At the same time that the industrial unionists were pushing their strike propaganda some of them who were also members of the radical political parties were trying to bring those parties (_viz._, the Socialist party and the Socialist Labor party) together. To do this they realized that the two parties must agree upon a policy in regard to the attitude which the party should assume toward the trade unions. With this object in view representatives of the two socialist parties called a conference which was afterwards known as the New Jersey Socialist Unity Conference. The sessions of this conference were held in various New Jersey towns--Orange, Paterson, West Hoboken, Newark--at irregular times between September 10, 1905, and March 4, 1906. The purpose of the conference, as expressed in the Manifesto issued at the close of its sessions, was "to consider the causes of the division between the two [socialist] camps and ascertain, if possible, whether solid grounds could be found for a union of the militant socialist forces ... of the State...."[203]

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