Inter-Allied Women's Conference

Inter-Allied Women's Conference.
The Inter-Allied Women's Conference opened in Paris on 10 February 1919, several weeks after the start of the Paris Peace Conference, the meeting of the victorious Allies of World War I to set peace terms for the Central Powers. The women's conference was convened after the war to introduce women's issues to the process. On 18 January Marguerite de Witt-Schlumberger, vice-president of the International Woman Suffrage Alliance, asked Woodrow Wilson, the U.S. president, to allow women to participate in the discussions that would inform the treaty negotiations. After first being rebuffed, suffragists were allowed to make a presentation before the Commission on International Labour Legislation, and on 10 April a resolution was presented to the League of Nations Commission. Though the women failed to achieve many of their aims, they gained the right for women to serve in the League of Nations organisation.