What Our Foremothers Intended:

Looking to situate annual Mother’s Day celebrations in their
original antiwar context, several Santa Barbaran women and mothers
formed the MotherHearts organization about six months ago. The
group—which is committed to stopping war in any form—will have its
first public demonstration this Sunday at Arlington West, featuring
live music, poetry, and speakers. At the heart of the gathering
will be homage to Julia Ward Howe—probably best known as the author
of the “Battle Hymn of the Republic”—who conceived the Mother’s Day
holiday more than a century ago in the wake of the Civil War.
Verbalizing the spirit of the day, Howe penned the Mother’s Day
Proclamation in 1870, which calls on all women and moms of the
world to “leave all that may be left of home for a great and
earnest day of counsel” against the atrocities and death of
war.