On April 1, 1918, the Czech National Socialist Party held its eighth annual
conference in Prague, at which it adopted a resolution endorsing
international Socialism and changing its name to "The Czech Socialist
Party." The conference was attended also by two representatives of the
Czecho-Slav Social Democratic Party, J. Stivin and deputy Nemec. The
National Socialist leader, deputy Klofac, welcomed the representatives of
the Social Democrats "whom we have for years past been struggling against,
but with whom the trials of this war have united us." He declared that his
party accepted the Socialist programme and would join the new Socialist
International. On September 6, 1918, the executive committees of the two
parties elected a joint council. Its object is to work for the
consolidation of the Czech working classes and for the formation of a
united Czech Labour Party, composed of Social Democrats as well as of the
former National Socialists. A similar process of consolidation is taking
place also among the other parties, so that soon there will probably be
only three Czech parties, on the basis of class difference, viz.
Socialists, Agrarians and Democratic Nationalists (_bourgeoisie_), all of
whom will stand behind the programme of full Czecho-Slovak independence.

The most significant demonstration of the Czech national sentiment took
place at Prague on January 6, 1918, at a meeting of all the Czech deputies
of the Reichsrat and of the diets of Bohemia, Moravia and Austrian Silesia,
with which we deal in another chapter, and at which a resolution was
unanimously carried demanding full independence and representation at the
peace conference.

Finally, on July 13, 1918, a National Council or Committee was formed in
Prague on which all the parties are represented and which may rightly be
described as part of the Provisional Government of Bohemia.