The Daughters of the American Revolution’s national board voted to disband a Texas chapter that pushed to limit membership to biological women, a move critics say punishes members for defending the group’s founding purpose.
On October 10, 2026, the National Board of Management of the National Society Daughters of the American Revolution approved a resolution by a two-thirds majority to dissolve the Martha Laird Chapter in Texas. Organizing Secretary General Marguerite Hogan Fritsch informed members in a letter that the chapter’s actions violated Article XIX, Section 4 of the national bylaws.
Fox News Digital reported the board’s decision and the society’s explanation that chapter officers had used the chapter’s name, leadership positions, communications, and governance processes to advance a separate advocacy organization.
The DAR insisted the issue was misuse of chapter authority and resources, not the substance of the members’ views on who qualifies as a daughter of the American Revolution.
In its statement, the National Society Daughters of the American Revolution said the board found that officers had redirected chapter tools toward outside advocacy goals.
“The National Board of Management voted on October 10 to disband the Martha Laird Chapter in Texas after finding that chapter officers had used the chapter’s name, leadership positions, communications, and governance processes to further the goals of a separate advocacy organization.”
The society continued:
“The Board determined that it was this use of chapter authority and resources, not the views being advocated, that constituted conduct discrediting the National Society under Article XIX, Section 4 of the National Bylaws.”
It also stated the decision was not based on the chapter’s views on membership eligibility, efforts to change the national bylaws, or members’ right to advocate for governance changes. Individual members keep their DAR membership and may still push bylaw changes through official channels.
Fritsch’s letter to the chapter laid out the vote in plain terms.
“On October 10, 2026, at the meeting of the National Board of Management of the National Society, Daughters of the American Revolution a resolution passed by two-thirds majority vote to disband the Martha Laird Chapter, NSDAR.”
The letter did not spell out the specific conduct beyond the general finding of a bylaw violation. Article XIX, Section 4 gives the national board authority to discipline or disband chapters that break organizational rules or engage in conduct that discredits the DAR.
The Martha Laird Chapter had challenged the national leadership’s approach to transgender applicants. In September 2024, the Texas chapter, backed by 11 other chapters, submitted a proposed bylaw amendment that would define membership eligibility by biological sex.
The National Board of Management rejected that proposal in February 2025. At a June 2026 national members meeting, a separate resolution seeking further membership restrictions also failed.
Chapter member Laura McDonald had already told Fox News Digital the group was contradicting its founding mission by treating a man who identifies as a woman as eligible while barring a man who does not make that claim.
“But, then they go on to say that a man who claims he’s a woman is a woman, and therefore he’s eligible for membership. But if you are a man that doesn’t claim to be a woman, you’re not eligible for membership.”
After the February 2025 rejection, McDonald said the board’s move confirmed leadership was taking a political stance rather than acting out of fear over 501(c)(3) nonprofit status. The Center for American Liberty provided legal help to the chapter as it contested the leadership claim that excluding transgender applicants could threaten the organization’s tax-exempt standing.
The DAR has long allowed women with legally amended birth certificates to join if they meet genealogical requirements. Founded in 1890 as a lineage-based society for female descendants of American Revolution patriots, the organization now faces open conflict over whether “daughter” still means what it did for more than a century.
Sonja Shaw, a conservative California superintendent candidate, framed the board’s action as punishment for women who refused to abandon a sex-based definition of membership. She noted the Martha Laird Chapter’s history dating to 1942.
“The women of the Martha Laird Chapter in Texas stood their ground. They sought to preserve a definition of “Daughters” based on biological sex and asked for a clear vote. On October 10, national leadership dissolved their chapter.”
Shaw pressed the leadership directly:
“Think about that. Women who stood up for their convictions saw their chapter, with a history dating back to 1942, dissolved. Here is the damning question national leadership needs to answer: Why should women be punished for standing up for the very definition of the organization they belong to?”
She added that the fight extends beyond one Texas chapter and that daughters deserve a future where no woman is punished for speaking biological truth.
Nearly three months before the dissolution vote, Rep. Ben Cline, R-Va., introduced the Daughters of the American Revolution Membership Integrity Act. The bill would amend the DAR’s congressional charter to restrict membership to biological women. Sen. Marsha Blackburn, R-Tenn., later introduced companion legislation in the Senate.
Cline did not mince words about the society’s direction.
“Rather than honoring and preserving a lineage-based organization for women, it has embraced radical gender ideology at the expense of the women it was created to serve.”
The DAR is a private membership organization free to enforce its own bylaws. Its national board followed the two-thirds threshold required to disband a chapter and left individual members free to remain in the society and pursue changes through regular processes.
What the board did not do is identify, in the letter to members, the precise actions that crossed the line or name the separate advocacy organization it says chapter officers were advancing. That gap leaves members and the public with the society’s process explanation on one side and the chapter’s years-long effort to restore a biological-sex definition on the other.
For an organization built on lineage, sex, and the memory of the Revolution, the choice to dissolve a chapter that insisted “daughter” means female is not a neutral housekeeping matter. It is a decision about whether the words in the name still bind the institution that carries them.
When a society founded for the daughters of patriots dissolves a chapter for defending that very premise, ordinary Americans can see which side of the cultural line the leadership chose.
