[1] The committee was formed at the suggestion of Maud Wood Park, who was concerned that the passage of the 19th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution – prohibiting any U.S. citizen from being denied the right to vote on the basis of sex – might cause women to abandon the women's organizing groups and lead to greater political partisanship, and wanted instead to channel the existing organizing energy into continuing to lobby for women's interests.
[2] As a national organization with members including both national organizations and local chapters, the committee formed several sub-committees around issues including infancy and maternity protection, independent citizenship for married women, regulation of the meat packing industry and child labor, social hygiene and education, and Prohibition.
It was at one point accused (along with many other organizations) of being a part of an international conspiracy to promote socialism in the U.S.,[3] an accusation which was refuted at length by Carrie Chapman Catt via an open letter in The Women Citizen.
"[4] The committee successfully used the rhetoric of maternalism to lobby for greater legal protections for women and children.
[5] The committee's influence and activity peaked in 1930, after which it lost most of its public and political support.