Biography
One of the eight Union Theological Seminary students known as the "Union Eight" who, on October 16, 1940, the first day of registration under the Selective Training and Service Act of 1940, collectively refused to register for the draft despite their automatic seminarian exemption. Their joint statement objected to conscription itself: "To us, the war system is an evil part of our social order, and we declare we cannot cooperate with it... We believe that war and conscription are sins against God and humanity." Convicted in U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York; sentenced November 14, 1940 to 1 year at FCI Danbury (Connecticut). Most served roughly 9 months before parole. Co-defendants: George Houser, David Dellinger, Don Benedict, Meredith Dallas, Joseph Bevilacqua, Richard Wichlei, William Lovell, Howard Spragg. After release Benedict was ordained a Methodist minister and in 1948 co-founded the East Harlem Protestant Parish, an early urban-storefront-church experiment. Active in civil rights and anti-poverty work; long-time executive of Community Renewal Society in Chicago.
Donald Benedict was one of the eight Union Theological Seminary students who refused to register for the draft in October 1940, the opening act of organized Second World War draft resistance in America. Sentenced to a year and a day at Danbury, he later refused to cooperate a second time and served an additional term. He went on to a long career as a socially engaged urban minister, leading the Community Renewal Society in Chicago.