November Coalition Awards and Recognitions
2001 - The Robert C. Randall Award for Achievement in the
Field of Citizen Action
 Robert
C. Randall pioneered the medical marijuana issue in America.
A model citizen activist who took on the federal government,
assisted in the defense of people accused of criminal offenses
involving marijuana and worked to change the entire federal prohibition
against marijuna's medical use. Citizen action is at the heart
of a successful democracy. The Robert C. Randall Award honors
those citizens who make democracy work in the difficult area
of drug law and policy reform.
Nora Callahan, Randy Credico, Chris Conrad, Mikki Norris and
Virgina Resner, grassroots activists focusing on the prisoners
of the drug war, received this award at the annual Lindesmith-Drug
Policy Foundation Conference in New Mexico. Robert C. Randall
died the night of the awards ceremony.
2000 Letelier-Moffitt Human Rights Awards
 The Letelier-Moffitt
Human Rights Awards honor two Institute for Policy
Studies' colleagues who were murdered on September 21, 1976 by
agents of Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet. Orlando Letelier,
the target of the car bomb attack, was a former Chilean ambassador
and well-known critic of Pinochet. Ronni Karpen Moffitt was a
25-year-old IPS development assistant and committed peace activist.
Their murder on Massachussets Avenue remains the only proven
act of state-sponsored terrorism in our nation's capitol.
According to Sanho Tree, Director of the IPS' Drug Policy
Project, "As with political prisoners the world over, the
thought that keeps many other prisoners going is the knowledge
that they have not been forgotten by the world they were forced
to leave behind. The November Coalition reminds us of our war
against our fellow citizens - and our common obligation to seek
their freedom." Full
Story
 1998 Thomas Paine Award
On January 16, 1998 the Thomas Paine Society of Pasadena selected
Dr. John Beresford, Nora Callahan and Ralph Nader the recipients
of the first annual Thomas Paine Awards. The Thomas Paine Awards
were instituted to recognize and reward individuals who through
their efforts have helped to encourage and inspire freedom, justice
and reasoned thinking, principles that Thomas Paine struggled
to promote throughout his life and works. Full
Story
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