Nation: What's in a Symbol

American Opinion magazine, published by John Birch Society Founder Robert Welch, compared the familiar peace symbol to an anti-Christian "broken cross" carried by the Moors when they invaded Spain in the 8th century. A recent national Republican newsletter noted an ominous similarity to a symbol used by the Nazis in World War II; some experts say it was a letter in an ancient Nordic alphabet. Any resemblance, however, is probably coincidental. The peace design was devised in Britain for the first Ban-the-Bomb Aldermaston march in 1958. The lines inside the circle stand for "nuclear disarmament." They are a stylized combination of...