The league's origins lay in a split in the British Socialist Party in 1915, primarily over the need to win the First World War.
A group, dissenting from the pacifism of the Labour Party, would be formed by Victor Fisher and supported "the eternal idea of nationality" and aimed to promote "socialist measures in the war effort".
[5] The league's first public meeting was held at the Queen's Hall in London on 10 May 1916, and its guest speaker and big advocate was Prime Minister Billy Hughes of Australia.
[12] The first issue of the league's newspaper, the British Citizen and Empire Worker, published the party's platform:[13]A Standard Living Wage for Industrial and Agricultural Workers; The Revival and Development of National Agriculture; Adequate Pensions for all Our Disabled Soldiers and Sailors; Victory in the War to be followed by the Expropriation of Enemy Economic and Industrial Interests Within the Empire; National or Municipal Control of National Monopolies and Vital Industries; The Full Exploitation of the Natural Resources of the Empire in the Interests of the Whole People.
The league's secretary, Victor Fisher, stressed the need for 'respectable' socialism, noting that, "The British Commonwealth still remains the highest and finest embodiment of social life which men had yet developed...the main business of our public life and of our public activities...must be..To unite by every possible link the scattered states of the British Commonwealth.
In 1916, the newspaper severely criticized Prime Minister Asquith, nicknamed "Squiff", for drinking too much, allowing no crisis to interfere with his two hours of bridge every evening, and, while hundreds of thousands died, spending leisurely nonworking weekends at friends' country houses.