Women's International League for Peace and Freedom. Massachusetts Branch.

The Women's International Committee for Permanent Peace was organized in April 1915 at an International Congress of Women at The Hague. Jane Addams was appointed as its first International Chairman. In May 1919, members of the WICPP met in Zurich, Switzerland, to discuss postwar problems; this was "the first international group to point out the dangers to permanent peace contained in some of the provisions of the treaty of Versailles." At this meeting, the name of the organization was changed to Women's International League for Peace and Freedom. The "Statement of Objects" adopted at the Fifth International Congress (Dublin, Ireland, 1926) set its "aims at uniting women in all countries who are opposed to every kind of war, exploitation and oppression, and who work for universal disarmament and for the solution of conflicts by the recognition of human solidarity, by conciliation and arbitration, by world cooperation, and by the establishment of social, political and economic justice for all, without distinction of sex, race, class or creed." The United States Section contains branches in many states and at present has its national office in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. WILPF has organized protest marches, obtained funds for the relief of the poor in many parts of the world, and organized community action for the repeal of unjust laws and for the passage of disarmament and anti-war bills.

From the guide to the Records, 1915-1977, (Schlesinger Library, Radcliffe Institute)