With, theoretically, representatives from all states parties and language federations, the National Committee met once a year as the highest body of the Socialist Party between congresses. Part of the discussion in 1911 was to review the progress of the new Women’s Department.

‘National Committee Discuss Plans to Get Women for Socialism’ from The Chicago Daily Socialist. Vol. 5 No. 243. August 11, 1911.

National Committee Urge Propaganda Among Organized Workers.

Prepared with many new ideas and plans, members of the Woman’s National Committee, coming from all parts of the country, gathered today at the national office of the Socialist party for their first meeting to devise ways and means to carry on the work of Socialist propaganda.

Talk Strike Results

One of the main things to be discussed will be the work of Socialist women among women of organized labor.

The splendid results accomplished by the women of Chicago during the garment workers’ strike and in New York and Philadelphia during the shirtwaist makers’ strike will be reviewed with a view to letting the women in other parts of the country become acquainted with the tactics used, which proved so successful, and to analyze other plans which have been found serviceable in helping the organized working women.

In New York a ball was held for the benefit of the shirtwaist strikers at of the which so many turned out that two extra halls and orchestras had to be secured.

Raise Strike Funds

The Socialist women were the main people to organize the girls and carry the strike to a successful conclusion. In Chicago almost $6,000 was raised by the Socialist women by selling The Chicago Daily Socialist upon the streets.

During the past year hundreds of thousands of pieces of Socialist literature dealing with the woman question have been distributed over the country. Plans will be discussed to make this work more effective, to drop methods of distribution and agitation that have not proved advantageous and to institute others that are thought more competent.

Ethel Whitehead of California has written a book with several Socialist plays adaptable for women and an effort will be made to have women push work along that line, as it has been demonstrated to be one of the best ways of teaching Socialism.

A proposition will be offered to have a woman’s correspondent elected in every state who will work in cooperation with the Intercollegiate Socialist Society, for the purpose of distributing its literature among college students and reaching the women students of the different schools.

Organize Every State

The Socialist women will draw up a petition to congress demanding that woman suffrage be put to a referendum vote of the people of the different states for adoption or rejection.

The committee will decide whether they will secure the help of the suffrage associations and woman’s labor organizations in getting signers. A petition will be presented to Socialist Congressman Victor L. Berger to lay before congress next spring.

Angelina Napolitano will find staunch supporters in the Socialist women, for they will do all in their power to have her set free, so that she may again care for her children.

How to make the demand for her liberty most effective will be discussed in full and an aggressive campaign for her absolute pardon will be inaugurated.

About Welfare Exhibit

The women will also try to secure pictures of the exhibitions which appeared at the Child Welfare Exhibits at New York and Chicago. These pictures will be sent to all Socialist and labor papers of the country, with an article giving the Socialist interpretation of them.

The committee will go to Milwaukee Saturday, where they will participate in the conference of Socialist officials and the national executive committee. They will return to Chicago on Monday to continue the session until all business has been dispensed with.

WOMEN TELL ABOUT WORK FOR SOCIALISM

“It is the duty of every Socialist, either man or woman, to help in the special work of awakening the mothers of the race to the new day,” said Mrs. Otto F. Branstetter, member of the Woman’s National Committee, who is in the city taking part in the conference between the Woman’s National Committee and the National Executive Committee.

Work Extended

“Since 1908 the Woman’s National Committee has been systematically carrying on its special work for the Socialist party. Gradually our first duty of bringing woman into the Socialist party has brought before the membership new needs and new demands along these lines.

“As these new needs have presented themselves to the committee it has met them with new plans and a gradual extension of our work. During the past year the work has been especially effectual in awakening and bringing into the party hundreds of class conscious women.

“But the most far-reaching work of the committee is in the awakening of the men comrades to the fact that the Woman’s National Committee is not a ladies’ aid society nor pink-tea institution, whose purpose in existing is to serve coffee and ice cream to the public.

“The fact that for the first time we are meeting in conference with the executive committee proves woman’s influence to be a live factor in working class politics.

Review Work

“The object of this meeting is to review the work of the past year and to Initiate new work and new departments in the party work.

“Special attention will be paid to the preparation of a petition to be presented to congress. The advisability of a Socialist teachers’ bureau will be discussed.

“Our special Sunday school committee will report on the progress of their department and advise methods of perfecting and extending this department into cities and into country districts.

Counteract Other Agitation

“The extensive agitation of the bourgeois social center clubs will be counteracted by plans for the establishment of similar institutions or clubs for the workers, on the farm and in the city.

“The past year’s work of the Woman ‘s National Committee shows a greater increase in membership and enthusiasm than is shown by any other organization of women in the country.”

Anna A. Maley, woman’s national organizer, has just returned from a tour of the west.

“A marked increase of interest in our movement has taken place among the women of Colorado within the past year,” she says.

“At Grand Junction fully as many women as men attended our large meeting, which was held in the auditorium of the Y.M.C.A. building.

Hold Big Picnic

“Farmington, New Mexico, is one of the most charming spots in the west. A great picnic gathering listened to the Socialist idea of patriotism there on July 4. Lizzie Holmes, who will be remembered as one of the participants in the famous Haymarket meeting with Albert Parsons, keeps up the agitations among the women of that region. Thirteen women are on the roll of are on the local at Trinidad, where a year ago there were but two.”

Octavia Floaten, woman’s correspondent for Colorado, has been working in that state. She states that they have a plan on foot to have a woman’s correspondent In every local in order to better carry on the work among the women.

The Chicago Socialist, sometimes daily sometimes weekly, was published from 1902 until 1912 as the paper of the Chicago Socialist Party. The roots of the paper lie with Workers Call, published from 1899 as a Socialist Labor Party publication, becoming a voice of the Springfield Social Democratic Party after splitting with De Leon in July, 1901. It became the Chicago Socialist Party paper with the SDP’s adherence and changed its name to the Chicago Socialist in March, 1902. In 1906 it became a daily and published until 1912 by Local Cook County of the Socialist Party and was edited by A.M. Simons if the International Socialist Review. A cornucopia of historical information on the Chicago workers movements lies within its pages.

PDF of full issue: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/chicago-daily-socialist/1911/110811-chicagodailysocialist-v05n243.pdf