l enough, were ludicrously unimportant in
comparison with our cognate home grievances. Nobody in his senses would
have contemplated a war on their account,"[31] But when war had come the
situation was entirely altered. The majority of the Society recognised
that the British Empire had to win the war, and that no other conclusion
to it was possible. Some of us had joined in the protest against the
threat of war: but when that protest was fruitless we declined to
contest the inevitable. A large section of the Liberal Party and nearly
all other Socialists took another view. They appeared to believe, and
some of them even hoped, that the Boers might be successful and the
British army be driven to the sea. The I.L.P. regarded the war as a
typical case of the then accepted theory of Socialism that war is always
instigated by capitalists for the purpose of obtaining profits. They
opposed every step in the prosecution of the campaign, and criticised
every action of the British authorities.

In this matter the left and right wings of the Fabians joined hands in
opposition to the centre. Members who came into the movement when
Marxism was supreme, like Walter Crane, those who worked largely with
the I.L.P., such as J. Ramsay Macdonald, S.G. Hobson, and G.N. Barnes
(later M.P. and Chairman of the Labour Party), were joined by others who
were then associated with the Liberals, such as Dr. F. Lawson Dodd, Will
Crooks (later Labour M.P.), Clement Edwards (later Liberal M.P.), and
Dr. John Clifford. On the other side were the older leaders of the
Society, who took the view that the members had come together for the
purpose of promoting Socialism, that the question at issue was one
"which Socialism cannot solve and does not touch,"[32] and that whilst
each member was entitled to hold and work for his own opinion, it was
not necessary for the Society in its corporate capacity to adopt a
formal policy with the result of excluding the large minority which
would have objected to whatever decision was arrived at.

The first round in the contest was at a business meeting on October
13th, 1899, when on the advice of the Executive the members present
rejected a motion of urgency for the discussion of a resolution
expressing sympathy with the Boers.

It was however agreed that the matter could not end thus, and a members'
meeting was fixed for December 8th, at Clifford's Inn Hall, when S.G.
Hobson moved a long resolution declaring it essentia