This was not mere neglect. In 1893 a
committee was appointed "to draw up a tract advocating the claims of
women to all civil and political rights at present enjoyed by men," and
in March, 1894, it reported that "a tract had been prepared which the
Committee itself did not consider suitable for publication." Later the
Committee was discharged, and in face of this fiasco nothing further was
done.
Mr. Wells took a strong view on the importance of doing something in
relation to women and children, though exactly what he proposed was
never clear. He offered to the Society his little book on "Socialism and
the Family," subsequently published by Mr. Fifield, but the Executive
Committee declined it precisely because of its vagueness: they were not
disposed to accept responsibility for criticisms on the existing
system, unless some definite line of reform was proposed which they
could ask the Society to discuss and approve, or at any rate to issue as
a well-considered scheme suitable for presentation to the public.
The new Basis proposed by the Special Committee declared that the
Society sought to bring about "a reconstruction of the social
organisation" by
_(a)_ promoting transfer of land and capital to the State,
_(b)_ "enforcing equal citizenship of men and women,
_(c)_ "substituting public for private authority in the education
and support of the young.
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