William Sloane Coffin Jr.

The death of the Rev. William Sloane Coffin Jr. sent out concentric ripples of grief that touched all who care about peace, social justice, civil rights and other causes he so eloquently championed during his busy, engaged life.

Many in the Nation community worked with him in these causes, or admired him as an inspirational leader. His public witness began in 1961, when he made a dangerous Freedom Ride in the South. He was heeding the call to lend the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.'s endangered nonviolent movement the legitimacy of a white Presbyterian minister and Yale chaplain with hereditary roots in the WASP establishment. During the Vietnam War, this World War II veteran and former CIA officer again used his celebrity and his powerful preaching to spark the draft resistance movement.

Nation contributor Rabbi Arthur Waskow, who met Coffin in that movement, called him "one of the greatest of our 'prophetic voices.'" Marcus Raskin, a member of the Nation editorial board, joined Coffin in the Boston Five, a group of antiwar activists, including Dr. Benjamin Spock, who practiced civil disobedience in solidarity with young Americans and were indicted for conspiring to violate the draft laws. To Raskin, what was striking about Coffin was his "powerful moral core," religiously grounded. "Courage was a major part of his life; he had a kind of nobility," Raskin said. Yet he fondly recalled Coffin's "sunny disposition."

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