Education: 1902-5, and the Labour Party: 1900-15
Housing--"The Education muddle and the way out"--Supporting the
Conservatives--The Education Acts of 1902 and 1903--Feeding School
Children--The Labour Representation Committee formed--The Fabian
Election Fund--Will Crooks elected in 1910--A Fabian Cabinet
Minister--Resignation of Graham Wallas--The younger generation: H.W.
Macrosty, J.F. Oakeshott, John W. Martin--Municipal Drink
Trade--Tariff Reform--The Decline of the Birth-rate.
The controversy described in the preceding chapter was not the only
business that occupied the Society at the period of the South African
War.
Amongst minor affairs was a change of premises. The office first taken,
in 1891, was at 276 Strand, in the island at that time formed by
Holywell Street which ran between the churches of St. Clement Danes and
St. Martin's in the Fields. At the end of 1899 the London County Council
acquired the property for the Kingsway and Aldwych clearance scheme, and
we found new quarters in a basement at Clement's Inn, a pleasant couple
of rooms, with plenty of light, though sometimes maliciously
misdescribed as a cellar. At the end of 1908 we removed into three much
more spacious rooms at the same address, also in "a dismal basement,"
where we remained until in 1914 the Society rented a house at 25 Tothill
Street, Westminster.
Another undertaking was a conference on Housing. Although the first
public effort of the Society was its conference at South Place Chapel in
1886, this particular form of propaganda has never commended itself to
the Executive, chiefly no doubt because conferences, to which numerous
representative persons are invited, are most useful for promoting
moderate reforms which have already made themselves acceptable to the
members and officials of local governing bodies. Such reforms the Fabian
Society does not regard as its special business; it prefers to pioneer;
it is true that it uses its machinery for spreading a knowledge of local
government in all its forms, but that is mainly a matter of office
routine.
However, for once we took up an already popular proposal. The Housing of
the Working Classes Act of 1890 was an admirable measure, but it was
hedged about with obstacles which rendered it very difficult to work in
urban areas and virtually useless in rural districts. We had drafted an
amending Bill for rural districts in 1895, which was read a first time
in the House of Commons on the day of the vote on the supply of cordite,
when the defeat of the Liberal Government led to the dissolution of
Parliament.
The Act of 1890 was singular in one respect. Part III was headed
"Working-Class Lodging Houses," and was drafted accordingly, but the
definition of lodging-houses was made to include cottages with not more
than half an acre of garden, thus enabling houses to be provided by
local authorities in town and country, apart from clearances of
insanitary areas. For years this definition was overlooked, and very few
people were aware that cottages could be built in rural districts by the
Guardians, and later by Rural District Councils. Our Leaflet No. 63,
"Parish Council Cottages," issued in 1895, was almost the first
publication drawing attention to the subject, and with one exception no
use was made of these powers of the Act in rural districts before that
year. Our Tract 76, "Houses for the People," published in 1897,
explained the Act in simple language, and was widely circulated.
In 1900 an amending Act, chiefly to simplify procedure in rural
districts, was promised by the Government; and the conference we called
was intended to agitate for widening its scope and strengthening its
provisions. The papers, read by Clement Edwards (afterwards M.P.), Miss
Constance Cochrane, Alderman Thompson, and others, were first discussed
at a preliminary private meeting in December, and then submitted to the
Conference, which was held on March 1st, the day following the
Conference at which the Labour Party was established. By choosing this
date we secured a large number of delegates from Trade Unions, and these
were reinforced by numerous delegates from Vestries and other local
authorities, altogether numbering about 400. At the close of the
proceedings a National Committee was formed with headquarters at the
Fabian Office, which had however only a short career. The Conference
papers were printed as a bulky penny tract, "The House Famine and How to
Relieve It," which rapidly went through two editions. We also published
"Cottage Plans and Common Sense," by Raymond Unwin, which describes how
cottages should be built--an anticipation of garden suburbs and
town-planning--and a compilation of everything which Parish Councils had
done and could do, including housing, prepared by Sidney Webb and
called "Five Years' Fruits of the Parish Councils Act," which in 1908
was revised and reissued as "Parish Councils and Village Life." A speech
by W.C. Steadman, M.P., who was a member of the Society, was printed
under the title "Overcrowding and Its Remedy." Our agitation was not
without results. The amending Acts of 1900, 1903, and 1909 have done
much to remove the unnecessary administrative complexities of the Act of
1890, but in fact the problem is still unsolved, and the scandalous
character of our housing, both urban and rural, remains perhaps the
blackest blot in the record of British civilisation.
* * * * *
The Society had always been concerned in public education. Its first
electoral success was when Mrs. Besant and the Rev. Stewart Headlam were
elected to the London School Board in 1888, and except for one interval
of three years Mr. Headlam has sat on the School Board and its
successor, the London County Council, ever since. Sidney Webb was
Chairman or Vice-Chairman of the L.C.C. Technical Education Board from
its foundation in 1893, almost continuously until the Board came to an
end in 1904, after the London Education Act. Graham Wallas was elected
to the School Board in 1894, and from 1897 onwards was Chairman of the
School Management Committee; he had been re-elected in 1900, and was
therefore filling the most important administrative position on the
Board when the Education question was before the Society.
The educational scheme of the Society was not, however, the joint
production of its experts. It was entirely the work of Sidney Webb.
Headlam and Wallas, and the members who took part, contributed their
share as critics, but as critics only, and for the most part as hostile
critics. It was in part a struggle between the County Councils and the
School Boards and in part a controversy over the denominational schools.
Wallas opposed our proposals in the main because he regarded them as
too favourable to sectarian education: Headlam was against them on both
issues. They put up a vigorous fight, but they were beaten every time in
the Society, as the defenders of School Boards were beaten ultimately in
Parliament and in the country.
The first step in the controversy was taken in May, 1899, when a
Members' Meeting was held to discuss "The Education Muddle and the Way
Out," in the form of sixteen resolutions, six on "General Principles"
and the remainder on "Immediate Practicable Proposals." These were
introduced by Webb, and the "General Principles," advocating the
transfer of education to the local government authority and the
abolition of School Boards, were adopted. Amendments by Graham Wallas
were defeated by large majorities, and the discussion on the second
part, the immediately practicable proposals, was adjourned.
At the adjourned meeting in November, 1899, the resolutions were put
aside and a draft tract was submitted. Graham Wallas again led the
opposition, which was always unsuccessful, though serious shortcomings
in the proposals were revealed and it was agreed to meet the criticisms
wherever possible. Finally it was decided to appoint a Revision
Committee, on which Wallas was placed. Thirteen months passed before the
scheme came before the Society again; in December the tract as amended
was submitted, and this time the chief critic was Mr. Headlam. On the
main question of principle he found only one supporter, and with minor
amendments the scheme was adopted.
It is unnecessary to describe the Fabian plan, because it is
substantially the system of administration, established by the Act of
1902, under which present-day education is organised. The main
difference is that we presented a revolutionary proposal in an
extremely moderate form and Mr. Arthur Balfour found himself able to
carry out our principles more thoroughly than we thought practically
possible. Our tract advocated the abolition of all School Boards, but
anticipated, incorrectly, that those of the twenty or thirty largest
cities would be too strong to be destroyed: and whilst insisting that
the public must find all the money required to keep the voluntary
schools in full efficiency, we only proposed that this should take the
form of a large grant by County Councils and County Boroughs, whilst Mr.
Balfour was able to make the Councils shoulder the cost.
How far the draughtsmen of the Bill were influenced by the Fabian scheme
cannot here be estimated, but the authorities at Whitehall were so
anxious to see it that they were supplied with proofs before
publication; and the tract when published was greedily devoured by
perplexed M.P.'s.
It must be recollected that the whole complex machinery of educational
administration was in the melting-pot, and nobody knew what was to come
out of it. It had been assumed by nearly everybody that education was a
department of local government which demanded for its management a
special class of representatives. The Liberal Party was attached to
School Boards, because their creation had been one of the great party
victories of Mr. Gladstone's greatest Government, because they embodied
a triumph over the Church and the virtual establishment of nonconformity
in control of half the elementary schools of the country. Socialists and
the vague labour section took the same view partly because they believed
theoretically in direct election for all purposes and partly because the
cumulative vote, intended to secure representation to minorities, gave
them better chances of success at the polls than they then had in any
other local election. The Board schools, with ample funds derived from
the rates, were far better than the so-called voluntary schools; but
more than half the children of the nation were educated in these
schools, under-staffed, ill-equipped, and on the average in all respects
inefficient. Every year that passed turned out thus its quota of poorly
educated children. Something had to be done at once to provide more
money for these inferior schools. It might be better that they should be
abolished and State schools everywhere supplied, but this was a counsel
of perfection, and there was no time to wait for it. Then again the
distinction between elementary education for the poor, managed by School
Boards and by the voluntary school authorities, and other education
controlled and subsidised by Town and County Councils, was disastrous,
the more so since a recent legal decision (the Cockerton case) had
restricted the limits of School Board education more narrowly than ever.
All sorts of projects might have been proposed for solving these complex
difficulties, projects drafted in the interests of the Church or the
Nonconformists, the voluntary schools or the schools of the local
authorities: but, in fact, the scheme proposed by Mr. Balfour followed
almost precisely the lines laid down in our tract, which was published
in January, 1901, and of which 20,000 copies were quickly circulated.
At the Annual Meeting in May, 1901, a resolution was adopted, in spite
of the vigorous opposition of Mr. Headlam, welcoming the Government Bill
and suggesting various amendments to it. This Bill was withdrawn, to be
reintroduced a year later as the Education Bill, 1902, which ultimately
became law. This measure was considered at a meeting in May, 1902, and a
long series of resolutions welcoming the Bill and advocating amendments
on eighteen different points was carried in spite of vigorous
opposition. Nearly all these amendments, the chief of which was directed
to making the Bill compulsory where it was drafted as optional, were
embodied in the Act.
Our support of the Conservative Government in their education policy
caused much surprise and attracted not a little attention. We had been
suspected by other Socialists, not without excuse, of intrigues with the
Liberals, and our attack on that party in 1893 was made exclusively in
the interests of Labour. Now when Liberals and Labour were united in
denouncing the Government, when Nonconformists who had deserted
Liberalism on the Home Rule issue were returning in thousands to their
old party, the Fabians, alone amongst progressives (except of course the
Irish, who were keen to save the Roman Catholic schools), supported the
Government in what was popularly regarded as a reactionary policy. Time
has vindicated our judgment. The theological squabbles which occupied so
much of the energies of the School Boards are now forgotten because the
rival sects are no longer represented on the Education Authorities, that
is, the town and county councils. Education has been secularised in the
sense that it is no longer governed by clerics, and though some Liberals
now desire to carry Mr. Balfour's policy still further, the Liberal
Party in its ten years of office has never been able to affect any
further change.
The Act of 1902 did not apply to London, and in the great province ruled
by its County Council the case for maintaining the separate existence of
the School Board was stronger than anywhere else. The London County
Council itself was unwilling to undertake elementary education, and the
School Board, like all other bodies in such circumstances, vehemently
objected to its own dissolution. The Board was efficient; its schools
were excellent; there was no evidence that the already overburdened
County Council could properly carry on the work. On the other hand, the
Fabian Society was in a stronger position. The Chairman of the Technical
Education Board was something more than a self-constituted authority on
the organisation of education: and the other members of the Society were
engaged on a contest on their home ground. Into the details of the
resolutions submitted to the Fabian Society outlining a plan for London
education it is needless now to enter, except to say that Graham Wallas
on this issue supported, without enthusiasm, the policy of the Society.
Mr. Balfour made no fewer than three attempts to solve the problem, each
time approaching more nearly to the plan prepared by the Fabian Society.
On the third and eventually successful Bill thirteen amendments were
formulated by the Society, eleven of which were adopted by the House of
Commons, and finally, to quote our Annual Report, "the Act only departed
from our plan by giving to the Borough Councils the appointment of
two-thirds of the managers of provided schools, while we desired the
proportion to be one-half, and omitting a proposal that the Education
Authority should have compulsory powers to acquire sites for schools
other than elementary."
On the County Council itself, which was strongly opposed to the Bill,
Mr. Webb conducted a skilful and successful campaign to defeat a policy
of passive resistance which might have led to endless difficulties. But
that is outside the history of the Fabian Society.
It should be added that the Society did not content itself with merely
passing resolutions. All these documents were printed by thousands and
posted to members of Parliament and of education authorities up and
down the country: our members incessantly lectured and debated at
Liberal Associations and Clubs, and indefatigably worked the London and
Provincial presses; none of the resources of skilful propagandists was
neglected which might shake the opposition to the Bills, or convince
some of the Liberal and Labour opponents that for once at any rate a
good thing might come from the Conservative Party.
The transfer of the control of all elementary schools to the local
authorities rendered at last possible the public feeding of school
children, long before advocated by the Social Democratic Federation.
This had hitherto been regarded by the Fabian Society as impracticable;
though an eloquent and often quoted passage in Graham Wallas's
contribution to "Fabian Essays" describes the schools of the future with
"associated meals [served] on tables spread with flowers, in halls
surrounded with beautiful pictures, or even, as John Milton proposed,
filled with the sound of music." Our contribution towards this ideal was
Tract No. 120, "After Bread Education: a Plan for the State Feeding of
School Children," published in 1905, one of the few tracts for which
Hubert Bland was largely responsible, which advocated a reform carried
into law a year later.
* * * * *
In 1893, and even before, the Fabian Society had urged the Trade
Unionists to form a Labour Party of their own, and earlier in the same
year the Independent Labour Party had been founded which was originally
intended to achieve the object indicated by its name, but which quickly
became a purely Socialist society. It carried on a vigorous and
successful propaganda amongst Trade Unionists, with the result that in
1899 the Trade Union Congress passed a resolution directing its
Parliamentary Committee, in co-operation with the Socialist Societies,
to call a conference in order "to devise ways and means for securing an
increased number of Labour members in the next Parliament." In
accordance with this resolution the Society was invited to appoint two
representatives to meet the delegates of the Parliamentary Committee and
of the two other Socialist organisations. Bernard Shaw and myself were
appointed, and we took part in the business of arranging for the
Conference. This was held on the last two days of February, 1900, and I
was appointed the one delegate to which the Society was by its numbers
entitled. The "Labour Representation Committee" was duly formed, and it
was decided that the Executive Committee of twelve should include one
elected by the Fabian Society. This Committee was constituted then and
there, and, as "Fabian News" reports, "Edward R. Pease provisionally
appointed himself, as the only Fabian delegate, to be on the Executive
Committee, and the Executive Committee has since confirmed the
appointment." This little comedy was carried on for some years. The
Fabian Society was only entitled to send one delegate to the annual
conference, but that delegate had the right of electing one member to
the Executive Committee, and I was appointed by my Committee to serve in
both capacities. But the incident embodies a moral. The Trade Unionists
on the Committee represented in the earlier years about 100,000 members
each: I then represented some 700. But although it was often proposed to
amend the constitution by giving every vote an equal value, the Trade
Union leaders always defended the over-representation of the Socialists
(the I.L.P. were also over-represented, though their case was not so
extreme) partly because the Labour Representation Committee was founded
as a federation of Socialists and Trade Unionists, and partly because
Socialist Societies, consisting exclusively of persons keenly concerned
in politics, were entitled to larger representation per head of
membership than Unions which were primarily non-political. But when we
remember how attractive to the average man are broad generalisations
like "one vote one value," and how plausible a case could be made out
against discrimination in favour of Socialist Societies, it has always
seemed to me a remarkable example of the practical common sense of
organised labour that the old constitution has been preserved, in fact
though not precisely in form, to the present day. By the present
constitution the "Socialist Section" elects three members to the
Executive from nominations sent in advance; but as the I.L.P. always
makes two nominations, and the Fabian Society one, the alteration of the
rule has not in fact made any change, and the over-representation of
this section is of course undiminished.
Six months after the Labour Representation Committee was formed the
Society adopted a project drafted by Mr. S.G. Hobson for a Labour
Members' Guarantee Fund, and circulated it amongst the Unions affiliated
to the Committee. The proposal was submitted by its author on behalf of
the Society to the Labour Representation Conference of 1901, but an
amendment both approving of the scheme and declaring that the time was
not ripe for it was carried. A year later however the Conference
unanimously agreed to establish its Parliamentary Fund by which salaries
for their M.P.'s were provided until Parliament itself undertook the
business.
For several years after this the Fabian Society did not greatly concern
itself with the Labour Party. I attended the Annual Conferences and took
a regular part in the work of the Executive Committee, but my
colleagues of the Fabian Society as a whole showed little interest in
the new body. In a sense, it was not in our line. Its object was to
promote Labour Representation in Parliament, and the Fabian Society had
never run, and had never intended to run, candidates for Parliament or
for any local authority. We had made appeals for election funds on a
good many occasions and had succeeded once or twice in collecting
substantial sums, but this was a very different matter from accepting
responsibility for a candidate and his election expenses. Therefore, for
a good while, we remained in a position of benevolent passivity.
The Labour Representation Committee was founded as a Group, not as a
Party, and one of the two members elected under its auspices at the
General Election of 1900 ran as a Liberal. In 1903 it transformed itself
into a Party, and then began the somewhat strange anomaly that the
Fabian Society as a whole was affiliated to the Labour Party, whilst
some of its members were Liberal Members of Parliament. It is true that
the Trade Unions affiliated to the party were in the same position:
their members also were sometimes official Liberals and even Liberal
M.P.'s. The Labour Party itself never complained of the anomaly in the
position of the Society or questioned its collective loyalty. And the
Liberals in our Society never took any action hostile to the Labour
Party, or indeed, so far as I know, supported any of the proposals
occasionally made that we should disaffiliate from it. These proposals
always came from "Fabian reformers," the younger men who wanted to
create a revolution in the Society. And so little was their policy
matured that in several cases the same member first tried to get the
Society to expel all members who worked with any party other than the
Labour Party, and a short time later moved that the Society should
leave the Labour Party altogether. Or perhaps it was the other way
round. Logical consistency is usually incompatible with political
success: compromise runs smooth, whilst principle jams. But the lesser
sort of critic, on the look out for a grievance, can always apply a
principle to a compromise, point out that it does not fit, and that
difficulties may arise. In the case in question they have in fact rarely
arisen, and such as have occurred have been easily surmounted. It is not
necessary to record here all the proposals put forward from time to time
that the Society should disaffiliate from the Labour Party, or on the
other hand, that it should expel, directly or indirectly, all members
who did not confine their political activities to co-operating with the
Labour Party. It may be assumed that one or other of these proposals was
made every few years after the Labour Party was constituted, and that in
every case it was defeated, as a rule, by a substantial majority.
The Labour Party won three remarkable victories in the period between
the General Election of 1900 and that of 1906. In 1902 Mr. David
Shackleton was returned unopposed for a Liberal seat, the Clitheroe
Division of Lancashire; in 1903 Mr. (now the Right Hon.) Will Crooks, an
old member of our Society, captured Woolwich from the Conservatives by a
majority of 3229, amidst a scene of enthusiasm which none who were
present will ever forget: and five months later Mr. (now the Right Hon.)
Arthur Henderson, who later became a member of our Society, beat both
Liberal and Tory opponents at the Barnard Castle Division of Durham.
When the election campaign of 1906 began the Labour Party put fifty
candidates into the field and succeeded in carrying no fewer than
twenty-nine of them, whilst another joined the party after his
election. Four of these were members of the Fabian Society, and in
addition three Fabians were successful as Liberals, including Percy
Alden, then a member of our Executive Committee.
Whilst the election was in progress Mr. H.G. Wells began the Fabian
reform movement which is described in the next chapter. At that time he
did not bring the Labour Party into his scheme of reconstruction, but
some of the members of his Committee were then ardent adherents of that
party, and they persuaded his Committee to report in favour of the
Society's choosing "in harmonious co-operation with other Socialist and
Labour bodies, Parliamentary Candidates of its own. Constituencies for
such candidates should be selected, a special election fund raised and
election campaigns organised."
The result was that a resolution proposed by the Executive Committee was
carried early in March, 1907, directing the appointment of a Committee
to report on "the best means of promoting local Socialist societies of
the Fabian type with the object of increasing Socialist representation
in Parliament as a party co-operating as far as possible with the Labour
Party whilst remaining independent of that and of all other Parties."
This, it will be observed, is a different proposition, and one which
resulted in a lot of talk and nothing else. Bernard Shaw had the idea
that there might be county constituencies in the South of England, where
independent middle-class Socialists could win when Labour candidates had
no chance. No such constituency has ever been discovered and the Fabian
scheme has never even begun to be realised.
In January, 1908, the Committee's Report was considered and adopted, the
important item being the decision to send a circular to every member
inviting promises to an election fund of at least £5,000, contributions
to be spread over five years. This ultimately resulted in promises
amounting to £2637--a much larger sum than the Society had ever had at
its command--and with this substantial fund in prospect the Society was
in a position to begin the business of electioneering.
A favourable opportunity soon presented itself. A vacancy at the little
town of Taunton was not to be fought by the Liberals, while the
Conservative candidate, the Hon. W. (now Viscount) Peel, was a London
County Councillor, bitterly opposed even to the mild collectivism of the
London Progressives, Frank Smith, a member both of the Society and the
London County Council, was willing to fight, the Labour Party Executive
cordially approved, and the members promptly paid up the first
instalment of their promises. The election cost £316, of which the
Society paid £275, and although our candidate was beaten by 1976 votes
to 1085, the result was not contrary to our anticipations.
During 1909 the Executive Committee resolved to run two candidates, both
already nominated by the I.L.P., who willingly transferred to us the
responsibility for their election expenses. W. Stephen Sanders had been
third on the poll out of six candidates who fought in 1906 for the two
seats at Portsmouth, and as he had polled 8172 votes, more than either
Conservative, it was reasonably hoped that the Liberals would leave one
of the seats to him. Harry Snell at Huddersfield was opposing both
parties, but had a fair chance of winning. At the General Election of
January, 1910, neither of these candidates was successful, Sanders,
opposed by Lord Charles Beresford with an irresistible shipbuilding
programme, only obtaining 3529 votes, whilst at Huddersfield Snell was
second on the poll, but 1472 behind the Liberal. Elsewhere, however, the
members of the Society did well, no less than eight securing seats, four
for the Labour Party and four as Liberals.
In December, 1910, we won our first electoral victory. Will Crooks had
lost his seat at Woolwich in January by 295 votes. It was decided to
take over his candidature from the Coopers' Union, a very small society
which only nominally financed it, and also to support Harry Snell again
at Huddersfield. Will Crooks was victorious by 236 votes, but Harry
Snell failed to reduce the Liberal majority. Elsewhere members of the
Society were very successful. In all eight secured seats for the Labour
Party and four for the Liberals, amongst the latter Mr. (now Sir) L.G.
Chiozza Money, then a member of the Executive Committee.
This brings the electoral record of the Society up to the present time,
except that it should be mentioned that Mr. Arthur Henderson, M.P., who
became a member of the Society in 1912, was in 1915 both Secretary of
the Labour Party Executive and Chairman of the party in the House of
Commons, until he relinquished the latter position on joining the
Coalition Cabinet as Minister for Education, being thus actually the
first member of a Socialist society to attain Cabinet rank in this
country during his membership.
During these later years the Fabian Society with its increased numbers
was entitled to several delegates at the annual conference of the Labour
Party, and it frequently took part in the business by putting motions or
amendments on the agenda paper. All talk of forming a Fabian Socialist
Party had died away, and the Executive Committee had shown itself far
more appreciative of the importance of the Labour Party than in earlier
years. I continued to represent the Society on the Executive Committee
until the end of 1913, when I retired, and the new General Secretary, W.
Stephen Sanders, took my place. When in December, 1915, he accepted a
commission for the period of the war, as a recruiting officer, Sidney
Webb was appointed to fill the vacancy.
* * * * *
The account of the part taken by the Society in the work of the Labour
Party has carried us far beyond the period previously described, and a
short space must now be devoted to the years which intervened between
the Education episode and the outburst of activity to be described in
the next chapter.
Social progress advances in waves, and outbursts of energy are always
succeeded by depressions. Up to 1899 the Society slowly grew in
membership until this reached 861. Then it slowly declined to 730 in
1904. This was symptomatic of a general lack of interest in Socialism.
The lectures and meetings were poorly attended, and the really important
debates which decided our educational policy were conducted by only a
few dozen members. Twenty years had passed since the Society was
founded. Of the Essayists Bernard Shaw, Sidney Webb, Hubert Bland, and
when in England, Sydney Olivier were still leaders of the Society, and
so until January, 1904, was Graham Wallas, who then resigned his
membership on account of his disagreement with the tract on Tariff
Reform, but really, as his letter published in "Fabian News" indicated,
because in the long controversy over education policy he had found
himself constantly in the position of a hostile critic. It should be
added that his resignation has been followed by none of those personal
and political disagreements which so commonly accompany the severance of
old associations. Mr. Wallas has remained a Fabian in all except name.
His friendship with his old colleagues has been unbroken, and he has
always been willing to assist the Society out of his abundant stores of
special knowledge both by lecturing at its meetings and by taking part
in conferences and even by attending quite small meetings of special
groups.
In all these years a large number of younger members had come forward,
none of them of quite the same calibre as the Essayists, but many of
them contributing much to the sum total of the Society's influence. Of
these perhaps the most active was Henry W. Macrosty,[33] who sat on the
Executive from 1895 till 1907, when he retired on account of the
pressure of official duties. During and indeed before his period of
office Mr. Macrosty was constantly engaged in research and writing for
the Society. He prepared the Eight Hours Bill which approached nearest
to practicability (Tract 48, "Eight Hours by Law," 1893); in 1898 he
wrote for the Society "State Arbitration and the Living Wage" (Tract
83); in 1899, Tract 88, "The Growth of Monopoly in English Industry"; in
1905 "The Revival of Agriculture, a national policy for Great Britain,"
the last named an extraordinarily farsighted anticipation of the chief
reforms which were advocated with such vigour by the Liberal Party, and
indeed by all parties in the years preceding the great war. In the same
year his "State Control of Trusts" was published as Tract 124. As I have
before explained, a great part of the published work of the Society has
been prepared co-operatively, and in this process Mr. Macrosty always
took an active part. He had a considerable share in drafting the
innumerable documents issued in connection with the education
controversy, and indeed participated in all the activities of the
Executive until his retirement.
Scarcely less active was Joseph F. Oakeshott, who has been already
mentioned in connection with the Fellowship of the New Life. He joined
the Executive when it was first enlarged in 1890, and sat until 1902. A
Somerset House official, like Macrosty, he was strong on statistics, and
for many years he undertook the constant revisions of the figures of
national income, in the various editions of our "Facts for Socialists,"
His "Democratic Budget" (Tract 39) was our first attempt to apply
Socialism to taxation: and his "Humanising of the Poor Law" (Tract 54),
published in 1894, set out the policy which in recent years has been
widely adopted by the better Boards of Guardians.
John W. Martin sat on the Executive from 1894 to 1899, wrote Tract No.
52, "State Education at Home and Abroad" (1894), and did a lot of
valuable lecturing, both here and in America, where he married the
leading exponent of Fabianism and editor of a monthly called "The
American Fabian," and, settling in New York, has since, under the name
of John Martin, played a considerable part in the educational and
progressive politics of his adopted city.
* * * * *
I will conclude this chapter with a short account of some of the
applications of Socialism to particular problems which were studied by
the Society in or about this period of its history.
In 1897 and 1898 a good deal of time was devoted to working out a scheme
for the municipalisation of the Drink Trade. This was before the
publication of "The Temperance Problem and Social Reform," by Joseph
Rowntree and Arthur Sherwell, in 1899, a volume which was the first to
treat the subject scientifically on a large scale. I took the lead on
the question, and finally two tracts were published in 1898, "Liquor
Licensing at Home and Abroad" (No. 85), giving a sketch of the facts,
and "Municipal Drink Traffic" (No. 86), which set out a scheme drafted
by me, but substantially modified as the result of discussions by the
Executive Committee and by meetings of members. This is one of the few
causes taken up by the Society which has made but little progress in
popular favour in the seventeen years that have elapsed since we adopted
it.
Old Age Pensions, proposed in 1890 by Sidney Webb in Tract 17, "Reform
of the Poor Law," was definitely advocated in Tract No. 73, "The Case
for State Pensions in Old Age," written in 1896 by George Turner, one of
the cleverest of the younger members. The Society did not make itself
responsible for the scheme he proposed, universal pensions for all, and
the Old Age Pensions Act of 1908 adopted another plan.
In 1899 and 1900 we devoted much time to the working out of further
schemes of municipalisation in the form of a series of leaflets, Nos. 90
to 97. We applied the principle to Milk, Pawnshops, Slaughterhouses,
Bakeries, Fire Insurance, and Steamboats. These were written by various
members, and are all careful little studies of the subject, but they
were not issued in a convenient form, and none of the schemes advocated
has yet been generally carried out.
* * * * *
The Tariff Reform agitation could not pass unnoticed, and for a time
Bernard Shaw showed a certain inclination to toy with it. A tract
advocating Free Trade was actually set up, but got no further. Finally
Shaw drafted "Fabianism and the Fiscal Question An Alternative Policy"
(Tract 116), which we adopted with practical unanimity, though it was
the occasion of the resignation of Graham Wallas.
It was perhaps the least successful of the many pronouncements written
by Bernard Shaw on behalf of the Society. A subtle and argumentative
criticism of Mr. Chamberlain's policy on one side and of the Free Trade
rejoinder on the other is neither simple nor decisive enough for the
general reader: and the alternatives advocated--reorganisation of the
consular service in the interests of export trade, free ocean transit
for the purpose of consolidating the Empire and nationalisation of
railways as a necessary corollary together with improved technical
education--were too futurist, and appealed directly to too small and
conservative a class, to attract much attention in the heat of a vital
controversy. The writer had no anticipation of the triumph of
Liberalism, then so near, and Evidently expected that Mr. Chamberlain
would carry the country for his policy. The tract was also issued in a
shilling edition on superior paper with a preface by the author, and it
is the only one of his publications which has failed to sell freely.
* * * * *
At this period we had a number of Committees appointed to investigate
various problems, and one of them, which had for its reference the
Birth-rate and Infant Mortality, produced a report of more that
temporary significance. When the Society was formed the Malthusian
hypothesis held the field unchallenged and the stock argument against
Socialism was that it would lead to universal misery by removing the
beneficent checks on the growth of population, imposed by starvation
and disease upon the lowest stratum of society. Since the year 1876 the
birth-rate had declined, and gradually the fear of over-population,
which had saddened the lives of such men as John Stuart Mill, began to
give way to the much less terrifying but still substantial fear of
under-population, caused either by race degeneracy or race suicide. At
that period the former of the two was the accepted explanation, and only
by vague hints did scientific statisticians indicate that there might be
or perhaps must be something else than "natural" causes for the decline.
To the Society it seemed an all-important question. Was our race to
perish by sterility, and if so, was sterility due to wealth and luxury
or to poverty and disease? Or was the cause of the decline a voluntary
limitation of families? We determined, as a first step, to form some
sort of statistical estimate of the extent of voluntary restriction. We
thought, and, as the event proved, thought rightly, that our members
would be willing to assist us in this delicate enquiry. They were a
sample of the population, selected in a manner which bore no sort of
relation to the question at issue, and if we could get returns from them
indicating their personal practice in the matter, we might have some
clue to the facts. It turned out that the result was far more startling
and far more conclusive than we suspected.
In November, 1905, carefully drafted enquiry forms were sent out to all
members of the Society except unmarried women, so arranged as to allow
exact answers to be given to the questions without disclosure of the
name or handwriting of the deponent. Of the 634 posted 460 were returned
or accounted for, and only two members signified objection to the
enquiry. After deduction of bachelors and others not relevant, we
obtained particulars of 316 marriages. I prepared an elaborate
statistical report, which showed that in the period 1890-1899 out of 120
marriages only 6 fertile marriages were recorded in which no restriction
had been adopted. This was the first and possibly is the only
statistical enquiry yet made on the subject, and although the number of
cases was minute in proportion to the population, the evidence afforded
by that sample was sufficient to be conclusive, that at any rate a
cause, and probably the chief cause, of the fall in the birth-rate was
voluntary limitation of families.
The method of publication presented some difficulty, and finally it was
decided, in order to secure the most generally impressive publicity, to
ask Sidney Webb to collect the other available evidence and to make an
article out of the whole, to be published over his name. It appeared as
two special articles in "The Times" for October 11th and 18th, 1906, and
was subsequently reprinted by us as Tract 131, "The Decline of the
Birth-rate."
Other Committees at this period discussed Agriculture, Poor Law, Local
Government Areas, Public Control of Electricity, and Feeding of School
Children. Reports on all these subjects were issued as tracts, some of
which have been mentioned already in connection with their authors, H.W.
Macrosty and Hubert Bland, whilst others will be referred to in a future
chapter.
[Illustration: _From a copyright photograph by Lambert Weston and Son,
Folkestone_
H.G. WELLS, IN 1908 At the door of his house at Sandgate]
FOOTNOTES:
[33] Born 1865. Clerk in the Exchequer and Audit Dept. 1884, Assistant
Director of the Census of Production 1908. Author of "Trusts and the
State" (1901) and "The Trust Movement in British Industry" (1907).