Page 391 - The_story_of_the_C._W._S._The_jubilee_history_of_the_cooperative_wholesale_society,_limited._1863-1913_(IA_storyofcwsjubill00redf) (1)_Neat

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Industrial Republicans and the C.W.S.
the Wholesale Society for " old-world selfishness " and faithlessness
to " the true ideals " in retaining the profits of production for " the
whole body of consumers." A month later the same charge was
made from a still more conspicuous platform. At this period
a National Co-operative Festival was held every year at the
Crystal Palace. Originated by Mr. E. 0. Greening, it was hi charge
of a National Festival Society. The festivals were meant to include
a general exliibition and display of productions, music, flowers,
speeches, ideas, and every fine and good thing in the co-operative
world, and the C.W.S. at first took up exhibition space hberally.
On the whole, until as " consumers " of festivities the participants
were starved out bj'' increased railway charges, tlie festivals
embodied with fair success a distinctly bright and happy idea.
But the opening speeches now became notoriously unfestive. At the
1898 gathering in August, surrounded by none but copartnership
leaders, Earl Grey again " looked in vain " to the " distributive
movement " and the C.W.S. for anything that would " stir the
soul " and " lift men out of the narrow groove of selfishness."
Another month and the C.W.S. was increasing its annual grant
to the Co-operative Union from £150 to £250. " I hope now," said
George Hawkins at London genially, " that members of the Board
will not go about bemoaning the Wholesale." The next festival,
however, saw Mr. Gerald Balfour, then Chief Secretary' for Ireland,
won over to asserting on behalf of the copartnership movement
that the C.W.S. " trusted labour much as a joint-stock company
would." His idea (he said) was " to substitute an industrial
repubhc for an industrial monarchj^" In 1900 Earl Grey again
spoke of " the antagonism " of the English Wholesale Society to
profit-sharing; "whether it proceeded from selfishness, want of
imagination, or futile aspiration towards a collectiWst Utopia,
he knew not." The successor of the earl in 1901 was Sir (then
the Hon.) Horace Plunkett. His criticism of the C.W.S. was more
detailed and more fairly stated. Still he saw in an extension of
federaHsm an "abandonment of the old ideals in favour of an
uninspiring gross materialism."
"
Uttered at a " national festival in London from a platform
shared by Messrs. Greening, Holyoake, Vivian, Maddison, Blandford,
Aneurin Wilhams, and other prominent figures at Co-operative
Congresses, these criticisms gained a wide pubUcity. The Daihj
Chronicle referred to the festival of 1900 as "the Co-operative
Congress." The Times, the Daily News, and other newspapers
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