The American Physical Society's Involvement in the Defense of Human Rights

This session has been organized to remedy the possibility that many APS members do not fully appreciate how important and praiseworthy a role scientists in general, and physicists in particular, have played in the defense of human rights worldwide. The preceding talks in this session have described the efforts, often at great personal risk, of physicists and other scientists residing in a few selected oppressive states (namely China, the former Soviet Union, and Iran), to defend their and their fellow citizens' human rights. The preceding talks also have made reference to the frequently crucial support these embattled foreign scientists have received from scientists in the United States; the ready availability of such support is another important aspect of the scientific community's dedication to human rights. In this talk I shall concentrate on the support activities of this sort undertaken by the U.S. physics community through the APS, via the APS Committee on the International Freedom of Scientists (CIFS), of which activities the U.S. physics community can be justly proud. More specifically, I will review the history of CIFS since its formation, including details of its more noteworthy efforts on behalf of human rights. I also will very briefly summarize the important human rights efforts undertaken independently of the APS by several other organizations of American scientists, e.g. (to name just two), the Committee of Concerned Scientists (CCS) and the American Association for the Advancement of Science AAAS).