of what the article is trying to accomplish which talks about the urgency of the situation, the devastating effects of a nuclear war and what’s being done about getting rid of nuclear weapons.

Loechler said in the explanation, “It has always been urgent to address the proliferation and use of nuclear weapons. Over the years, there has been progress toward the elimination of nuclear weapons.”

The article explains that the U.S hasn’t signed the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons and wants to have that changed and also wants the option of using nukes not to be the first priority. It also wants to keep the president from being able to launch an attack so there’s less of a chance of a nuclear war happening.

Loechler said that a news article from the harvard law record inspired him, ands explores why he thinks issue matters to Brookline residents.

“On november 4th, Bostonians were again at the forefront, with a major conference at Harvard titled ‘Presidential First Use of Nuclear Weapons; Is It Legal? Is it Constitutional? Is it Just?. The conference brought together leading constitutional lawyers, nuclear weapons experts, and politicians including senator Ed Markey to discuss one possible tiny initial step- requiring that the president of the united states given the constitution’s stipulation that only congress has the authority to declare war, obtain prior congressional authorization before initiating a nuclear war.”

Cornelia van der Zeil also responded in an email why Brookline should take part in this decision. “We are hoping that other communities will follow suit. Northampton MA has already done so. There are bills in the US House and Senate as well as in our own state legislature and the state legislators in California and Minnesota. We want to put pressure on our leaders to work toward the abolition of nuclear weapons. These weapons threaten to end all life on earth.”

This is also one of the goals of Article 35, to redistribute the power to launch a nuclear attack to someone in congress to give the president permission to use nuclear weapons and keep them off hair- trigger alert.

Loechler and Van der Zeil plan to run a later town meeting to get more people in Brookline to back the resolution.