Back in late June, member groups of United for Peace and Justice met outside Chicago for the coalition's 3rd National Assembly. At that gathering, delegates overwhelmingly voted in favor of a grassroots-driven national mobilization this fall. Instead of asking everyone to travel to Washington DC or New York City for one demonstration, the organizers from around the country who came to the Assembly decided it was time to offer people mass mobilizations closer to home, to enable much larger numbers of people to participate. While it remains important to go to Washington and New York, to directly confront the halls of power, we must also make it dramatically clear that opposition to the war and occupation in Iraq is strong, active, and nationwide.

In the past, we have also organized and supported locally coordinated days of action, and will do so in the future, however, delegates at the Sssembly recognized that massive numbers are necessary to get the attention of the media and of people around the country. Regional demonstrations enable us to organize actions that are widely accessible and draw the necessary numbers to demonstrate the strength of the peace movement and the desire to end the war and occupation in Iraq.