A Pacifist by Any Other Name Wouldn’t Stand Out on Ballot

All he was saying was give peace a chance.

And pacifist and Beatles fan Jerry Rubin has persuaded one judge to do just that.

From now on he can legally call himself Jerry Peace Activist Rubin.

The name change was prompted by Santa Monica election officials’ repeated refusal to list Rubin’s occupation as “peace activist” on the ballot when he unsuccessfully ran for City Council.

Election administrators asserted that the phrase would violate state rules that prohibit misleading occupation descriptions on ballots that could confuse voters.

The 60-year-old Rubin, a familiar figure in shorts and sandals when he sells antiwar buttons and bumper stickers on the 3rd Street Promenade and conducts a yearly John Lennon memorial service in Hollywood, contended that peace activism was his career.

Rubin sued over the ballot designation and lost at the state level. When the U.S. Supreme Court declined this fall to take the case, he petitioned Santa Monica Superior Court for the name change and a hearing was scheduled for Dec. 11 -- Rubin’s birthday.

Expecting routine approval of his new moniker, Rubin organized a public birthday-cake cutting, with a “peace party and concert” afterward.

“I was respectful. I even wore long pants to court,” Rubin said.

But Judge Alan B. Haber, alluding to Rubin’s past tussles over the “peace activist” designation, initially balked at signing the request, saying he wanted more time to ponder it.

Worried that his name change was being quashed, Rubin went to his party and discovered that his specially decorated “peace activist” celebratory cake had been squashed.

“The box lid was pushed down on the icing and it was wrecked,” he said.

Rubin’s identity was left up in the air until Thursday, when Haber finally signed off on the name change.

With the court order in hand, Rubin marched off to re-register to vote and to apply for a new state identification card bearing his new name. “I don’t drive a car. I don’t have a driver’s license,” he said.

On Friday, Rubin appealed to State Sen. Sheila Kuehl (D-Santa Monica) and Assemblywoman Fran Pavley (D-Agoura Hills) to introduce legislation that would change the state’s election code so that the word “activist” would be defined as an occupation and not just as a status.

Rubin said he was uncertain whether he would run for City Council again -- he said he would meet with supporters next month to discuss it. But if he does, Santa Monica officials will finally have to print “peace activist” on the ballot, no matter what the state Legislature decides to do.

And Jerry Peace Activist Rubin will finally have peace of mind.