Fanny Fligelman Brin (20 October 1884 – 4 September 1961) was an American political activist best known for her peace advocacy work in the interwar years.Bronk, Joan and Faith Rogow. Gone to Another Meeting: The National Council of Jewish Women, 1893-1993. The University of Alabama Press, 2005, p. 226-227.
Brin fought for women's rights and peace as a political realist and felt impelled to act at every political call for further violence. She became involved in politics as a suffragist while she was a student at the University of Minnesota from 1902 to 1906.
She influenced public opinion through her activism work in women's groups, including prominent leadership in the National Council of Jewish Women (NCJW) and active membership in the Women's International League for Peace and Freedom (WILPF) and the National Committee on the Cause and Cure of War (NCCCW).Klapper, Melissa R. Ballots, Babies, and Banners of Peace: American Jewish Women's Activism, 1890-1940. NYU Press, 2013, p. 132. Her greatest impact was made through organizing large groups of women around the peace cause, exerting influence to push for peace work within the groups she was involved with, speaking to groups of women to educate about the importance of peace advocacy, and reaching women through her writing in NCJW's publication The Jewish Woman.
Brin's work across peace advocacy groups and recognizing her intersecting identities as a Jewish woman committed to peace allowed her to have a significant impact on the movement and to galvanize her community of Jewish women toward the pacifist cause.
Biography Early life and family Brin was born in Berlad, Romania to John Fligelman and Antonette Friedman Fligelman.Bronk and Rogow 2005, p. 226. One of six siblings,Stuhler, Barbara and Gretchen V. Kreuter. Women of Minnesota: Selected Biographical Essays. Minnesota Historical Society Press, 1977, p. 284. her family immigrated to the United States when she was three months old in 1884. Due to family ties and a strong Romanian Jewish community, the Fligelman family found themselves in Minneapolis, Minnesota, where Brin grew up and spent the majority of her life.Meerse, Katherine Clare. "Progressives for Peace and Social Justice: The Minnesota Branch of the Women's International League for Peace and Freedom, 1921-1941." University of Minnesota, 1999, p. 71. Brin grew up with stronger ties to the United States than to Romania; if she ever fell into speaking Yiddish, her father would tell her to “talk United States.”Stuhler and Kreuter 1977, p. 284.
Brin's parents had great influence on her interests and education growing up. Her father introduced her to politics at an early age, taking her to see Eugene Debs speak when she was just 10 years old.Meerse 1999, p. 71. This likely contributed to her interest in politics and later drive to engage in political activism. Her mother was a strong proponent of her education,Stuhler and Kreuter 1977, p. 286. and Brin's critical thinking skills that she developed through her early learning and extracurricular involvement likely contributed to her deep understanding of international politics that she developed later in life. As a student at South High School in Minneapolis, she was active in her high school debate league, developing skills in communications and argumentation that would support her activism work in later years.
College life and early career Brin attended the University of Minnesota for college and was a Phi Beta Kappa graduate in 1906. As a college student, Brin was involved in oratory and debate and had a strong academic record. She was the first woman to win a prize in the Pillsbury oratorical contest on a speech entitled “Russian Bureaucracy and the Jews.” Her involvements taught her invaluable public speaking skills that set her up for success in later activism work, and her accomplishments likely empowered her to take on future leadership roles. Her speech topics focused on international politics, showing her early interest in a topic that she later dedicated her activism toward.
After graduating from college, Brin taught English for several years.Klapper 2013, p. 104. Teaching likely furthered her public speaking and relational abilities that proved crucial to her later success in political advocacy. She also joined Peripatetics, an elite women's study club for Jewish college graduates in Minneapolis. Joining this group gave Brin an opportunity to begin building her community of other Jewish educated women in Minneapolis, a group she would later be intimately involved with through her activism work.
Marriage and family Fanny Fligelman Brin married Arthur Brin, the president and treasurer of Brin Glass Company, in 1913. Together they had three children, Rachel, Howard, and Charles. Arthur Brin made a high income which allowed Fanny Brin financial stability and ample leisure time. The Brins were able to afford to hire domestic help to take care of the children and cook and clean in the home.Klapper 2013, p. 105. Because of her socioeconomic status that her marriage afforded her, Brin was able to dedicate herself to activism full-time. Most women involved in social movements at the time of Brin's life came from strong financial means because activism required a large time commitment. The level of Brin's involvement would not have been possible without the resources she had access to. Although her leadership in advocacy is important, it does call into question who had access to the ability to be an activist and whose voices were stifled in social movements due to this need for time and resources to be able to fully participate. Rabbi Deborah Brin, Brin's granddaughter, gave a speech at the Minnesota State Capitol Rotunda on September 8, 2019, which was the official 100th anniversary of women getting the right to vote in the state. She spoke in honor of Fanny Fligelman Brin.
Political actions and beliefs Interwar period peace activism After the bloodshed of World War I, peace advocacy groups came to prominence worldwide.Klapper 2013, p. 106. Peace advocacy spanned political affiliations and caught the attention of a diverse group of activists interested in building a better future globally. Women in the United States saw the peace movement as a natural next step after gaining the right to vote, and women broadly saw the plight of nonviolence as a uniquely feminist cause rooted in feminine values of the time, including human dignity and preserving life.Klapper 2013, p. 107. Peace efforts in legislation, like the Kellogg-Briand Pact that rejected armed force as a use of conflict resolution, were created by men and with the priorities and assumptions of men in mind.Sharp, Ingrid, and Matthew Stibbe. “Women’s International Activism During the Inter-War Period, 1919-1939.” Women’s History Review 26.2, 2017, p. 164. Therefore, women felt called to work on peace advocacy to bring their voices into a movement they felt reflected their priorities. However, women's activism in the peace movement was not necessarily always accepted. Activism was considered by some to be “unpatriotic” and “unmotherly” because it detracted from the women's duty to care for their children.Sharp and Stibbe 2017, p. 165. Women who participated in the peace movement defied expectations to advocate for their beliefs. In this context, Brin spent much of her time and energy in her peace advocacy efforts focused on the ratification of the Kellogg-Briand Pact. While NCJW was at first timid to support the Kellogg-Briand Pact, Brin called strongly on the group to make it a priority, and they did eventually join other women's groups in its support in 1928.Stuhler and Kreuter 1977, p. 289. Through NCJW, Brin effectively organized 1200 women in Minnesota alone to support the Pact and 700 participants to participate in a conference to mobilize around this piece of legislation.Stuhler and Kreuter 1977, p. 289-290. Brin and other women peace activists often invoked the Pact to frame the entirety of their peace advocacy as centering around this objective, thus making it their own.Limberg, Michael. “‘In Relation to the Pact’: Radical Pacifists and the Kellogg-Briand Pact, 1928-1939.” Peace & Change vol. 39 no. 3, 2014, p. 396-411. Thanks to these efforts throughout the peace movement, Kellogg-Briand Pact was ratified in 1929.Stuhler and Kreuter 1977, p. 290.
In addition to her advocacy for the Kellogg-Briand Pact, Brin dedicated herself to fighting against compulsory military training in the interwar years.Meerse 1999, p. 61. Brin argued strongly that bringing military training into schools would create a more militaristic mindset in the United States. In an opinion column in NCJW's The Jewish Woman, Brin wrote, “Are we not, by allowing the Military Department to put military training in our civil education institutions, introducing in this country a feature more militaristic than that which any country ever essayed?”Brin, Fanny. “National Chairman Discusses Military Training in Schools.” The Jewish Woman vol. VI, 1926, p. 31. Although Brin took a strong stance on compulsory military training, NCJW kept its distance from this advocacy, focusing on more moderate efforts.Meerse 1999, 59. Brin often pushed the organization to take more radical stances. By the 1930s, Brin began to focus her advocacy efforts on creating a new international institution that could prevent conflict and end war.Stuhler and Kreuter 1977, p. 294. This characterized much of her activism moving forward.
World War II activism As World War II commenced, Brin began to revise her long-standing radical pacifist views, specifically around the opposition to a large American defense program.Stuhler and Kreuter 1977, p. 295. The world saw a collapse of France and the potential of a German victory. Brin could no longer reconcile her work to push NCJW toward advocacy for “’…demobilizing armaments.’” When Japanese forces attacked Pearl Harbor, Brin responded by reaffirming her commitment to international collective security and a resolve for peace after the war. She declared, “‘We must never forget the lessons we have learned, that isolation does not protect us, that it breaks down when we need it most; that when it breaks down, it ends in intervention; that we can only avoid intervention by setting up agencies which make possible collective action. We must learn and teach the lesson of cooperation and search for the form it must take.’”Paton-Walsh, Margaret. “Women’s Organizations, U.S. Foreign Policy, and the Far Eastern Crisis, 1937–1941.” Pacific Historical Review vol. 70 no. 4, University of California Press, 2001, p. 624. Brin refocused her advocacy in this moment on the need for international cooperation as a collective security measure. Throughout World War II, she advocated for global institutions to collaborate for conflict resolution. She articulated, “‘War is global, peace is global, and prosperity is global.’” In addition to her advocacy work, Brin devoted time to supporting Jewish refugees displaced due to the Holocaust.Stuhler and Kreuter 1977, p. 292. As a Jew who had immigrated to the United States at a young age herself, she likely felt a strong connection to this cause. Brin ran a Minneapolis coordinating committee for refugee aid and headed the state refugee committee. In 1943, Brin advocated for American participation in an international conflict resolution organization, what would eventually become the United Nations.Stuhler and Kreuter 1977, p. 296. This put Brin on a path toward further UN advocacy.
Post-World War II activism