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Hellraisers Journal – Sunday March 18, 1900
San Francisco’s Class Struggle of March 17th Claims “Unity Achieved”
The first national convention of the Social Democratic Party of America was called to order Tuesday morning, March 6, 1900 by Chairman Jesse Cox, at Reichwein’s hall, Indianapolis, Ind. The Class Struggle of March 17th, official organ of the Socialist Labor Party of California, described the convention in detail in an article written by Editor G. B. Benham.
[Part I of II.]
At 10 o’clock am Tuesday, March 6th, the convention was called to order and William Mailly, editor of the Haverhill Social Democrat, was elected chairman. Strickland was made secretary and Johnson of Chicago and Val Putnam of St. Louis assistant secretaries.
The usual committees were appointed, and an order of business was adopted. The credentials committee had an amount of work that does not usually fall to such committees, for the arrangement and basis of representation is not of the character generally used in representative bodies. Any number of members may sign the credentials of a delegate and his vote in the convention is the vote of the number who signed the credentials. Any local organization can thus send as many delegates as they desire. In fact a member can send himself, sign his own credentials, and his voice is recorded as one vote on the floor of the convention, but the vote depends entirely upon the number of signers of the credentials. Thus Margaret Haile has 196 votes, and Martin of Ohio has 1 vote.
The total number of delegates present was 67, representing 17 states, showing total membership represented 2,043.
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