ten, its name changed to the British Socialist Party--a title
since adopted by the old Social Democratic Federation--the Executive
Committee was to be replaced by a Council of twenty-five, which was to
appoint three Committees of three members each for Publishing, for
Propaganda, and General Purposes respectively. The last, to be entitled
the Directing Committee, was to meet frequently and manage most of the
affairs of the Society. Finally, "in harmonious co-operation with other
Socialist and Labour bodies," the Society was to run candidates for
Parliament and raise a fund for the purpose.

It will be seen that some of these proposals were merely speculative.
Groups could be organised easily enough when the members in any district
numbered hundreds instead of units, or, at best, dozens. New tracts
could be published when they were written: a weekly review was possible
if the capital was provided. The new Basis and the new name were matters
of emphasis and taste rather than anything else. The new machinery of
government was in the main a question to be decided by experience. Mr.
Wells had none; it is said that he never sat on a Committee before that
under discussion, and certainly while he remained a Fabian he never
acquired the Committee habit. On the principle underlying some of these
proposals, viz. that the Society should cease to treat membership as a
privilege, and should aim at increasing its numbers, there was no
serious controversy. The Executive Committee had already carried through
a suggestion made in the discussion on "Faults of the Fabian" for the
creation of a class of Associates, entitled to all privileges except
control over policy, with a view to provide a means of attracting new
adherents. The one constructive proposal, direct collective
participation in Parliamentary Elections, was quite alien to Mr. Wells'
original ideas; it was forced on him, it is said, by other members of
his Committee and was described by himself later on as "secondary and
subordinate."[35]

The Executive Committee transmitted the Special Committee's Report to
the members of the Society accompanied by a Report of their own, drafted
by Bernard Shaw and incomparably superior to the other as a piece of
literature.[36]

The reply of the Executive Committee began by welcoming criticism from
within the Society, of which they complained that in the past they had
had too little. An opposition, they said, was a requisite of good
govern