Page:History of Woman Suffrage Volume 5.djvu/484

 plan called for congressional district meetings all over the country on or about November 16 in every district where the Representative was not already pledged to the Federal Amendment. The call was sent to every congressional district chairman and it requested that every local suffrage league send as many delegates as possible to the meeting which would be held in the city where the Senator or Representative lived. It was urged that they be invited to attend the meetings and to speak and that resolutions be adopted asking them to vote for the amendment. It was a part of the plan to send these resolutions also to the State Central Committees of the Republican and Democratic parties, asking for suffrage planks on the State and national platformsWe received most cordial and widespread cooperation in this work. I believe we can say that practically every Senator and Representative returned to Washington this session with the knowledge that behind him at home is an organized demand for his favorable vote on the Federal Amendment.

The usual pleasant social features of these conventions had been eliminated and the only relaxation for the delegates was one large evening reception in the New Willard Hotel. The National College Equal Suffrage League held its annual luncheon on the 18th at the New Ebbitt Hotel, Dr. M. Carey Thomas, president of Bryn Mawr College, presiding. The guests were 225 women graduates of various colleges and the topic of all the speeches was, "How to advance women suffrage by making friends instead of enemies." The speakers included Dr. Shaw, Mrs. Charles L. Tiffany, Mrs. Raymond Brown, Mrs. Medill McCormick, Miss Florence Stiles, Mrs. Frank M. Roessing, Miss Hannah J. Patterson, Mrs. Elizabeth Puffer Howes and Mrs. Laura Puffer Morgan.

The convention sent a telegram of sympathy in her illness to Miss Jane Addams. A special vote of thanks was tendered to Senators Charles S. Thomas and John F. Shafroth and to Representative Edward T. Taylor, all of Colorado, and to Representative Frank W. Mondell of Wyoming for the very great assistance they had given to the Congressional Committee. A cordial invitation came from the Chicago suffrage headquarters for the delegates to accept its hospitality during the National Republican Convention in June, 1916. Invitations for the next convention were received from St. Louis, Little Rock and Atlantic City.

Mrs. Medill McCormick, chairman of the Congressional Com-