Socialism and Government ...Independent Labour Party, 1909 - 162 pages |
Common terms and phrases
action active become bill candidates carried Church citizen citizenship co-operate consider constituencies cracy cratic created delegates demo Democracy democratic discussed economic effective elections electors ence enfranchisement evolution existence experience expressed favour force franchise function habit House of Commons House of Lords human idea importance income INDEPENDENT LABOUR PARTY individual individualist industrial influence interests Irish Party Labour Party legislation Liberal liberty Lord Randolph Churchill majority means members of Parliament ment method mind minority modern moral nature organ organisation Parlia Parliament Parliamentary personality Philip Snowden political practical present system principles problem programme progress Proportional Representation proposals protect public opinion RAMSAY MACDONALD Referendum reform regarding religion in Scotland repre representative responsible result rule Second Ballot secure sexual selection social Socialist Society spirit theory things tical tion to-day vidual vote whilst whole women
Popular passages
Page 87 - Anti-Corn-Law movement, for they had inexhaustible purses, which they opened freely in a contest where not only their pecuniary interests but their pride as ' an order
Page 167 - ... at all they must be transferred en bloc from one party to another party, and not from one candidate to another candidate, in accordance with the expressed wishes of the elector. Mr. JR Macdonald states that " proportional representation seeks to prevent the intermingling of opinion on the margins of parties and sections of parties which is essential to ordered and organic social progress.
Page 93 - ... And the chief divisions of temperament and opinion, he says, will be between the world-old tendencies of action and inaction — a view which does not differ one iota from that of Mr. Roosevelt. Mr. MacDonald asserts that "it is the whole of society which is developing towards Socialism," and adds, "The consistent exponent of the class struggle must, of course, repudiate these doctrines, but then the class struggle is far more akin to Radicalism than to Socialism.
Page xxvi - A people who greet the praises of political freedom with a yawn, are already offering their wrists for the shackles of servitude. The practical consequences of this disregard for political liberty and independence are immediate. It is seen in a lowering of democratic institutions in the public estimation.
Page 167 - Thus a system of proportional representation will exaggerate rather than remove those dangers which arise from the fact that governments may not be really representative. It is a method of election for securing the representation of fragments of political thought and desire, and for inviting those fragments to coalesce after and not before elections.
Page 35 - ... and Society, p. 144). The proper organ for accomplishing socialism was the democratic State, which meant the organised political personality of a sovereign people. The State was not the organ of a class, but of the whole society. Indeed, " socialism could not be defined better than as that stage of social organisation when the State organises for society an adequate nutritive system ; and democratic government is the signal that the change is taking place " (Socialism and Government, i.
Page 52 - The truth is that democracy is simply an experiment in the application of the principle of equality to the management of the common affairs of the community. It is the principle of equality which has conquered the world. That one man is as good as another is an outgrowth of what may be called social consciousness, and as soon as it has got possession of the State, democratic government follows as a matter of course.
Page 13 - Or, this thought may be translated into this form: The State does not concern itself primarily with man as a possessor of rights, but with man as the doer of duties.