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.
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