Dr. Bunch accepting the Medal of Freedomfrom President Johnson
"May there be, in our time, at long last,
a world at peace in which we, the people, may for once begin to make full use of the great good that is in us."
Nobel Prize Acceptance Speech
Beginning in 1947, Ralph Bunch served as assistant to the U.N. Special Committee on Palestine, and thereafter as the principal secretary of the U.N. Palestine Commission. In 1948 he traveled to the Middle East as the chief aide to Count Folke Bernadotte, who had been appointed by the U.N. to attempt to mediate the conflict. In September, when Bernadotte was assassinated, Bunche became the U.N.'s chief mediator. Working concluded the task with the signing of the 1949 Armistice Agreements, the work for which he received the Nobel Peace Prize in 1950 and many other honors.
Dr. Bunch was the foremost U.S. expert on colonialism in Africa, and at the end of World War II went to the State Department where he advised U.S. representatives to the Dumbarton Oaks Conference and the meetings that established the United Nations. He helped draft the trusteeship provisions of the U.N. Charter and assisted in organizing the Division of Trusteeship at the United Nations, becoming its director in 1947. He later served as undersecretary for Special Political Affairs and undersecretary-general of the United Nations.
He was active in the civil rights movement, using his great prestige to draw public attention to and support for civil rights in the United States. He declined President Truman's offer of the position of assistant secretary of state because of the segregated housing conditions in Washington, D. C.; helped to lead the civil rights march organized by Martin Luther King, Jr., in Montgomery, Alabama, in 1965; supported the action programs of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) and of the Urban League.
This week Andre Varchaver spoke to the students in my class, drawing on his very long experience with the United Nations. As I listened, it occurred to me that the students probably did not know about Ralph Bunch. I had the advantages of being old enough to remember his fame, of graduating from UCLA (Bunch is its most distinguished graduate), and actually having known one of his friends from his Los Angeles days. It seemed the least I could do to recall his importance in this posting on the blog.
It is also useful to recall how a U.S. citizen, working through the United Nations, could help to bring peace, at least temporarily, in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Ralph Bunch symbolizes the proudest part of the record the United States had in the past in attempting to resolve the conflict in the Middle East, and serves as a beacon for a return to policies promoting peace in the region.
Read Dr. Bunch's:
a world at peace in which we, the people, may for once begin to make full use of the great good that is in us."
Nobel Prize Acceptance Speech
Beginning in 1947, Ralph Bunch served as assistant to the U.N. Special Committee on Palestine, and thereafter as the principal secretary of the U.N. Palestine Commission. In 1948 he traveled to the Middle East as the chief aide to Count Folke Bernadotte, who had been appointed by the U.N. to attempt to mediate the conflict. In September, when Bernadotte was assassinated, Bunche became the U.N.'s chief mediator. Working concluded the task with the signing of the 1949 Armistice Agreements, the work for which he received the Nobel Peace Prize in 1950 and many other honors.
Dr. Bunch was the foremost U.S. expert on colonialism in Africa, and at the end of World War II went to the State Department where he advised U.S. representatives to the Dumbarton Oaks Conference and the meetings that established the United Nations. He helped draft the trusteeship provisions of the U.N. Charter and assisted in organizing the Division of Trusteeship at the United Nations, becoming its director in 1947. He later served as undersecretary for Special Political Affairs and undersecretary-general of the United Nations.
He was active in the civil rights movement, using his great prestige to draw public attention to and support for civil rights in the United States. He declined President Truman's offer of the position of assistant secretary of state because of the segregated housing conditions in Washington, D. C.; helped to lead the civil rights march organized by Martin Luther King, Jr., in Montgomery, Alabama, in 1965; supported the action programs of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) and of the Urban League.
This week Andre Varchaver spoke to the students in my class, drawing on his very long experience with the United Nations. As I listened, it occurred to me that the students probably did not know about Ralph Bunch. I had the advantages of being old enough to remember his fame, of graduating from UCLA (Bunch is its most distinguished graduate), and actually having known one of his friends from his Los Angeles days. It seemed the least I could do to recall his importance in this posting on the blog.
It is also useful to recall how a U.S. citizen, working through the United Nations, could help to bring peace, at least temporarily, in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Ralph Bunch symbolizes the proudest part of the record the United States had in the past in attempting to resolve the conflict in the Middle East, and serves as a beacon for a return to policies promoting peace in the region.
Read Dr. Bunch's:
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