three "free cities," in 1901 and it was followed by others in
the other two "free cities," Frankfort and Bremen, and in the southern
States, where these restrictions did not exist. In 1902 these
societies were united in a National Association, of which Dr. Anita
Augspurg was president. Its members kept up an agitation for the
Municipal vote, carrying the question into the courts, and they also
petitioned the Reichstag for the full suffrage.

The International Council of Women met in Berlin in 1904, the largest
meeting of women ever held in any country, and the organizing at this
time of the International Woman Suffrage Alliance aroused universal
interest. In the election of the new Reichstag in 1906 the suffrage
societies took an active part and in 1907 it repealed the old law
forbidding women to attend political meetings and form political
associations, the new law going into effect in May, 1908. The
suffragists celebrated with an immense meeting in Frankfort, addressed
by Mrs. Pethick Lawrence and Miss Annie Kenney of England, who roused
great enthusiasm. Suffrage associations were then organized in the
various States, which began to work with their own Parliaments.
Through lectures, literature and organizing the effort was continued,
the women joining and working with the political parties, especially
the Social Democratic, which espoused their cause. In 1912 forty
petitions for the Municipal suffrage in Prussia were presented to its
Diet by women. A Woman's Congress was held in Munich and for the first
time in Germany a procession of women marched through the streets. In
1911 differences in questions of policy which had been increasing had
resulted in the forming of a second National Association. The two
united in 1916 under the presidency of Mrs. Marie Stritt, former
president of the National Council of Women of Germany and secretary of
the International Alliance. In March, 1918, Mrs. Stritt wrote to the
_International Suffrage News_: "We German women have at present no
reason to rejoice over the progress of our cause but we have followed
with all the greater joy the unexpected success of our sisters in
other countries."

In 1920 Mrs. Stritt, now a member of the city council in Dresden,
wrote for this History as follows: "Although throughout the more than
four years of war the women worked eagerly for the suffrage through
their organizations, demanding it in public meetings and petitioning
legislative bodies, the