of the committee. It was moved by Mrs. Catt and carried that the convention request the Official Board to continue the Congressional Committee and to cooperate with it in such a way as to remove further causes of embarrassment to the association. The motion was amended that the board should appropriate what money could be spared for the work of this committee.[1]
The movement for woman suffrage was now so plainly centering in Congress, which had been the goal for over forty years, that there was a widespread feeling that the national headquarters should be established in Washington. Mrs. Oliver H. P. Belmont, a delegate from New York, through whose generosity it had been possible to take them to that city in 1900, offered a motion that they now be removed to Washington. She had given notice of this action the preceding day and the opponents were prepared. A motion to lay it on the table was quickly made and all discussion cut off. The opposition of the national officers Was SO apparent that many delegates hesitated to express their convictions for the affirmative but nevertheless the vote stood 134 ayes, and 169 noes.
The National Association had now so many auxiliaries and so much work was being done in all the States that the day sessions were largely consumed in hearing reports from them and the usual conferences and symposiums were almost crowded off the program. For the first time Hawaii took her place among the auxiliaries, a suffrage society having been formed there during
- ↑ When the board met after the convention it was disclosed that the Congressional Union, instead of being merely a local society to assist the committee in its efforts with Congress, as Miss Paul had said, was a national organization to work for the Federal Amendment. That is, it was to duplicate the work which the National Association had been formed to do in 1869 and had brought to its present advanced stage. The association's letterheads had been used for this purpose and persons from all parts of the country had sent their names and money, many supposing they were assisting the National Association. Miss Paul had been obtaining names for membership in the Union during all the sessions of the convention. The board decided that there must be complete separation of the work of the committee and the Union; that the same person could not be at the head of both and that the plans of the Union must be regularly submitted to the Board. Miss Paul refused to accept these conditions and she was at once relieved from the chairmanship of the Congressional Committee and the other members resigned. The Union was continued as a separate organization. Another committee was appointed by the National American Association consisting of Mrs. Ruth Hanna McCormick, chairman; Mrs. Antoinette Funk, Mrs. Sherman Booth, all of Illinois, Mrs. Desha Breckinridge (Ky.), Mrs. Helen H. Gardener (D. C.), Mre. H. Edward Dreier (N. Y.), Mrs. James Tucker (Calif.). Headquarters were opened in the Munsecy Building, Washington, with the Illinois women in charge.
