Archives West Finding Aid

The bulk of this series features items from the far-left and student protest movement. Much of the material is fliers produced in Seattle.

This series features literature produced by specific radical organizations in the United States and Canada. The bulk of the materials was published during the 1960s and 1970s.

Draft Resistance-Seattle was a protest group in the Seattle, Washington-area that actively opposed the draft during the Vietnam war. They burned draft cards, staged solidarity protests along the Canadian border, and partnered with the local SDS chapter to organize anti-war protests on college campuses.

Located in Seattle, Washington, the George Jackson Brigade was a urban guerrilla group that opposed both corporate and state institutions. They claimed to have committed a number of crimes, including bank robberies and pipe bombings. They also executed the successful jailbreak of one of their members.

Students for a Democratic Society was an activist group that grew out of the Civil Rights movement of the 1950s and helped fuel the student protest movement of the 1960s and 1970s. One of the best known student organizations of the Vietnam-era, the SDS boasted Thomas Hayden, who later became a California state senator, as a founding member. The group, with Hayden's help produced the Port Huron Statement, one of the best known political manifestos of the 1960s.

The Student Union for Peace Action was a Toronto-based organization during the 1960s and 1970s that opposed both the war in Vietnam and the nuclear arms race. The group promoted student activism on Canadian campuses as well as championed racial equality and an end to human rights violations.

The Weather Underground Organization, more commonly referred to as the Weathermen, was a splinter group of the SDS. The organization advocated for a militant approach to social activism, with the goal of overthrowing the U.S. government and establishing a society ruled by the working class.

Much of the material in this series was produced during the 1990s and focuses on left-wing issues such as environmentalism, anarchism, labor relations, and communism. There are a couple of periodicals that focus specifically on marijuana legalization.

None of the periodicals in this collection represent a complete run and date ranges vary widely. Often only a few issues of a particular title exist within the collection. Where possible, subject keywords and/or short descriptions of the publication are listed with the title.

Certain organizations published more than one title, for example the Central Committee for Conscientious Objectors published three separate periodicals—CCCO News Notes, News Notes of the CCCO, and The Objector. In each case titles have been filed alphabetically within the series rather than grouped together under the organization name.