BERNARD SHAWS NEW PARTY.

Dominion, Volume 1, Issue 16, 14 October 1907, Page 11

BERNARD SHAWS NEW PARTY.

">::;-.•'.. v , ;:;,'';♦'..:.. : , ■- : : ■•■■'".■' ,;; '.. : _"Lnow solemnly! abandon' tho Labour party' after doing/my share;of the work'of setting it on its, feet—or/rather, on .its kneos—-in ■ Parliament," So writes Mr. George 'Bernard' ' bhaw ln'the^'Clarion.".''•■■ :'■','." ; ::- ' ■ "V,"9W .want,", he 'goes. on,. ■ "to get' my ' own ; class—the' disiiili'eritcd poor relations,' ' and younger sons'.progeny of the'plutocrats r ancl_ aristocrats—into Parliament and into ' political ,aray I : want a .party of. Socialists who have had enough of being gentlemen. No common: working man need apply; his dissht- ■ isfaction with genteel life cannot be:sincere because > has never tried it.' 'Poor people ai r yS kb?b; m(i ' no Pom Person . shall be admitted into my ne w party unless! \luh W h - h ' s ,P°yerty;i s his own fault ~ and..that his parents were respectable. The : SwT °^ have never been, to '; church,-will-be rigidly excluded; but .those ; ' who were taken.'to church.'reg, larly ever? ; ' Knfh y th r parents and hr ° k ° loLmZ ■" on will be welcome; ■• •■,.■•... *• ■ | ■_"All members overtlnrty must bo married, i or, at least domesticated -bachelors and liber- < tines.invariably idealise,matrimony, and can put forward impracticable plans of education. ' Drunkards,: ] borrowers and amateur gamblers i will be excluded, not fronr moral prejudice, i but becauso thoy are nuisances, and will find ( plenty of congonial company in the other < parties ;--but ■disinterestedly irregular and in- t provided they are ladies and •gentlomen '1 Bubordinate persons will bo specially wolcomo, i provided.they aro/ladies arid geritlemon "■■ ! Various tests of,gentility,will be applied; t For instance candidates ..will bo asked whether 'i it has ever occurred to them to, clean their ] swn boots or go to bed in their day shirts A.ll-afßrmative answer will be a-decisive dis- s ludlifieation. The thing.must bo kept select I it nil costs. ' Keir Hardie, obviously tbo most o ngrained gentleman in the Houso of Com- v Tions, will be admitted on his renouncine o r.bqur,' and either : publicly.'.'apologising' for h laving worked as a boy,in a mine, or else b sciifdssihg' Lhat the story of his having done h id is as unfounded as it seems improbable t nit,, as a ruls, only Socialists, who are iene- r ;r.des from, capitalism will be tolerated. s "Professional men and .em- t Joyces will then have a society suited'to n rheir position, free from tho red tapo of tho a ,iado unions, and the aspirations ;of the i I'orking man to be 'a gentleman in the traiT p ense of the word , —that is, on the cheap." n