September 29, 1943
Six conscientious objectors, in prison for refusing to cooperate with the draft during WW II, began a hunger strike to protest the censorship of mail and reading material in prison. The strike ended in December 1943. James V. Bennett, head of the federal Bureau of Prisons, ended the censorship but retained the right to open and read mail for security purposes. At the time one out of six inmates held in United States’ federal prisons was a conscientious objector.
