"Women's rights supporters from the Pacific to the Atlantic will gather in historic downtown Philadelphia for the 2001 National NOW Conference," said National Organization for Women (NOW) President Patricia Ireland. "From June 29 through July 1, NOW activists will participate in Not For Ourselves Alone: A Leadership Skills Conference focused on building the campaign to defend against the anti-feminist Bush administration and expanding the grassroots network needed to succeed." NOW activists will also elect new leadership to the organization, as Patricia Ireland comes to the end of her term.

Not For Ourselves Alone will be a weekend filled with hard-hitting skills building sessions and workshops on feminist issues. At the conference the second national NOW PAC Political Institute will again train activists to recruit and elect women's rights supporters to all levels of government and wrest power from the ultraconservatives.

Linda Chavez-Thompson, Vice President, AFL-CIO, and Dr. Jane Smith, immediate-past president of the National Council of Negro Women, will speak to conference attendees about leadership and coalition-building as the feminist, labor, civil rights and other movements work toward taking back the Congress in 2002. NOW will honor former Fanwood, NJ mayor Maryanne Connelly and Olympic bronze medalist Cheryl "Fun" Haworth as Women of Courage. Haworth, now 17, won the bronze medal for weightlifting at the 1999 Olympics.

"Connelly ran an extraordinary congressional campaign in 2000, and though edged out by her Republican opponent, she continues to inspire feminists to political action," Ireland said. "In addition to electing a new team of officers to lead NOW, activists at this conference will fine tune our own leadership skills in preparation for taking politics into our own hands."

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