Second , those determined activists included both men AND women : some of those women deserve to be called founding mothers . Ursula Hirschman transported the text written on cigarette paper to the mainland , investing herself to the fullest in the dissemination of the Manifesto and the advancement of Federalist ideas . In the same lineage of founding mothers , we find Louise Weiss ( also active in the interwar period ) and Simone Veil , the first president of the directly elected EP , among many others , alas not always acknowledged .
Third , the frontrunners of European unity came from all ideological strands . Spinelli was a young journalist arrested for his Communist ideas , imprisoned for long years , then kept in confinement . He was expelled from the Italian Communist party for his rejection of Stalin ’ s policies , and he maintained his convictions in other organisations .
The men and women who authored and rapidly disseminated the Ventotene manifesto might not have suspected it , but they were marking the beginning of an astonishing decade for European unity . The war ended in 1945 , and the next year Winston Churchill advocated for the creation of a United States of Europe , while pro-European activism grew amid post-war reconstruction . In 1948 , more than 700 individuals from across the continent — Spinelli with a prominent role among them — gathered in The Hague in the Congress of Europe to realize ideals with action . One of the results was the creation of the Council of Europe in 1949 , but it was clear that its cooperative rationale was a world apart from a federal Europe . Conversely , both the Schuman Declaration and the international treaty it informed , the Treaty of Paris , laid down concrete foundations for what was seen as a first step to a European federation . To be sure , Spinelli judged some of those petits pas , and the petits pas
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