Letter to August Bebel, May 29, 1892

Author(s)	George Bernard Shaw
Written	29 May 1892

Published for the first time. Reproduced from the original in Marx-Engels Collected Works, Volume 49

GEORGE BERNARD SHAW

TO AUGUST BEBEL

IN BERLIN

29 May 1892

Our aims are as advanced as those of any other body of Social Democrats in England or in Germany, and our methods are as like the German party methods as is possible in view of the facts that we have no second ballot in England as you have in Germany, whilst on the other hand our House of Commons has command of the army, so that when we capture that we capture everything. The result is that whereas you can always run your S. D. candidate against both Liberal & Tory (as we should call them) with the certainty of winning at the 2nd ballot if you have a majority as against the Tory, we in England would be defeated at the 1st ballot by the division of the labour vote between the Liberal and the S. D., both being beaten by the Tory. Therefore, our only chance where the workers are not completely organized is to force the Liberals to accept our men as their party candidates. At the last City Council election the S.D.F. ran independent candidates and they were all badly beaten, the Fabian Society^[1] ran 6 of its members as 'Progressives' and they were all triumphantly successful. Meanwhile we are agitating for the introduction of the 2nd ballot here and urging the workers to organize themselves independently and break loose from the Liberals. If you and Paul Singer were to take the command of the Fabian Society, you would find yourselves compelled to take the same course and if you make a careful study of the work that has been done for some years past in spreading the S. D. idea in this country, I am sure that you will find that the Fabians who are a small and a poor body of men, have done as much as any other body in forwarding that work. You will readily understand that those enthusiastic socialists who have had no experience of practical political work accuse us of compromising our principles and intriguing with the Liberal party. I have already explained to you how we find ourselves as Possibilists, compelled for the present either to force our candidates on the Liberals or to suffer defeat and disgrace at every election.

↑ The Fabian Society was a British reformist organisation set up by a group of intellectuals in 1884 and led by Sidney and Beatrice Webb. The Society's name derives from Fabius Maximus, a Roman general of the 3rd century B.C. nicknamed Cunctator (Delayer) for his tactic of evading a set battle in the war against Hannibal.

[1] The Fabian Society was a British reformist organisation set up by a group of intellectuals in 1884 and led by Sidney and Beatrice Webb. The Society's name derives from Fabius Maximus, a Roman general of the 3rd century B.C. nicknamed Cunctator (Delayer) for his tactic of evading a set battle in the war against Hannibal.

[1]