Social Democratic Federation | |
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Leader | Henry Hyndman |
Founded | 1881 |
Dissolved | 1911 |
Preceded by | Manhood Suffrage League Scottish Socialist Federation |
Succeeded by | British Socialist Party Socialist Party of Great Britain |
Headquarters | London |
Newspaper | Justice |
Ideology | Socialism |
The Social Democratic Federation (SDF) was established as Britain's first organised socialist political party by H. M. Hyndman, and had its first meeting on 7 June 1881. Those joining the SDF included William Morris, George Lansbury, James Connolly and Eleanor Marx. However, Friedrich Engels, Karl Marx's long-term collaborator, refused to support Hyndman's venture. Many of its early leading members had previously been active in the Manhood Suffrage League.[1]
The SDF battled through defections of its right and left wings to other organisations in the first decade of the twentieth century before uniting with other radical groups in the Marxist British Socialist Party from 1911 until 1920.