Fourteen Tablets revealed by 'Abdu'l-Baha during the First World War, addressed to the Baha'is in North America and received by them in 1919, which Shoghi Effendi has called the 'mandate' and 'the supreme charter for teaching'.' They are addressed either to the Baha'is of the United States and Canada as one body or to one of five regional areas of North America.
The 'mandate' was to carry the 'fame of the Cause of God' to the East and to the West and to spread the Glad Tidings of the coming of Baha'u'llah throughout the five continents of the world. In all, 'Abdu'l-Baha mentioned some 120 territories and islands to which the message of Baha'u'llah was to be carried.
The first eight Tablets were revealed between 26 March and 22 April 1916, and the final six between 2 February and 8 March 1917. Of the first group, five Tablets reached America and were published in the 8 September 1916 issue of Star of the West. After that communication with the Holy Land was cut off and the rest of the Tablets remained in the vault under the Shrine of the Bab until the end of the war. They were dispatched to America and unveiled in a ceremony during the 'Convention of the Covenant' held at the Hotel McAlpin in New York in April 1919.
An immediate response to the Tablets was made by Martha Root, who began her world travels, and by Mr. and Mrs. Dunn, who arose to move to Australia. However, it was not until 1937 when Shoghi Effendi gave the American believers the First Seven Year Plan, that the Divine Plan began to be generally implemented. (‘A Basic Baha’i Dictionary, by Wendi Momen)