This resolution definitely settled the question of the relationship between the revolutionary movement in Russia and the National Council. A branch of the latter body was established in Russia, its chairman being a member of the Paris organization who happened to be in Russia at that time.
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As in all the other Allied countries, the Czechoslovak colony in the United States, comprising more than a million and a half persons, rose against Austria-Hungary at the very outbreak of the war. On the eve of the declaration of war against Serbia, a large Czech meeting of protest against the Habsburg Empire was held at Chicago, and a committee appointed to collect funds for the support of war victims in the Czech territories.
The Czechs in Omaha were the first to come forward with any constructive plans, and in the middle of August a practical revolutionary scheme was announced in Rosický’s Americká Osvěta (American Enlightenment). Then, on August 18, 1914, on the initiative of R. J. Pšenka, J. Tvrzický, K. Vinklárek, and others, there had been a meeting between representatives of the American National Council, the Czech Press Bureau, and the above-mentioned committee, at which these bodies were amalgamated into a uniform organization known as “The Czech National Alliance.” It was agreed that the programme of this body was to consist of propaganda for the Czech cause, collections on behalf of war victims, and finally, also, what was called political action. At the head of the National Alliance, the headquarters of which were in Chicago, was Dr. L. Fisher, whose place was taken later by Dr. Pecivál, while the movement in New York was directed by E. Voska, with the assistance of V. Sperakus, Koňas, V. Rejsek, Marek, and others.
From the manifesto of the new organization, which was published on the day after the inaugural meeting, we learned that the aim of the National Alliance was to inform the public in America and Europe about the just demands of the Czech nation for independence, and thus to prepare the ground for achieving it. This movement arose at the initiative of our fellow-countrymen in America. It got into touch with the leaders of our revolutionary movement abroad later on, after Voska had returned from Bohemia with the first news of the preparations which were being made by Masaryk and his
