"The above programme," it says,
"is sufficient for the present to fill the hands of the True Radical
Party--the New Labour Party--in a word, the Practical Socialist Party,"
It is by no means so able and careful a production as the Report on the
Government Organisation of Unemployed Labour.
In April, 1888, the seven Essayists were elected as the Executive
Committee, Graham Wallas and William Clarke taking the places of Frank
Podmore and W.L. Phillips, who retired, and at the same meeting the
Parliamentary League was turned into the Political Committee of the
Society; and Tract 7, "Capital and Land," was approved. This tract, the
work of Sydney Olivier, is a reasoned attack on Single Tax as a panacea,
and in addition contains an estimate of the total realised wealth of the
country, just as "Facts for Socialists" does of its income. This, too,
has been regularly revised and reprinted ever since and commands a
steady sale. It is now in its seventh edition.
Meanwhile the series of meetings, variously described as Public,
Ordinary, and Private, was kept on regularly twice a month, with a break
only of two months from the middle of July. Most of the meetings were
still held in the houses of members, but as early as November, 1886, an
ordinary meeting was held at Willis's Rooms, King Street, St. James's,
at that time an ultra-respectable rendezvous for societies of the most
select character, keeping up an old-fashioned ceremonial of crimson
tablecloths, elaborate silver candlesticks, and impressively liveried
footmen.
Pages:
68
69
70
71
72
73
74
75
76
77
78
79
80
81
82
83
84
85
86
87
88
89
90
91
92