ut not the last time, to appoint a Committee
to revise the Basis. The Committee consisted of the Executive and eight
added members, amongst whom may be mentioned Walter Crane, the Rev. S.D.
Headlam, and Graham Wallas. It is said that after many hours of
discussion they arrived by compromise at an unanimous report, and that
their draft was accepted by the Society without amendment. The report
was presented to a meeting on June 3rd, 1887, of which I, on a visit to
London, was chairman. It is unfortunate that the record of this meeting,
at which the existing Basis of the Society was adopted, is the only one,
in the whole history of the Society, which is incomplete. Possibly the
colonial policy of the empire was disturbed, and the secretary occupied
with exceptional official duties. Anyway the minutes were left
unfinished in June, were continued in October, and were never completed
or recorded as confirmed. The proceedings relating to the Basis were
apparently never written. There is no doubt, however, that the Basis was
adopted on this occasion, it is said, at an adjourned meeting, and in
spite of many projects of revision it has with one addition--the phrase
about "equal citizenship of women"--remained the Basis of the Society to
the present time.[20]

The purpose of the Basis has been often misunderstood. It is not a
confession of faith, or a statement of the whole content and meaning of
Socialism. It is merely a test of admission, a minimum basis of
agreement, acceptance of which is required from those who aspire to
share in the control of a Society which had set out to reconstruct our
social system. The most memorable part of the discussion was the
proposal of Mr. Stuart Glennie to add a clause relating to marriage and
the family. This was opposed by Mrs. Besant, then regarded as an
extremist on that subject, and was defeated. In view of the large amount
of business transacted before the discussion of the Basis began, the
debate cannot have been prolonged.

It is easy enough, nearly thirty years later, to criticise this
document, to point out that it is purely economic, and unnecessarily
rigid: that the phrase about compensation, which has been more discussed
than any other, is badly worded, and for practical purposes always
disregarded in the constructive proposals of the Society.[21] The best
testimony to the merits of the Basis is its survival--its acceptance by
the continuous stream of new members who have joined