Women at the Hague

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International Congress of Women in 1915. left to right:1. Lucy Thoumaian – Armenia, 2. Leopoldine Kulka, 3. Laura Hughes – Canada, 4. Rosika Schwimmer – Hungary, 5. Anika Augspurg – Germany, 6. Jane Addams – United States, 7. Eugénie Hamer – Belgium, 8. Aletta Jacobs – Netherlands, 9. Chrystal Macmillan – UK, 10. Rosa Genoni – Italy, 11. Anna Kleman – Sweden, 12. Thora Daugaard – Denmark, 13. Louise Keilhau – Norway

Women at the Hague was an International Congress of Women conference held at The Hague, Netherlands in April 1915. It had over 1,100 delegates and it established an International Committee of Women for Permanent Peace (ICWPP) with Jane Addams as president. It led to the creation of the Women's International League for Peace and Freedom (WILPF).

Background[edit]

The June 1915 International Woman Suffrage Alliance Congress was scheduled to meet in Berlin. When World War I broke out, the Deutscher Verband für Frauenstimmrecht (German Union for Woman Suffrage) withdrew as host. A notice was published in the December 1914 issue of Jus Suffragii announcing the cancellation. A response to the notice, published in the same issue and written the Dutch pacifist, feminist, and suffragist Aletta Jacobs proposing that the conference be held in the Netherlands, as it was a neutral country. Recognizing that the IWSA could not sponsor a conference to discuss foreign policy and the war during the conflict, Chrystal Macmillan privately communicated to Jacobs, suggesting that individuals and organizations could be invited to an unsponsored convention.[1]: xxxvii–xxviii [2]: 425–426  Many IWSA members, including German leaders Anita Augspurg and Lida Gustava Heymann, echoed the need for a conference and stressed that it should be autonomous so as not to damage the women's movement objectives.[2]: 425, 429 

Preparations[edit]

In that regard, Jacobs invited representatives of both sides of the conflict and neutral women to a planning meeting held at Amsterdam early in February 1915. The goal of the congress was to protest the war then raging in Europe, and to suggest ways to prevent war in the future.[1]: xxxix [3]: 146–149  Those present included from Belgium – Flor Burton, Mme. and Mlle. Mulle, and Mme. Van Praag; from Britain – Kathleen Courtney, Emily Leaf, Macmillan, Catherine Marshall, and Theodora Wilson Wilson; from Germany – Augspurg, Heymann, Frida Perlen, and Mme. Von Schlumberger; and twenty-six activists from the Netherlands.[1]: xxxix  [Notes 1] A preliminary programme was drafted at this meeting, and it was agreed to request the Dutch women to form a committee to take in hand all the arrangement for the Congress and to issue the invitations. The expenses of the Congress were guaranteed by British, Dutch and German women present who all agreed to raise one third of the sum required.[3]: 146–149 

Invitations to take part in the Congress were sent to women's organisations and mixed organisations as well as to individual women all over the world. Each organisation was invited to appoint two delegates. Women only could become members of the Congress and they were required to express themselves in general agreement with the resolutions on the preliminary programme. This general agreement was interpreted to imply the conviction (a) That international disputes should be settled by pacific means; (b) That the parliamentary franchise should be extended to women.[3]: 146–147 

The Congress[edit]

The Congress opened on April 28[4] and was attended by 1,136 participants from both neutral and belligerent nations.[5] The Congress was carried on under two important rules: 1) That discussions on the relative national responsibility for or conduct of the present war and 2) Resolutions dealing with the rules under which war shall in future be carried on, shall be outside the scope of the Congress.[3]: 147  The focus was to remain on establishing peace immediately when the conflict ended and developing lasting peacekeeping measures.[2]: 427 

The Congress adopted much of the platform of Woman's Peace Party (WPP),[6]: 68  which had passed at a January convention held in Washington, D.C. The WPP platform included arms limitations, diplomatic mediation of the war, development of legislation and economic policies to prevent war, and creation of an international policing force instead of national militaries.[6]: 63  Among resolutions passed by the attendees were affirmation of the need for peace and for no territorial transfers to be granted in a peace settlement without the consent of the population affected.[7]: 148  Other resolutions called for creation of an international permanent council to peacefully mediate differences between nations, involvement of women in the peace processes, and women's suffrage.[7]: 148–149 [8]: 258–259  Participants at the conference established the International Committee of Women for Permanent Peace, subsequently known as the Women's International League for Peace and Freedom (WILPF).[8]: 256, 262  with Jane Addams as president.[6]: 69 

Delegations[edit]

Six women wearing long winter coats and hats standing in front of a building
1915 Belgian delegation

There were problems in getting 1200 women together during wartime. The delegation from Britain was trimmed by the Foreign Office to 24 delegates and actually only two (or three) made it to the Hague. Italy only managed one delegate and she was keen to note that she did not represent her country. One woman also came from Canada to represent what was called at the time "the Colonies".[9] Neither France or Russia sent delegations because of the war and the potential that attendance might appear disloyal.[6]: 67  The Belgian delegation arrived late because they had to obtain travel documents from the German authorities of Occupied Belgium, undergo frisking at the border crossing at Essen, Belgium, and then walk two hours to Roosendaal, where they caught a train to The Hague. To reinforce the spirit of cooperation, all five of the Belgian delegates were invited by Augspurg to sit on the rostrum.[10]: 210  Only Eugénie Hamer agreed, with the caveat that she be allowed to address the congress, which was granted.[11]: 52 [2]: 427 

Countries represented included the United States, which sent 47 members; Sweden, 12; Norway, 12; Netherlands, 1,000; Italy, 1; Hungary, 9; Germany, 28; Denmark, 6; Canada, 2; Belgium, 5; Austria, 6, and Great Britain, 3, although 180 others from there were prevented from sailing owing to the closing of the North Sea for military reasons. The Congress, which was attended by a large number of visitors as well as by the members, was extremely successful. Proceedings were conducted with the greatest goodwill throughout, and the accompanying resolutions were passed at the business sessions.[3]

Initial International Committee of Women for Permanent Peace members[edit]

See also[edit]

Notes[edit]

  1. ^ The complete list of Dutch planners per MacMillan included: W. Asser-Thorbecke, E. Baelde, Hanna van Biema-Hymans, Dr. Mia Boissevain, J. Broese Van Groenou-Holle, Wibbina Clifford Kocq Van Breughel-Roelofs, Geertruida Docters van Leeuwen-van Maarseveen, J. Goudsmit-Goudsmit, Henriëtte Heineken-Daum [nl], S. Hoevenaar, Mien van Itallie-Van Embden, Aletta H. Jacobs, Clasina A. de Jong van Beek en Donk-Kluyver [nl], Gertrude Kapteyn-Muysken [nl], Cornelia Kehrer-Stuart, Jeanne Caroline van Lanschot Hubrecht [nl], Nelly Mansfeldt-De Witt Huberts, Rosa Manus, C. Meyer, Clara Mulder van de Graaf-de Bruyn, Suzanna van Rees-Broese van Groenou, Mietje Rutgers-Hoitsema, Anna Maria den Tex-Boissevain, Thiska Thiel-Wehrbein, Cornelia Mathilde Werker-Beaujon [wikidata], Sophie Wichers, Mien van Wulfften Palthe-Broese van Groenou.[1]: xxxix 

References[edit]

  1. ^ a b c d Macmillan, Chrystal, ed. (1915). "The History of the Congress". Bericht-Rapport-Report. International Congress of Women, The Hague, April 28th to May 1st 1915. Amsterdam, the Netherlands: International Women's Committee for Permanent Peace. OCLC 1327848600.
  2. ^ a b c d Lembke, Ulrike (December 2015). "Der Frauenfriedenskongress 1915 - auch ein Beitrag zur Geschichte des Pazifismus als Völkerrechtsidee" [The Women's Peace Congress 1915 - A Contribution to the History of Pacifism as an Idea of International Law]. Archiv des Völkerrechts (in German). 53 (4). Tübingen, Germany: Mohr Siebeck GmbH & Co. KG: 424–460. doi:10.1628/000389215X14551101169882. ISSN 0003-892X. JSTOR 43953915. OCLC 1197142154. Retrieved 20 January 2023.
  3. ^ a b c d e f Addams, Jane; Balch, Emily Greene; Hamilton, Alice (1916). Women at the Hague: The International Congress of Women and Its Results (Public domain ed.). Macmillan. ISBN 978-0-524-05888-6. OCLC 1074574.
  4. ^ "International Congress of Women opens at The Hague". History.Doc. Retrieved 12 December 2014.
  5. ^ van der Veen, Sietske (22 June 2017). "Hirschmann, Susanna Theodora Cornelia (1871-1957)". Huygens ING (in Dutch). The Hague, The Netherlands: Huygens Institute for the History of the Netherlands. Archived from the original on 30 August 2017. Retrieved 30 August 2017.
  6. ^ a b c d Alonso, Harriet Hyman (1993). Peace as a Women's Issue: A History of the U.S. Movement for World Peace and Women's Rights (1st ed.). Syracuse, New York: Syracuse University Press. ISBN 978-0-8156-2565-0.
  7. ^ a b Laqua, Daniel (2015). "Belgian Internationalists, the Great War and the Quest for Peace". Être citoyen du monde. Entre destruction et reconstruction du monde: Les enfants de Babel XIVe–XXIe siècles [To Be a Citizen of the World – Between Destruction and Reconstruction of the World: The Children of Babel 14th–21st Centuries] (in French). Vol. 2. Paris, France: Éditions Université Paris Diderot. pp. 135–150. ISBN 978-2-7442-0198-1.
  8. ^ a b Paull, John (2018) The Women Who Tried to Stop the Great War: The International Congress of Women at The Hague 1915, In A. H. Campbell (Ed.), Global Leadership Initiatives for Conflict Resolution and Peacebuilding (pp. 249-266). (Chapter 12) Hershey, PA: IGI Global.
  9. ^ "Hellraisers Journal: From The Survey: "Women of the Hague" a first-hand report by Mary Chamberlain". Daily Kos. Retrieved 2017-11-03.
  10. ^ Sklar, Kathryn Kish; Schüler, Anja; Strasser, Susan, eds. (1998). Social Justice Feminists in the United States and Germany: A Dialogue in Documents, 1885–1933. Ithaca, New York: Cornell University Press. ISBN 978-1-5017-1812-0.
  11. ^ Kazin, Michael (2017). War against War: The American Fight for Peace, 1914-1918 (First ed.). New York, New York: Simon and Schuster. ISBN 978-1-4767-0590-3.

Bibliography[edit]

  • Public Domain This article incorporates text from this source, which is in the public domain: J. Addams, E. G. Balch, & A. Hamilton's Women at the Hague: The International Congress of Women and Its Results (1916)
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