(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.
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