Nuclear Consciousness Raising

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Volunteers in Spokane, Wash., Muscatine, Iowa, and Washington led local tours of hypothetical nuclear devastation. Hundreds of black, helium-filled balloons were released in Houston and Chapel Hill, N.C., each balloon carrying a note about windswept nuclear fallout. In Belle Glade, Fla. (pop. 18,000), as in many communities, local churches sponsored a showing of The Last Epidemic, a film distributed by Physicians for Social Responsibility about nuclear war's medical horrors. Doctors from several hospitals described the same bleak scenario at a rally in Philadelphia.

Dozens of sign-carrying demonstrators dodged rush-hour traffic in downtown Memphis to pass out leaflets to motorists. Ron Thomas, a clean-cut Memphis State University junior, wore a sheet and a homemade death mask for the event. "I call myself a Christian," he says, "and if I'm really serious about the religious commands of peace, then I felt I had to do something about nuclear weapons." At Yale, 1,000 people filled the university chapel to hear Evangelist Billy Graham, a very recent convert to the cause, denounce nuclear war as the ultimate sin. In Rochester, Mich., a well-to-do Detroit suburb, a crowd of 500 paid $10 apiece to be enlightened by four speakers, including SALT Negotiator Paul Warnke.

Molander himself preached at twelve functions across the country, including a 7 a.m. breakfast rally with 300 citizens of his home town, Marinette, Wis. (pop. 12,600). "It's good to be back," said Molander, before getting to the point: "After a nuclear war, Marinette would never be inhabitable again."

Molander's organization does not endorse any specific arms control proposal, but the Reagan Administration is fearful that the spreading obsession with nuclear holocaust could pressure the U.S. to undertake an arms freeze prematurely. Both on the eve of Ground Zero's kickoff and during the week, the President felt obliged to express his sympathy with the fundamental fears of the participants. Yet he repeated his objection to an immediate freeze on nuclear weaponry; such an agreement, he argued, would simply lock in a supposed Soviet missile advantage.

Nevertheless, sponsors of a U.S. -Soviet nuclear freeze initiative in California chose Ground Zero Week to file 750,000 petition signatures, more than twice the number necessary to put the proposal on November's ballot. The measure would require the Governor to call on the President and Congress to propose to the Soviets a mutual halt to all nuclear arms development. According to a new survey, if the election were held now, California voters would approve the freeze by a 2-to-l victory.

—By Kurt Andersen. Reported by Benjamin W. Cate/Los Angeles and Gary Lee/Washington