The British Labour Party was not explicitly socialist until 1918. In February of that year a Special Conference adopted a new constitution which stated that the ultimate aim of the party was:-

“To secure for the producers by hand or by brain the full fruits of their industry, and the most equitable distribution thereof that may be possible, upon the basis of common ownership of the means of production and the best obtainable system of popular administration and control of each industry or service.”

Before this change, Ramsay MacDonald, writing in 1911, had said: “The Labour Party is not Socialist. It is a union of Socialist and trade-union bodies for immediate political work…” The new party, founded in 1900 as the Labour Representation Committee, was in many ways un manage de convenance of militant Socialists and Glad-stonian Liberal trade-union leaders. The “immediate political work” for which these groups came together was the representation of the working class in parliament. Of the need for such representation both sides were firmly convinced: the Socialists because they hoped to convert the trade unions to their own way of thinking; the trade-union leaders because they were disappointed by the failure of the official Liberal party constituency caucuses to adopt more working-class candidates.

Das Sozialistengesetz zerstörte, zehn Jahre nach ihrer Entstehung, die Gewerkschaftsbewegung, die 1868 so eifrig begonnen hatte. Die Entwicklung, die damit verschleppt und aufgeschoben war, kam nach Aufhebung des Sozialistengesetzes zum Austrag. Der durch sie her-aufbeschworene Konflikt von Gewerkschaft und Partei 1906 ist als ein Bestandteil der Industrialisierung Deutschlands aufzufassen. Die Überordnung der Partei über die Gewerkschaften gehörte der Zeit an, in der Deutschland verglichen mit England ein industriell unter-entwickeltes Land war. Die Umkehrung des Verhältnisses und die Angleichung an das Modell der gleichzeitig in England entstehenden Labour Party trat mit dem endgültigen Durchbruch zum Industriestaat ein.

The period 1870–1880 represents an important phase in the history of social movements in Russia. Within that decade ideas and groups merged whose influence can be discerned in the events that preceded and those that followed the upheaval of 1917.

Among those groups one of the more interesting was the so-called Lavrists, or vperedovtzy, named after the publication “Vpered” (Forward), founded and edited by Peter Lavrov (1823–1900) and first published in Zurich, Switzerland, where volumes I and II were brought out in 1873 And 1874 respectively, and then in London, where volumes III, IV And V (the last-named not under the editorship of lavrov) as well as a bimonthly edition of “Vpered” were published during 1874–1877. In addition, the printing office of “Vpered” also produced several books and pamphlets.

There are few legends relating to the history of the Labour Movement which have enjoyed the influence and popularity of the story of how British workmen responded to the American Civil War. Their supposed unanimity in opposition to the Slave Power and their resistance to every ruling class project for intervention on its behalf were thought to be a serviceable example and inspiration, not only by the stalwarts of the International and the Reform League, but by the organisers of the anti-war campaigns of 1878 and after. Even today a writer on „Peaceful Co-existence” finds it an instructive example of the power of the working class in international relations.

The successful reassertion of the authority of the Court of the Earl Marshal, in the recent case of the Corporation of Manchester vs. The Manchester Palace of Varieties, Ltd., has renewed interest in this ancient institution. The court ruled that The Manchester Palace of Varieties had wrongly displayed the heraldic arms of the Corporation, contrary to the laws and customs of arms, and that the court itself, which had last sat in 1751 and which Blackstone described as having fallen into contempt and disuse, was still empowered to give relief to those who thought themselves aggrieved in such matters.