International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons

"The awareness that we are all human beings together has become lost in war and through politics."

"We are constantly being told about a 'permissible amount of radiation.' Who permitted it? Who has any right to permit it? This propaganda [about the safety of nuclear tests] will continue to set the tone in certain newspapers. But beside it the truth about the danger of nuclear tests marches imperturbably along, influencing an ever-increasing section of public opinion. In the long run, even the most efficiently organized propaganda can do nothing against the truth."

Many friends and well-known scientists, headed by his friend Albert Einstein, urged Dr. Albert Schweitzer to protest in public against nuclear bombs and the atomic tests. Renowned scientists had the idea that the reputation of Albert Schweitzer could help to awaken the public to the problem of nuclear pollution and the consequent danger to human beings.

On the 4th of November 1954, in his acceptance speech in Oslo for the Nobel Peace Prize of 1952, Schweitzer spoke of the danger of nuclear weapons.Albert Schweitzer's Nobel Peace Prize Lecture

Schweitzer wrote a letter to the American President Dwight Eisenhower: "In my heart I carry the hope I may somehow be able to contribute to the peace of the world. This I know has always been our deepest wish. We both share the conviction that humanity must find a way to control the weapons which now menace the very existence of life on earth. May it be given to us both to see the day when the world's people will realize that the fate of all humanity is now at stake, and that it is urgently necessary to make the bold decisions that can deal adequately with the agonizing situation in which the world now find itself."

In 1957 Schweitzer published 'A Declaration of Conscience', his public appeal against the development of nuclear weapons. Radio Oslo broadcast Schweitzer's "Declaration of Conscience". The manuscripts were read by Gunnar Jahn, the president of the Norwegian Nobel Prize Committee. The broadcasts were made by radio Oslo on the 28th, 29th and 30th of April 1958. There were various echoes around the world. The declaration was transmitted by 140 other radio stations all around the world. Many broadcast services - in the east and west - were forbidden by their governments to broadcast it.

The statements, 'The Renunciation of Nuclear Tests', 'The Danger of an Atomic War', and 'Negotiations at the Highest Level' call for the abandonment of both nuclear tests and the production of nuclear weapons, and are published in book form under the title 'Peace or Atomic War?'.