Między „Sterem” lwowskim i warszawskim. Działalność społeczna i publicystyczna Pauliny Kuczalskiej-Reinschmit na początku xx wieku

Date of release of digital version under CC-BY-SA license: May 2024

The monograph presents the 20th century activity of liberal suffragists in the Kingdom of Poland before World War I. The activists were centred round Paulina Kuczalska-Reinschmit (1859–1921) in the period before her closure of Ster. Dwutygodnik dla spraw wychowania i pracy kobiet [The Helm. The Biweekly for Women’s Education and Work] published in Lviv (1895–1897)] and the reactivation of Ster. Organ równouprawnienia kobiet [The Helm. The Women’s Rights Organ] published in Warsaw (1907–1914).

The history of liberal Warsaw’s suffragettes, presented through the prism of her leader’s biography, displays the most important social processes of the beginning of the 20th century that determined the status of women and provides individual answers to the life conditions created by these processes. The biography of Paulina Kuczalska-Reinschmit is one of many life scenarios which the supporters of engaging women’s energy into the national fight for survival in a partitioned country had. For liberal suffragettes, the engagement involved the fight for equal rights “without gender difference” understood as the path towards democratization of the society that strengthened national community. Like biographies of men, also their pursuit of education, work, creative output and civic rights, as well as their social service illustrate the history of successes and failures of the Polish intelligentsia in the pre-wwi period.

The activists centred around Paulina Kuczalska-Reinschmit adjusted their activities to the political, economic and social conditions of the Kingdom of Poland (an integral part of Russia) trying to seize each opportunity to extend the rights of women. In the beginning of the 20th century they were active in such legal institutions as the commercial Czytelnia dla Kobiet [Reading Room for Women] (1898–1920), social Delegacja Pracy Kobiet [Women’s Labour Delegation] (1894–1904) and Koło Pracy Kobiet [Women’s Labour Society] (1905–1907) of the Warsaw’s Towarzystwo Popierania Rosyjskiego Przemysłu i Handlu [Society for the Support of Russian Industry and Commerce], informal Związek Polski Równouprawnienia Kobiet [Polish Women’s Rights Association] (1905–1907); they organized questionnaire surveys among female employers and employees, training courses for female workers, public lectures on the plight of women in the labour market, etc. These actions were propagated and discussed via leaflets and brochures but also in dailies and women’s press, social weeklies and illustrated magazines, among others, Kurier Codzienny [The Daily Courier], Kurier Warszawski [The Warsaw Courier], Bluszcz [The Ivy], Świat Kobiecy [The Women’s World], Ster [The Helm], Nowa Gazeta [The New Gazette], Krytyka [The Critique], Ogniwo [The Link], Tygodnik Ilustrowany [The Illustrated Weekly] or Wędrowiec [The Wanderer].

In the years of revolution 1905–1907, as a result of developments at home and the observation of the international (including Russian) women’s movement, Warsaw’s suffragettes put forward demands for equal rights “without gender difference”, focusing first on the informal Związek Polski Równouprawnienia Kobiet [Polish Women’s Rights Association] (1905–1907) and then joining various legal professional, educational and self-help institutions. One of them was the legalized by Paulina Kuczalska-Reinschmit in 1907 Związek Równouprawnienia Kobiet Polskich [Union of Equal Rights for Polish Women] (1907–1921) the philosophy of which was, to a large extent, similar to other women’s democratic organisations and political groups. Ster. Organ równouprawnienia kobiet (Warsaw 1907–1914) was considered a press organ of the Union, one of many women’s pressure groups aimed at politicians who during wwi worked on the projects of the future political system of independent Poland.