With a view to a “Second Reading” debate the executive Committee had put down a general resolution that their report be received, but Mr. Wells did not fall in with this plan, and the resolution on the motion of Bernard Shaw was adopted without discussion.  On the first clause of the next resolution, instructing the Executive to submit amendments to the Rules for increasing their number to twenty-five, Mr. Wells, acting for himself, moved an amendment “approving the spirit of the report of the Committee of Enquiry, and desiring the outgoing Executive to make the earliest possible arrangements for the election of a new Executive to give effect to that report.”  His speech, which occupied an hour and a quarter and covered the whole field, would have been great if Mr. Wells had been a good speaker.  Written out from notes, it was printed in full by himself for circulation amongst the members, and it is vigorous, picturesque entertaining, and imaginative, as his work always is.  But it delivered him into the hands of his more experienced opponents by virtually challenging the society to discard them and enter on a regenerated career under his guidance.  It was a heroic issue to force; and it was perhaps the real one; but it could have only one result.  The discussion was adjourned to the 14th, and at 9 o’clock on that evening Bernard Shaw replied on the whole debate.  His main proposition was that, as the amendment had been converted by Mr. Wells’ printed and circulated speech into a motion of want of confidence, the leaders of the Society must and would retire if it were adopted.  They were willing to discuss every point on its merits and to abide by the decision of the Society, but they would not accept a general approval of the Committee’s Report as against their own when it implied an accusation of misconduct.  In the course of the speech Mr. Wells pledged himself not to retire from the Society if he was defeated; and at the end of it he consented to withdraw his amendment.  Bernard Shaw’s speech, probably the most impressive he has ever made in the Society, was delivered to a large and keenly appreciative audience in a state of extreme excitement.  A long report pacifically toned down by Shaw himself, appears in “Fabian News” (January, 1907).  It succeeded in its object.  The Executive Committee welcomed the co-operation of Mr. Wells; the last thing they desired was to drive him out of the Society, and whilst they could not accept his report as a whole, they were willing to adopt any particular item after full discussion.  There is no doubt that they would have won if the amendment had gone to a division, but they were only too glad not to inflict a defeat on their opponents.

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