The History of the Fabian Society Part 7

If the Essays had been written in 1890 instead of 1888 the authors would have acquired from the great Trade Union upheaval of 1889 a fuller appreciation of the importance of Trade Unionism than they possessed at the earlier date. Working-cla.s.s organisation has never been so prominent in London as in the industrial counties, and the captious comments on the great Co-operative movement show that the authors of the Essays were still youthful, and in some matters ignorant.[25]

Sydney Olivier's "Moral Basis" is, in parts, as obscure now as it was at first, and there are pages which can have conveyed but little to most of its innumerable readers. Graham Wallas treated of "Property" with moderation rather than knowledge. Time has dealt hardly with Mrs.

Besant's contribution. She antic.i.p.ated, as the other Essayists did, that unemployment caused by labour-saving machinery would constantly increase; and that State organisation of industries for the unemployed would gradually supersede private enterprise. She apparently supposed that the county councils all over England, then newly created, were similar in character to the London County Council, which had already inaugurated the Progressive policy destined in the next few years to do much for the advancement of practical socialism. The final paper on "The Outlook," by Hubert Bland, is necessarily of the nature of prophecy, and in view of the difficulty of this art his attempt is perhaps less unsuccessful than might have been expected. He could foresee the advent neither of the Labour Party, mainly formed of Trade Unionists, nor of Mr. Lloyd George and the policy he represents: he a.s.sumed that the rich would grow richer and the poor poorer; that Liberals would unite with Tories, as they have done in Australia, and would be confronted with a Socialist Party representing the dispossessed. Possibly the developments he sketches are still to come, but that is a matter which cannot be discussed here.

I can find no trace in the records of the Society that the first success of their publication occasioned any elation to the Essayists, and I cannot recollect any signs of it at the time. The Annual Report mentions that a substantial profit was realised on the first edition, and states that the authors had made over the copyright, "valued at about 200," to the Society; but these details are included in a paragraph headed "Publications," and the Essays are not mentioned in the general sketch of the work of the year.

In fact the obvious results of the publication took some months to materialise, and the number of candidates for election to the Society showed little increase during the spring. It is true that great changes were made in the organisation of the Society at the Annual Meeting held on March 28th, 1890, but these were in part due to other causes. The Executive Committee was enlarged to fifteen, and as I happened to be available I was appointed paid secretary, half time, at the modest salary of 1 a week for the first year. The newly elected Executive included the seven Essayists, Robert E. Dell, now Paris correspondent for several journals, W.S. De Mattos, for many years afterwards an indefatigable organiser for the Society, and now settled in British Columbia, the Rev. Stewart D. Headlam, Mrs. L.T. Mallet, then a prominent member of the Women's Liberal a.s.sociation, J.F. Oakeshott, of the Fellowship of the New Life, and myself.

The lectures of the early months of 1890 were a somewhat brilliant series. Sidney Webb on the Eight Hours Bill; James Rowlands, M.P., on the then favourite Liberal nostrum of Leasehold Enfranchis.e.m.e.nt (which the Essayists demolished in a crushing debate); Dr. Bernard Bosanquet on "The Ant.i.thesis between Individualism and Socialism Philosophically Considered"; Mrs. Besant on "Socialism and the School Board Policy"; Mr.

(now Sir) H. Llewellyn Smith on "The Causes and Effects of Immigration from Country to Town," in which he disproved the then universal opinion that the unemployed of East London were immigrants from rural districts; Sydney Olivier on "Zola"; William Morris on "Gothic Architecture"

(replacing a lecture on Morris himself by Ernest Radford, who was absent through illness); Sergius Stepniak on "Tolstoi, Tchernytchevsky, and the Russian School"; Hubert Bland on "Socialist Novels"; and finally on July 18th Bernard Shaw on "Ibsen." This last may perhaps be regarded as the high-water mark in Fabian lectures. The minutes, which rarely stray beyond bare facts, record that "the paper was a long one," nearer two hours than one, if my memory is accurate, and add: "The meeting was a very large one and the lecture was well received." In fact the lecture was the bulk of the volume "The Quintessence of Ibsenism," which some regard as the finest of Bernard Shaw's works, and it is perhaps unnecessary to say that the effect on the packed audience was overwhelming. It was "briefly discussed" by a number of speakers, but they seemed as out of place as a debate after an oratorio.

On June 16th Henry H. Hutchinson of Derby was elected a member, an event of much greater importance than at the time appeared. Mr. Hutchinson had been clerk to the Justices of Derby, and when we first knew him had retired, and was with his wife living a somewhat wandering life accompanied by a daughter, who also joined the Society a few months later. He was not rich, but he was generous, and on July 29th it is recorded in the minutes of the Executive that he had offered us 100 or 200, and approved the suggestion that it should be chiefly used for lectures in country centres.

A fortnight later the "Lancashire campaign" was planned. It was thoroughly organised. An advanced agent was sent down, and abstracts of lectures were prepared and printed to facilitate accurate reports in the press. Complete lists of the forthcoming lectures--dates, places, subjects, and lecturers--were printed. All the Essayists except Olivier took part, and in addition Robert E. Dell, W.S. De Mattos, and the Rev.

Stewart Headlam. An account of the Society written by Bernard Shaw was reprinted from the "Scottish Leader" for September 4th, 1890, for the use of the audience and the Press.

A "Report" of the campaign was issued on November 4th, which says:--

"The campaign began on September 20th and ended on October 27th, when about sixty lectures in all had been delivered ... not only in Lancashire, at Manchester, Liverpool, Rochdale, Oldham, Preston, Salford, and the district round Manchester, but also at Barnsley, Kendal, Carlisle, Sheffield, and Hebden Bridge.

"In thus making our first attack upon the stronghold of the old Unionism and the new Toryism, we would have been contented with a very small measure of success, and we are much more than contented with the results obtained. The lectures, except for a few days during the contest at Eccles, were extremely well reported, and even the 'Manchester Guardian'

(the 'Daily News' of the manufacturing districts) came out with an approving leader. The audiences throughout the campaign steadily increased and followed the lectures with close and intelligent attention. In particular the members of Liberal working men's clubs constantly declared that they had never heard 'the thing put so straight' before, and complained that the ordinary party lecturers were afraid or unwilling to speak out. Men who frankly confessed that they had hesitated before voting for the admission of our lecturers to their clubs were enthusiastic in welcoming our message as soon as they heard it. The vigorous propaganda in the manufacturing districts of the S.D.F.

branches has been chiefly carried on by means of outdoor meetings. Its effect upon working-cla.s.s opinion, especially among unskilled labourers, has been marked and important, but it has entirely failed to reach the working-men politicians who form the rank and file of the Liberal a.s.sociations and Clubs, or the 'well-dressed' Liberals who vaguely desire social reform, but have been encouraged by their leaders to avoid all exact thought on the subject."

The lectures were given chiefly in sets of four in consecutive weeks, mostly at Liberal and Radical Clubs: others were arranged by Co-operative Societies, and by branches of the S.D.F. and the Socialist League. The subjects were "Socialism," "Where Liberalism Fails,"

"Co-operation and Labour," "The Future of Women," "The Eight Hours Bill," "The Politics of Labour," and so on. Those arranged by Co-operative Societies were, we are told, the least successful, but it is hoped "that they will bring about a better feeling between Socialists and Co-operators," a state of things which on the side of the Socialists was, as we have previously indicated, badly wanted. It should be noted that much of the success of the campaign was due to friendly a.s.sistance from the head-quarters of the Co-operative Union and the National Reform Union.

There is no doubt that this campaign with the series of lectures on the same lines which were continued for several years was an event of some importance, not only in the history of the Fabian Society but also in English politics. Hitherto the Socialism presented to the industrial districts of England, which are the backbone of Trade Unionism and Co-operation, to the men who are meant when we speak of the power and independence of the working cla.s.ses, was revolutionary and destructive, ill-tempered and ungenerous. It had perhaps alarmed, but it had failed to attract them. It had made no real impression on the opinion of the people. From this point a new movement began. It first took the form of local Fabian Societies. They were succeeded by and merged into branches of the Independent Labour Party, which adopted everything Fabian except its peculiar political tactics. A few years later the Labour Party followed, more than Fabian in its toleration in the matter of opinions, and virtually, though not formally, Fabian in its political policy. No doubt something of the sort would have happened had there never been a Lancashire campaign, but this campaign may be fairly described as the first step in an evolution, the end of which is not yet in sight.

Her lectures in the Lancashire campaign and the formation of the branches were Mrs. Besant's last contributions to the Socialist movement. Early in November she suddenly and completely severed her connection with the Society. She had become a convert to Theosophy, which at that time accepted the Buddhist doctrine that spiritual conditions alone mattered, and that spiritual life would flourish as well in the slum amidst dirt and starvation as in the comfortable cottage, and much better than in the luxurious mansion.

Twentieth-century theosophy has receded from that position, and now advocates social amelioration, but Mrs. Besant thought otherwise in 1890. Some twenty years later she lectured on several occasions to the Society, and she joined her old friends at the dinner which celebrated the thirtieth anniversary of its foundation, but in the interval her connection with it completely ceased.

The Fabian Society and British Socialism owe much to Mrs. Besant for the a.s.sistance she gave it during five important years. Her splendid eloquence, always at our service, has seldom been matched, and has never been surpa.s.sed by any of the innumerable speakers of the movement. She had, when she joined us, an a.s.sured position amongst the working-cla.s.s Radicals in London and throughout the country; and through her Socialism obtained a sympathetic hearing in places where less trusted speakers would have been neglected. She was not then either a political thinker or an effective worker on committees, but she possessed the power of expressing the ideas of other people far better than their originators, and she had at her command a certain amount of political machinery--such as an office at 63 Fleet Street, and a monthly magazine, "Our Corner"--which was very useful. Her departure was a serious loss, but it came at a moment of rapid expansion, so rapid that her absence was scarcely felt.

On the Society itself the effect of the Essays and the Lancashire Campaign was considerable. As the Executive Committee report in April, 1891: "During the past year the Socialist movement has made conspicuous progress in every respect, and a constantly increasing share of the work of its organisation and extension has fallen to the Fabian Society." The membership increased from 173 to 361, and the subscription list--thanks in part to several large donations--from 126 to 520. Local Fabian Societies had been formed at Belfast, Birmingham, Bombay, Bristol, Huddersfield, Hyde, Leeds, Manchester, Oldham, Plymouth, Tyneside, and Wolverhampton, with a total membership of 350 or 400. The business in tracts had been enormous. Ten new tracts, four pamphlets and six leaflets, were published, and new editions of all but one of the old ones had been printed. In all 335,000 tracts were printed and 98,349 distributed. The new tracts include "The Workers' Political Programme,"

"The New Reform Bill," "English Progress Towards Social Democracy," "The Reform of Poor Law," and a leaflet, No. 13, "What Socialism Is," which has been in circulation ever since. It should be added that at this period our leaflets were given away freely, a form of propaganda which soon proved too expensive for our resources.

In March, 1891, just before the end of the official year, appeared the first number of "Fabian News," the monthly organ of the Society, which has continued ever since. It replaced the printed circulars previously issued to the members, and was not intended to be anything else than a means of communicating with the members as to the work of the Society, and also in later years as to new books on subjects germane to its work.

It has been edited throughout by the Secretary, but everything of a contentious character relating to the affairs of the Society has been published by the express authority of the Executive Committee.

It may be mentioned that from this time forward the doc.u.ments of the Society are both fuller and more accessible than before. For the period up to the end of 1889 the only complete record is contained in the two minute books of the meetings. No regular minutes of Executive Committee meetings were kept, and the Annual Reports were not printed until 1889.

From 1890 onwards the meetings of every committee were regularly recorded: the Annual Reports were printed in octavo and can be found in many public libraries, whilst "Fabian News" contains full information of the current doings of the Society. It will not therefore be necessary to treat the later years with such attention to detail as has seemed appropriate to the earlier. The only "sources" for these are shabby notebooks and the memories of a few men now rapidly approaching old age.

The later years can be investigated, if any subsequent enquirer desires to do so, in a dozen libraries in Great Britain and the United States.

[Ill.u.s.tration: _From a photograph by Van der Weyde_

WILLIAM CLARKE, ABOUT 1895]

FOOTNOTES:

[24] Shaw demurs to this pa.s.sage, and says that he did not revise the papers verbally, especially those by Mrs. Besant and Graham Wallas, but that he suggested or made alterations in the others. I am still disposed to suspect that my statement is not far from the truth.

[25] The opinions of some of the Essayists about co-operation were apparently modified by some small meetings with leading co-operators on March 27th, April 17th, and May 22nd, 1889. Bernard Shaw tells me that he thinks that they were held at Willis's Rooms, that he was in the chair, and that Mr. Benjamin Jones (whose name I find as a speaker at Fabian Meetings about this period) played a prominent part on behalf of the Co-operative Wholesale Society.

The first printed Annual Report presented on 5th April, 1889, mentions that "the Society is taking part in a 'Round Table Conference' to ascertain amongst other objects how far the various Co-operative and Socialist bodies can act together politically," a problem, thirty years later, still unsolved. It is a pity that the references to Co-operation in "Fabian Essays" were not modified in the light of the Conference which was held after the lectures were written but before they were published. No record of the Conference seems to have been preserved.

Chapter VI

"To your tents, O Israel": 1894-1900

Progress of the Society--The Independent Labour Party--Local Fabian Societies--University Fabian Societies--London Groups and Samuel Butler--The first Fabian Conference--Tracts and Lectures--The 1892 Election Manifesto--The Newcastle Program--The Fair Wages Policy--The "Fortnightly" article--The "Intercepted Letter" of 1906.

During the next two or three years the Society made rapid progress. The membership was 541 in 1892, 640 in 1893, and 681 in 1894. The expenditure, 640 to March, 1891, rose to 1100 for 1892, and 1179 in 1893. In both these years large sums--350 and 450--were given by two members for the expenses of lectures in the provinces, and in provincial societies the growth was most marked. In March, 1892, 36 were recorded: the report for 1893 gives 74, including Bombay and South Australia. This was the high-water mark. The Independent Labour Party was founded in January, 1893, at a Conference at which the Fabian Society of London and nine local Fabian Societies were represented, and from this time onward our provincial organisation declined until, in 1900, only four local and four University Societies remained.

The att.i.tude of the parent society towards its branches has always been somewhat unusual. In early days it made admission to its own ranks a matter of some difficulty. A candidate resident in London had to secure a proposer and seconder who could personally vouch for him and had to attend two meetings as a visitor. We regarded membership as something of a privilege, and a candidate was required not only to sign the Basis, but also to take some personal trouble as evidence of zeal and good faith. To our provincial organisation the same principle was applied. If the Socialists in any town desired to form a local society we gave them our blessing and received them gladly. But we did not urge the formation of branches on lukewarm adherents, and we always recognised that the peculiar political methods of the London Society, appropriate to a body of highly educated people, nearly all of them speakers, writers, or active political workers, were unsuitable for the groups of earnest workmen in the provinces who were influenced by our teaching. In fact the local Fabian Societies, with rare exceptions, of which Liverpool was the chief, were from the first "I.L.P." in personnel and policy, and were Fabian only in name.

This somewhat detached att.i.tude, combined with the recognition of the differences between the parent society and its offspring, led to the adoption of a system of local autonomy. The parent society retained complete control over its own affairs. It was governed by a ma.s.s meeting of members, which in those days elected the Executive for the year. It decided that a local Fabian Society might be formed anywhere outside London, by any body of people who accepted the Fabian Basis. The parent society would send them lecturers, supply them with literature and "Fabian News," and report their doings in the "News." But in other respects complete autonomy was accorded. No fees were asked, or subventions granted: no control over, or responsibility for, policy was claimed. Just as the political policy of each Fabian was left to his own judgment, so we declined the impossible task of supervising or harmonising the political activities of our local societies. When the I.L.P. was founded in Bradford and set to work to organise Socialism on Fabian lines, adopting practically everything of our policy, except the particular methods which we had selected because they suited our personal capacities, we recognised that provincial Fabianism had done its work. There was no room, except here and there, for an I.L.P. branch and a local F.S. in the same place. The men who were active in the one were active also in the other. We made no effort to maintain our organisation against that of the I.L.P., and though a few societies survived for some years, and for a while two or three were formed every year at such places as Tunbridge Wells, Maidstone, and Swindon, they were bodies of small importance, and contributed scarcely anything to the sum of Fabian activity. The only local Fabian Society which survived the debacle was Liverpool, which has carried on work similar to that of the London Society down to the present time. Its relations with the I.L.P. have always been harmonious, and, like the I.L.P., it has always maintained an att.i.tude of hostility towards the old political parties.

Its work has been lecturing, the publication of tracts, and political organisation.

The University Fabian Societies are of a different character. Formed by and for undergraduates, but in some cases, especially at Oxford, maintaining continuity by the a.s.sistance of older members in permanent residence, such as Sidney Ball of St. John's, who has belonged to the Oxford Society since its formation in 1895, they are necessarily fluctuating bodies, dependent for their success on the personality and influence of a few leading members. Their members have always been elected at once to the parent society in order that the connection may be unbroken when they leave the University. Needless to say, only a small proportion become active members of the Society, but a few of the leading members of the movement have entered it in this way. Oxford, Glasgow, Aberystwyth, and latterly Cambridge have had flourishing societies for long periods, and quite a number of the higher grade civil servants and of the clergy and doctors in remote districts in Wales and Scotland are or have been members. Moreover, the Society always retains a scattering of members, mostly officials or teachers, in India, in the heart of Africa, in China, and South America, who joined it in their undergraduate days.

Almost from the first the Executive has endeavoured to organise the members in the London area into groups. The parent society grew up through years of drawing-room meetings; why should not the members residing in Hampstead and Hammersmith, in Bloomsbury or Kensington do the same? Further, the Society always laid much stress on local politics: there were County Council and Borough Council, School Board and Poor Law Guardians elections in which policy could be influenced and candidates promoted or supported.

In fact it is only in the years when London government was in the melting-pot, or in times of special socialist activity, and in a few districts, such as Hampstead, where Fabians are numerous, and especially when one or more persons of persistence and energy are available, that the groups have had a more than nominal existence. The drawing-room meetings of the parent society attracted audiences until they outgrew drawing-rooms, because of the exceptional quality of the men and women who attended them and the novelty of the doctrines promulgated. These conditions were not repeated in each district of London, and in spite of constant paper planning, and not a little service by the older members, who spent their time and talents on tiny meetings in Paddington or Streatham, the London group system has never been a permanent success. What has kept the Society together is the series of fortnightly meetings carried on regularly from the first, which themselves fluctuate in popularity, but which have never wholly failed.[26]

We now return to the point whence this digression started. Our local societies were then flourishing. They were vigorously supported from London. We had funds for the expenses of lecturers and many willing to give the time. W.S. De Mattos was employed as lecture secretary, and arranged in the year 1891-2 600 lectures, 300 of them in the provinces.

In all 3339 lectures by members during the year were recorded. All this activity imparted for a time considerable vitality to the local societies, and on February 6th and 7th, 1892, the first (and for twenty years the last) Annual Conference was held in London, at Ess.e.x Hall.

Only fourteen provincial societies were represented, but they claimed a membership of about 1100, some four-fifths of the whole.

The Conference was chiefly memorable because it occasioned the preparation of the paper by Bernard Shaw, ent.i.tled "The Fabian Society: What it has done and how it has done it," published later as Tract 41 and renamed, when the pa.s.sage of years rendered the t.i.tle obsolete, "The Fabian Society: Its Early History," parts of which have already been quoted. This entertaining account of the Society, and brilliant defence of its policy as opposed to that of the Social Democratic Federation, was read to a large audience on the Sat.u.r.day evening, and made so great an impression that comment on it seemed futile and was abandoned. The Conference on Sunday was chiefly occupied with the discussion of a proposal that the electors be advised to vote at the coming General Election in accordance with certain test questions, which was defeated by 23 to 21. A resolution to expel from the Society any member becoming "an official of the Conservative, Liberal, Liberal Unionist, or National League parties" was rejected by a large majority, for the first but by no means for the last time. The Conference was quite a success, but a year later there was not sufficient eagerness in the provinces for a second, and the project was abandoned.