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MALLAM AI 2

The difficulty is solved very easily if we remember that the entire commodity-product I in its bodily form consists of means of production, i.e., of the material elements of the constant capital itself. We meet here the same phenomenon which we witnessed before under II, only in a different aspect. In the case of II the entire commodity-product consisted of articles of consumption. Hence one portion of it, measured by the wages plus surplus-value contained in this product, could be consumed by its own producers. Here, in the case of I, the entire product consists of means of production, of buildings, machinery, vessels, raw and auxiliary materials, etc. One portion of them, namely that replacing the constant capital employed in this sphere, can therefore immediately function anew in its bodily form as a component of the productive capital: So far as it goes into circulation, it circulates within class I. In II a part of the commodity-product is individually consumed in kind by its own producers while in I a portion of the product is productively consumed in kind by its capitalist producers. In the part of the commodity-product I equal to 4,000c the capital-value consumed in this category re-appears, and does so in a bodily form in which it can immediately resume its function of productive constant capital. In II that portion of the commodity-product of 3,000 whose value is equal to the wages plus the surplus-value (equal to 1,000) passes directly into the individual consumption of the capitalists and labourers of II, while on the other hand the constant capital-value of this commodity-product (equal to 2,000) cannot re-enter the productive consumption of the II capitalists but must be replaced by exchange with I. In I, on the contrary, that portion of its commodity-product of 6,000 whose value is equal to the wages plus the surplus-value (equal to 2,000) does not pass into the individual consumption of its producers, and cannot do so on account of its bodily form. It must first be exchanged with II. Contrariwise the constant portion of the value of this product, equal to 4,000, exists in a bodily form in which taking the capitalist class I as a whole it can immediately resume its function of constant capital of that class. In other words, the entire product of department I consists of use-values which, on account of their bodily form, can under a capitalist mode of production serve only as elements of constant capital. Hence one-third (2,000) of this product of 6,000 replaces the constant capital of department II, and the other two thirds the constant capital of department I. The constant capital I consists of a great number of different groups of capital invested in the various branches of production of means of production, so much in iron works, so much in coal-mines, etc. Every one of these groups of capital, or every one of these social group capitals, is in its turn composed of a larger or smaller number of independently functioning individual capitals. In the first place, the capital of society, for instance 7,500 (which may mean millions, etc.) is composed of various groups of capital; the social capital of 7,500 is divided into separate parts, every one of which is invested in a special branch of production; each portion of the social capital-value invested in some particular branch of production consists, so far as its bodily form is concerned, partly of means of production required in that particular sphere of production, partly of the labour-power needed in that business and trained accordingly, variously modified by division of labour, according to the specific kind of labour to be performed in each individual sphere of production. Each portion of social capital invested in any particular branch of production in its turn consists of the sum of the individual capitals invested in it and functioning independently. This patently applies to both departments, I as well as II. As for the constant capital-value re-appearing in I in the form of its commodity-product, it re-enters in part as means of production into the particular sphere of production (or even into the individual business) from which it emerges as product; for instance corn into the production of corn, coal into the production of coal, iron in the form of machines into the production of iron, etc. However since the partial products constituting the constant capital-value I do not return directly to their particular or individual sphere of production, they merely change their place. They pass in their bodily form to some other sphere of production of department I, while the product of other spheres of production of department I replaces them in kind. It is merely a change of place of these products. All of them re-enter as factors replacing constant capital in I, only instead of the same group of I they enter another. Since an exchange takes place here between the individual capitalist of I, it is an exchange of one bodily form of constant capital for another bodily form of constant capital, of one kind of means of production for other kinds of means of production. It is an exchange of the different individual parts of constant capital I among themselves. Products which do not serve directly as means of production in their own sphere are transferred from their place of production to another and thus mutually replace one another. In other words (similarly to what we saw in the case of the surplus-value II), every capitalist I draws from this quantity of commodities, proportionally to his share in the constant capital of 4,000, the means of production required by him. If production were socialised instead of capitalistic, these products of department I would evidently just as regularly be redistributed as means of production to the various branches of this department, for purposes of reproduction, one portion remaining directly in that sphere of production from which it emerged as a product, another passing over to other places of production, thereby giving rise to a constant to-and-fro movement between the various places of production in this department. On the assumption of simple reproduction the total value of the annually produced articles of consumption is therefore equal to the annual value-product, i.e., equal to the total value produced during the year by social labour, and this must be so, because in simple reproduction this entire value is consumed. The total social working-day is divided into two parts: 1) Necessary labour which creates in the course of the year a value of 1,500v; 2) surplus-labour, which creates an additional value, or surplus-value, of 1,500s. The sum of these values, 3,000, is equal to the value of the annually produced articles of consumption 3,000. The total value of the articles of consumption produced during the year is therefore equal to the total value produced by the total social working-day during the year, equal to the value of the social variable capital plus the social surplus-value, equal to the total new product of the year. But we know that although these two magnitudes of value are equal the total value of commodities II, the articles of consumption, is not produced in this department of social production. They are equal because the constant capital-value re-appearing in II is equal to the value newly produced by I (value of variable capital plus surplus-value); therefore I(v + s) can buy the part of the product of II which represents the constant capital-value for its producers (in department II). This shows, then, why the value of the product of capitalists II, from the point of view of society, may be resolved into v + s although for these capitalists it is divided into c + v + s. This is so only because IIc is here equal to I(v + s), and because these two components of the social product interchange their bodily forms by exchange, so that after this transformation II exists once more in means of production and I(v + s) in articles of consumption. And it is this circumstance which induced Adam Smith to maintain that the value of the annual product resolves itself into v + s. This is true 1) only for that part of the annual product which consists of articles of consumption; and 2) it is not true in the sense that this total value is produced in II and that the value of its product is equal to the value of the variable capital advanced in II plus the surplus-value produced in II. It is true only in the sense that II(c + v + s) is equal to II(v + s) + I(v + s), or because II is equal to I(v + s). It follows furthermore: The social working-day (i.e., the labour expended by the entire working-class during the whole year), like every individual working-day, breaks up into only two parts, namely into necessary labour and surplus-labour, and the value produced by this working-day consequently likewise resolves itself into only two parts, namely into the value of the variable capital, or that portion of the value with which the labourer buys the means of his own reproduction, and the surplus-value which the capitalist may spend for his own individual consumption. Nevertheless, from the point of view of society, one part of the social working-day is spent exclusively on the production of new constant capital, namely of products exclusively intended to function as means of production in the labour-process and hence as constant capital in the accompanying process of self-expansion of value. According to our assumption the total social working-day presents itself as a money-value of 3,000, only one-third of which, or 1,000, is produced in department II which manufactures articles of consumption, that is, the commodities in which the entire value of the variable capital and the entire surplus-value of society are ultimately realised. Thus, according to this assumption, two-thirds of the social working-day are employed in the production of new constant capital. Although from the standpoint of the individual capitalists and labourers of department I these two-thirds of the social working-day serve merely for the production of variable capital-value plus surplus-value, the same as the last third of the social working-day in department II, still from the point of view of society and likewise of the use-value of the product, these two-thirds of the social working-day produce only replacement of constant capital in the process of productive consumption or already so consumed. Also when viewed individually these two-thirds of the working-day, while producing a total value equal only to the value of the variable capital plus surplus-value for the producer, nevertheless do not produce any use-values of a kind on which wages or surplus-value could be expended; for their products are means of production. It must be noted in the first place that no portion of the social working-day, whether in I or in II, serves for the production of the value of the constant capital employed and functioning in these two great spheres of production. They produce only additional value, 2,000 I(v + s) + 1,000 II(v + s), in addition to the value of the constant capital equal to 4,000 Ic + 2,000 IIc. The new value produced in the form of means of production is not yet constant capital. It merely is intended to function as such in the future. The entire product of II the articles of consumption viewed concretely as a use-value, in its bodily form, is a product of the one-third of the social working-day spent by II. It is the product of labour in its concrete form such as the labour of weaving, baking, etc., performed in this department the product of this labour, inasmuch as it functions as the subjective element of the labour-process. As to the constant portion of the value of this product II, it re-appears only in a new use-value, in a new bodily form, the form of articles of consumption, while it existed previously in the form of means of production. Its value has been transferred by the labour-process from its old bodily form to its new bodily form. But the value of these two-thirds of the product-value, equal to 2,000, has not been produced in this year s self-expansion process of II. Just as from the point of view of the labour-process, the product of II is the result of newly functioning living labour and of the assumed means of production assigned to it, in which that labour materialises itself as in its objective conditions, so, from the point of view of the process of self-expansion, the value of the product of II, equal to 3,000, is composed of a new value (500v + 500s = 1,000) produced by the newly added one-third of the social working-day and of a constant value in which are embodied two-thirds of a past social working-day that had elapsed before the present process of production of II here under consideration. This portion of the value of the II product finds expression in a portion of the product itself. It exists in a quantity of articles of consumption worth 2,000, or two-thirds of a social working-day. This is the new use-form in which this value-portion re-appears. The exchange of part of the articles of consumption equal to 2,000 IIc for means of production of I equal to I (1,000v + l,000s) thus really represents an exchange of two-thirds of an aggregate working-day which do not constitute any portion of this year s labour, and elapsed before this year for two-thirds of the working-day newly added this year. Two-thirds of this year s social working-day could not be employed in the production of constant capital and at the same time constitute variable capital-value plus surplus-value for their own producers unless they were to be exchanged for a portion of the value of the annually consumed articles of consumption, in which are incorporated two-thirds of a working-day spent and realised before this year. It is an exchange of two-thirds of this year s working-day for two-thirds of a working-day spent before this year, an exchange of this year s labour-time for last year s. This explains the riddle of how the value-product of an entire social working-day can resolve itself into variable capital-value plus surplus-value, although two-thirds of this working-day were not expended in the production of articles in which variable capital or surplus-value can be realised, but rather in the production of means of production for the replacement of the capital consumed during the year. The explanation is simply that two-thirds of the value of the product of II, in which the capitalists and labourers of I realise the variable capital-value plus surplus-value produced by them (and which constitute two-ninths of the value of the entire annual product), are, so far as their value is concerned, the product of two-thirds of a social working-day of a year prior to the current one. The sum of the social product I and II means of production and articles of consumption is indeed, viewed from the standpoint of their use-value, in their concrete, bodily form, the product of this year s labour, but only to the extent that this labour itself is regarded as useful and concrete and not as an expenditure of labour-power, as value-creating labour. And even the first is true only in the sense that the means of production have transformed themselves into new products, into this year s products solely by dint of the living labour added on to them, operating on them. On the contrary, this year s labour could not have transformed itself into products without means of production independent of it, without instruments of labour and materials of production. The entire annual social product here contains three social working-days, each of one year. The value expressed by each one of these working-days is 3,000, so that the value expressed by the total product is equal to 3 3,000, or 9,000. Furthermore the following portions of this working time have elapsed prior to the one-year process of production, the product of which we are now analysing: In department I four-thirds of a working-day (with a product worth 4,000), and in department II two-thirds of a working-day (with a product worth 2,000), making a total of two social working-days with a product worth 6,000. For this reason 4,000 Ic + 2,000 IIc = 6,000c figure as the value of the means of production, or the constant capital-value re-appearing in the total value of the social product. Furthermore one-third of the social working-day of one year newly added in department I is necessary labour, or labour replacing the value of the variable capital of 1,000 I and paying the price of the labour employed by I. In the same way one-sixth of a social working-day in II is necessary labour with a value of 500. Hence 1,000 Iv + 500 IIv = 1,500v, expressing the value of one half of the social working-day, is the value-expression of the first half of the aggregate working-day added this year and consisting of necessary labour. Finally, in department I one-third of the aggregate working-day, with a product worth 1,000, is surplus-labour, and in department II one-sixth of the working-day, with a product worth 500, is surplus-labour. Together they constitute the other half of the added aggregate working-day. Hence the total surplus-value produced is equal to l,000 Is + 500 IIs, or 1,500s. Thus: The constant capital portion of the value of the social product (c): Two working-days expended prior to the process of production; expression of value = 6,000. Necessary labour (v) expended during the year: One half of a working-day expended on the annual production; expression of value 1,500. Surplus-labour (s) expended during the year: One half of a working-day expended on the annual production; expression of value = 1,500. Value produced by annual labour (v + s) = 3,000. Total value of product (c + v + s) = 9,000. The difficulty, then, does not consist in the analysis of the value of the social product itself. It arises in the comparison of the component parts of the value of the social product with its material constituents. The constant, merely re-appearing portion of value is equal to the value of that part of this product which consists of means of production and is incorporated in that part. The new value-product of the year, equal to v + s, is equal to the value of that part of this product which consists of articles of consumption and is incorporated in it. But with exceptions of no consequence here, means of production and articles of consumption are wholly different kinds of commodities, products of entirely different bodily or use-forms, and, therefore, products of wholly different classes of concrete labour. The labour which employs machinery in the production of means of subsistence is vastly different from the labour which makes machinery. The entire aggregate annual working-day, whose value-expression is 3,000, seems spent in the production of articles of consumption equal to 3,000, in which no constant portion of value re-appears, since these 3,000, equal to 1,500v + 1,500s, resolve themselves only into variable capital-value and surplus-value. On the other hand the constant capital-value of 6,000 re-appears in a class of products quite different from articles of consumption, namely in means of production, while as a matter of fact no part of the social working-day seems spent in the production of these new products. It seems rather that the entire working-day consists only of classes of labour which do not result in means of production but in articles of consumption. This mystery has already been cleared up. The value-product of the year s labour is equal to the value of the products of department II, to the total value of the newly produced articles of consumption. But the value of these products is greater by two-thirds than that portion of the annual labour which has been expended in the sphere of production of articles of consumption (department II). Only one-third of the annual labour has been expended in their production. Two-thirds of this annual labour have been expended in the production of means of production, that is to say, in department I. The value-product created during this time in I, equal to the variable capital-value plus surplus-value produced in I, is equal to the constant-capital-value of II re-appearing in articles of consumption of II. Hence they may be mutually exchanged and replaced in kind. The total value of the articles of consumption of II is therefore equal to the sum of the new value-product of I and II, or II(c + v + s) equal to I(v + s) + II(v + s), hence equal to the sum of the new values produced by the year s labour in the form of v plus s. On the other hand the total value of the means of production (I) is equal to the sum of the constant capital-value re-appearing in the form of means of production (I) and in that of articles of consumption (II); in other words, equal to the sum of the constant capital-value re-appearing in the total product of society. This total value is equal in terms of value to four-thirds of a working-day preceding the process of production of I and two-thirds of a working-day preceding the process of production of II, in all equal to two aggregate working-days. The difficulty with the annual social product arises therefore from the fact that the constant portion of value is represented by a wholly different class of products means of production than the new value v + s added to this constant portion of value and represented by articles of consumption. Thus the appearance is created, so far as value is concerned, that two-thirds of the consumed mass of products are found again in a new form as new product, without any labour having been expended by society in their production. This is not so in the case of an individual capital. Every individual capitalist employs some particular concrete kind of labour, which transforms the means of production peculiar to it into a product. Let for instance the capitalist be a machine-builder, the constant capital expended during the year 6,000c, the variable 1,500v, the surplus-value 1,500s, the product 9,000, the product, say, 18 machines of 500 each. The entire product here exists in the same form, that of machines. (If he produces various kinds, each kind is calculated separately.) The entire commodity-product is the result of the labour expended during the year in machine-building; it is a combination of the same concrete kind of labour with the same means of production. The various portions of the value of the product therefore present themselves in the same bodily form: 12 machines embody 6,000c, 3 machines 1,500v, 3 machines 1,500s. In the present case it is evident that the value of the 12 machines is equal to 6,000c, not because there is incorporated in these 12 machines only labour performed previously to the manufacture of these machines and not labour expended on building them. The value of the means of production for 18 machines did not of itself become transformed into 12 machines but the value of these 12 machines (consisting itself of 4,000c + 1,000v + 1,000s) is equal to the total value of the constant capital contained in the 18 machines. The machine-manufacturer must therefore sell 12 of the 18 machines in order to replace his expended constant capital, which he requires for the reproduction of 18 new machines. On the contrary, the thing would be inexplicable if in spite of the fact that the labour expended was employed solely in the manufacture of machines, the result were to be: On the one hand 6 machines equal to 1,500v + 1,500s, on the other iron, copper, screws, belts, etc., of a value amounting to 6,000c, i.e., the means of production of the machines in their bodily form, which, as we know, the individual machine-building capitalist does not produce himself but must replace by way of the process of circulation. And yet it seems at first glance that the reproduction of the annual product of society takes place in this absurd way. The product of an individual capital, i.e., of every fraction of the social capital endowed with a life of its own and functioning independently, has a bodily form of one kind or another. The only condition is that this product must really have a use-form, a use-value, which gives it the imprint of a member of the world of commodities capable of circulation. It is immaterial and accidental whether or not it can re-enter as a means of production into the same process of production from which it emerged as a product; in other words, whether the portion of its value representing the constant part of the capital has a bodily form in which it can actually function again as constant capital. If not, this portion of the value of the product is reconverted into the form of its material elements of production by means of sale and purchase and thus the constant capital is reproduced in the bodily form capable of functioning. It is different with the product of the aggregate social capital. All the material elements of reproduction must in their bodily form constitute parts of this product. The consumed constant part of capital can be replaced by the aggregate production only to the extent that the entire constant part of the capital reappearing in the product re-appears in the bodily form of new means of production which can really function as constant capital. Hence, simple reproduction being assumed, the value of that portion of the product which consists of means of production must be equal to the constant portion of the value of social capital. Furthermore: Considered individually, the capitalist produces in the value of his product by means of the newly added labour only his variable capital plus surplus-value, while the constant part of the value is transferred to the product owing to the concrete character of the newly added labour. Considered socially that portion of the social working-day which produces means of production, hence adding new value to them as well as transferring to them the value of the means of production consumed in their manufacture, creates nothing but new constant capital intended to replace that consumed in the shape of old means of production in both departments I and II. It creates only product intended for productive consumption. The entire value of this product, then, is only value which can function anew as constant capital, which can only buy back constant capital in its bodily form, and which, for this reason, resolves itself, considered socially, neither into variable capital nor surplus-value. On the other hand that part of the social working-day which produces articles of consumption does not create any portion of the social replacement capital. It creates only products intended, in their bodily form, to realise the value of the variable capital and surplus-value of I and II. Speaking of the point of view of society, and therefore considering the aggregate product of society, which comprises both the reproduction of social capital and individual consumption, we must not lapse into the manner copied by Proudhon from bourgeois economy and look upon this matter as though a society with a capitalist mode of production, if viewed en bloc, as a totality, would lose this its specific historical and economic character. No, on the contrary. We have, in that case, to deal with the aggregate capitalist. The aggregate capital appears as the capital stock of all individual capitalists combined. This joint-stock company has in common with many other stock companies that everyone knows what he puts in, but not what he will get out of it. In the second place the constant capital of department I is replaced in kind, partly by exchange among capitalists I, partly by replacement in kind in each individual business. The phrase that the value of the entire annual product must ultimately be paid by the consumer would be correct only if consumer were taken to comprise two vastly different kinds: individual consumers and productive consumers. However that one portion of the product must be consumed productively means nothing but that it must function as capital and not be consumed as revenue. If we divide the value of the aggregate product, equal to 9,000, into 6,000c + l,500v + 1,500s and look upon the 3,000(v + s) only in its quality of revenue, then, on the contrary, the variable capital seems to disappear and capital, socially speaking, to consist only of constant capital. For that which appeared originally as 1,500v has resolved itself into a portion of the social revenue, into wages, the revenue of the working-class, and its character of capital has thus vanished. This conclusion is actually drawn by Ramsay. According to him, capital, socially considered, consists only of fixed capital, but by fixed capital be means the constant capital, that quantity of values which consists of means of production, whether these means of production are instruments or materials of labour, such as raw materials, semi-finished products, auxiliary materials, etc. He calls the variable capital circulating capital: Ramsay defines fixed capital, by which he means constant capital, more closely in the following words: Here we see once more the calamity Adam Smith brings on by submerging the distinction between constant and variable capital in that between fixed capital and circulating capital. Ramsay s constant capital consists of instruments of labour, his circulating capital of means of subsistence. Both of them are commodities of a given value. The one can no more create surplus-value than the other. Take our scheme. We have, after the exchange of the elements hitherto considered between I and II, and within II. 1) 4,000c + 1,000v + 1,000s (the latter 2,000 realised in articles of consumption of IIc) = 6,000. II) 2,000c (reproduced by exchange with I(v + s) + 500v + 500s = 3,000. Sum of values = 9,000. Value newly produced during the year is contained only in v and s. The sum of the value-product of this year is therefore equal to the sum of v + s, or 2,000 I(v + s) + 1,000 II(v + s) = 3,000. All remaining value-parts of the product of this year are merely value transferred from the value of earlier means of production consumed in the annual production. The current annual labour has not produced any value other than that of 3,000. That represents its entire annual value-product. Now, as we have seen, the 2,000 I(v + s) replace for class II its 2,000 IIc in the bodily form of means of production. Two-thirds of the annual labour, then, expended in category I, have newly produced constant capital II, both its entire value and its bodily form. From the standpoint of society, two-thirds of the labour expended during the year have created new constant capital-value realised in the bodily form appropriate for department II. Thus the greater portion of the annual labour of society has been spent in the production of new constant capital (capital-value existing in the form of means of production) in order to replace the value of the constant capital expended in the production of articles of consumption. What distinguishes capitalist society in this case from the savage is not, as Senior thinks, the privilege and peculiarity of the savage to expend his labour at times in a way that does not procure him any products resolvable (exchangeable) into revenue, i.e., into articles of consumption. No, the distinction consists in the following. a) Capitalist society employs more of its available annual labour in the production of means of production (ergo, of constant capital) which are not resolvable into revenue in the form of wages or surplus-value, but can function only as capital. b) When a savage makes bows, arrows, stone hammers, axes, baskets, etc., he knows very well that he did not spend the time so employed in the production of articles of consumption, but that he has thus stocked up the means of production he needs, and nothing else. Furthermore, a savage commits a grave economic sin by his utter indifference to waste of time, and, as Tylor tells us, takes sometimes a whole month to make one arrow. The current conception whereby some political economists seek to extricate themselves from the theoretical difficulty, i.e., the understanding of the real interconnections that what is capital to one is revenue to another, and vice versa is only partially correct and becomes utterly wrong (harbours therefore a complete misunderstanding of the entire process of exchange taking place in annual reproduction, hence also a misunderstanding of the actual basis of the partially correct) as soon as the character of universality is attributed to it. We now summarise the actual relations on which the partial correctness of this conception rests, and in doing so the wrong conception of these relations will come to the surface. The variable capital exists at first in the hands of the capitalist as money-capital; and it performs the function of money-capital, by his buying labour-power with it. So long as it persists in his hands in the form of money, it is nothing but a given value existing in the form of money; hence a constant and not a variable magnitude. It is a variable capital only potentially, owing to its convertibility into labour-power. It becomes real variable capital only after divesting itself of its money-form, after being converted into labour-power functioning as a component part of productive capital in the capitalist process. Money, which first functioned as the money-form of the variable capital for the capitalist, now functions in the hands of the labourer as the money-form of his wages, which he exchanges for means of subsistence; i.e., as the money-form of revenue derived from the constantly repeated sale of his labour-power. We have here but the simple fact that the money of the buyer, in this case the capitalist, passes from his hands into those of the seller, in this case the seller of labour-power, the labourer. It is not a case of the variable capital functioning in a dual capacity, as capital for the capitalist and as revenue for the labourer. It is the same money which exists first in the hands of the capitalist as the money-form of his variable capital, hence as potential variable capital, and which serves in the hands of the labourer as an equivalent for sold labour-power as soon as the capitalist converts it into labour-power. But the fact that the same money serves another useful purpose in the hands of the seller than in those of the buyer is a phenomenon peculiar to the purchase and sale of all commodities. Apologetic economists present the matter in a wrong light, as is best seen if we keep our eyes fixed exclusively, without taking for the time being any notice of what follows, on the act of circulation M L (equal to M C), the conversion of money into labour-power on the part of the capitalist buyer, which is L M (equal to C M), the conversion of the commodity labour-power into money on the part of the seller, the labourer. They say: Here the same money realises two capitals; the buyer the capitalist converts his money-capital into living labour-power, which he incorporates in his productive capital; on the other hand the seller, the labourer, converts his commodity, labour-power, into money, which he spends as revenue, and this enables him to keep on reselling his labour-power and thereby to maintain it. His labour-power, then, represents his capital in commodity-form, which yields him a continuous revenue. Labour-power is indeed his property (ever self-renewing, reproductive), not his capital. It is the only commodity which he can and must sell continually in order to live, and which acts as capital (variable) only in the hands of the buyer, the capitalist. The fact that a man is continually compelled to sell his labour-power, i.e., himself, to another man proves, according to those economists, that he is a capitalist, because he constantly has commodities (himself) for sale. In that sense a slave is also a capitalist, although he is sold by another once and for all as a commodity; for it is in the nature of this commodity, a labouring slave, that its buyer does not only make it work anew every day, but also provides it with the means of subsistence that enable it to work ever anew. (Compare on this point Sismondi and Say in the letters to Malthus. ) Let us first look at the exchange of Iv for IIc, beginning with the point of view of the labourer. The collective labourer of I has sold his labour-power to the collective capitalist of I for 1,000; he receives this value in money, paid in the form of wages. With this money he buys from II articles of consumption for the same amount of value. Capitalist II confronts him only as a seller of commodities, and nothing else, even if the labourer buys from his own capitalist, as he does for instance in the exchange of 500 IIv, as we have seen above (Part IV, present chapter). The form of circulation through which his commodity, labour-power, passes, is that of the simple circulation of commodities for the mere satisfaction of needs, for the purpose of consumption: C (labour-power) M C (articles of consumption, commodities II). The result of this act of circulation is that the labourer maintains himself as labour-power for capitalist I, and in order to continue maintaining himself as such he must continually renew the process L(C) M C. His wages are realised in articles of consumption, they are spent as revenue, and, taking the working-class as a whole, are spent again and again as revenue. Now let us look at the same exchange of Iv for IIc, from the point of view of the capitalist. The entire commodity-product of II consists of articles of consumption, hence of things intended to enter into annual consumption, hence to serve in the realisation of revenue for someone, in the present case for the collective labourer I. But for the collective capitalist II one portion of his commodity-product, equal to 2,000, is now the form of the constant capital-value of his productive capital converted into commodities. This productive capital must be reconverted from this commodity-form into its bodily form, in which it may act again as the constant portion of a productive capital. What capitalist II has accomplished so far is that he has reconverted by means of sales to labourers I one half (equal to 1,000) of his constant capital-value, which had been reproduced in the shape of commodities (articles of consumption), into the form of money. Hence it is not the variable capital Iv, which has been converted into this first half of the constant capital-value IIc, but simply the money which functioned for I as money-capital in the exchange for labour-power and thus came into the possession of the seller of labour-power, to whom it does not represent capital but revenue in the form of money, i.e., it is spent as a means of purchase of articles of consumption. Meanwhile, the money amounting to 1,000, which has come into the hands of the II capitalists from labourers of I, cannot function as the constant element of productive capital II. It is only as yet the money-form of his commodity-capital to be commuted into fixed or circulating constituents of constant capital. So II buys with the money received from the labourers of I, the buyers of its commodities, means of production from I to the amount of 1,000. In this way the constant capital-value II is renewed to the extent of one half of its total amount in its bodily form, in which it can function once more as an element of productive capital II. The circulation in this instance took the course C M C: articles of consumption worth 1,000 money to the amount of 1,000 means of production worth 1,000. But C M C represents here the movement of capital. C, when sold to the labourers, is converted into M, and this M is converted into means of production. It is the reconversion of commodities into the material elements of which this commodity is made. On the other hand just as capitalist II acts vis- -vis I only as a buyer of commodities, so capitalist I acts only as a seller of commodities vis- -vis II. I originally bought labour-power worth 1,000 with 1,000 in money intended to function as variable capital. It has therefore received an equivalent for the 1,000v which it expended in money-form. This money now belongs to the labourer who spends it in purchases from II. I cannot get back this money, which thus found its way into the II treasury unless it fishes its way out of it again by the sale of commodities of the same value. I first had a definite sum of money amounting to 1,000 destined to function as variable capital. The money functions as such by its conversion into labour-power of the same value. But the labourer supplied it as a result of the process of production with a quantity of commodities (means of production) worth 6,000, of which one-sixth, or 1,000, are equivalent to the variable portion of capital advanced in money. The variable capital-value functions no more as variable capital now in its commodity-form than it did before in its form of money. It can do so only after its conversion into living labour-power, and only so long as this labour-power functions in the process of production. As money the variable capital-value was only potential variable capital. But it had a form in which it was directly convertible into labour-power. As a commodity the same variable capital-value is still potential money-value, it is restored to its original money-form only by the sale of the commodities, and therefore by II buying for 1,000 commodities from I. The movement of the circulation is here as follows: 1,000v (money) labour-power worth 1,000 1,000 in commodities (equivalent of the variable capital) 1,000v (money); hence M C... C M (equal to M L ... C M). The process of production intervening between C ... C does not itself belong in the sphere of circulation. It does not figure in the mutual exchange of the various elements of the annual reproduction, although this exchange includes the reproduction of all the elements of productive capital, the constant elements as well as the variable element (labour-power). All the participants in this exchange appear either as buyers or sellers or both. The labourers appear only as buyers of commodities, the capitalists alternately as buyers and sellers, and within certain limits either only as buyers of commodities or only as sellers of commodities. Result: I possesses once more the variable value-constituent of its capital in the form of money, from which alone it is directly convertible into labour-power, i.e., it once more possesses the variable capital-value in the sole form in which it can really be advanced as a variable element of its productive capital. On the other hand the labourer must again act as a seller of commodities, of his labour-power, before he can act again as a buyer of commodities. So far as the variable capital of category II (500 IIv) is concerned, the process of circulation between the capitalists and labourers of the same class of production takes place directly, since we look upon it as taking place between the collective capitalist II and the collective labourer II. The collective capitalist II advances 500v for the purchase of labour-power of the same value. In this case the collective capitalist is a buyer, the collective labourer a seller. Thereupon the labourer appears with the proceeds of the sale of his labour-power to act as a buyer of a part of the commodities produced by himself. Here the capitalist is therefore a seller. The labourer has replaced to the capitalist the money paid in the purchase of his labour-power by means of a portion of commodity-capital II produced, namely 500v in commodities. The capitalist now holds in the form of commodities the same v which he had in the form of money before its conversion into labour-power, while the labourer on the other hand has realised the value of his labour-power in money and now, in his turn, realises this money by spending it as his revenue to defray his consumption in the purchase of part of the articles of consumption produced by himself. It is an exchange of the revenue of the labourer in money for a portion of commodities he has himself reproduced, namely 500v of the capitalist. In this way this money returns to capitalist II as the money-form of his variable capital. An equivalent value of revenue in the form of money here replaces variable capital-value in the form of commodities. The capitalist does not increase his wealth by taking away again the money paid by him to the labourer in the purchase of labour-power when he sells him an equivalent quantity of commodities. He would indeed be paying the labourer twice if he were to pay him first 500 in the purchase of his labour-power, and then in addition give him gratis a quantity of commodities worth 500, which the labourers produced for him. Vice versa, if the labourer were to produce for him nothing but an equivalent in commodities worth 500 for the price of his labour-power of 500, the capitalist would be no better off after the transaction than before. But the labourer has reproduced a product of 3,000. He has preserved the constant portion of the value of the product, i.e., the value of the means of production used up in it to the amount of 2,000 by converting them into a new product. He has furthermore added to this given value a value of 1,000(v + s). (The idea that the capitalist grows richer in the sense that he wins a surplus-value by the reflux of the 500 in money is developed by Destutt de Tracy, as shown in detail in section XIII of this chapter.) Through the purchase of 500 worth of articles of consumption by labourer II, capitalist II recovers the value of 500 IIv which he just possessed in commodities in money, the form in which he advanced it originally. The immediate result of this transaction, as of any other sale of commodities, is the conversion of a given value from the form of commodities into that of money. Nor is there anything special in the reflux thus effected of the money to its point of departure. If capitalist II had bought, with 500 in money, commodities from capitalist I, and then in turn sold to capitalist I commodities to the amount of 500, 500 would have likewise returned to him in money. This sum of 500 in money would merely have served for the circulation of a quantity of commodities (1,000), and according to the general law previously expounded, the money would have returned to the one who put it into circulation for the purpose of exchanging this quantity of commodities. But the 500 in money which flowed back to capitalist II are at one and the same time renewed potential variable capital in money-form. Why is this so? Money, and therefore money-capital, is potential variable capital only because and to the extent that it is convertible into labour-power. The return of 500 in money to capitalist II is accompanied by the return of labour-power II to the market. The return of both of these at opposite poles hence also the re-appearance of 500 in money not only as money but also as variable capital in the form of money is conditional on one and the same process. The money equal to 500 returns to capitalist II because he sold to labourers II articles of consumption amounting to 500, i.e., because the labourer spends his wages to maintain himself and his family and thus his labour-power. In order to be able to live on and act again as a buyer of commodities he must again sell his labour-power. The return of 500 in money to capitalist II is therefore at the same time a return, or an abiding, of the labour-power in the capacity of a commodity purchasable with 500 in money, and thereby a return of 500 in money as potential variable capital. As for category IIb, which produces articles of luxury, the case with v (IIb)v is the same as with Iv. The money, which renews for capitalists IIb their variable capital in the form of money, flows back to them in a round-about way through capitalists IIa. But it nevertheless makes a difference whether the labourers buy their means of subsistence directly from the capitalist producers to whom they sell their labour-power or whether they buy them from capitalists of another category, through whose agency the money returns to the former only by a circuitous route. Since the working-class lives from hand to mouth, it buys as long as it has the means to buy. It is different with the capitalists, as for instance in the exchange of 1,000 IIc for 1,000 Iv. The capitalist does not live from hand to mouth. His compelling motive is the utmost self-expansion of his capital. Now, if circumstances of any description seem to promise greater advantages to capitalist II in case he holds on to his money, or to part of it at least, for a while, instead of immediately renewing his constant capital, then the return of 1,000 IIc (in money) to I is delayed; and so is the restoration of 1,000v to the form of money, and capitalist I can continue his business on the same scale only if he disposes of reserve money; and, generally speaking, reserve capital in the form of money is necessary to be able to work without interruption, regardless of the rapid or slow reflux of the variable capital-value in money. If the exchange of the various elements of the current annual reproduction is to be investigated, so are the results of the labour of the preceding year, of the labour of the year that has already come to a close. The process of production which resulted in this yearly product lies behind us; it is a thing of the past, incorporated in its product, and so much the more is this the case with the process of circulation, which precedes the process of production or runs parallel with it, the conversion of potential into real variable capital, i.e., the sale and purchase of labour-power. The labour-market is no longer a part of the commodity-market, such as we have here before us. The labourer has here not only already sold his labour-power, but besides the surplus-value also supplied an equivalent of the price of his labour-power in the shape of commodities. He has furthermore pocketed his wages and figures during the exchange only as a buyer of commodities (articles of consumption). On the other hand the annual product must contain all the elements of reproduction, restore all the elements of productive capital, above all its most important element, the variable capital. And we have seen indeed that the result of the exchange in regard to the variable capital is this: By spending his wages and consuming the purchased commodities, the labourer as a buyer of commodities maintains and reproduces his labour-power, this being the only commodity which he has to sell. Just as the money advanced by the capitalist in the purchase of his labour-power returns to him, so labour-power returns to the labour-market in its capacity of a commodity exchangeable for money. The result in the special case of 1,000 Iv is that the capitalists of I hold 1,000v in money and the labourers of I offer them 1,000 in labour-power, so that the entire process of reproduction of I can be renewed. This is one result of the process of exchange. On the other hand the expenditure of the wages of the labourers of I relieved II of articles of consumption to the amount of 1,000c, thus transforming them from the commodity-form into the money-form. Department II reconverted them into the bodily form of its constant capital by purchasing from I commodities equal to 1,000v and thus restoring to I in money-form the value of its variable capital. The variable capital of I passes through three metamorphoses, which do not appear at all in the exchange of the annual product or do so only suggestively. During all these transformations capitalist I continually holds the variable capital in his hands; 1) to start with as money-capital; 2) then as an element of his productive capital; 3) still later as a portion of the value of his commodity-capital, hence in the form of commodity-value; 4) finally once more in money which is again confronted by the labour-power for which it can be exchanged. During the labour-process the capitalist is in possession of the variable capital as active value-creating labour-power, but not as a value of a given magnitude. But since he never pays the labourer until his power has acted for a certain length of time, he already has in hand the value created by that power to replace itself plus the surplus-value before he pays him. As the variable capital always stays in the hands of the capitalist in some form or other, it cannot be claimed in any way that it converts itself into revenue for anyone. On the contrary, 1,000 Iv in commodities converts itself into money by its sale to II half of whose constant capital it replaces in kind. What resolves itself into revenue is not variable capital I, or 1,000v in money. This money has ceased to function as the money-form of variable capital I as soon as it is converted into labour-power, just as the money of any other buyer of commodities has ceased to represent anything belonging to him as soon as he has exchanged it for commodities of still other sellers. The conversions which the money received in wages goes through in the hands of the working-class are not conversions of variable capital, but of the value of their labour-power converted into money; just as the conversion of the value (2,000 I(v + s)) created by the labourer is only the conversion of a commodity belonging to the capitalist, which does not concern the labourer. However, the capitalist, and still more his theoretical interpreter, the political economist, can rid himself only with the greatest difficulty of the idea that the money paid to the labourer is still his, the capitalist s. If the capitalist is a producer of gold, then the variable portion of value i.e., the equivalent in commodities which replaces for him the purchasing price of the labour appears itself directly in the form of money and can therefore function anew as variable money-capital without the circuitous route of a reflux. But so far as labourer II is concerned aside from the labourer who produces articles of luxury 500 v exists in commodities intended for the consumption of the labourer which he, considered as the collective labourer, buys directly again from the same collective capitalist to whom he sold his labour-power. The variable portion of capital-value II, so far as its bodily form is concerned, consists of articles of consumption intended mostly for consumption by the working-class. But it is not the variable capital which is spent in this form by the labourer, it is the wages, the money of the labourer, which precisely by its realisation in these articles of consumption restores to the capitalist the variable capital 500 IIv in its money-form. The variable capital IIv is reproduced in articles of consumption, the same as the constant capital 2,000 IIc. The one resolves itself no more into revenue than the other does. In either case it is the wages which resolve themselves into revenue. However it is a momentous fact in the exchange of the annual product that by the expenditure of the wages as revenue there is restored to the form of money-capital in the one case 1,000 IIc, likewise, by this circuitous route, 1,000 Iv and ditto 500 IIv, hence constant and variable capital. (In the case of the variable capital partly by means of a direct and partly by means of an indirect reflux.)

Economic Manuscripts: Capital: Volume Two

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1885-c2/ch20_02.htm

One portion of the value of the constant capital, which consists of instruments of labour in the strict meaning of the term (as a distinct section of the means of production) is transferred from the instruments of labour to the product of labour (the commodity); these instruments of labour continue to function as elements of the productive capital, doing so in their old bodily form. It is their wear and tear, the depreciation gradually experienced by them during their continual functioning for a definite period which re-appears as an element of value of the commodities produced by means of them, which is transferred from the instrument of labour to the product of labour. With regard to the annual reproduction therefore only such component parts of fixed capital will from the first be given consideration as last longer than a year. If they are completely worn out within the year they must be completely replaced and renewed by the annual reproduction, and the point at issue does not concern them at all. It may happen in the case of machines and other more durable forms of fixed capital and it frequently does happen that certain parts of them must be replaced lock, stock and barrel within one year, although the building or machine in its entirety lasts much longer. These parts belong in one category with the elements of fixed capital which are to be replaced within one year. This element of the value of commodities must not be confused with the costs of repair. If a commodity is sold, this value-element is turned into money, the same as all others. But after it has been turned into money, its difference from the other elements of value becomes apparent. The raw and auxiliary materials consumed in the production of commodities must be replaced in kind in order that the reproduction of commodities may begin (or that the process of production of commodities in general may be continuous). The labour-power spent on them must also be renewed by fresh labour-power. Consequently the money realised on the commodities must be continually reconverted into these elements of the productive capital, from the money-form into the commodity-form. It does not alter the matter if raw and auxiliary materials for instance are bought at certain intervals in larger quantities so that they constitute productive supplies and need not be bought anew during certain periods; and therefore as long as they last the money coming in through the sale of commodities, inasmuch as it is meant for this purpose, may accumulate and this portion of constant capital thus appears temporarily as money-capital whose active function has been suspended. It is not a revenue-capital; it is productive capital suspended in the form of money. The renewal of the means of production must go on all the time, although the form of this renewal with reference to the circulation may vary. The new purchases, the circulation operation by which they are renewed or replaced, may take place at more or at less prolonged intervals: then a large amount may be invested at one stroke, compensated by a corresponding productive supply. Or the intervals between purchases may be small: then follows a rapid succession of money expenditures in small doses, of small productive supplies. This does not alter the matter itself. The same applies to labour-power. Where production is carried on continuously throughout the year on the same scale continuous replacement of consumed labour-power by new. Where work is seasonable, or different portions of labour are applied at different periods, as in agriculture corresponding purchases of labour-power, now in small, now in large amounts. But the money proceeds realised from the sale of commodities, so far as they turn into money that part of the commodity-value which is equal to the wear and tear of fixed capital, are not re-converted into that component part of the productive capital whose diminution in value they cover. They settle down beside the productive capital and persist in the form of money. This precipitation of money is repeated, until the period of reproduction consisting of great or small numbers of years has elapsed, during which the fixed element of constant capital continues to function in the process of production in its old bodily form. As soon as the fixed element, such as buildings, machinery, etc., has been worn out, and can no longer function in the process of production, its value exists alongside it fully replaced by money, by the sum of money precipitations, the values which had been gradually transferred from the fixed capital to the commodities in whose production it participated and which had assumed the form of money as a result of the sale of these commodities. This money then serves to replace the fixed capital (or its elements, since its various elements have different durabilities) in kind and thus really to renew this component part of the productive capital. This money is therefore the money-form of a part of the constant capital-value, namely of its fixed part. The formation of this hoard is thus itself an element of the capitalist process of reproduction; it is the reproduction and storing up in the form of money of the value of fixed capital, or its several elements, until the fixed capital has ceased to live and in consequence has given off its full value to the commodities produced and must now be replaced in kind. But this money loses only its form of a hoard and hence resumes its activity in the process of reproduction of capital brought about by the circulation as soon as it is reconverted into new elements of fixed capital to replace those that died off. Just as simple commodity circulation is in no way identical with a bare exchange of products, the conversion of the annual commodity-product can in no way resolve itself into a mere unmediated mutual exchange of its various components. Money plays a specific role in it, which finds expression particularly in the manner in which the value of the fixed capital is reproduced. (How different the matter would present itself if production were collective and no longer possessed the form of commodity production is left to a later analysis.) Should we now return to our fundamental scheme, we shall get the following for class II: 2,000c + 500v + 500s. All the articles of consumption produced in the course of the year are in that case equal in value to 3,000; and every one of the different commodity elements in the total sum of the commodities is composed, so far as its value is concerned, of c + 1/6v + 1/6s, or, in percentages, 66 c + 16 v + 16 s. The various kinds of commodities of class II may contain different proportions of constant capital. Likewise the fixed portion of the constant capital may be different. The duration of the parts of the fixed capital and hence the annual wear and tear, or that portion of value which they transfer pro rata to the commodities in the production of which they participate, may also differ. But that is immaterial here. As to the process of social reproduction, it is only a question of exchange between classes II and I. These two classes here confront each other only in their social, mass relations. Therefore the proportional magnitude of part c of the value of commodity-product II (the only one of consequence in the question now being discussed) gives the average proportion if all the branches of production classed under II are embraced. Every kind of commodity (and they are largely the same kinds) whose aggregate value is classed under 2,000c + 500v + 500s is therefore equal in value to 66 %c + 16 %v + 16 %s. This applies to every 100 of the commodities, whether classed under c, v or s. The commodities in which the 2,000c are incorporated may be further divided, in value, into: 1) 1,333 c + 333 v + 333 s = 2,000c; similarly 500v may be divided into: 2) 333 c + 83 v + 83 s = 500v; and finally 500s may be divided into: 3) 333 c + 83 v + 83 s = 500s Now, if we add the c s in 1), 2), and 3) we get 1,333 c + 333 c + 333 c = 2,000. Furthermore 333 v + 83 v + 83 v = 500. And the same in the case of s. The addition gives the same total value of 3,000, as above. The entire constant capital-value contained in the commodity mass II representing a value of 3,000 is therefore comprised in 2,000c, and neither 500v nor 500s hold an atom of it. The same is true of v and s respectively. In other words, the entire share of commodity mass II that represents constant capital-value and therefore is reconvertible either into its bodily or its money-form, exists in 2,000c. Everything referring to the exchange of the constant value of commodities II is therefore confined to the movement of 2,000 IIc. And this exchange can be made only with I (1,000v + 1,000s). Similarly, as regards class I, everything that bears in the exchange of the constant capital-value of that class is to be confined to a consideration of 4,000 Ic. In the exchange between I (1,000v + 1,000s) and 2,000 IIc it must be first noted that the sum of values I(v + s) does not contain any constant element of value, hence also no element of value to replace wear and tear, i.e., value that has been transmitted from the fixed component of the constant capital to the commodities in whose bodily form v + s exist. On the other hand this element exists in IIc, and it is precisely a part of this value-element that owes its existence to fixed capital which is not to be converted immediately from the money-form into its bodily form, but has first to persist in the form of money. The exchange between I (1,000v + 1,000s) and 2,000 IIc, therefore, at once presents the difficulty that the means of production of I, in whose bodily form the 2,000(v + s) exist, are to be exchanged to the full value of 2,000 for an equivalent in articles of consumption II, while on the other hand the 2,000 IIc of articles of consumption cannot be exchanged at their full value for means of production I (1,000v + 1,000s) because an aliquot part of their value equal to the wear and tear, or the value depreciation of the fixed capital that is to be replaced must first be precipitated in the form of money that will not function any more as a medium of circulation during the current period of annual reproduction, which alone we are examining. But the money paying for this element of wear and tear incorporated in the commodity-value 2,000 IIc can come only from department I, since II cannot pay for itself but effects payment precisely by selling its goods, and since presumably I(v + s) buys the whole of the commodities 2,000 IIc. Hence class I must by means of this purchase convert that wear and tear into money for II. But according to the law previously evolved, money advanced to the circulation returns to the capitalist producer who later on throws an equal amount of commodities into circulation. It is evident that in buying IIc, I cannot give II commodities worth 2,000 and a surplus amount of money on top of that once and for all (without any return of the same by way of the operation of exchange). Otherwise I would buy the commodity mass II above its value. If II actually exchanges its 2,000c for I (1,000v + 1,000s), it has no further claims on I, and the money circulating in this exchange returns to either I or II, depending on which of them threw it into circulation, i.e., which of them acted first as buyer. At the same time II would have reconverted the entire value of its commodity-capital into the bodily form of means of production, while our assumption is that after its sale it would not reconvert an aliquot portion of it during the current period of annual reproduction from money into the bodily form of fixed components of its constant capital. A money balance in favour of II could arise only if it sold 2,000 worth to I and bought less than 2,000 from I, say only 1,800. In that case I would have to make good the debit balance by 200 in money, which would not flow back to it, because it would not have withdrawn from circulation the money it had advanced to it by throwing into it commodities equal to 200. In such an event we would have a money-fund for II, placed to the credit of the wear and tear of its fixed capital. But then we would have an over-production of means of production in the amount of 200 on the other side, the side of I, and the basis of our scheme would be destroyed, namely reproduction on the same scale, where complete proportionality between the various systems of production is assumed. We would only have done away with one difficulty in order to create another one much worse. As this problem offers peculiar difficulties and has hitherto not been treated at all by the political economists, we shall examine seriatim all possible (at least seemingly possible) solutions, or rather formulations of the problem. In the first place, we have just assumed that II sells commodities of the value of 2,000 to I, but buys from it only 1,800 worth. The commodity-value 2,000 IIc contains 200 for replacement of wear and tear, which must be stored up in the form of money. The value of 2,000 IIc would thus be divided into 1,800, to be exchanged for means of production I, and 200, to replace wear and tear, which are to be kept in the form of money (after the sale of the 2,000c to I). Expressed in terms of value, 2,000 IIc equals 1,800c + 200c(d), this d standing for d chet. [Wear and tear. Ed.] We would then have to study Exchange I. 1,000v + 1,000s II. 1,800c + 200c(d). I buys with 1,000, which has gone to the labourers in wages for their labour-power, 1,000 IIc of articles of consumption. II buys with the same 1,000 means of production 1,000 Iv. Capitalists I thus recover their variable capital in the form of money and can employ it next year in the purchase of labour power to the same amount, i.e., they can replace the variable portion of their productive capital in kind. Furthermore, II buys with advanced 400 means of production Is, and Is buys with the same 400 articles of consumption IIc. The 400 advanced to the circulation by the capitalists of II have thus returned to them, but only as an equivalent for sold commodities. I now buys articles of consumption for advanced 400; II buys from I 400 worth of means of production, whereupon these 400 flow back to I. So far, then, the account is as follows: I throws into circulation l,000v + 800s in commodities; it furthermore throws into circulation, in money, 1,000 in wages and 400 for exchange with II. After the exchange has been made, I has 1,000v in money, 800s exchanged for 800 IIc (articles of consumption) and 400 in money. II throws into circulation 1,800c in commodities (articles of consumption) and 400 in money. On the completion of the exchange it has 1,800 in commodities I (means of production) and 400 in money. There still remain, on the side of I, 200s (in means of production) and, on the side of II, 200c(d) (in articles of consumption). According to our assumption I buys with 200 the articles of consumption c (d) of the value of 200. But II holds on to these 200 since 200 c (d) represent wear and tear, and are not to be immediately reconverted into means of production. Therefore 200 Is cannot be sold. One-fifth of the surplus-value I to be replaced cannot be realised, or converted, from its bodily form of means of production into that of articles of consumption. This not only contradicts our assumption of reproduction on a simple scale; it is by itself not a hypothesis which would explain the transformation of 200c(d) into money. It means rather that it cannot be explained. Since it cannot be demonstrated in what manner 200c(d) can be converted into money, it is assumed that I is obliging enough to do the conversion just because it is not able to convert its own remainder of 200s into money. To conceive this as a normal operation of the exchange mechanism is tantamount to the notion that 200 fall every year from the clouds in order regularly to convert 200c(d) into money. But the absurdity of such a hypothesis does not strike one at once if Is, instead of appearing, as it does in this case, in its primitive mode of existence namely as a component part of the value of means of production, hence as a component part of the value of commodities which their capitalist producers must convert into money by sale appears in the hands of the partners of the capitalists, for instance as ground-rent in the hands of landowners or as interest in the bands of moneylenders. But if that portion of the surplus-value of commodities which the industrial capitalist has to yield as ground-rent or interest to other co-owners of the surplus-value cannot be realised for a long time by the sale of the commodities, then there is also an end to the payment of rent and interest, and the landowners or recipients of interest cannot therefore serve as dei ex machina to convert at pleasure definite portions of the annual reproduction into money by spending rent and interest. The same is true of the expenditures of all so-called unproductive labourers government officials, physicians, lawyers, etc., and others who as members of the general public serve the political economists by explaining what they left unexplained. Nor does it improve matters if instead of direct exchange between I and II between the two major departments of capitalist producers the merchant is drawn in as mediator and helps to overcome all difficulties with his money. In the present case for instance 200 Is must be definitively disposed of to the industrial capitalists of II. It may pass through the hands of a number of merchants, but the last of them will find himself, according to the hypothesis, in the same predicament, vis- -vis II, in which the capitalist producers of I were at the outset, i.e., they cannot sell the 200 Is to II. And this stalled purchase sum cannot renew the same process with I. We see here that, aside from our real purpose, it is absolutely necessary to view the process of reproduction in its basic form in which obscuring minor circumstances have been eliminated in order to get rid of the false subterfuges which furnish the semblance of scientific analysis when the process of social reproduction is immediately made the subject of the analysis in its complicated concrete form. The law that when reproduction proceeds normally (whether it be on a simple or on an extended scale) the money advanced by the capitalist producer to the circulation must return to its point of departure (whether the money is his own or borrowed) excludes once and for all the hypothesis that 200 IIc(d) is converted into money by means of money advanced by I. We assumed hitherto But the absurdity is only apparent. Class II consists of capitalists whose fixed capital is in the most diverse stages of its reproduction. In the case of some of them it has arrived at the stage where it must be entirely replaced in kind. In the case of the others it is more or less remote from that stage. All the members of the latter group have this in common, that their fixed capital is not actually reproduced, i.e., is not renewed in natura by a new specimen of the same kind, but that its value is successively accumulated in money. The first group is in quite the same (or almost the same, it does not matter here) position as when it started in business, when it came on the market with its money-capital in order to convert it into constant (fixed and circulating) capital on the one hand and into labour-power, into variable capital, on the other. They have once more to advance this money-capital to the circulation, i.e., the value of constant fixed capital as well as that of the circulating and variable capital. Hence, if we assume that half of the 400 thrown into circulation by capitalist class II for exchange with I comes from those capitalists of II who have to renew not only by means of their commodities their means of production pertaining to the circulating capital, but also, by means of their money, their fixed capital in kind, while the other half of capitalists II replaces in kind with its money only the circulating portion of its constant capital, but does not renew in kind its fixed capital, then there is no contradiction in the statement that these returning 400 (returning as soon as I buys articles of consumption for it) are variously distributed among these two sections of II. They return to class II, but they do not come back into the same hands and are distributed variously within this class, passing from one of its sections to another. One section of II has, besides the part of the means of production covered in the long run by its commodities, converted 200 in money into new elements of fixed capital in kind. As was the case at the start of the business the money thus spent returns to this section from the circulation only gradually over a number of years as the wear-and-tear portion of the value of the commodities to be produced by this fixed capital. The other section of II however did not get any commodities from I for 200. But I pays it with the money which the first section of II spent for elements of its fixed capital. The first section of II has its fixed capital-value once more in renewed bodily form, while the second section is still engaged in accumulating it in money-form for the subsequent replacement of its fixed capital in kind. The basis on which we now have to proceed after the previous exchanges is the remainder of the commodities still to be exchanged by both sides: 400s on the part of I, and 400c on the part of II. We assume that II advances 400 in money for the exchange of these commodities amounting to 800. One half of the 400 (equal to 200) must be laid out under all circumstances by that section of IIc which has accumulated 200 in money as the wear-and-tear value and which has to reconvert this money into the bodily form of its fixed capital. Just as constant capital-value, variable capital-value, and surplus-value into which the value of commodity-capital II as well as I is divisible may be represented by special proportional shares of commodities II and I respectively, so may, within the value of the constant capital itself, that portion of the value which is not yet to be converted into the bodily form of the fixed capital, but is rather to be accumulated for the time being in the form of money. A certain quantity of commodities II (in the present case therefore one half of the remainder, or 200) is here only a vehicle of this wear-and-tear value, which has to be precipitated in money by means of exchange. (The first section of capitalists II, which renews fixed capital in kind, may already have realised in this way with the wear-and-tear part of the mass of commodities of which here only the rest still figures a part of its wear-and-tear value, but it still has to realise 200 in money.) As for the second half (equal to 200) of the 400 thrown into circulation by II in this final operation, it buys circulating components of constant capital from I. A portion of these 200 may be thrown into circulation by both sections of II, or only by the one which does not renew its fixed component of value in kind. With these 400 there is thus extracted from I: 1) commodities amounting to 200, consisting only of elements of fixed capital; 2) commodities amounting to 200, replacing only natural elements of the circulating portion of the constant capital of II. So I has sold its entire annual product, so far as it is to be sold to II; but the value of one-fifth of it, 400, is now held by I in the form of money. This money however is surplus-value converted into money which must be spent as revenue for articles of consumption. Thus I buys with its 400 II s entire commodity-value equal to 400; hence this money flows back to II by setting its commodities in motion. We shall now suppose three cases, in which we shall call the section of capitalists II which replaces its fixed capital in kind section 1, and that section which stores up depreciation-value from fixed capital in money-form, section 2. The three cases are the following: a) that a share of the 400 still existing with II as a remnant in the shape of commodities must replace certain shares of the circulating parts of the constant capital for sections 1 and 2 (say, one half for each); b) that section 1 has already sold all its commodities, while section 2 still has to sell 400; c) that section 2 has sold all but the 200 which are the bearers of the depreciation value. Then we have the following distributions: Section 1, then, advanced 300, and section 2 100 of the 400 in money. Of these 400 there return however: To section 1 100 i.e., only one-third of the money advanced by it. But it has in place of the other a renewed fixed capital to the value of 200. Section l has given money to I for this element of fixed capital to the value of 200, but no subsequent commodities. So far as the 200 in money are concerned, section 1 confronts department I only as buyer, but not later on as seller. This money cannot therefore return to section 1; otherwise it would have received the elements of fixed capital from I as a gift. With reference to the last third of the money advanced by it, section 1 first acted as a buyer of circulating constituent parts of its constant capital. With the same money I buys from it the remainder of its commodities worth 100. This money, then, flows back to it (section 1 of department II) because it acts as a vendor of commodities directly after having acted as a buyer. If this money did not return, then II (section 1) would have given to I, for commodities amounting to 100, first 100 in money, and then into the bargain, 100 in commodities, i.e., II would have given away its commodities to I as a present. On the other hand section 2, which laid out 100 in money receives back 300 in money: 100 because first as a buyer it threw 100 in money into circulation, and receives them back as a seller; 200, because it functions only as a seller of commodities to that amount, but not as a buyer. Hence the money cannot flow back to I. The fixed capital depreciation is thus balanced by the money thrown into circulation by II (section 1) in the purchase of elements of fixed capital. But it reaches the hands of section 2 not as money of section 1, but as money belonging to class I. Section 1 has sold all of its commodities, but 200 in money are a transformed shape of the fixed component part of its constant capital which it has to renew in kind. Hence it acts here only as a buyer and receives instead of its money commodity I to the same value in natural elements of its fixed capital. Section 2 has to throw only 200 into circulation, as a maximum (if I does not advance any money for commodity-exchange between I and II), since for half of its commodity-value it is only a seller to I, not a buyer from I. There return to section 2 from the circulation 400: 200, because it has advanced them as a buyer and receives them back as a seller of 200 in commodities; 200, because it sells commodities to the value of 200 to I without obtaining an equivalent in commodities from I. On this supposition section 2 does not have any advance to make in money, because vis- -vis I it no longer acts at all as buyer but only as seller, hence has to wait until someone buys from it. Section 1 advances 400 in money: 200 for mutual commodity-exchange with I, 200 as mere buyer from I. With the last 200 in money it purchases the elements of fixed capital. With 200 in money I buys from section 1 commodities for 200, so that the latter thus recovers the 200 in money it had advanced for this commodity-exchange. And I buys with the other 200, which it has likewise received from section 1, commodities to the value of 200 from section 2, whereby the latter s wear and tear of fixed capital is precipitated in the form of money. The matter is not altered in the least if it is assumed that, in case c), class I instead of II (section 1) advances the 200 in money to promote the exchange of the existing commodities. If I buys in that event first 200 in commodities from II, section 2, on the assumption that this section has only this commodity remnant left to sell then the 200 do not return to I, since II, section 2, does not act again as buyer. But II, section 1, has in that case 200 in money to spend in buying and 200 in commodities for exchange purposes, thus making a total of 400 for trading with I, 200 in money then return to I from II, section 1. If I again lays them out in the purchase of 200 in commodities from II, section 1, they return to I as soon as II, section 1, takes the second half of the 400 in commodities off I s hands. Section 1 (II) has spent 200 in money as a mere buyer of elements of fixed capital; they therefore do not return to it, but serve to turn the 200c, the commodity remnant of II, section 2, into money, while the 200, the money laid out by I for the exchange of commodities, return to I via II, section 1, not via II, section 2. In the place of its commodities of 400 there has returned to it a commodity equivalent amounting to 400; the 200 in money advanced by it for the exchange of 800 in commodities have likewise returned to it. Everything is therefore all right. Since in II, section 1, 200c in commodities are exchanged for 200 Is (in commodities) and since all the money circulating in this exchange of 400 in commodities between I and II returns to him who advanced it, I or II, this money, being an element of the exchange between I and II, is actually not an element of the problem which is troubling us here. Or, to present it differently: Supposing in the exchange between 200 Is (commodities) and 200 IIc (commodities of II, section 1) the money functions as a means of payment, not as a means of purchase and therefore also not as a medium of circulation, in the strictest sense of the words. It is then clear, since the commodities 200 Is and 200 IIc (section 1) are equal in magnitude of value, that means of production worth 200 are exchanged for articles of consumption worth 200, that money functions here only ideally, and that neither side really has to throw any money into the circulation for the payment of any balance. Hence the problem presents itself in its pure form only when we strike off on both sides, I and II, the commodities 200 Is and their equivalent, the commodities 200 IIc (section 1). After the elimination of these two amounts of commodities of equal value (I and II), which balance each other, there is left for exchange a remainder in which the problem evinces its pure form, namely, It is evident here that II, section 1, buys with 200 in money the component parts of its fixed capital, 200 Is. The fixed capital of II, section 1, is thereby renewed in kind and the surplus-value of I, worth 200, is converted from the commodity-form (means of production, or, more precisely, elements of fixed capital) into the money-form. With this money I buys articles of consumption from II, section 2, and the result for II is that for section I a fixed component part of its constant capital has been renewed in kind, and that for section 2 another component part (which compensates for the depreciation of its fixed capital) has been precipitated in money-form. And this continues every year until this last component part, too, has to be renewed in kind. The condition precedent is here evidently that this fixed component part of constant capital II, which is reconverted into money to the full extent of its value and therefore must be renewed in kind each year (section 1), should be equal to the annual depreciation of the other fixed component part of constant capital II, which continues to function in its old bodily form and whose wear and tear, depreciation in value, which it transfers to the commodities in whose production it is engaged, is first to be compensated in money. Such a balance would seem to be a law of reproduction on the same scale. This is equivalent to saying that in class I, which puts out the means of production, the proportional division of labour must remain unchanged, since it produces on the one hand circulating and on the other fixed component parts of the constant capital of department II. Before we analyse this more closely we must see what turn the matter takes if the remainder of IIc (1) is not equal to the remainder of IIc (2), and may be larger or smaller. Let us study the two cases one after the other. In this case IIc (1) buys with 200 in money the commodities 200 Is, and I buys with the same money the commodities 200 IIc (2), i.e., that portion of the fixed capital which is to be precipitated in money. This portion is thus converted into money. But 20 IIc (1) in money cannot be reconverted into fixed capital in kind. It seems this misfortune can be remedied by setting the remainder of Is at 220 instead of at 200, so that only 1,780 instead of 1,800 of the 2,000 I would be disposed of by former exchange. We should then have: IIc, section 1, buys with 220 in money the 220 Is and I buys then with 200 the 200 IIc (2) in commodities. But now 20 in money remain on the side of I, a portion of surplus-value which it can hold on to only in the form of money, without being able to spend it for articles of consumption. The difficulty is thus merely transferred from IIc, section 1, to Is. Let us now assume on the other hand that IIc, section 1, is smaller than IIc, section 2: then we have the With 180 in money II (section 1) buys commodities, 180 Is. With this money I buys commodities of the same value from II (section 2), hence 180 IIc (2). There remain 20 Is unsaleable on one side, and also 20 IIc (2) on the other commodities worth 40, not convertible into money. It would not help us to make the remainder of I equal to 180. True, no surplus would then be left in 1, but now as before a surplus of 20 would remain in IIc (section 2), unsaleable, inconvertible into money. In the first case, where II (1) is greater than II (2), there remains on the side of IIc (1) a surplus in money-form not reconvertible into fixed capital; or, if the remainder Is is assumed to be equal to IIc (1), there remains on the side of Is the same surplus in money-form, not convertible into articles of consumption. In the second case, where IIc (1) is smaller than IIc (2), there remains a money deficit on the side of 200 Is and IIc (2), and an equal surplus of commodities on both sides, or, if the remainder of Is is assumed to be equal to IIc (1), there remains a money deficit and a surplus of commodities on the side of IIc (2). If we assume the remainders of I, always to be equal to IIc (1) since production is determined by orders and reproduction is not altered in any way if one year there is a greater output of fixed component parts and the next a greater output of circulating component part of constant capitals II and I then in the first case Is can be reconverted into articles of consumption only if I buys with it a portion of the surplus-value of II and II accumulates it in money instead of consuming it; and in the second case matters can be remedied only if I spends the money itself, an assumption we have already rejected. If IIc (1) is greater than IIc (2), foreign commodities must be imported to realise the money-surplus in Is. If, conversely, IIc (1) is smaller than IIc (2), commodities II (articles of consumption) will have to be exported to realise the depreciation part of IIc in means of production. Consequently in either case foreign trade is necessary. Even granted that for a study of reproduction on an unchanging scale it is to be supposed that the productivity of all lines of industry, hence also the proportional value-relations of their commodities, remain constant, the two last-named cases, in which IIc (1) is either greater or smaller than IIc (2), will nevertheless always be of interest for production on an enlarged scale where these cases may infallibly be encountered. If all other things, and not only the scale of production, but above all the productivity of labour, remaining the same a greater part of the fixed element of IIc expires than did the year before, and hence a greater part must be renewed in kind, then that part of the fixed capital which is as yet only on the way to its demise and is to be replaced meanwhile in money until its day of expiry, must shrink in the same proportion, inasmuch as it was assumed that the sum (and the sum of the value) of the fixed part of capital functioning in II remains the same. This however brings with it the following circumstances. First: If the greater part of commodity-capital I consists of elements of the fixed capital of IIc, then a correspondingly smaller portion consists of circulating component parts of IIc, because the total production of I for IIc remains unchanged. If one of these parts increases the other decreases, and vice versa. On the other hand the total production of class II also retains the same volume. But how is this possible if its raw materials, semi-finished products, and auxiliary materials (i.e., the circulating elements of constant capital II) decrease? Second: the greater part of fixed capital IIc, restored in its money-form, flows to I to be reconverted from its money-form into its bodily form. So there is a greater flow of money to I, aside from the money circulating between I and II merely for the exchange of their commodities; more money which is not instrumental in effecting mutual commodity exchange, but acts only one-sidedly in the function of a means of purchase. But then the mass of commodities of IIc, which is the bearer of the wear-and-tear equivalent and thus the mass of commodities II that must only be exchanged for money I and not for commodities I would also shrink proportionately. More money would have flown from II to I as mere means of purchase, and there would be fewer commodities II in relation to which I would have to function as a mere buyer. A greater portion of Is for Iv is already converted into commodities II would not therefore be convertible into commodities II, but would persist in the form of money. The opposite case, in which the reproduction of demises of fixed capital II in a certain year is less and on the contrary the depreciation part greater, needs no further discussion. There would be a crisis a crisis of over-production in spite of reproduction on an unchanging scale. In short, if under simple reproduction and other unchanged conditions particularly under unchanged productive power, total volume and intensity of labour no constant proportion is assumed between expiring fixed capital (to be renewed) and fixed capital still continuing to function in its old bodily form (merely adding to the products value in compensation of its depreciation), then, in the one case the mass of circulating component parts to be reproduced would remain the same while the mass of fixed component parts to be reproduced would be increased. Therefore the total production I would have to grow or, even aside from money-relations, there would be a deficit in reproduction. In the other case, if the size of fixed capital II to be reproduced in kind should proportionately decrease and hence the component part of fixed capital II, which must now be replaced only in money, should increase in the same ratio, then the quantity of the circulating component parts of constant capital II reproduced by I would remain unchanged, while that of the fixed component parts to be reproduced would decrease. Hence either decrease in aggregate production of I, or surplus (as previously deficit) and surplus that is not to be converted into money. True, the same labour can, in the first case, turn out a greater product through increasing productivity, extension or intensity, and the deficit could thus be covered in that case. But such a change would not take place without a shifting of capital and labour from one line of production of I to another, and every such shift would call forth momentary disturbances. Furthermore (in so far as extension and intensification of labour would mount), I would have for exchange more of its own value for less of II s value. Hence there would be a depreciation of the product of I. The reverse would take place in the second case, where I must curtail its production, which implies a crisis for its labourers and capitalists, or produce a surplus, which again spells crisis. Such surplus is not an evil in itself, but an advantage; however it is an evil under capitalist production. Foreign trade could help out in either case: in the first case in order to convert commodities I held in the form of money into articles of consumption, and in the second case to dispose of the commodity surplus. But since foreign trade does not merely replace certain elements (also with regard to value), it only transfers the contradictions to a wider sphere and gives them greater latitude. Once the capitalist form of reproduction is abolished, it is only a matter of the volume of the expiring portion expiring and therefore to be reproduced in kind of fixed capital (the capital which in our illustration functions in the production of articles of consumption) varying in various successive years. If it is very large in a certain year (in excess of the average mortality, as is the case with human beings), then it is certainly so much smaller in the next year. The quantity of raw materials, semi-finished products, and auxiliary materials required for the annual production of the articles of consumption provided other things remain equal does not decrease in consequence. Hence the aggregate production of means of production would have to increase in the one case and decrease in the other. This can be remedied only by a continuous relative over-production. There must be on the one hand a certain quantity of fixed capital produced in excess of that which is directly required; on the other hand, and particularly, there must be a supply of raw materials, etc., in excess of the direct annual requirements (this applies especially to means of subsistence). This sort of over-production is tantamount to control by society over the material means of its own reproduction. But within capitalist society it is an element of anarchy. This illustration of fixed capital, on the basis of an unchanged scale of reproduction, is striking. A disproportion of the production of fixed and circulating capital is one of the favourite arguments of the economists in explaining crises. That such a disproportion can and must arise even when the fixed capital is merely preserved, that it can and must do so on the assumption of ideal normal production on the basis of simple reproduction of the already functioning social capital is something new to them.

Economic Manuscripts: Capital: Volume Two

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1885-c2/ch20_03.htm

According to older data the entire annual production of gold amounted to 800,000-900,000 lbs., equal roundly to 1,100 or 1,250 million marks. But according to Soetbeers it amounted to only 170,675 kilograms, valued at roundly 476 million marks, based on the average for 1871 to 1875. Of this amount Australia supplied roundly 167, the United States 166, and Russia 93 million marks. The remainder is distributed over various countries in amounts of less than 10 million marks each. During the same period, the annual production of silver amounted to somewhat less than 2 million kilograms, valued at 354 million marks. Of this amount, Mexico supplied roundly 108, the United States 102, South America 67, Germany 26 million, etc. Among the countries with predominantly capitalist production only the United States is a producer of gold and silver. The capitalist countries of Europe obtain almost all their gold, and by far the greater part of their silver, from Australia, the United States, Mexico, South America, and Russia. But we take it that the gold mines are in a country with capitalist production whose annual reproduction we are here analysing, and for the following reasons: Capitalist production does not exist at all without foreign commerce. But when one assumes normal annual reproduction on a given scale one also assumes that foreign commerce only replaces home products by articles of other use or bodily form, without affecting value-relations, hence without affecting either the value-relations in which the two categories means of production and articles of consumption mutually exchange, or the relations between constant capital, variable capital, and surplus-value, into which the value of the product of each of these categories may be divided. The involvement of foreign commerce in analysing the annually reproduced value of products can therefore only confuse without contributing any new element of the problem, or of its solution. For this reason it must be entirely discarded. And consequently gold too is to be treated here as a direct element of annual reproduction and not as a commodity element imported from abroad by means of exchange. The production of gold, like that of metals generally, belongs in class I, the category which embraces the production of means of production. Supposing the annual production of gold is equal to 30 (for convenience s sake; actually the figure is much too high compared to the other figures of our scheme). Let this value be divisible into 20c + 5v + 5s; 20c is to be exchanged for other elements of Ic and this is to be studied later; but the 5v + 5s (I) are to be exchanged for elements of IIc, i.e., articles of consumption. As for the 5v, every gold-producing establishment begins by buying labour-power. This is done not with gold produced by this particular enterprise, but with a portion of the money-supply in the land. The labourers buy with this 5v articles of consumption from II, and that buys with this money means of production from I. Let II buy gold from I to the amount of 2 as commodity material, etc. (component part of its constant capital), then 2v flow back to gold producers I in money which has already belonged to the circulation. If II does not buy any more material from I, then I buys from II by throwing its gold into circulation as money, since gold can buy any commodity. The difference is only that I does not act here as a seller, but only as a buyer. Gold miners I can always get rid of their commodity; it is always in a directly exchangeable form. Let us assume that some producer of yarn has paid 5v to his labourers, who create for him in return aside from the surplus-value a yarn product equal to 5. For 5 the labourers buy from IIc, and the latter buys yarn from I for 5 in money, and thus 5 flows back in money to the spinner of yarn. Now in the case assumed I g (as we shall designate the producers of gold) advances to its labourers 5v in money which previously belonged to the circulation. The labourers spend it for articles of consumption, but only 2 of the 5 return from II to I g. However I g can begin the process of reproduction anew, just as well as the producer of yarn. For his labourers have supplied him with 5 in gold, 2 of which he sold and 3 of which he still has, so that he has but to coin them, or turn them into bank-notes to have his entire variable capital again directly in his hands in money-form, without the further intervention of II. Even this first process of annual reproduction has wrought a change in the quantity of money actually or virtually belonging to the circulation. We assumed that IIc bought 2v (I g) as material, and that I g has again laid out 3 as the money-form of its variable capital within II. Hence 3 of the mass of money supplied by the new gold production remained within II and did not return to I. According to our assumption II has satisfied its requirements in gold material. The 3 remain in its hands as a gold hoard. Since they cannot constitute any element of its constant capital, and since II had previously enough money-capital for the purchase of labour-power; since furthermore these additional 3 g, with the exception of the depreciation element, have no function to perform within IIc, for a portion of which they were exchanged (they could only serve to cover the depreciation element pro tanto, if IIc (1) should be smaller than IIc (2), which would be accidental); on the other hand, however, namely with the exception of the depreciation element, the entire commodity-product IIc, must be exchanged for means of production I(v + s) this money must be transferred in its entirety from IIc to IIs, no matter whether it exists in necessities of life or articles of luxury, and vice versa corresponding commodity-value must be transferred from IIs to IIc. Result: A portion of the surplus-value is stored up as a money-hoard. In the second year of reproduction, provided the same proportion of annually produced gold continues to be used as material, 2 will again flow back to I g, and 3 will be replaced in kind, i.e., will be released again in II as a hoard, etc. With reference to the variable capital in general: The capitalist I g, like every other capitalist, must continually advance this capital in money for the purchase of labour-power. But so far as this v is concerned, it is not he but his labourers who have to buy from II. It can therefore never happen that he should act as a buyer, throwing gold into II without the initiative of II. But to the extent that II buys material from him, and must convert constant capital II c into gold material, a portion of (I g)v flows back to him from II in the same way that it does to other capitalists of I. And so far as this is not the case, he replaces his v in gold directly from his product. But to the extent that the v advanced in money does not flow back to him from II, a portion of the already available means of circulation (received from I and not returned to I) is converted in II into a hoard and for that reason a portion of its surplus-value is not expended for articles of consumption. Since new gold-mines are continually opened or old ones re-opened, a certain portion of the money to be laid out by I g in v is always part of the money existing prior to the new gold production; it is thrown by I g through its labourers into II, and unless it returns from II to I g it forms there an element of hoard formation. But as for (I g)s, I g can always act here as buyer. He throws his s in the shape of gold into circulation and withdraws from it in return articles of consumption IIc. In II the gold is used in part as material, and thus functions as a real element of the constant constituent portion c of the productive capital. When this is not the case it becomes once more an element of hoard formation as a part of IIs persisting in the form of money. We see, then, aside from Ic which we reserve for a later analysis, that even simple reproduction, excluding accumulation proper, namely reproduction on an extended scale, necessarily includes the storing up, or hoarding, of money. And as this is annually repeated, it explains the assumption from which we started in the analysis of capitalist production, namely, that at the beginning of the reproduction a supply of money corresponding to the exchange of commodities is in the hands of capitalist classes I and II. Such an accumulation takes place even after deducting the amount of gold being lost through the depreciation of money in circulation. It goes without saying that the more advanced capitalist production, the more money is accumulated in all hands, and therefore the smaller the quantity annually added to this hoard by the production of new gold, although the absolute quantity thus added may be considerable. We revert once more in general terms to the objection raised against Tooke; how is it possible that every capitalist draws a surplus-value in money out of the annual product, i.e., draws more money out of the circulation than he throws into it, since in the long run the capitalist class itself must be regarded as the source of all the money thrown into circulation? We reply by summarising the ideas developed previously (in Chapter XVII): In the first place, if we analyse only the circulation and the turnover of capital, thus regarding the capitalist merely as a personification of capital, not as a capitalist consumer and man about town, we see indeed that he is continually throwing surplus-value into circulation as a component part of his commodity-capital, but we never see money as a form of revenue in his hands. We never see him throwing money into circulation for the consumption of his surplus-value. In the second place, if the capitalist class throws a certain amount of money into circulation in the shape of revenue, it looks as if it were paying an equivalent for this portion of the total annual product, and this portion thereby ceases to represent surplus-value. But the surplus-product in which the surplus-value is represented does not cost the capitalist class anything. As a class, the capitalists possess and enjoy it gratuitously, and the circulation of money cannot alter this fact. The alteration brought about by this circulation consists merely in the fact that every capitalist, instead of consuming his surplus-product in kind, a thing which is generally impossible, draws commodities of all sorts up to the amount of the surplus-value he has appropriated out of the general stock of the annual surplus-product of society and appropriates them. But the mechanism of the circulation has shown that while the capitalist class throws money into circulation for the purpose of spending its revenue, it also withdraws this money from the circulation, and can continue the same process over and over again; so that, considered as a class, capitalists remain as before in possession of the amount of money necessary for the conversion of surplus-value into money. Hence, if the capitalist not only withdraws his surplus-value from the commodity-market in the form of commodities for his consumption-fund, but at the same time gets back the money with which he has paid for these commodities, he has evidently withdrawn the commodities from circulation without paying an equivalent for them. They do not cost him anything, although he pays money for them. If I buy commodities for one pound sterling and the seller of the commodities gives me the pound back for surplus-product which I got for nothing, it is obvious that I received the commodities gratis. The constant repetition of this operation does not alter the fact that I constantly withdraw commodities and constantly remain in possession of the pound, although I part with it temporarily to purchase commodities. The capitalist constantly gets this money back as a money equivalent of surplus-value that has not cost him anything. We have seen that with Adam Smith the entire value of the social product resolves itself into revenue, into v + s, so that the constant capital-value is set down as zero. It follows necessarily that the money required for the circulation of the yearly revenue must also suffice for the circulation of the entire annual product, that therefore in our illustration the money required for the circulation of the articles of consumption worth 3,000 also suffices for the circulation of the entire annual product worth 9,000. This is indeed the opinion of Adam Smith, and it is repeated by Th. Tooke. This erroneous conception of the ratio of the quantity of money required for the realisation of revenue to the quantity of money required to circulate the entire social product is the necessary result of the uncomprehended, thoughtlessly conceived manner in which the various elements of material and value of the total annual product are reproduced and annually replaced. It has therefore already been refuted. Let us listen to Smith and Tooke themselves. Smith says in Book II, Ch. 2: Th. Tooke remarks to this passage from Adam Smith (in An Inquiry into the Currency Principle, London, 1844, pp. 34 to 36 passim): If this last sentence stood by itself, one might think Tooke simply stated the fact that there was a ratio between the exchanges among dealers and those among dealers and consumers, in other words, between the value of the total annual revenue and the value of the capital with which it is produced. But this is not the case. He explicitly endorses the view of Adam Smith. A special criticism of his theory of circulation is therefore superfluous. In all lines of industry whose production period as distinguished from its working period extends over a long term, money is continually thrown into circulation during this period by the capitalist producers, partly in payment for labour-power employed, partly in the purchase of means of production to be consumed. Means of production are thus directly withdrawn from the commodity-market, and articles of consumption, partly indirectly, by the labourers spending their wages, and partly directly, by the capitalists, who do not by any means suspend their consumption, although they do not simultaneously throw any equivalent in commodities on the market. During this period the money thrown by them into circulation serves to convert commodity value, including the surplus-value embodied in it, into money. This factor becomes very important in an advanced stage of capitalist production in the case of long-drawn out enterprises, such as are undertaken by stock companies, etc., for instance the construction of railways, canals, docks, large municipal buildings, iron shipbuilding, large-scale drainage of land, etc. On the other hand not all movements of the process of reproduction are effected through the circulation of money. The entire process of production, once its elements have been procured, is excluded from circulation. All products which the producer himself consumes directly, whether individually or productively, are also excluded. Under this head comes also the feeding of agricultural labourers in kind. Therefore the quantity of money which circulates the annual product, exists in society, having been gradually accumulated. It does not belong to the value produced during the given year, except perhaps the gold used to make good the loss of depreciated coins. This exposition presupposes the exclusive circulation of precious metals as money, and in this circulation the simplest form of cash purchases and sales; although money can function also as a means of payment, and has actually done so in the course of history, even on the basis of circulating plain metal coin, and though a credit system and certain aspects of its mechanism have developed upon that basis. This assumption is not made from mere considerations of method, although these are important enough, as demonstrated by the fact that Tooke and his school, as well as their opponents, were continually compelled in their controversies concerning the circulation of bank-notes to revert to the hypothesis of a purely metallic circulation. They were forced to do so post festum and did so very superficially, which was unavoidable, because the point of departure in their analysis thus played merely the role of an incidental point. But the simplest study of money circulation presented in its primitive form and this is here an immanent element of the process of annual reproduction demonstrates: In the slave system, the money-capital invested in the purchase of labour-power plays the role of the money-form of the fixed capital, which is but gradually replaced as the active period of the slave s life expires. Among the Athenians therefore, the gain realised by a slave owner directly through the industrial employment of his slave, or indirectly by hiring him out to other industrial employers (e.g., for mining), was regarded merely as interest (plus depreciation allowance) on the advanced money-capital, just as the industrial capitalist under capitalist production places a portion of the surplus-value plus the depreciation of his fixed capital to the account of interest and replacement of his fixed capital. This is also the rule with capitalists offering fixed capital (houses, machinery, etc.) for rent. Mere household slaves, whether they perform necessary services or are kept as luxuries for show, are not considered here. They correspond to the modern servant class. But the slave system too so long as it is the dominant form of productive labour in agriculture, manufacture, navigation, etc., as it was in the advanced states of Greece and Rome preserves an element of natural economy. The slave market maintains its supply of the commodity labour-power by war, piracy, etc., and this rapine is not promoted by a process of circulation, but by the actual appropriation of the labour-power of others by direct physical compulsion. Even in the United States, after the conversion of the buffer territory between the wage-labour states of the North and the slavery states of the South into a slave-breeding region for the South, where the slave thrown on the market thus became himself an element of the annual reproduction, this did not suffice for a long time, so that the African slave trade was continued as long as possible to satisfy the market. To this must be added the difference between those lines of business whose production proceeds under otherwise normal conditions continuously on the same scale, and those which apply varying quantities of labour-power in different periods of the year, such as agriculture. This distinguished writer gives the following explanations concerning the entire process of social reproduction and circulation: And this quite aside from the fact that a portion of their profits, and therefore in general a supply of commodities in which there exist profits, is here assumed. But Destutt undertook precisely to tell us where those profits come from. The quantity of money required to circulate the profit is a very subordinate question. The quantity of commodities in which the profit is represented seems to have its origin in the circumstance that the capitalists not only sell these commodities to one another, although even this much is quite fine and profound, but sell them to one another at prices which are too high. So we now know one source of the enrichment of the capitalists. It is on a par with the secret of the Entspektor Br sig" that the great poverty is due to the great pauvret . To be sure it is another question how the capitalists came into possession of the 100 and why the labourers, instead of producing commodities for their own account, are compelled to exchange their labour-power for these 100. But this, for a thinker of Destutt s calibre, is self-explanatory. Destutt himself is not quite satisfied with the solution. After all, he did not tell us that one gets richer by spending a sum of money, a hundred pounds, and then taking in again a sum of money amounting to 100; hence, by the reflux of 100 in money, which merely shows why the 100 in money do not get lost. He tells us that the capitalists get richer Consequently the capitalists must get richer also in their transactions with the labourers by selling to them too dear. Very well! In other words, the capitalists pay 100 in wages to the labourers, and then they sell to these labourers their own product at 120, so that they not only recover their 100 but also gain 20? That is impossible. The labourers can pay only with the money which they have received in the form of wages. If they get 100 in wages from the capitalists they can buy only 100 worth, not 120 worth. So this will not work. But there is still another way. The labourers buy from the capitalists commodities for 100, but actually receive commodities worth only 80. Then they are absolutely cheated out of 20. And the capitalist has absolutely gained 20, because he actually paid for the labour-power 20 per cent less than its value, or cut nominal wages 20 per cent by a circuitous route. The capitalist class would accomplish the same end if it paid the labourers at the start only 80 in wages and afterwards gave them for these 80 in money actually 80 worth of commodities. This seems to be the normal way, considering the class of capitalists as a whole, for according to Monsieur Destutt himself the labouring class must receive a sufficient wage (p. 219), since their wages must at least be adequate to maintain their existence and capacity to work, "to procure the barest subsistence. (p. 180). If the labourers do not receive such sufficient wages, that means, according to the same Destutt, the death of industry (p. 208), which does not seem therefore to be a way in which the capitalists can get richer. But whatever may be the scale of wages paid by the capitalists to the working-class, they have a definite value, e.g., 80. If the capitalist class pays the labourers 80, then it has to supply them with commodities worth 80 for these 80 and the reflux of the 80 does not enrich it. If it pays them 100 in money, and sells them 80 worth of commodities for 100 it pays them in money 25 per cent more than their normal wage and supplies them in return with 25 per cent less in commodities. In other words, the fund from which the capitalist class in general derives its profits is supposedly made up of deductions from the normal wages by paying less than its value for labour-power, i.e., less than the value of the means of subsistence required for their normal reproduction as wage-labourers. If therefore normal wages were paid, which is supposed to be the case according to Destutt, there could be no profit fund for either the industrial or the idle capitalists. Hence Destutt should have reduced the entire secret of how the capitalist class gets richer to the following: by a deduction from wages. In that case the other surplus-value funds, which he mentions under 1) and 3), would not exist. Hence in all countries, in which the money wages of the labourers should be reduced to the value of the articles of consumption necessary for their subsistence as a class, there would be no consumption-fund and no accumulation-fund for the capitalists, and hence also no existence-fund for the capitalist class, and hence also no capitalist class. And, according to Destutt, this should be the case in all wealthy and developed countries with an old civilisation, for in them, We have seen above that the industrial capitalists Take it, then, that their profits are equal to 200. And let them use up, say, 100 of this in their individual consumption. But the other half, or 100, does not belong to them; it belongs to the idle capitalists, i.e., to those who receive the ground-rent, and to capitalists who lend money on interest. So they have to pay 100 to these gentry. Let us assume that these gentry need 80 of this money for their individual consumption, and 20 for the hire of servants, etc. With those 80 they buy articles of consumption from the industrial capitalists. Thus while these capitalists part with commodities to the value of 80, they receive back 80 in money, or four-fifths of the 100 paid by them to the idle capitalists under the name of rent, interest, etc. Furthermore the servant class, the direct wage-labourers of the idle capitalists, have received 20 from their masters. These servants likewise buy articles of consumption from the industrial capitalists to the amount of 20. In this way, while parting with commodities worth 20, these capitalists have 20 in money flow back to them, the last fifth of the 100 which they paid to the idle capitalists for rent, interest, etc. At the close of the transaction the industrial capitalists have recovered in money the 100 which they remitted to the idle capitalists in payment of rent, interest, etc. But one half of their surplus-product, equal to 100, passed meanwhile from their hands into the consumption-fund of the idle capitalists. It is evidently quite superfluous for the question now under discussion to bring in somehow or other the division of the 100 between the idle capitalists and their direct wage-labourers. The matter is simple: their rent, interest, in short, their share in the surplus-value equal to 200, is paid to them by the industrial capitalists in money to the amount of 100. With these 100 they buy directly or indirectly articles of consumption from the industrial capitalists. Thus they pay back to them the 100 in money and take from them articles of consumption worth 100. This completes the reflux of the 100 paid by the industrial capitalists in money to the idle capitalists. Is this reflux of money a means of enriching the industrial capitalists, as Destutt imagines? Before the transaction they had a sum of values amounting to 200, 100 being money and 100 articles of consumption. After the transaction they have only one half of the original sum of values. They have once more the 100 in money, but they have lost the 100 in articles of consumption which have passed into the hands of the idle capitalists. Hence they are poorer by 100 instead of richer by 100. If instead of taking the circuitous route of first paying out 100 in money and then receiving this 100 in money back in payment of articles of consumption worth 100, they had paid rent, interest, etc., directly in the bodily form of their products, there would be no 100 in money flowing back to them from the circulation, because they would not have thrown that amount of money into the circulation. Via payment in kind the matter would simply have taken this course: they would keep one half of the surplus-product worth 200 for themselves and give the other half to the idle capitalists without any equivalent in return. Even Destutt would not have been tempted to declare this a means of getting richer. Of course the land and capital borrowed by the industrial capitalists from the idle capitalists and for which they have to pay a portion of their surplus-value in the form of ground-rent, interest, etc., are profitable for them, for this constitutes one of the conditions of production of commodities in general and of that portion of the product which constitutes surplus-product or in which surplus-value is represented. This profit accrues from the use of the borrowed land and capital, not from the price paid for them. This price rather constitutes a deduction from it. Otherwise one would have to contend that the industrial capitalists would not get richer but poorer, if they were able to keep the other half of their surplus-value for themselves instead of having to give it away. This is the confusion which results from mixing up such phenomena of circulation as a reflux of money with the distribution of the product, which is merely promoted by these phenomena of circulation. And yet the same Destutt is shrewd enough to remark: So now the payment of this rent, etc., is a deduction from the profit of the industrial capitalists. Before it was a means wherewith they could enrich themselves. But at least one consolation is left to our Destutt. These good industrialists handle the idle capitalists the same way they have been handling one another and the labourers. They sell them all commodities too dear, for instance, by 20 per cent. Now there are two possibilities. The idle capitalists either have other money resources aside from the 100 which they receive annually from the industrial capitalists, or they have not. In the first case the industrial capitalists sell them commodities worth 100 at a price of, say, 120. Consequently on selling their commodities they recover not only the 100 paid to the idlers but 20 besides, which constitute really new value for them. How does the account look now? They have given away 100 in commodities for nothing, because the 100 in money that they were paid in part for their commodities were their own money. Thus their own commodities have been paid with their own money. Hence they have lost 100. But they have also received an excess of 20 in the price of their commodities over and above their value, which makes 20 to the good. Balance this against the loss of 100, and you still have a loss of 80. Never a plus, always a minus. The cheating practised against the idle capitalists has reduced the loss of the industrial capitalists, but for all that it has not transformed a diminution of their wealth into a means of enrichment. But this method cannot go on indefinitely, for the idle capitalists cannot possibly pay year after year 120 in money if they take in only 100 in money year after year. There remains the other approach: The industrial capitalists sell commodities worth 80 in exchange for the 100 in money they paid to the idle capitalists. In this case, the same as before, they still give away 80 for nothing, in the form of rent, interest, etc. By this fraudulent means the industrial capitalists have reduced their tribute to the idlers, but it still exists nevertheless and the idlers are in a position according to the same theory proclaiming that prices depend on the good will of the sellers to demand in the future 120 instead of 100, as formerly, for rent, interest, etc., on their land and capital. This brilliant analysis is quite worthy of that deep thinker who copies on the one hand from Adam Smith that that the industrial capitalists and who concludes on the other hand that these industrial capitalists that it is not the capitalists who are fed by the labourers, but the labourers who are fed by the capitalists, for the brilliant reason that the money with which the labourers are paid does not remain in their hands, but continually returns to the capitalists in payment of the commodities produced by the labourers. After this exhaustive analysis of social reproduction and consumption, as being brought about by the circulation of money, Destutt continues: Destutt, that very distinguished writer, membre de l Institut de France et de la Soci t Philosophique de Philadelphie, and in fact to a certain extent a luminary among the vulgar economists, finally requests his readers to admire the wonderful lucidity with which he has presented the course of social process, the flood of light which he has poured over the matter, and is even condescending enough to communicate to his readers, where all this light comes from. This must be read in the original: Voil le cr tinisme bourgeois dans toute sa b atitude! [There you have the bourgeois idiocy in all its beatitude!]

Economic Manuscripts: Capital: Volume Two

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1885-c2/ch20_04.htm

For instance capitalist A, who sells during one year or during a number of years certain quantities of commodities successively produced by him, thereby converts into money also that portion of the commodities which is the vehicle of surplus-value the surplus-product or in other words the very surplus-value produced by him in commodity-form, accumulates it gradually, and thus forms for himself new potential money-capital potential because of its capacity and mission to be converted into elements of productive capital. But in actual fact he only engages in simple hoarding, which is not an element of actual reproduction. His activity at first consists only in successively withdrawing circulating money out of the circulation. Of course it is not impossible that the circulating money thus kept under lock and key by him was itself, before it entered into circulation, a portion of some other hoard. This hoard of A, which is potentially new money-capital, is not additional social wealth, any more than it would be if it were spent in articles of consumption. But money withdrawn from circulation, which therefore previously existed in circulation, may have been stored up at some prior time as a component part of a hoard, may have been the money-form of wages, may have converted means of production or other commodities into money or may have circulated portions of constant capital or the revenue of some capitalist. It is no more new wealth than money, considered from the standpoint of the simple circulation of commodities, is the vehicle not only of its actual value but also of its ten-fold value, because it was turned over ten times a day, realised ten different commodity-values. The commodities exist without it, and it itself remains what it is (or becomes even less by depreciation) whether in one turnover or in ten. Only in the production of gold inasmuch as the gold product contains a surplus-product, a depository of surplus-value is new wealth (potential money) created, and it increases the money material of new potential money-capitals only so far as the entire money-product enters into circulation. Although this surplus-value hoarded in the form of money is not additional new social wealth, it represents new potential money-capital, on account of the function for which it is hoarded. (We shall see later that new money-capital may arise also in a way other than the gradual conversion of surplus-value into money.) Money is withdrawn from circulation and stored up as a hoard by selling commodities without subsequent buying. If this operation is therefore conceived as a general process, it seems inexplicable where the buyers are to come from, since in that process everybody would want to sell in order to hoard, and none would want to buy. And it must be conceived generally, since every individual capital may be in the process of accumulation. If we were to conceive the process of circulation between the various parts of the annual reproduction as taking place in a straight line-which would be wrong as it always consists with a few exceptions of mutually opposite movements-then we should have to start from the producer of gold (or silver) who buys without selling, and to assume that all others sell to him. In that case the entire yearly social surplus-product (the bearer of the entire surplus-value) would pass into his hands, and all the other capitalists would distribute among themselves pro rata his surplus-product, which naturally exists in the form of money, the natural embodiment in gold of his surplus-value. For that portion of the product of the gold producer which has to make good his active capital is already tied up and disposed of. The surplus-value of the gold producer, created in the form of gold, would then be the sole fund from which all other capitalists would draw the material for the conversion of their annual surplus-product into money. The magnitude of its value would then have to be equal to the entire annual surplus-value of society, which must first assume the guise of a hoard. Absurd as these assumptions would be, they would do nothing more than explain the possibility of a universal simultaneous formation of a hoard, and would not get reproduction itself one step further, except on the part of the gold producer. Before we resolve this seeming difficulty we must distinguish between the accumulation in department I (production of means of production) and in department II (production of articles of consumption). We shall start with I. For instance, let A sell 600 (equal to 400 c + 100 v + 100 s ) to B (who may represent more than one buyer). A sells 600 in commodities for 600 in money, of which 100 are surplus-value which he withdraws from circulation and hoards in the form of money. But these 100 in money are but the money-form of the surplus-product, which was the bearer of a value of 100. The formation of a hoard is no production at all, hence not an increment of production, either. The action of the capitalist consists here merely in withdrawing from circulation the 100 in money he grabbed by the sale of his surplus-product, holding on to it and impounding it. This operation is carried on not alone by A, but at numerous points along the periphery of circulation by other capitalists, A', A'', A''', all of them working with equal zeal at this sort of hoard formation. These numerous points at which money is withdrawn from circulation and accumulated in numerous individual hoards or potential money-capitals appear as so many obstacles to circulation, because they immobilise the money and deprive it of its capacity to circulate for a certain length of time. But it must be borne in mind that hoarding takes place in the simple circulation of commodities long before this is based on capitalist commodity production. The quantity of money existing in society is always greater than the part of it in actual circulation, although this swells or subsides according to circumstances. We find here again the same hoards, and the same formation of hoards, but now as an element immanent in the capitalist process of production. One can understand the pleasure experienced when all these potential capitals within the credit system, by their concentration in the hands of banks, etc., become disposable, "loanable capital," money-capital, which indeed is no longer passive and music of the future, but active capital growing rank. However, A accomplishes the formation of a hoard only to the extent that he acts only as a seller, so far as his surplus-product is concerned, and not afterward as a buyer. His successive production of surplus-products, the vehicles of his surplus-value to be converted into money, is therefore the premise of his forming a hoard. In the present case, where we are examining only the circulation within category I, the bodily form of the surplus-product, as that of the total product of which it is a part, is the bodily form of an element of constant capital I, that is to say, it belongs in the category of means of production creating means of production. We shall see presently what becomes of it, what function it performs, in the hands of buyers B, B', B'', etc. It must be noted at this point first and foremost that although withdrawing money to the amount of his surplus-value from circulation and hoarding it, A on the other hand throws commodities into it without withdrawing other commodities in return. The capitalists B, B', B'', etc., are thereby enabled to throw money into circulation and withdraw only commodities from it. In the present case these commodities, according to their bodily form and their destination, enter into the constant capital of B, B', etc., as fixed or circulating element. We shall hear more about this anon when we deal with the buyer of the surplus-product, with B, B', etc. So far as the balance is restored by the fact that the buyer acts later on as a seller to the same amount of value, and vice versa, the money returns to the side that advanced it on purchasing, and which sold before it bought again. But the actual balance, so far as the exchange of commodities itself, the exchange of the various portions of the annual product is concerned, demands that the values of the commodities exchanged for one another be equal. But inasmuch as only one-sided exchanges are made, a number of mere purchases on the one hand, a number of mere sales on the other and we have seen that the normal exchange of the annual product on the basis of capitalism necessitates such one-sided metamorphoses the balance can be maintained only on the assumption that in amount the value of the one-sided purchases and that of the one-sided sales tally. The fact that the production of commodities is the general form of capitalist production implies the role which money is playing in it not only as a medium of circulation, but also as money-capital, and engenders certain conditions of normal exchange peculiar to this mode of production and therefore of the normal course of reproduction, whether it be on a simple or on an extended scale conditions which change into so many conditions of abnormal movement, into so many possibilities of crises, since a balance is itself an accident owing to the spontaneous nature of this production. We have also seen that in the exchange of I v for a corresponding amount of value of II c, there takes place in the end, precisely for II c, a replacement of commodities II by an equivalent commodity-value I, that therefore on the part of aggregate capitalist II the sale of his own commodities is subsequently supplemented by the purchase of commodities from I of the same amount of value. This replacement takes place. But what does not take place is an exchange between capitalists I and II of their respective goods. II sells its commodities to working-class I. The latter confronts it one-sidedly, as a buyer of commodities, and it confronts that class one-sidedly as a seller of commodities. With the money proceeds so obtained II c confronts aggregate capitalist I one-sidedly as a buyer of commodities, and aggregate capitalist I confronts it one-sidedly as a seller of commodities up to the amount of I v. It is only by means of this sale of commodities that I finally reproduces its variable capital in the form of money-capital. If capital I faces that of II one-sidedly as a seller of commodities to the amount of I v, it faces working-class I as a buyer of commodities purchasing their labour-power. And if working-class I faces capitalist II one-sidedly as a buyer of commodities (namely, as a buyer of means of subsistence), it faces capitalist I one-sidedly as a seller of commodities, namely, as a seller of its labour-power. The constant supply of labour-power on the part of working-class I, the reconversion of a portion of commodity-capital I into the money-form of variable capital, the replacement of a portion of commodity-capital II by natural elements of constant capital II c all these necessary premises demand one another, but they are brought about by a very complicated process, including three processes of circulation which occur independently of one another but intermingle. This process is so complicated that it offers ever so many occasions for running abnormally. The surplus-product, the bearer of surplus-value, does not cost its appropriators, capitalists I, anything. They are by no manner of means obliged to advance any money or commodities in order to obtain it. Even among the physiocrats an advance was the general form of value embodied in elements of productive capital. Hence what capitalists I advance is nothing but their constant and variable capital. The labourer not only preserves by his labour their constant capital; he not only replaces the value of their variable capital by a corresponding newly created portion of value in the form of commodities; by his surplus-labour he supplies them with a surplus-value existing in the form of surplus-product. By the successive sale of this surplus-product they form a hoard, additional potential money-capital. In the case under consideration, this surplus-product consists from the outset of means of production of means of production. It is only when it reaches the hands of B, B', B'', etc. (I) that this surplus-product functions as additional constant capital. But it is this virtualiter even before it is sold, even in the hands of the accumulators of hoards, A, A', A'' (I). If we consider merely the amount of value of the reproduction on the part of I, we are still moving within the bounds of simple reproduction, for no additional capital has been set in motion to create this virtualiter additional constant capital (the surplus-product), nor has any greater amount of surplus-labour been expended than that on the basis of simple reproduction. The difference is here only in the form of the surplus-labour performed, in the concrete nature of its particular useful character. It has been expended in means of production for I c instead of II c, in means of production of means of production instead of means of production of articles of consumption. In the case of simple reproduction it was assumed that the entire surplus-value I is spent as revenue, hence in commodities II. Hence the surplus-value consisted only of such means of production as have to replace constant capital II in its bodily form. In order that the transition from simple to extended reproduction may take place, production in department I must be in a position to fabricate fewer elements of constant capital for II and so many the more for I. This transition, which does not always take place without difficulties, is facilitated by the fact that some of the products of I may serve as means of production in either department. It follows, then, that, considering the matter merely from the angle of volume of values, the material substratum of extended reproduction is produced within simple reproduction. It is simply surplus-labour of working-class I expended directly in the production of means of production, in the creation of virtual additional capital I. The formation of virtual additional money-capital on the part of A, A' and A'' (1) by the successive sale of their surplus-product which was formed without any capitalist expenditure of money is therefore simply the money-form of additionally produced means of production 1. Consequently production of virtual additional capital expresses in our case (we shall see that it may also be formed in a quite different way) nothing but a phenomenon of the process of production itself, production, in a particular form, of elements of productive capital. The production of additional virtual money-capital on a large scale, at numerous points of the periphery of circulation, is therefore but a result and expression of multifarious production of virtually additional productive capital, whose rise does not itself require additional expenditure of money on the part of the industrial capitalist. The successive transformation of this virtually additional productive capital into virtual money-capital (hoard) on the part of A, A', A'', etc. (I), occasioned by the successive sale of their surplus-product hence by repeated one-sided sale of commodities without a supplementing purchase is accomplished by a repeated withdrawal of money from circulation and a corresponding formation of a hoard. Except in the case where the buyer is a gold producer, this hoarding does not in any way imply additional wealth in precious metals, but only a change in the function of money previously circulating. A while ago it functioned as a medium of circulation, now it functions as a hoard, as virtually new money-capital in the process of formation. Thus the formation of additional money-capital and the quantity of the precious metals existing in a country are not in any causal relation to each other. Hence it follows furthermore: The greater the productive capital already functioning in a country (including the labour-power, the producer of the surplus-product, incorporated in it), the more developed the productive power of labour and thereby also the technical means for the rapid expansion of the production of means of production the greater therefore the quantity of the surplus-product both as to its value and as to the quantity of use-values in which it is represented so much the greater is Whereas the surplus-product, directly produced and appropriated by the capitalists A, A', A'' (I), is the real basis of the accumulation of capital, i.e., of extended reproduction, although it does not actually function in this capacity until it reaches the hands of B, B', B'', etc. (I), it is on the contrary absolutely unproductive in its chrysalis stage of money as a hoard and virtual money-capital in process of gradual formation runs parallel with the process of production in this form, but lies outside of it. It is a dead weight of capitalist production. The eagerness to utilise this surplus-value accumulating as virtual money-capital for the purpose of deriving profits or revenue from it finds its object accomplished in the credit system and "papers." Money-capital thereby gains in another form an enormous influence on the course and the stupendous development of the capitalist system of production. The surplus-product converted into virtual money-capital will grow so much more in volume, the greater was the total amount of already functioning capital whose functioning brought it into being. With the absolute increase of the volume of the annually reproduced virtual money-capital its segmentation also becomes easier, so that it is more rapidly invested in any particular business, either in the hands of the same capitalist or in those of others (for instance members of the family, in the case of a partition of inherited property, etc.). By segmentation of money-capital is meant here that it is wholly detached from the parent stock in order to be invested as a new money-capital in a new and independent business. While the sellers of the surplus-product, A, A', A'', etc. (I), have obtained it as a direct outcome of the process of production, which does not envisage any additional acts of circulation except the advance of constant and variable capital required also in simple reproduction; and while they thereby construct the real basis for reproduction on an extended scale, and in actual fact manufacture virtually additional capital, the attitude of B, B', B'', etc. (I), is different. 1) Not until it reaches the hands of B, B', B'', etc. (I), will the surplus-product of A, A', A'', etc., actually function as additional constant capital (we leave out of consideration for the present the other element of productive capital, the additional labour-power, in other words, the additional variable capital). 2) In order that that surplus-product may reach their hands an act of circulation is wanted they must buy it. In regard to point 1 it should be noted here that a large portion of the surplus-product (virtually additional constant capital), although produced by A, A', A'' (I) in a given year, may not function as industrial capital in the hands of B, B', B'' (I) until the following year or still later. With reference to point 2, the question arises: Whence comes the money needed for the process of circulation? Since the products created by B, B', B'', etc. (I), re-enter in kind into their own process, it goes without saying that pro tanto a portion of their own surplus-product is transferred directly (without any intervention of circulation) to their productive capital and becomes an additional element of constant capital. And pro tanto they do not effect the conversion of the surplus-product of A, A', etc. (I), into money. Aside from this, where does the money come from? We know that B, B', B'', etc. (I) have formed their hoard in the same way as A, A', etc., by the sale of their respective surplus-products. Now they have arrived at the point where their hoarded, only virtual, money-capital is to function effectively as additional money-capital. But this is merely going round in circles. The question still remains: Where does the money come from which the B's (I) before withdrew from circulation and accumulated? We know from the analysis of simple reproduction that capitalists I and II must have a certain amount of money at hand in order to be able to exchange their surplus-product. In that case the money which served only as revenue to be spent for articles of consumption returned to the capitalists in the same measure in which they had advanced it for the exchange of their respective commodities. Here the same money re-appears, but performing a different function. The A's and B's (I) supply one another alternately with the money for converting surplus-product into additional virtual money-capital, and throw the newly formed money-capital alternately back into circulation as a means of purchase. The only assumption made in this case is that the amount of money in the country in question (the velocity of circulation, etc., being constant) should suffice for both the active circulation and the reserve hoard. As we have seen this is the same assumption as had to be made in the case of the simple circulation of commodities. Only the function of the hoards is different in the present case. Furthermore, the available amount of money must be larger, first, because under capitalist production all the products (with the exception of newly produced precious metals and the few products consumed by the producer himself) are created as commodities and must therefore pass through the pupation stage of money; secondly, because on a capitalist basis the quantity of the commodity-capital and the magnitude of its value is not only absolutely greater but also grows with incomparably greater rapidity; thirdly, because an ever expanding variable capital must always be converted into money-capital; fourthly, because the formation of new money-capitals keeps pace with the extension of production, so that the material for corresponding hoard formation must be available. This is generally true of the first phase of capitalist production, in which even the credit system is mostly accompanied by metallic circulation, and it applies to the most developed phase of the credit system as well, to the extent that metallic circulation remains its basis. On the one hand an additional production of precious metals, being alternately abundant or scarce, may here exert a disturbing influence on the prices of commodities not only at long, but also at very short intervals. On the other hand the entire credit mechanism is continually occupied in reducing the actual metallic circulation to a relatively more and more decreasing minimum by means of sundry operations, methods, and technical devices. The artificiality of the entire machinery and the possibility of disturbing its normal course increase to the same extent. The different B's, B''s, B'''s, etc. (I), whose virtual new money-capital enters upon its function as active capital, may have to buy their products (portions of their surplus-product) from one another, or to sell them to one another. Pro tanto the money advanced by them for the circulation of their surplus-product flows back under normal conditions to the different B's in the same proportion in which they had advanced it for the circulation of their respective commodities. If the money circulates as a means of payment, then only balances are to be squared so far as the mutual purchases and sales do not cover one another. But it is important first and foremost to assume here, as everywhere, metallic circulation in its simplest, most primitive form, because then the flux and reflux, the squaring of balances, in short all elements appearing under the credit system as consciously regulated processes present themselves as existing independently of the credit system, and the matter appears in primitive form instead of the later, reflected form. We have explained at great length in Book I that labour-power is always available under the capitalist system of production, and that more labour can be rendered fluent, if necessary, without increasing the number of labourers or the quantity of labour-power employed. We therefore need not go into this any further, but shall rather assume that the portion of the newly created money-capital capable of being converted into variable capital will always find at hand the labour-power into which it is to transform itself. It has also been explained in Book I that a given capital may expand its volume of production within certain limits without any accumulation. But here we are dealing with the accumulation of capital in its specific meaning, so that the expansion of production implies the conversion of surplus-value into additional capital, and thus also an expansion of the capital forming the basis of production. The gold producer can accumulate a portion of his golden surplus- value as virtual money-capital. As soon as it becomes sufficient in amount, he can transform it directly into new variable capital, without first having to sell his surplus-product. He can likewise convert it into elements of the constant capital. But in the latter case he must find at hand the material elements of his constant capital. It is immaterial whether, as was assumed in our presentation hitherto, each producer works to stock up and then brings his finished product to the market or fills orders. The actual expansion of production, i.e., the surplus-product, is assumed in either case, in the one case as actually available, in the other as virtually available, capable of delivery. In this case the additional virtual money-capital on the side of A (I) is indeed a moneyed form of surplus-product (surplus-value), but the surplus-product (surplus-value) considered as such is here a phenomenon of simple reproduction, not yet of reproduction on an extended scale. I(v+s) for which this is true at all events of one portion of s, must ultimately be exchanged for II c, in order that the reproduction of II c may take place on the same scale. By the sale of his surplus-product to B(II), A(I) has supplied to the latter a corresponding portion of the value of constant capital in its bodily form. But at the same time he has rendered an equivalent portion of the commodities of B (II) unsaleable by withdrawing the money from circulation by failing to complement his sale through subsequent purchase. Hence, if we survey the entire social reproduction, which comprises the capitalists of both I and II, the conversion of the surplus-product of A (I) into virtual money-capital expresses the impossibility of reconverting commodity-capital of B (II) representing an equal amount of value into productive (constant) capital; hence not virtual production on an extended scale but an obstruction of simple reproduction, and so a deficit in simple reproduction. As the formation and sale of the surplus-product of A (I) are normal phenomena of simple reproduction, we have here even on the basis of simple reproduction the following interdependent phenomena: Formation of virtual additional money-capital in class I (hence under-consumption from the view-point of II); piling up of commodity-supplies in class II which cannot be reconverted into productive capital (hence relative over-production in II); surplus of money-capital in I and reproduction deficit in II. Without pausing any longer at this point, we simply remark that we had assumed in the analysis of simple reproduction that the entire surplus-value of I and II is spent as revenue. As a matter of fact however one portion of the surplus-value is spent as revenue, and the other is converted into capital. Actual accumulation can take place only on this assumption. That accumulation should take place at the expense of consumption is, couched in such general terms, an illusion contradicting the nature of capitalist production. For it takes for granted that the aim and compelling motive of capitalist production is consumption, and not the snatching of surplus-value and its capitalisation, i.e., accumulation. The first difficulty with reference to II c, i.e., its reconversion from a component part of commodity-capital II into the bodily form of constant capital II, concerns simple reproduction. Let us take the former scheme: (1,000 v + 1,000 s) I are exchanged for 2,000 II c. Now, if for instance one half of the surplus-product of I, hence 1,000/2 s or 500 I s is reincorporated in department I as constant capital, then this portion of the surplus-product, being detained in I, cannot replace any part of II c. Instead of being converted into articles of consumption (and here in this section of the circulation between I and II the exchange is actually mutual, that is, there is a double change of position of the commodities, unlike the replacement of 1,000 II c by 1,000 I v effected by the labourers of I), it is made to serve as an additional means of production in I itself. It cannot perform this function simultaneously in I and II. The capitalist cannot spend the value of his surplus-product for articles of consumption and at the same time consume the surplus-product itself productively, i.e., incorporate it in his productive capital. Instead of 2,000 I(v+s), only 1,500, namely (1,000 v + 500 s) I, are therefore exchangeable for 2,000 II c ; 500 II c cannot be reconverted from the commodity-form into productive (constant) capital One might attempt to circumvent this difficulty in the following way: Far from being over-production, the 500 II c which are kept in stock by the capitalists and cannot be immediately converted into productive capital represent, on the contrary, a necessary element of reproduction, which we have so far neglected. We have seen that a money-supply must be accumulated at many points, hence money must be withdrawn from circulation, partly for the purpose of making it possible to form new money-capital in I, and partly to hold fast temporarily the value of the gradually depreciating fixed capital in the form of money. But since we placed all money and commodities from the very start exclusively into the hands of capitalists I and II when we drew up our scheme and since neither merchants, nor money-changers, nor bankers, nor merely consuming and not directly producing classes exist here, it follows that the constant formation of commodity stores in the hands of their respective producers is here indispensable to keep the machinery of reproduction going. The 500 II c held in stock by capitalists II therefore represent the commodity-supply of articles of consumption which ensures the continuity of the process of consumption implied in reproduction, here meaning the passage of one year to the next. The consumption-fund, which is as yet in the hands of its sellers who are at the same time its producers, cannot fall one year to the point of zero in order to begin the next with zero, any more than such a thing can take place in the transition from today to tomorrow. Since such supplies of commodities must constantly be built up anew, though varying in volume, our capitalist producers II must have a reserve money-capital, which enables them to continue their process of production although one portion of their productive capital is temporarily tied up in the shape of commodities. Our assumption is that they combine the whole business of trading with that of producing. Hence they must also have at their disposal the additional money-capital, which is in the hands of the merchants when the individual functions in the process of reproduction are separated and distributed among the various kinds of capitalists. To this one may object:

Economic Manuscripts: Capital: Volume Two

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We might vary the scheme by changing the ratio between the variable and constant capital. For instance as follows: Now let us analyse scheme a) more closely. Let us suppose that both I and II accumulate one half of their surplus-value, that is to say, convert it into an element of additional capital, instead of spending it as revenue. As one half of 1,000 Is, or 500, are to be accumulated in one form or another, invested as additional money-capital, i.e., converted into additional productive capital, only (l,000v + 500s) I are spent as revenue. Hence only 1,500 figures here as the normal size of IIc. We need not further examine the exchange between 1,500 I(v + s) and 1,500 IIc, because this has already been done under the head of process of simple reproduction. Nor does 4,000 Ic require any attention, since its re-arrangement for the newly commencing reproduction (which this time will occur on an extended scale) was likewise discussed as a process of simple reproduction. The only thing that remains to be examined by us is 500 Is and (376v + 376s) II, inasmuch as it is a matter on the one hand of the internal relations of both I and II and on the other of the movement between them. Since we have assumed that in II likewise one half of the surplus-value is to be accumulated, 188 are to be converted here into capital, of which one-fifth, or 47, or, to round it off, 48, are to be variable capital, so that 140 remain to be converted into constant capital. Here we come across a new problem, whose very existence must appear strange to the current view that commodities of one kind are exchanged for commodities of another kind, or commodities for money and the same money again for commodities of another kind. The 140 IIs can be converted into productive capital only by replacing them with commodities of Is of the same value. It is a matter of course that that portion of Is which must be exchanged for IIs must consist of means of production, which may enter either into the production of both I and II, or exclusively into that of II. This replacement can be made feasible only by means of a one-sided purchase on the part of II, as the entire surplus-product of 500 Is, which we still have to examine, is to serve the purposes of accumulation within I, hence cannot be exchanged for commodities II; in other words, it cannot be simultaneously accumulated and consumed by I. Therefore II must buy 140 Is for cash without recovering this money by a subsequent sale of its commodities to I. And this is a process which is continually repeating itself in every new annual production, so far as it is reproduction on an extended scale. Where in II is the source of the money for this? It would rather seem that II is a very unprofitable field for the formation of new money-capital which accompanies actual accumulation and necessitates it under capitalist production, and which at first actually presents itself as simple hoarding. We have first 376 IIv. The money-capital of 376, advanced in labour-power, continually returns through the purchase of commodities II as variable capital in money-form to capitalist II. This constant repetition of departure from and return to the starting-point, the pocket of the capitalist, does not add in any way to the money roving over this circuit. This, then, is not a source of the accumulation of money. Nor can this money be withdrawn from circulation in order to form hoarded, virtually new, money-capital. But stop! Isn't there a chance here to make a little profit? We must not forget that class II has this advantage over class I, that its labourers have to buy back from it the commodities produced by themselves. Class II is a buyer of labour-power and at the same time a seller of the commodities to the owners of the labour-power employed by it. Class II can therefore: We see that in an objective analysis of the mechanism of capitalism certain stains still sticking to it with extraordinary tenacity cannot be used as a subterfuge to get over some theoretical difficulties. But strange to say, the great majority of my bourgeois critics upbraid me as though I have wronged the capitalists by assuming, for instance in Book I of Capital, that the capitalist pays labour-power at its real value, a thing which he mostly does not do! (Here, exercising some of the magnanimity attributed to me, it would be appropriate to quote Sch ffle.) So with the 376 IIv we cannot get any nearer the goal we have mentioned. But the 376 IIv seem to be in a still more precarious position. Here only capitalists of the same class, mutually buying and selling the articles of consumption they produced, confront one another. The money required for these transactions functions only as a medium of circulation and in the normal course of things must flow back to the interested parties in the same portion in which they advanced it to the circulation, in order to cover the same route over and over again. There seem to be only two ways by which this money can be withdrawn from circulation to form virtually additional money-capital. Either one part of capitalists II cheats the other and thus robs them of their money. We know that no preliminary expansion of the circulating medium is necessary for the formation of new money-capital. All that is necessary is that the money should be withdrawn from circulation by certain parties and hoarded. It would not alter the case if this money were stolen, so that the formation of additional money-capital by one part of capitalists II would entail a positive loss of money by another part. The cheated capitalists II would have to live a little less gaily, that would be all. Or a part of II represented by necessities of life is directly converted into new variable capital within department II. How that is done we shall examine at the close of this chapter (under No. IV). Let us now assume that 400 of the 500 Is are to be converted into constant capital, and 100 into variable capital. The exchange within I of the 400s, which are thus to be capitalised, has already been discussed. They can therefore be annexed to Ic, without more ado and in that case we get for I: 4,400c + 1,000v + 100s (the latter to be converted into 100v). II in turn buys from I for the purpose of accumulation the 100 Is (existing in means of production) which now form additional constant capital II, while the 100 in money which it pays for them are converted into the money-form of the additional variable capital of I. We then have for I a capital of 4,400c + 1,100v (the latter in money), equaling 5,500. II has now 1,600c for its constant capital. In order to put them to work, it must advance a further 50v in money for the purchase of new labour-power, so that its variable capital grows from 750 to 800. This expansion of the constant and variable capital of II by a total of 150 is supplied out of its surplus-value. Hence only 600s of the 750 IIs remain as a consumption-fund for capitalists II, whose annual product is now distributed as follows: II. 1,600c + 800v + 600s (consumption-fund), equal to 3,000. The 150s produced in articles of consumption, which have been converted here into (100c + 50v) II, go entirely in their bodily form for the consumption of the labourers, 100 being consumed by the labourers of I (100 Iv), and 50 by the labourers of II (50 IIv), as explained above. As a matter of fact in II, where its total product is prepared in a form suitable for accumulation, a part greater by 100 of the surplus-value in the form of necessary articles of consumption must be reproduced. If reproduction really starts on an extended scale, then the 100 of variable money-capital I flow back through the hands of its working-class to II, while II transfers 100s in commodity-supply to I and at the same time 50 in commodity-supply to its own working-class. The arrangement changed for the purpose of accumulation is now as follows: But if the old ratio of v:s is maintained in II, then additional 25v must be laid out for 50c, and these are to be taken from the 750s. Then we have In I, 550s must be capitalised. If the former ratio is maintained, 440 of this amount form constant capital and 110 variable capital. These 110 might be taken out of the 725 IIs, i.e., articles of consumption to the value of 110 are consumed by labourers I instead of capitalists II, so that the latter are compelled to capitalise these 110s which they cannot consume. This leaves 615 IIs of the 725 IIs. But if II thus converts these 110 into additional constant capital, it requires an additional variable capital of 55. This again must be supplied by its surplus-value. Subtracting this amount from 615 IIs leaves 560 for the consumption of capitalists II, and we now obtain the following capital-value after accomplishing all actual and potential transfers: If things are to proceed normally, accumulation in II must take place more rapidly than in I, because otherwise the portion I(v + s) which must be converted into commodities II will grow more rapidly than IIc, for which alone it can be exchanged. If reproduction is continued on this basis and conditions otherwise remain unchanged we obtain at the end of the succeeding year: I has now to capitalise 605s. Of these 484 are constant and 121 variable. The last named are to be deducted from IIs, which is still equal to 797 , leaving 676 IIs. II, then, converts another 121 into constant capital and requires another variable capital of 60 for it, which likewise comes out of 676 , leaving 616 for consumption. Then we have the following capitals: in the consumption-fund of the capitalists and labourers. As 70 IIs are directly annexed here to IIc, a variable capital of 70/5, or 14, is required to set this additional constant capital in motion. These 14 must also come out of the 215 IIs, so that 201 IIs remain, and we have: The exchange of 1,500 I(v + s) for 1,500 IIc is a process of simple reproduction, and nothing further need be said about it. However a few peculiarities remain to be noted here, which arise from the fact that in accumulating reproduction I(v + s) is not replaced solely by IIc, but by IIc plus a portion of IIs. It goes without saying that as soon as we assume accumulation, I(v + s) is greater than IIc, not equal to IIc, as in simple reproduction. For in the first place, I incorporates a portion of its surplus-product in its own productive capital and converts five-sixths of it into constant capital, therefore cannot replace these five-sixths simultaneously by articles of consumption II. In the second place I has to supply out of its surplus-product the material for the constant capital required for accumulation within II, just as II has to supply I with the material for the variable capital, which is to set in motion the portion of I s surplus-product employed by I itself as additional constant capital. We know that the actual, and therefore also the additional, variable capital consists of labour-power. It is not capitalist I who buys from II a supply of necessities of life or accumulates them for the additional labour-power to be employed by him, as the slaveholder had to do. It is the labourers themselves who trade with II. But this does not prevent the articles of consumption of his additional labour-power from being viewed by the capitalist as only so many means of production and maintenance of his eventual additional labour-power, hence as the bodily form of his variable capital. His own immediate operation, in the present case that of I, consists in merely storing up the new money-capital required for the purchase of additional labour-power. As soon as he has incorporated this in his capital, the money becomes a means of purchase of commodities II for this labour-power, which must find these articles of consumption at hand. By the by. The capitalist, as well as his press, is often dissatisfied with the way in which the labour-power spends its money and with the commodities II in which it realises this money. On such occasions he philosophises, babbles of culture, and dabbles in philanthropical talk, for instance after the manner of Mr. Drummond, the Secretary of the British Embassy in Washington. According to him, The Nation (a journal) carried last October 1879, an interesting article, which contained among other things the following passages: Long hours of labour seem to be the secret of the rational and healthful processes, which are to raise the condition of the labourer by an improvement of his mental and moral powers and to make a rational consumer of him. In order to become a rational consumer of the commodities of the capitalist, he should above all begin to let his own capitalist consume his labour-power irrationally and unhealthfully but the demagogue prevents him! What the capitalist means by a rational consumption is evident wherever he is condescending enough to engage directly in the trade with his own labourers, in the truck system, which includes also the supplying of homes to the labourers, so that the capitalist is at the same time a landlord for them a branch of business among many others. The same Drummond, whose beautiful soul is enamoured of the capitalist attempts to uplift the working-class, tells in the same report among other things of the cotton goods manufacture of the Lowell and Lawrence Mills. The boarding and lodging houses for the factory girls belong to the corporation or company owning the mills. The stewardesses of these houses are in the employ of the same company which prescribes them rules of conduct. No girl is permitted to stay out after 10 p.m. Then comes a gem: a special police patrol the grounds for the purpose of guarding against an infringement of those rules. After 10 p. m. no girl can leave or enter. No girl may live anywhere but on the premises of the company, and every house on it brings the company about 10 dollars per week in rent. And now we see the rational consumer in his full glory: But the main secret of making a rational consumer out of the labourer is yet to be told. Mr. Drummond visits the cutlery works of Turner s Falls (Connecticut River), and Mr. Oakman, the treasurer of the concern, after telling him that especially American table cutlery beat the English in quality, continues: A reduction of wages and long hours of labour that is the essence of the rational and healthful processes which are to uplift the labourer to the dignity of a rational consumer, so that they make a market for things showered upon them by culture and growth of invention. Consequently, just as I has to supply the additional constant capital of II out of its surplus-product, so II likewise supplies the additional variable capital for I. II accumulates for I and for itself, so far as the variable capital is concerned, by reproducing a greater portion of its total product, and hence especially of its surplus-product, in the shape of necessary articles of consumption. In production on the basis of increasing capital, I(v + s) must be equal to II plus that portion of the surplus-product which is re-incorporated as capital, plus the additional portion of constant capital required for the expansion of the production in II; and the minimum of this expansion is that without which real accumulation, i.e., a real expansion of production in I itself, is unfeasible. Reverting now to the case which we examined last, we find in it the peculiarity that II is smaller than I(v + s), than that portion of product I which is spent as revenue for articles of consumption, so that on exchanging the 1,500 I(v + s) a portion of surplus-product II, equal to 70, is at once realised. As for IIc, equal to 1,430, it must, all other conditions remaining the same, be replaced by an equal magnitude of value out of I(v + s), in order that simple reproduction may take place in II, and to that extent we need not pay any more attention to it here. It is different with the additional 70 IIs. What for I is merely a replacement of revenue by articles of consumption, merely commodity-exchange meant for consumption, is for II not a mere reconversion of its constant capital from the form of commodity-capital into its bodily form, as it is in simple reproduction, but a direct process of accumulation, a transformation of a part of its surplus-product from the form of articles of consumption into that of constant capital. If with 70 in money (money-reserve for the conversion of surplus-value) I buys the 70 IIs, and if II does not buy in exchange 70 Is, but accumulates the 70 as money-capital, then the latter is indeed always an expression of additional product (precisely of the surplus-product of II, of which it is an aliquot part), although this is not a product which re-enters production; but in that case this accumulation of money on the part of II would at the same time express that 70 Is in means of production are unsaleable. There would be a relative overproduction in I, corresponding to the simultaneous non-expansion of reproduction on the part of II. But apart from this: Until the 70 in money, which came from I, return to it, wholly or in part, through the purchase of 70 Is by II, this 70 in money figures wholly or in part as additional virtual money-capital in the hands of II. This is true of every exchange between I and II, until the mutual replacement of their respective commodities has effected the return of the money to its starting-point. But in the normal course of things the money figures here only transiently in this role. In the credit system, however, where all temporarily released additional money is supposed to function at once actively as an additional money-capital, such only temporarily released money-capital may be enthralled, for instance, serve in new enterprises of I, while it should have to realise surplus-products held there in other enterprises. It must also be noted that the annexation of 70 Is to constant capital II requires at the same time an expansion of variable capital II by 14. This implies about the way it did in I, in the direct incorporation of surplus-product Is in capital Ic that the reproduction in II is already in process with a tendency toward further capitalisation; in other words, it implies expansion of that portion of the surplus-product which consists of necessary means of subsistence. The product of 9,000 in the second illustration must, as we have seen, be distributed in the following manner for the purpose of reproduction, if 500 Is is to be capitalised. In doing so we merely consider the commodities and neglect the money-circulation. Capitalisation takes place in the following manner: In I the 500s which are being capitalised divide into five-sixths, or 417c plus one-sixth, or 83v. The 83v draw an equal amount out of IIs, which buys elements of constant capital and adds them to IIc. An increase of IIc by 83 implies an increase of IIv by one-fifth of 83, or 17. We have, then, after this exchange The reproduction on this basis in the second year brings the capital at the end of that year to In accumulation it is above all the rate of accumulation that must be considered. In the preceding cases we assumed that the rate of accumulation in I was equal to s I, and also that it remained constant from year to year. We changed only the proportion in which this accumulated capital was divided into variable and constant capital. We then had three cases: The premise of simple reproduction, that I(v + s) is equal to IIc, is not only incompatible with capitalist production, although this does not exclude the possibility that in an industrial cycle of 10-11 years some year may show a smaller total production than the preceding year, so that not even simple reproduction takes place compared to the preceding year. Besides that, considering the natural annual increase in population simple reproduction could take place only to the extent that a correspondingly larger number of unproductive servants would partake of the 1,500 representing the aggregate surplus-value. But accumulation of capital, real capitalist production, would be impossible under such circumstances. The fact of capitalist accumulation therefore excludes the possibility of IIc being equal to I(v + s). Nevertheless it might occur even with capitalist accumulation that in consequence of the course taken by the processes of accumulation during a preceding series of periods of production IIc might become not only equal but even bigger than I(v + s). This would mean an over-production in II and could not be adjusted in any other way than by a great crash, in consequence of which some capital of II would get transferred to I. Nor does it alter the relation of I(v + s) to IIc if a portion of constant capital II reproduces itself, as happens for instance in the use of home-grown seeds in agriculture. This portion of IIc is no more to be taken into consideration in the exchange between I and II than is Ic. Nor does it change matters if a part of the products of II is capable of entering into I as means of production. It is covered by a part of the means of production supplied by I, and this portion must be deducted on both sides at the outset, if we wish to examine in pure and unobscured form the exchange between the two large classes of social production, the producers of means of production and the producers of articles of consumption. Hence under capitalist production I(v + s) cannot be equal to IIc, in other words, the two cannot balance in mutual exchange. On the other hand, if I(s/x) is taken as that portion of Is which is spent by capitalists I as revenue, I(v + s/x) may be equal to, larger, or smaller than, IIc. But I(v + s/x) must always be smaller than II(c + s) by as much as that portion of IIs which must be consumed under all circumstances by capitalist class II. It must be noted that in this exposition of accumulation the value of the constant capital is not presented accurately so far as that capital is a part of the value of the commodity-capital it helped to produce. The fixed portion of the newly accumulated constant capital enters into the commodity-capital only gradually and periodically, according to the different natures of these fixed elements. Therefore whenever raw materials, semi-finished goods, etc., enter in huge quantities into the production of commodities, the commodity-capital consists for the most part of replacements of the circulating constant components and of the variable capital. (On account of the specific turnover of the circulating component parts this way of presenting the matter may nevertheless be adopted. It is then assumed that the circulating portion together with the portion of value of the fixed capital transferred to it is turned over so often during the year that the aggregate sum of the commodities supplied is equal in value to all the capital entering into the annual production.) But wherever only auxiliary materials are used for mechanical industry, and no raw material, there the labour element, equal to v, must reappear in the commodity-capital as its larger constituent. While in the calculation of the rate of profit the surplus-value is figured on the total capital, regardless of whether the fixed components periodically transfer much or little value to the product, the fixed portion of constant capital is to be included in the calculation of the value of any periodically created commodity-capital only to the extent that on an average it yields value to the product on account of wear and tear.

Economic Manuscripts: Capital: Volume Two

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1885-c2/ch21_02.htm

The book which is herewith submitted to the English-speaking public in its own language, was written rather more than forty years ago. The author, at the time, was young, twenty-four years of age, and his production bears the stamp of his youth with its good and its faulty features, of neither of which he feels ashamed. That it is now translated into English, is not in any way due to his initiative. Still he may be allowed to say a few words, to show cause why this translation should not be prevented from seeing the light of day. The state of things described in this book belongs to-day in many respects to the past, as far as England is concerned. Though not expressly stated in our recognized treatises, it is still a law of modern Political Economy that the larger the scale on which Capitalistic Production is carried on, the less can it support the petty devices of swindling and pilfering which characterize its early stages. The pettifogging business-tricks of the Polish Jew, the representative in Europe of commerce in its lowest stage, those tricks that serve him so well in his own country, and are generally practiced there, he finds to be out of date and out of place when he comes to Hamburg or Berlin; and again the Commission Agent, who hails from Berlin or Hamburg, Jew or Christian, after frequenting the Manchester Exchange for a few months, finds out that in order to buy cotton-yarn or cloth cheap, he, too, had better drop those slightly more refined but still miserable wiles and subterfuges which are considered the acme of cleverness in his native country. The fact is, those tricks do not pay any longer in a large market, where time is money, and where a certain standard of commercial morality is unavoidably developed, purely as a means of saving time and trouble. And it is the same with the relation between the manufacturer and his hands. The repeal of the Corn-laws, the discovery of the Californian and Australian gold-fields, the almost complete crushing-out of domestic handweaving in India, the increasing access to the Chinese market, the rapid multiplication of railways and steam-ships all over the world, and other minor causes have given to English manufacturing industry such a colossal development, that the status of 1844 now appears to us as comparatively primitive and insignificant. And in proportion as this increase took place, in the same proportion did manufacturing industry become apparently moralized. The competition of manufacturer against manufacturer by means of petty thefts upon the workpeople did no longer pay. Trade had outgrown such low means of making money; they were not worth while practicing for the manufacturing millionaire, and served merely to keep alive the competition of smaller traders, thankful to pick up a penny wherever they could. Thus the truck-system was suppressed; the Ten Hours Bill was enacted, and a number of other secondary reforms introduced much against the spirit of Free Trade and unbridled competition, but quite as much in favor of the giant-capitalist in his competition with his less favored brother. Moreover, the larger the concern, and with it the number of hands, the greater the loss and inconvenience caused by every conflict between master and men; and thus a new spirit came over the masters, especially the large ones, which taught them to avoid unnecessary squabbles, to acquiesce in the existence and power of Trades Unions, and finally even to discover in strikes at opportune times a powerful means to serve their own ends. The largest manufacturers, formerly the leaders of the war against the working-class, were now the foremost to preach peace and harmony. And for a very good reason, The fact is, that all these concessions to justice and philanthropy were nothing else but means to accelerate the concentration of capital in the hands of the few, for whom the niggardly extra extortions of former years had lost all importance and had become actual nuisances; and to crush all the quicker and all the safer their smaller competitors who could not make both ends meet without such perquisites. Thus the development of production on the basis of the capitalistic system has of itself sufficed at least in the leading industries, for in the more unimportant branches this is far from being the case to do away with all those minor grievances which aggravated the workman s fate during its earlier stages. And thus it renders more and more evident the great central fact, that the cause of the miserable condition of the working class is to be sought, not in these minor grievances, but in the Capitalistic System itself. The wage-worker sells to the capitalist his labor-force for a certain daily sum. After a few hours work he has reproduced the value of that sum; but the substance of his contract is, that he has to work another series of hours to complete his working day; and the value he produces during these additional hours of surplus labor is surplus value which costs the capitalist nothing but yet goes into his pocket. That is the basis of the system which tends more and more to split up civilized society into a few Vanderbilts, the owners of all the means of production and subsistence, on the one hand, and an immense number of wage-workers, the owners of nothing but their labor-force, on the other. And that this result is caused, not by this or that secondary grievance, but by the system itself this fact has been brought out in bold relief by the development of Capitalism in England since 1847. Again, the repeated visitations of cholera, typhus, small-pox and other epidemics have shown the British bourgeois the urgent necessity of sanitation in his towns and cities, if he wishes to save himself and family from falling victims to such diseases. Accordingly, the most crying abuses described in this book have either disappeared or have been made less conspicuous. Drainage has been introduced or improved, wide avenues have been opened out athwart many of the worst slums I had to describe. Little Ireland has disappeared and the Seven Dials, are next on the list for sweeping away. But what of that? Whole districts which in 1844 I could describe as almost idyllic have now, with the growth of the towns, fallen into the same state of dilapidation, discomfort and misery. Only the pigs and the heaps of refuse are no longer tolerated. The bourgeoisie have made further progress in the art of hiding the distress of the working class. But that, in regard to their dwellings, no substantial improvement has taken place, is amply proved by the Report of the Royal Commission on the Housing of the Poor, 1885. And this is the case, too, in other respects. Police regulations have been plentiful as blackberries; but they can only hedge in the distress of the workers, they cannot remove it. But while England has thus outgrown the juvenile state of capitalist exploitation described by me, other countries have only just attained it. France, Germany, and especially America, are the formidable competitors who at this moment as foreseen by me in 1844 are more and more breaking up England s industrial monopoly. Their manufactures are young as compared with those of England, but increasing at a far more rapid rate than the latter; but curious enough, they have at this moment arrived at about the same phase of development as English manufacture in 1844. With regard to America, the parallel is indeed most striking. True, the external surroundings in which the working class is placed in America are very different, but the same economical laws are at work, and the results, if not identical in every respect, must still be of the same order. Hence we find in America the same struggles for a shorter working-day, for a legal limitation of the working time, especially of women and children in factories; we find the truck system in full blossom, and the cottage-system, in rural districts, made use of by the bosses as a means of domination over the workers. At this very moment I am receiving the American papers with accounts of the great strike of 12,000 Pennsylvanian coal-miners in the Connellsville district, and I seem but to read my own description of the North of England colliers strike of 1844. The same cheating of the work-people by false measure; the same truck system; the same attempt to break the miners resistance by the Capitalists last, but crushing, resource, the eviction of the men out of their dwellings, the cottages owned by the companies. There were two circumstances which for a long time prevented the unavoidable consequences of the Capitalist system from showing themselves in the full glare of day in America. These were the easy access to the ownership of cheap land, and the influx of immigration. They allowed, for many years, the great mass of the native American population to retire in early manhood from wage-labor and to become farmers, dealers, or employers of labor, while the hard work for wages, the position of a proletarian for life, mostly fell to the lot of immigrants. But America has outgrown this early stage. The boundless backwoods have disappeared, and the still more boundless prairies are fast and faster passing from the hands of the Nation and the States into those of private owners. The great safety-valve against the formation of a permanent proletarian class has practically ceased to act. A class of life-long and even hereditary proletarians exists at this hour in America. A nation of sixty millions striving hard to become and with every chance of success, too the leading manufacturing nation of the world such a nation cannot permanently import its own wage-working class; not even if immigrants pour in at the rate of half a million a year. The tendency of the Capitalist system towards the ultimate splitting-up of society into two classes, a few millionaires on the one hand, and a great mass of mere wage-workers on the other, this tendency, though constantly crossed and counteracted by other social agencies, works nowhere with greater force than in America; and the result has been the production of a class of native American wage-workers, who form, indeed, the aristocracy of the wage-working class as compared with the immigrants, but who become conscious more and more every day of their solidarity with the latter and who feel all the more acutely their present condemnation to life-long wage-toil, because they still remember the bygone days, when it was comparatively easy to rise to a higher social level. Accordingly the working class movement, in America, has started with truly American vigor, and as on that side of the Atlantic things march with at least double the European speed, we may yet live to see America take the lead in this respect too. I have not attempted, in this translation, to bring the book up to date, to point out in detail all the changes that have taken place since 1844. And for two reasons: Firstly, to do this properly, the size of the book must be about doubled, and the translation came upon me too suddenly to admit of my undertaking such a work. And secondly, the first volume of Das Kapital, by Karl Marx, an English translation of which is about to appear, contains a very ample description of the state of the British working class, as it was about 1865, that is to say, at the time when British industrial prosperity reached its culminating point. I should, then, have been obliged again to go over the ground already covered by Marx s celebrated work. It will be hardly necessary to point out that the general theoretical standpoint of this book philosophical, economical, political does not exactly coincide with my standpoint of to-day. Modern international Socialism, since fully developed as a science, chiefly and almost exclusively through the efforts of Marx, did not as yet exist in 1844. My book represents one of the phases of its embryonic development; and as the human embryo, in its early stages, still reproduces the gill-arches of our fish ancestors, so this book exhibits everywhere the traces of the descent of Modern Socialism from one of its ancestors, German philosophy. Thus great stress is laid on the dictum that Communism is not a mere party doctrine of the working class, but a theory compassing the emancipation of society at large, including the Capitalist class, from its present narrow conditions. This is true enough in the abstract, but absolutely useless, and worse, in practice. So long as the wealthy classes not only do not feel the want of any emancipation, but strenuously oppose the self-emancipation of the working class, so long the social revolution will have to be prepared and fought out by the working class alone. The French bourgeois of 1789, too, declared the emancipation of the bourgeoisie to be the emancipation of the whole human race; but the nobility and clergy would not see it; the proposition though for the time being, with respect to feudalism, an abstract historical truth soon became a mere sentimentalism, and disappeared from view altogether in the fire of the revolutionary struggle. And to-day, the very people who, from the impartiality of their superior stand-point preach to the workers a Socialism soaring high above their class interests and class struggles, and tending to reconcile in a higher humanity the interests of both the contending classes these people are either neophytes, who have still to learn a great deal, or they are the worst enemies of the workers wolves in sheeps clothing. The recurring period of the great industrial crises is stated in the text as five years. This was the period apparently indicated by the course of events from 1825 to 1842. But the industrial history from 1842 to 1868 has shown that the real period is one of ten years; that the intermediate revolutions were secondary and tended more and more to disappear. Since 1868 the state of things has changed again, of which more anon. I have taken care not to strike out of the text the many prophecies, amongst others that of an imminent social revolution in England, which my youthful ardor induced me to venture upon. The wonder is, not that a good many of them proved wrong, but that so many of them have proved right, and that the critical state of English trade, to be brought on by German and especially American competition, which I then foresaw though in too short a period has now actually come to pass. In this respect I can, and am bound to, bring the book up to date, by placing here an article which I published in the London Commonweal of March 1, 1885, under the heading: England in 1845 and in 1885. It gives at the same time a short outline of the history of the English working class during these forty years. London, February 25, 1886

Works of Frederick Engels 1886

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1886/02/25.htm

The French Republican Government seem resolved to show in every possible way that they are quite as much the Government of the capitalists as any of their predecessors. Not content with siding with the Mining Company in Decazeville, they now come out even stronger in Lyons. There is a strike at a glass-works there; a few knobsticks continue working, and are lodged inside the works for safety s sake. When the furniture of one of them a German anarchist of the name of Litner was removed to the works, the strikers followed it, hooting. No sooner was the cart with the furniture inside and the gates closed, than shots were fired from the windows upon the people outside revolver-bullets, and buckshot flying about in every direction, and wounding about thirty people. The crowd of course dispersed. Now the police and the judicial authorities interfered. But not to arrest the capitalist and his retainers who had fired oh no! they arrested a number of the strikers for interfering with the freedom of labour! This affair coming on at this very moment, has caused immense excitement in Paris. Decazeville has swelled the Socialist votes in Paris from 30,000 to above 100,000, and the effect of this murderous affair on the La Malotier Gray at Lyons will be greater still.

On the Strike at a Glass-Works in Lyons by Frederick Engels 1886

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1886/05/15.htm

The unity of the West-European world, which consisted of a group of nations developing in continual intercourse, was welded in Catholicism. This theological welding was not only in ideas, it existed in reality, not only in the Pope, its monarchistic centre, but above all in the feudally and hierarchically organized Church, which, owning about a third of the land in every country, occupied a position of tremendous power in the feudal organization. The Church with its feudal landownership was the real link between the different countries; the feudal organization of the Church gave a religious consecration to the secular feudal state system. Besides, the clergy was the only educated class. It was therefore natural that Church dogma was the starting-point and basis of all thought. Jurisprudence, natural science, philosophy, everything was dealt with according to, whether its content agreed or disagreed with the doctrines of the Church. But in the womb of feudalism the power of the bourgeoisie was developing. A new class appeared in opposition to the big landowners. The city burghers were first and foremost and exclusively producers of and traders in commodities, while the feudal mode of production was based substantially on self-consumption of the product within a limited circle, partly by the producers and partly by the feudal lord. The Catholic world outlook, fashioned on the pattern of feudalism, was no longer adequate for this new class and its conditions of production and exchange. Nevertheless, this new class remained for a long time a captive in the bonds of almighty theology. From the thirteenth to the seventeenth century all the reformations and the struggles carried out under religious slogans that were connected with them were, on the theoretical side, nothing but repeated attempts of the burghers and plebeians in the towns and the peasants who had become rebellious by contact with both the latter to adapt the old theological world outlook to the changed economic conditions and the condition of life of the new class. But that could not be done. The flag of religion waved for the last time in England in the seventeenth century, and hardly fifty years later appeared undisguised in France the new world outlook which was to become the classical outlook of bourgeoisie, the juristic world outlook. It was a secularization of the theological outlook. Human right took the place of dogma, of divine right, the state took the place of the church. The economic and social conditions, which had formerly been imagined to have been created by the Church and dogma because they were sanctioned by the Church, were now considered as founded on right and created by the state. Because commodity exchange on a social scale and in its full development, particularly through advance and credit, produces complicated mutual contract relations and therefore demands generally applicable rules that can be given only by the community state-determined standards of right it was imagined that these standards of right arose not from the economic facts but from formal establishment by the state. And because competition, the basic form of trade of free commodity producers, is the greatest equalizer, equality before the law became the main battle-cry of the bourgeoisie. The fact that this newly aspiring class s struggle against the feudal lords and the absolute monarchy then protecting them, like every class struggle, had to be a political struggle, a struggle for the mastery of the state, and had to be fought on juridical demands contributed to strengthen the juristic outlook. But the bourgeoisie produced its negative double, the proletariat, and with it a new class struggle which broke out before the bourgeoisie had completed the conquest of political power. As the bourgeoisie in its time had by force of tradition dragged the theological outlook with it for a while in its fight against the nobility, so, too, the proletariat at first took over the juristic outlook from its opponent and sought in it weapons against the bourgeoisie. The first elements of the proletarian party as well as their theoretical representatives remained wholly on the juristic ground of right, the only distinction being that they built up for themselves a different ground of right from that of the bourgeoisie. On one side the demand for equality was extended so that equality in right would be completed by social equality; on the other, from Adam Smith s proposition that labour is the source of all wealth but that the product of labour must be shared with the landowner and the capitalist the conclusion was drawn that this sharing was unjust and must be either abolished or modified in favour of the worker. But the feeling that to leave this question on the mere juristic ground of right in no way made possible the abolition of the evil conditions created by the bourgeois-capitalistic mode of production, i.e., the mode of production based on large-scale industry, already then led the major minds among the earlier socialists Saint-Simon, Fourier and Owen to abandon entirely the juristic-political field and to declare all political struggle fruitless. Both these views were equally unsatisfactory to express adequately and embrace completely the working class s desire for emancipation created by economic conditions. The demand for the full product of labour and just as much the demand for equality lost themselves in unsolvable contradictions as soon as they were formulated juristically in detail and left the core of the question the transformation of the mode of production more or less untouched. The rejection of the political struggle by the great Utopians was at the same time the rejection of the class struggle, i.e., of the only form of activity of the class whose interests they represented. Both outlooks made abstraction of the historical background to which they owed their existence; both appealed to feeling: some to the feeling of justice, others to the feeling of humanity. Both attired their demands in the form of pious wishes of which one could not say why they had to be fulfilled at that very time and not a thousand years earlier or later. The working class, who by the changing of the feudal mode of production into the capitalist mode was deprived of all ownership of the means of production and by the mechanism of the capitalist mode of production is continually engendered anew in that hereditary state of propertylessness, cannot find an exhaustive expression of its living condition in the juristic illusion of the bourgeoisie. It can only know that condition of life fully itself if it looks at things in their reality without juristically coloured glasses. But Marx helped it to do that with his materialist conception of history, by providing the proof that all man s juristic, political, philosophical, religious and other ideas are derived in the last resort from his economic conditions of life, from his mode of production and of exchanging the product. Thus he provided the world outlook corresponding to the conditions of the life and struggle of the proletariat; only lack of illusions in the heads of the workers could correspond to their lack of property. And this proletarian world outlook is now spreading over the world.

Marx and Engels on Religion

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1886/10/lawyers-socialism.htm

The same thing is proved by the growth of Kathedersozialismus [professorial socialism] which in one form or another is more and more supplanting classical economy in the professorial chairs both here and in France. The actual contradictions engendered by the method of production have become so crass that no theory can indeed conceal them any longer, unless it were this professorial socialist mish-mash, which however is no longer a theory but drivel. Six weeks ago symptoms of an improvement in trade were said to be showing themselves. Now this has all faded away again, the distress is greater than ever and the lack of prospect too, added to an unusually severe winter. This is now already the eighth year of the pressure of overproduction upon the markets and instead of getting better it is always getting worse. There is no longer any doubt that the situation has essentially changed from what it was formerly; since England has got important rivals on the world market the period of crises, in the sense known hitherto, is closed. If the crises change from acute into chronic ones but at the same time lose nothing in intensity, what will be the end? A period of prosperity, even if a short one, must after all return sometime, when the accumulation of commodities has been exhausted; but how all this will occur I am eager to see. But two things are certain: we have entered upon a period incomparably more dangerous to the existence of the old society than the period of ten-yearly crises; and secondly, when prosperity returns, England will be much less affected by it than formerly, when she alone skimmed the cream off the world market. The day this becomes clear here, and not before, the socialist movement here will seriously begin.

Letters: Marx-Engels Correspondence 1886

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1886/letters/86_01_20.htm

My dear Mrs. Wischnewetzky: Today I forwarded to you, registered, the first portion of the Ms. up to your page 70, inclusive. I am sorry I could not possibly send it sooner. But I had a job on my hand which must be finished before I could start with your Ms. Now I shall go on swimmingly; as I proceed I find we get better acquainted with each other, you with my peculiar old-fashioned German, I with your American. And indeed, I learn a good deal at it. Never before did the difference between British and American English strike me so vividly as in this experimentum in proprio corpore vili. What a splendid future must there be in store for a language which gets enriched and developed on two sides of an ocean, and which may expect further additions from Australia and India! I do not know whether this portion of the Ms. will arrive in time to reach Miss Foster before her sailing, but I hope you will not be put to any particular inconvenience through my delay, which was indeed unavoidable. I cannot be grateful enough to all the friends who wish to translate both Marx s and my writings into the various civilized languages and who show their confidence in me by asking me to look over their translations. And I am willing enough to do it, but for me as well as for others the day has but 24 hours, and so I cannot possibly always arrange to please everybody and to chime in with all arrangements made. If I am not too often interrupted in the evenings, I hope to be able to send you the remainder of the Ms. and possibly also the introduction in a fortnight. This latter may be printed either as a preface or as an appendix. As to the length of it I am utterly incapable of giving you any idea. I shall try to make it as short as possible, especially as it will be useless for me to try to combat arguments of the American press with which I am not even superficially acquainted. Of course, if American workingmen will not read their own states Labor Reports, but trust to politicians' extracts, nobody can help them. But it strikes me that the present chronic depression, which seems endless so far, will tell its tale in America as well as in England. America will smash up England s industrial monopoly whatever there is left of it but America cannot herself succeed to that monopoly. And unless one country has the monopoly of the markets of the world, at least in the decisive branches of trade, the conditions relatively favorable which existed here in England from 1848 to 1870 cannot anywhere be reproduced, and even in America the condition of the working class must gradually sink lower and lower. For if there are three countries (say England, America and Germany) competing on comparatively equal terms for the possession of the Weltmarkt, there is no chance but chronic overproduction, one of the three being capable of supplying the whole quantity required. That is the reason why I am watching the development of the present crisis with greater interest than ever and why I believe it will mark an epoch in the mental and political history of the American and English working classes the very two whose assistance is as absolutely necessary as it is desirable.

Letters: Marx-Engels Correspondence 1886

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1886/letters/86_02_03.htm

In the meantime unemployment was increasing more and more. The collapse of England's monopoly on the world market has caused the crisis to continue unbroken since 1878 and to get worse rather than better. The distress, especially in the East End of the city, is appalling. The exceptionally hard winter, since January, added to the boundless indifference of the possessing classes, produced a considerable movement among the unemployed masses. As usual, political wirepullers tried to exploit this movement for their own ends. The Conservatives, who had just been superseded in the Government, put the responsibility for unemployment on to foreign competition (rightly) and foreign tariffs (for the most part wrongly) and preached "fair-trade," i.e., retaliatory tariffs. A workers' organisation also exists which believes mainly in retaliatory tariffs. This organisation summoned the meeting in Trafalgar Square on February 8. In the meantime the S.D.F. had not been idle either, had already held some small demonstrations and now wanted to utilise this meeting. Two meetings accordingly took place; the "fair traders" were round the Nelson Column while the S.D.F. people spoke at the north end of the Square, from the street opposite the National Gallery, which is about 25 feet above the square. Kautsky, who was there and went away before the row began, told me that the mass of the real workers had been around the "fair traders," whilst Hyndman and Co. had a mixed audience of people looking for a lark, some of them already merry. If Kautsky, who has hardly been here a year, noticed this, the gentlemen of the Federation must have seen it still more clearly. Nevertheless, when everybody already seemed to be scattering, they proceeded to carry out a favourite old idea of Hyndman's, namely a procession of "unemployed" through Pall Mall, the street of the big political, aristocratic and high-capitalist clubs, the centres of English political intrigue. The employed who followed them in order to hold a fresh meeting in Hyde Park, were mostly the types who do not want work anyhow, hawkers, loafers, police spies, pickpockets. When the aristocrats at the club windows sneered at them they broke the said windows, ditto the shop windows; they looted the wine dealers' shops and immediately set up a consumers' association for the contents in the street, so that in Hyde Park Hyndman and Co. had hastily to pocket their blood-thirsty phrases and go in for pacification. But the thing had now got going. During the procession, during this second little meeting and afterwards, the masses of the Lumpenproletariat, whom Hyndman had taken for the unemployed, streamed through some fashionable streets nearby, looted jewellers' and other shops, used the loaves and legs of mutton which they had looted solely to break windows with, and dispersed without meeting with any resistance. Only a remnant of them were broken up in Oxford Street by four, say four, policemen. Otherwise the police were nowhere to be seen and their absence was so marked that we were not alone in being compelled to think it intentional. The chiefs of the police seem to be Conservatives who had no objection to seeing a bit of a row in this period of Liberal Government. However the Government at once set up a Commission of Inquiry and it may cost more than one of these gentlemen his job.

Letters: Marx-Engels Correspondence 1886

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1886/letters/86_02_15.htm

Dear Sorge: Your letters of February 15th and 28th and March 8th, and postcard of March 21st received. The manuscript [of Capital] contains largely the same things that Marx noted in his copy for the third edition. In other passages, which provide for more insertions from the French, I am not binding myself to these unconditionally, (1) because the work for the third edition was done much later, and hence is decisive for me, and (2) because, for a translation to be made in America, far away from him, Marx would rather a have had many a difficult passage correctly translated from the French simplification than incorrectly from the German, and this consideration now vanishes. Nevertheless, it has given me many very useful hints which will, in time, find application for the German edition too. As soon as I am through with it I shall return it to you by registered mail.... The Broadhouse-Hyndman translation of Capital is nothing but a farce. The first chapter was translated from the German, full of mistakes to the point of ridiculousness. Now it is being translated from the French the mistakes are the same. At the present rate of speed the thing won t be finished by 1900. Thanks for the calendar. I had, it is true, not suspected that Douais is so terribly underrated as a great man. Let him take the consciousness of his greatness, together with all of its underrating, with him into the grave without having it lessened in a pastry mold. But he was the right man for America, and if he had remained an ordinary democrat, I would have wished him the best of luck. But, as it is, he got into the wrong pew. As for the purist who declaims against our style and punctuation: he knows neither German nor English, else he wouldn t find Anglicisms where there aren t any. The German he admires, which was drilled into us in school, with its horrible periodic structure and the verb at the very end separated from the subject by ten miles of intervening matter it took me thirty years to unlearn that German again. That bureaucratic schoolmaster s German, for which Lessing doesn t exist at all, is on the decline even in Germany. What would this good fellow say if he heard the deputies speaking in the Reichstag, who have abolished this horrible construction because they always got tangled up in it, and spoke like the Jews: Als der Bismarck ist gekommen vor die Zwangswahl, hat er lieber den Papst gekusst auf den Hintern als die Revolution auf den Mund. This advance was first introduced by little Lasker; it is the only good thing he did. If Mr. Purist comes to Germany with his schoolmaster s German, they will tell him he talks American. You know how petty the learned German philistine is he seems to be particularly so in America. German sentence structure together with its punctuation as taught in the schools forty or fifty years ago deserves only to be thrown on the scrap-heap, and that is happening to it in Germany at last. I think I have already written you that an American lady, married to a Russian, has gotten it into her head to translate my old book. I looked over the translation, which required considerable work. But she wrote that publication was assured and it had to be done at once, and so I had to do it. Now it turns out that she turned the negotiations over to a Miss Foster, the secretary of a women s rights society, and the latter committed the blunder of giving it to the Socialist Labor Party. I told the translator what I thought of this, but it was too late. Moreover, I am glad that the gentlemen over there do not translate anything of mine; it would turn out beautifully. Their German is enough, and then their English! The gentlemen of the Volkszeitung must be satisfied. They have gained control of the whole movement among the Germans and their business must be flourishing. It is a matter of course that a man like Dietzgen is pushed to the rear there. Playing with the boycott and with little strikes is, of course, much more important than theoretical enlightenment. But with all that the cause is moving ahead mightily in America. A real mass movement exists among the English-speaking workers for the first time. That it proceeds gropingly at first, clumsy, unclear, unknowing, is unavoidable. All that will be cleared up; the movement will and must develop through its own mistakes. Theoretical ignorance is a characteristic of all young peoples, but so is practical rapidity of development, too. As in England, all the preaching is of no use in America until the actual necessity exists. And this is present in America now, and they are becoming conscious of it. The entrance of the masses of native-born workers into the movement in America is for me one of the greatest events of 1886. As for the Germans over there, let the sort flourishing now join the Americans gradually; they will still be somewhat ahead of them. And lastly, there still is a central core among the Germans over there which retains theoretical insight into the nature and the course of the whole movement, keeps the process of fermentation going, and finally rises to the top again. The second great event of 1886 is the formation of a workers party in the French Chamber by Basly and Camelinat, two handpicked worker deputies nominated and elected by the Radicals, who, contrary to all the regulations, did not become servants of their Radical masters, but spoke as workers. The Decazeville strike brought the split between them and the Radicals to a head five other deputies joined them. The Radicals had to come out in the open with their policy towards the workers, and, as the government exists only with the Radicals support, that was dreadful, for they were justifiably held accountable by the workers for each of the government s acts. In short, the Radicals: Clemenceau and all the others, behaved wretchedly; and then there took place what no preacher had succeeded in accomplishing up to then: the French workers defection from the Radicals. And the second result was: the union of all the socialist fractions for joint action. Only the miserable Possibilists kept apart, and consequently they are falling asunder more and more every day. The government helped this new departure tremendously by its blunders. For it wants to float a loan of 90,000,000 francs and needs high finance for this purpose, but the latter is also a stockholder in Decazeville and refuses to lend the money unless the government breaks the strike. Hence the arrest of Duc and Roche. The workers reply is: Roche s candidacy in Paris for next Sunday (elections to the Chamber) and Due s (Quercy s) candidacy for the Municipal Council, where he is certain of election. In brief, a splendid movement is merrily under way in France again, and the best thing about it is that our people, Guesde, Lafargue, Deville, are the theoretical leaders. The reaction upon Germany did not fail to make its appearance. The revolutionary speech and action of the Frenchmen made the whining of Geiser, Viereck, Auer and Co. appear more feeble than ever, and thus only Bebel and Liebknecht spoke in the Last debate on the Socialist Law, both of them very good. With this debate we can show our faces in respectable society again, which was by no means the case with all of them. In general it is good for the Germans to have their leadership disputed somewhat, especially since they have elected so many philistine elements (which was unavoidable, to be sure). In Germany everything becomes philistine in quiet periods; the spur of French competition then becomes absolutely necessary, nor will it be lacking. French socialism has suddenly grown from a sect into a party, and only now and only thereby is the mass affiliation of the workers possible, for the latter are sick and tired of sectarianism, and that was the secret of their following the extremist bourgeois party, the Radicals. Next Sunday will show considerable progress in the elections, though it is scarcely to be expected that Roche will win. I think the printing of the English translation of Capital, Volume I, will begin in two to three weeks. I am far from through with revision, but 300 pages are ready for the printer and another hundred almost ready. Another thing. A Mr. J. T. McEnnis interviewed me a few days ago under the pretext of getting advice on labor legislation for, the State of Missouri. I soon discovered that newspaper business was behind it, and he confessed that he was working for the leading democratic paper of St. Louis, but gave me his word of honor that he would submit, every word to me in advance for revision. The man was sent to me by the Russian Stepniak. Nearly two weeks have passed, and I am afraid he did not keep his promise. I have forgotten the name of the St. Louis paper. Therefore, if anything is printed regarding the interview, please have the enclosed statement printed in the Sozialist, Volkszeitung, and anywhere else you think necessary. If the man does come and keep his promise, I shall of course, let you know at once, and you can then tear up the statement. Here the movement is not progressing at all, luckily enough. Hyndman and Co. are political careerists who spoil everything, while the anarchists are making rapid progress in the Socialist League. Morris and Bax one as an emotional socialist and the other as a chaser after philosophical paradoxes are wholly under their control for the present and must now undergo this experience in corpere vili. You will note from the Commonweal that Aveling, largely thanks to Tussy s energy, no longer shares the responsibility for this swindle, and that is good. And these muddleheads want to lead the British working class! Fortunately the latter wants to have absolutely nothing to do with them. Best regards,

Letters: Marx-Engels Correspondence 1886

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1886/letters/86_04_29.htm

I am sending you Thursday s Parliamentary debates (Daily News) on the Irish Arms Bill, which restricts the right of the Irish to own and carry arms. Hitherto it was directed only against the nationalists, but now it is to be turned also against the Protestant braggarts of Ulster, who threaten to rebel. There is a remarkable speech by Lord Randolph Churchill, the brother of the Duke of Marlborough, a democratising Tory; in the last Tory cabinet he was Secretary for India and is thus a member of the Privy Council for life. In face of the feeble and cowardly protestations and assurances made by our petty-bourgeois socialists regarding the peaceful attainment of the goal under any circumstances, it is indeed very timely to show that English ministers, Althorp, Peel, Morley and even Gladstone, proclaim the right to revolution as a part of constitutional theory though only so long as they form the opposition, as Gladstone s subsequent twaddle proves, but even then he does not dare to deny the right as such especially because it comes from England, the country of legality par excellence. A more telling repudiation could hardly be found for our Vierecks.

Letters: Marx-Engels Correspondence 1885. Ireland

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1886/letters/86_05_22.htm

So I do believe, too, that the anarchist follies of Chicago will do much good. If the present American movement which so far as it is not exclusively German, is still in the Trades Union stage had got a great victory on the 8 hours question, Trades Unionism would have become a fixed and final dogma. While a mixed result will help to show them that it is necessary to go beyond high wages and short hours.

Letters: Marx-Engels Correspondence 1886

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1886/letters/86_05_23.htm

What the breakdown of Russian Czarism would be for the great military monarchies of Europe the snapping of their mainstay that is for the bourgeois of the whole world the breaking out of class war in America. For America after all was the ideal of all bourgeois; a country rich, vast, expanding, with purely bourgeois institutions unleavened by feudal remnants or monarchical traditions and without a permanent and hereditary proletariat. Here everyone could become, if not a capitalist, at all events an independent man, producing or trading, with his own means, for his own account. And because there were not, as yet, classes with opposing interests, our and your bourgeois thought that America stood above class antagonisms and struggles. That delusion has now broken down, the last bourgeois paradise on earth is fast changing into a Purgatorio, and can only be prevented from becoming, like Europe, an Inferno by the go-ahead pace at which the development of the newly fledged proletariat of America will take place. The way in which they have made their appearance on the scene is quite extraordinary: six months ago nobody suspected anything, and now they appear all of a sudden in such organised masses as to strike terror into the whole capitalist class. I only wish Marx could have lived to see it!

Letters: Marx-Engels Correspondence 1886

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1886/letters/86_06_03.htm

Dear Sorge: I am taking an hour off by main force in order to write you. After the (triple) proofs of the Capital translation kept me in such suspense for weeks that I was prevented from doing other work, they are now coming in heaps. Six sheets are to be delivered each week (that means 18 sheets to correct weekly), and everything is to be finished in a month. Let s wait and see. But this makes for a lively time for me, since old man Becker is coming from Geneva to visit me tomorrow, next week Schorlemmer is coming and probably the Lafargues, while other people also want to come here from Switzerland. So if I don t get a letter off today I know I won t be able to do so later. Many thanks for your efforts with regards to the interviewer. He was the last one. Now that he broke his word of honor I have a reason to let them cool their heels, unless we ourselves are interested in spreading something through such a liar. You are right on the whole I cannot complain. The man tries to be personally decent at least, and not he, but the American bourgeoisie is responsible for his stupidity. A fine gang seems to be at the head of the party in New York; the Sozialist is a model of what a paper should not be. But neither can I support Dietzgen in his article on the anarchists he has a peculiar way of dealing with things. If someone has a perhaps somewhat narrow opinion on a certain point, Dietzgen cannot emphasize enough, and often too much, that the thing has two sides. But now, because the New Yorkers are behaving contemptibly, he suddenly takes the other side and wants to picture us all as anarchists. The moment may excuse this, but he shouldn t forget all his dialectics at the decisive moment. However, he has gotten over it by now, no doubt, and is certainly back on the right track; I have no worries on that score. In a country as primitive as America, which has developed in a purely bourgeois fashion without any feudal past, but has unwittingly taken over from England a whole store of ideology from feudal times, such as the English common law, religion, and sectarianism, and where the exigencies of practical labor and the concentrating of capital have produced a contempt for all theory, which is only now disappearing in the educated circles of scholars in such a country the people must become conscious of their own social interests by making blunder upon blunder. Nor will that be spared the workers; the confusion of the trade unions, socialists, Knights of Labor, etc., will persist for some time to come, and they will learn only by their own mistakes. But the main thing is that they have started moving, that things are going ahead generally, that the spell is broken; and they will go fast, too, faster than anywhere else, even though on a singular road, which seems, from the theoretical standpoint, to be an almost insane road. Your letter came too late for me to be able to speak to Aveling about Brooks I saw him for only a couple of hours on August 30th and had left your letter behind in Eastbourne. In any event you have since seen him in New York together with Liebknecht.... I hope your health is better; I am apparently still robust enough, but because of an internal ailment I have constantly suffered for the past three years from a somewhat limited freedom of movement, which now and then is very limited indeed, so that I am no longer fit for military service, unfortunately. As soon as the translation is finished, I must first of all get rid of the minor work imposed upon me revision of the work of others, particularly translations and not let any others be forced on me so that I can at last tackle Volume III. It lies ready in dictated form, but there is a full six months work still to be done on it. This damned English translation cost me almost a year. But it was absolutely necessary, and I do not regret it. September 17th. The printed sheets were sent off yesterday; the Commonweals until September to follow today; I must first look for the To-Days. The movement here remains in the hands of adventurers (Democratic Federation) on the one hand, and of faddists and emotional socialists (Socialist League) on the other. The masses still stand aloof, though the beginning of a movement is also noticeable. But it will still take some time before the masses get under way, and that is good, in order that time be left to develop real leaders. In Germany the bourgeoisie, whose cowardly stagnation is beginning to harm us, will again start moving somewhat at last; on the one hand, the impending change of sovereigns will start everything tottering, and on the other, Bismarck s obeisance to the Tsar is arousing even the drowsiest sleepyheads. In France the situation is excellent. The people are learning discipline, through the strikes in the provinces, and through opposition to the Radicals in Paris. Best regards,

Letters: Marx-Engels Correspondence 1886

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1886/letters/86_09_16.htm

... I am afraid Paul exaggerates the significance of the Paris verdict in so far as it is a symptom of the accessibility of the industrial bourgeoisie for socialist ideas. The struggle between usurer and industrial capitalist is one within the bourgeoisie itself, and though no doubt a certain number of petty bourgeois will be driven over to us by the certainty of their impending expropriation de la part des boursiers, yet we can never hope to get the mass of them over to our side. Moreover, this is not desirable, as they bring their narrow class prejudices along with them. In Germany we have too many of them, and it is they who form the dead weight which trammels the march of the party. It will ever be the lot of the petty bourgeois as a mass to float undecidedly between the two great classes, one part to be crushed by the centralisation of capital, the other by the victory of the proletariat. On the decisive day, they will as usual be tottering, wavering and helpless, se laisseront faire, and that is all we want. Even if they come round to our views they will say: of course communism is the ultimate solution, but it is far off, maybe 100 years before it can be realised in other words: we do not mean to work for its realisation neither in our, nor in our children s lifetime. Such is our experience in Germany. Otherwise the verdict is a grand victory and marks a decided step in advance. The bourgeoisie, from the moment it is faced by a conscious and organised proletariat, becomes entangled in hopeless contradictions between its liberal and democratic general tendencies here, and the repressive necessities of its defensive struggle against the proletariat there. A cowardly bourgeoisie, like the German and Russian, sacrifices its general class tendencies to the momentary advantages of brutal repression. But a bourgeoisie with a revolutionary history of its own, such as the English and particularly the French, cannot do that so easily. Hence that struggle, within the bourgeoisie itself, which in spite of occasional fits of violence and oppression, on the whole drives it forward see the various electoral reforms of Gladstone in England, and the advance of radicalism in France. This verdict is a new tape. And so the bourgeoisie, in doing its own work, is doing ours... .

Letters: Karl Marx and Frederick Engels, Selected Correspondence 1886

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1886/letters/86_10_02.htm

I asked him years ago to write down his reminiscences and experiences, and now he tells me that you and others also encouraged him in this, that he himself longed to do so and even began to write on several occasions, but met little real encouragement with fragmentary publication (such was the case with the Neue Welt, to which he sent several quite splendid things some years ago; these, however, were found to be not sufficiently novelistic, as Liebknecht informed him through Motteler).

Letters: Marx-Engels Correspondence 1886

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1886/letters/86_10_08.htm

This morning I carried the last corrected proofs of the Preface to the publisher and now I am at last rid of this nightmare. I expect to be able to send you a copy of the translation in a fortnight. The day after tomorrow Mrs Liebknecht is coming here to wait for her husband who only left New York the day before yesterday. ... The Henry George boom has of course brought to light a colossal mass of fraud and I am glad I was not there. But despite it all it has been an epoch-making day. The Germans have not understood how to use their theory as a lever which could set the American masses in motion; they do not understand the theory themselves for the most part and treat it in a doctrinaire and dogmatic way, as something which has got to be learnt off by heart but which will then supply all needs without more ado. To them it is a credo [creed] and not a guide to action. Added to which they learn no English on principle. Hence the American masses had to seek out their own way and seem to have found it for the time being in the K(nights) of L(abour), whose confused principles and ludicrous organisation appear to correspond to their own confusion. But according to all I hear the K. of L. are a real power, especially in New England and the West, and are becoming more so every day owing to the brutal opposition of the capitalists. I think it is necessary to work inside them, to form within this still quite plastic mass a core of people who understand the movement and its aims and will therefore themselves take over the leadership, at least of a section, when the inevitably impending break-up of the present "order" takes place. The rottenest side of the K. of L. was their political neutrality, which resulted in sheer trickery on the part of the Powderlys, etc. ; but this has had its edge taken off by the behaviour of the masses at the November elections, especially in New York. The first great step of importance for every country newly entering into the movement is always the organisation of the workers as an independent political party, no matter how, so long as it is a distinct workers' party. And this step has been taken, far more rapidly than we had a right to hope, and that is the main thing. That the first programme of this party is still confused and highly deficient, that it has set up the banner of Henry George, these are inevitable evils but also only transitory ones. The masses must have time and opportunity to develop and they can only have the opportunity when they have their own movement--no matter in what form so long as it is only their own movement--in which they are driven further by their own mistakes and learn wisdom by hurting themselves. The movement in America is in the same position as it was with us before 1848; the really intelligent people there will first of all have the same part to play as that played by the Communist League among the workers' associations before 1848. Except that in America now things will go infinitely more quickly; for the movement to have attained such election successes after scarcely eight months of existence is absolutely unheard of. And what is still lacking will be set going by the bourgeoisie; nowhere in the whole world do they come out so shamelessly and tyrannically as here, and your judges have got Bismarck's smart practitioners in the German Reich brilliantly driven off the field. Where the bourgeoisie conducts the struggle by methods of this kind, things come rapidly to a decision, and if we in Europe do not hurry up the Americans will soon be ahead of us. But it is just now that it is doubly necessary to have a few people there from our side with a firm seat in their saddles where theory and long-proved tactics are concerned, and who can also write and speak English; for, from good historical reasons, the Americans are worlds behind in all theoretical things, and while they did not bring over any medieval institutions from Europe they did bring over masses of medieval traditions, religion, English common (feudal) law, superstition, spiritualism, in short every kind of imbecility which was not directly harmful to business and which is now very serviceable for making the masses stupid. And if there are people at hand there whose minds are theoretically clear, who can tell them the consequences of their own mistakes beforehand and make it clear to them that every movement which does not keep the destruction of the wage system in view the whole time as its final aim is bound to go astray and fail--then many a piece of nonsense may be avoided and the process considerably shortened. But it must take place in the English way, the specific German character must be cut out and for that the gentlemen of the Sozialist have hardly the qualifications, while those of the Volkszeitung are only more intelligent where business is concerned. ... In Europe the effect of the American elections in November was tremendous. That England and America in particular had no labour movement up to now was the big trump card of the radical republicans everywhere, especially in France. Now these gentlemen are dumbfounded; Mr Clemenceau in particular saw the whole foundation of his policy collapse on 2 November. Look at America , was his eternal motto; where there is a real republic, there is no poverty and no labour movement! And the same thing is happening to the Progressives and democrats in Germany and here where they are also witnessing the beginnings of their own movement. The very fact that the movement is so sharply accentuated as a labour movement and has sprung up so suddenly and forcefully has stunned these people completely. Here the lack of any competition, on the one hand, and the government s stupidity, on the other, have enabled the gentlemen of the Social-Democratic Federation to occupy a position which they did not dare to dream of three months ago. The hubbub about the plan never intended to be taken seriously of a parade behind the Lord Mayor s procession on 9 November, and later the same hubbub about the Trafalgar Square meeting on 21 November, when the mounting of artillery was talked of and the government finally backed down all this forced the gentlemen of the SDF to hold a very ordinary meeting at last on the 21st, without empty rodomontades and pseudo-revolutionary demonstrations with obbligato mob accompaniment and the philistines suddenly gained respect for the people who had stirred up such a fuss and yet behaved so respectably. And since, except for the SDF, nobody takes any notice of the unemployed, who constitute a fairly numerous group each winter during the chronic stagnation of business and suffer very acute hardships, the SDF is winning the game hands down. The labour movement is beginning here and no mistake, and if the SDF is the first to reap the harvest that is the result of the cowardice of the radicals and the stupidity of the Socialist League, which is squabbling with the Anarchists and cannot get rid of them, and hence has no time to concern itself with the living movement that is taking place outside under its very nose. Incidentally, how long Hyndman & Co will persist in their present comparatively rational mode of action is uncertain. Anyhow I expect that they will soon commit colossal blunders again; they're in too much of a hurry. And then they will see that this can t be done in a serious movement. Things are getting prettier all the time in Germany. In Leipzig sentences of as much as four years penal servitude for sedition'! They want to provoke a riot at all costs. At present I still have seven small jobs in my desk Italian and French translations, prefaces, new editions, etc and then I shall start working unflaggingly on Volume 3.

Letters: Marx-Engels Correspondence 1886

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1886/letters/86_11_29.htm

Just as in France in the 18th century, so in Germany in the 19th, a philosophical revolution ushered in the political collapse. But how different the two looked! The French were in open combat against all official science, against the church and often also against the state; their writings were printed across the frontier, in Holland or England, while they themselves were often in jeopardy of imprisonment in the Bastille. On the other hand, the Germans were professors, state-appointed instructors of youth; their writings were recognized textbooks, and the termination system of the whole development the Hegelian system was even raised, as it were, to the rank of a royal Prussian philosophy of state! Was it possible that a revolution could hide behind these professors, behind their obscure, pedantic phrases, their ponderous, wearisome sentences? Were not precisely these people who were then regarded as the representatives of the revolution, the liberals, the bitterest opponents of this brain-confusing philosophy? But what neither the government nor the liberals saw was seen at least by one man as early as 1833, and this man was indeed none other than Heinrich Heine.[A] Let us take an example. No philosophical proposition has earned more gratitude from narrow-minded governments and wrath from equally narrow-minded liberals than Hegel s famous statement: All that is real is rational; and all that is rational is real. That was tangibly a sanctification of things that be, a philosophical benediction bestowed upon despotism, police government, Star Chamber proceedings and censorship. That is how Frederick William III and how his subjects understood it. But according to Hegel certainly not everything that exists is also real, without further qualification. For Hegel the attribute of reality belongs only to that which at the same time is necessary: In the course of its development reality proves to be necessity. A particular governmental measure Hegel himself cites the example of a certain tax regulation is therefore for him by no means real without qualification. That which is necessary, however, proves itself in the last resort to be also rational; and, applied to the Prussian state of that time, the Hegelian proposition, therefore, merely means: this state is rational, corresponds to reason, insofar as it is necessary; and if it nevertheless appears to us to be evil, but still, in spite of its evil character, continues to exist, then the evil character of the government is justified and explained by the corresponding evil character of its subjects. The Prussians of that day had the government that they deserved. Now, according to Hegel, reality is, however, in no way an attribute predictable of any given state of affairs, social or political, in all circumstances and at all times. On the contrary. The Roman Republic was real, but so was the Roman Empire, which superseded it. In 1789, the French monarchy had become so unreal, that is to say, so robbed of all necessity, so irrational, that it had to be destroyed by the Great Revolution, of which Hegel always speaks with the greatest enthusiasm. In this case, therefore, the monarchy was the unreal and the revolution the real. And so, in the course of development, all that was previously real becomes unreal, loses it necessity, its right of existence, its rationality. And in the place of moribund reality comes a new, viable reality peacefully if the old has enough intelligence to go to its death without a struggle; forcibly if it resists this necessity. Thus the Hegelian proposition turns into its opposite through Hegelian dialectics itself: All that is real in the sphere of human history, becomes irrational in the process of time, is therefore irrational by its very destination, is tainted beforehand with irrationality, and everything which is rational in the minds of men is destined to become real, however much it may contradict existing apparent reality. In accordance with all the rules of the Hegelian method of thought, the proposition of the rationality of everything which is real resolves itself into the other proposition: All that exists deserves to perish. But precisely therein lay the true significance and the revolutionary character of the Hegelian philosophy (to which, as the close of the whole movement since Kant, we must here confine ourselves), that it once and for all dealt the death blow to the finality of all product of human thought and action. Truth, the cognition of which is the business of philosophy, was in the hands of Hegel no longer an aggregate of finished dogmatic statements, which, once discovered, had merely to be learned by heart. Truth lay now in the process of cognition itself, in the long historical development of science, which mounts from lower to ever higher levels of knowledge without ever reaching, by discovering so-called absolute truth, a point at which it can proceed no further, where it would have nothing more to do than to fold its hands and gaze with wonder at the absolute truth to which it had attained. And what holds good for the realm of philosophical knowledge holds good also for that of every other kind of knowledge and also for practical action. Just as knowledge is unable to reach a complete conclusion in a perfect, ideal condition of humanity, so is history unable to do so; a perfect society, a perfect state , are things which can only exist in imagination. On the contrary, all successive historical systems are only transitory stages in the endless course of development of human society from the lower to the higher. Each stage is necessary, and therefore justified for the time and conditions to which it owes its origin. But in the face of new, higher conditions which gradually develop in its own womb, it loses vitality and justification. It must give way to a higher stage which will also in its turn decay and perish. Just as the bourgeoisie by large-scale industry, competition, and the world market dissolves in practice all stable time-honored institutions, so this dialectical philosophy dissolves all conceptions of final, absolute truth and of absolute states of humanity corresponding to it. For it [dialectical philosophy], nothing is final, absolute, sacred. It reveals the transitory character of everything and in everything; nothing can endure before it except the uninterrupted process of becoming and of passing away, of endless ascendancy from the lower to the higher. And dialectical philosophy itself is nothing more than the mere reflection of this process in the thinking brain. It has, of course, also a conservative side; it recognizes that definite stages of knowledge and society are justified for their time and circumstances; but only so far. The conservatism of this mode of outlook is relative; its revolutionary character is absolute the only absolute dialectical philosophy admits. It is not necessary, here, to go into the question of whether this mode of outlook is thoroughly in accord with the present state of natural science, which predicts a possible end even for the Earth, and for its habitability a fairly certain one; which therefore recognizes that for the history of mankind, too, there is not only an ascending but also a descending branch. At any rate, we still find ourselves a considerable distance from the turning-point at which the historical course of society becomes one of descent, and we cannot expect Hegelian philosophy to be concerned with a subject which natural science, in its time, had not at all placed upon the agenda as yet. But what must, in fact, be said here is this: that in Hegel the views developed above are not so sharply delineated. They are a necessary conclusion from his method, but one which he himself never drew with such explicitness. And this, indeed, for the simple reason that he was compelled to make a system and, in accordance with traditional requirements, a system of philosophy must conclude with some sort of absolute truth. Therefore, however much Hegel, especially in his Logic, emphasized that this eternal truth is nothing but the logical, or, the historical, process itself, he nevertheless finds himself compelled to supply this process with an end, just because he has to bring his system to a termination at some point or other. In his Logic, he can make this end a beginning again, since here the point of the conclusion, the absolute idea which is only absolute insofar as he has absolutely nothing to say about it alienates , that is, transforms, itself into nature and comes to itself again later in the mind, that is, in thought and in history. But at the end of the whole philosophy, a similar return to the beginning is possible only in one way. Namely, by conceiving of the end of history as follows: mankind arrives at the cognition of the self-same absolute idea, and declares that this cognition of the absolute idea is reached in Hegelian philosophy. In this way, however, the whole dogmatic content of the Hegelian system is declared to be absolute truth, in contradiction to his dialectical method, which dissolves all dogmatism. Thus the revolutionary side is smothered beneath the overgrowth of the conservative side. And what applies to philosophical cognition applies also to historical practice. Mankind, which, in the person of Hegel, has reached the point of working out the absolute idea, must also in practice have gotten so far that it can carry out this absolute idea in reality. Hence the practical political demands of the absolute idea on contemporaries may not be stretched too far. And so we find at the conclusion of the Philosophy of Right that the absolute idea is to be realized in that monarchy based on social estates which Frederick William III so persistently but vainly promised to his subjects, that is, in a limited, moderate, indirect rule of the possessing classes suited to the petty-bourgeois German conditions of that time; and, moreover, the necessity of the nobility is demonstrated to us in a speculative fashion. The inner necessities of the system are, therefore, of themselves sufficient to explain why a thoroughly revolutionary method of thinking produced an extremely tame political conclusion. As a matter of fact, the specific form of this conclusion springs from this, that Hegel was a German, and like his contemporary Goethe had a bit of the philistine s queue dangling behind. Each of them was an Olympian Zeus in his own sphere, yet neither of them ever quite freed himself from German philistinism. But all this did not prevent the Hegelian system from covering an incomparably greater domain than any earlier system, nor from developing in this domain a wealth of thought, which is astounding even today. The phenomenology of mind (which one may call a parallel of the embryology and palaeontology of the mind, a development of individual consciousness through its different stages, set in the form of an abbreviated reproduction of the stages through which the consciousness of man has passed in the course of history), logic, natural philosophy, philosophy of mind, and the latter worked out in its separate, historical subdivisions: philosophy of history, of right, of religion, history of philosophy, aesthetics, etc. in all these different historical fields Hegel labored to discover and demonstrate the pervading thread of development. And as he was not only a creative genius but also a man of encyclopaedic erudition, he played an epoch-making role in every sphere. It is self-evident that owing to the needs of the system he very often had to resort to those forced constructions about which his pigmy opponents make such a terrible fuss even today. But these constructions are only the frame and scaffolding of his work. If one does not loiter here needlessly, but presses on farther into the immense building, one finds innumerable treasures which today still possess undiminshed value. With all philosophers it is precisely the system which is perishable; and for the simple reason that it springs from an imperishable desire of the human mind the desire to overcome all contradictions. But if all contradictions are once and for all disposed of, we shall have arrived at so-called absolute truth world history will be at an end. And yet it has to continue, although there is nothing left for it to do hence, a new, insoluble contradiction. As soon as we have once realized and in the long run no one has helped us to realize it more than Hegel himself that the task of philosophy thus stated means nothing but the task that a single philosopher should accomplish that which can only be accomplished by the entire human race in its progressive development as soon as we realize that, there is an end to all philosophy in the hitherto accepted sense of the word. One leaves alone absolute truth , which is unattainable along this path or by any single individual; instead, one pursues attainable relative truths along the path of the positive sciences, and the summation of their results by means of dialectical thinking. At any rate, with Hegel philosophy comes to an end; on the one hand, because in his system he summed up its whole development in the most splendid fashion; and on the other hand, because, even though unconsciously, he showed us the way out of the labyrinth of systems to real positive knowledge of the world. One can imagine what a tremendous effect this Hegelian system must have produced in the philosophy-tinged atmosphere of Germany. It was a triumphant procession which lasted for decades and which by no means came to a standstill on the death of Hegel. On the contrary, it was precisely from 1830 to 1840 that Hegelianism reigned most exclusively, and to a greater or lesser extent infected even its opponents. It was precisely in this period that Hegelian views, consciously or unconsciously, most extensively penetrated the most diversified sciences and leavened even popular literature and the daily press, from which the average educated consciousness derives its mental pabulum. But this victory along the whole front was only the prelude to an internal struggle. As we have seen, the doctrine of Hegel, taken as a whole, left plenty of room for giving shelter to the most diverse practical party views. And in the theoretical Germany of that time, two things above all were practical: religion and politics. Whoever placed the chief emphasis on the Hegelian system could be fairly conservative in both spheres; whoever regarded the dialectical method as the main thing could belong to the most extreme opposition, both in politics and religion. Hegel himself, despite the fairly frequent outbursts of revolutionary wrath in his works, seemed on the whole to be more inclined to the conservative side. Indeed, his system had cost him much more hard mental plugging than his method. Towards the end of the thirties, the cleavage in the school became more and more apparent. The Left wing, the so-called Young Hegelians, in their fight with the pietist orthodox and the feudal reactionaries, abandoned bit by bit that philosophical-genteel reserve in regard to the burning questions of the day which up to that time had secured state toleration and even protection for their teachings. And when in 1840, orthodox pietism and absolutist feudal reaction ascended the throne with Frederick William IV, open partisanship became unavoidable. The fight was still carried on with philosophical weapons, but no longer for abstract philosophical aims. It turned directly on the destruction of traditional religion and of the existing state. And while in the Deutsche Jahrbucher [B]the practical ends were still predominantly put forward in philosophical disguise, in the Rheinische Zeitung of 1842 the Young Hegelian school revealed itself directly as the philosophy of the aspiring radical bourgeoisie and used the meagre cloak of philosophy only to deceive the censorship. At that time, however, politics was a very thorny field, and hence the main fight came to be directed against religion; this fight, particularly since 1840, was indirectly also political. Strauss Life of Jesus, published in 1835, had provided the first impulse. The theory therein developed of the formation of the gospel myths was combated later by Bruno Bauer with proof that a whole series of evangelic stories had been fabricated by the authors themselves. The controversy between these two was carried out in the philosophical disguise of a battle between self-consciousness and substance . The question whether the miracle stories of the gospels came into being through unconscious-traditional myth-creation within the bosom of the community or whether they were fabricated by the evangelists themselves was magnified into the question whether, in world history, substance or self-consciousness was the decisive operative force. Finally came Stirner, the prophet of contemporary anarchism Bakunin has taken a great deal from him and capped the sovereign self-consciousness by his sovereign ego [C]. We will not go further into this side of the decomposition process of the Hegelian school. More important for us is the following: the main body of the most determined Young Hegelians was, by the practical necessities of its fight against positive religion, driven back to Anglo-French materialism. This brought them into conflict with the system of their school. While materialism conceives nature as the sole reality, nature in the Hegelian system represents merely the alienation of the absolute idea, so to say, a degradation of the idea. At all events, thinking and its thought-product, the idea, is here the primary, nature the derivative, which only exists at all by the condescension of the idea. And in this contradiction they floundered as well or as ill as they could. Then came Feuerbach s Essence of Christianity[D]. With one blow, it pulverized the contradiction, in that without circumlocutions it placed materialism on the throne again. Nature exists independently of all philosophy. It is the foundation upon which we human beings, ourselves products of nature, have grown up. Nothing exists outside nature and man, and the higher beings our religious fantasies have created are only the fantastic reflection of our own essence. The spell was broken; the system was exploded and cast aside, and the contradiction, shown to exist only in our imagination, was dissolved. One must himself have experienced the liberating effect of this book to get an idea of it. Enthusiasm was general; we all became at once Feuerbachians. How enthusiastically Marx greeted the new conception and how much in spite of all critical reservations he was influenced by it, one may read in the The Holy Family[E]. Even the shortcomings of the book contributed to its immediate effect. Its literary, sometimes even high-flown, style secured for it a large public and was at any rate refreshing after long years of abstract and abstruse Hegelianizing. The same is true of its extravagant deification of love, which, coming after the now intolerable sovereign rule of pure reason , had its excuse, if not justification. But what we must not forget is that it was precisely these two weaknesses of Feuerbach that true Socialism , which had been spreading like a plague in educated Germany since 1844, took as its starting-point, putting literary phrases in the place of scientific knowledge, the liberation of mankind by means of love in place of the emancipation of the proletariat through the economic transformation of production in short, losing itself in the nauseous fine writing and ecstacies of love typified by Herr Karl Grun. Another thing we must not forget is this: the Hegelian school disintegrated, but Hegelian philosophy was not overcome through criticism; Strauss and Bauer each took one of its sides and set it polemically against the other. Feuerbach smashed the system and simply discarded it. But a philosophy is not disposed of by the mere assertion that it is false. And so powerful a work as Hegelian philosophy, which had exercised so enormous an influence on the intellectual development of the nation, could not be disposed of by simply being ignored. It had to be sublated in its own sense, that is, in the sense that while its form had to be annihilatedhrough criticism, the new content which had been won through it had to be saved. How this was brought about we shall see below. But in the meantime, the Revolution of 1848 thrust the whole of philosophy aside as unceremoniously as Feuerbach had thrust aside Hegel. And in the process, Feuerbach himself was also pushed into the background.

Ludwig Feuerbach and the End of Classical German Philosophy - Part 1: Hegel

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1886/ludwig-feuerbach/ch01.htm

Thus the question of the relation of thinking to being, the relation of the spirit to nature the paramount question of the whole of philosophy has, no less than all religion, its roots in the narrow-minded and ignorant notions of savagery. But this question could for the first time be put forward in its whole acuteness, could achieve its full significance, only after humanity in Europe had awakened from the long hibernation of the Christian Middle Ages. The question of the position of thinking in relation to being, a question which, by the way, had played a great part also in the scholasticism of the Middle Ages, the question: which is primary, spirit or nature that question, in relation to the church, was sharpened into this: Did God create the world or has the world been in existence eternally? The answers which the philosophers gave to this question split them into two great camps. Those who asserted the primacy of spirit to nature and, therefore, in the last instance, assumed world creation in some form or other and among the philosophers, Hegel, for example, this creation often becomes still more intricate and impossible than in Christianity comprised the camp of idealism. The others, who regarded nature as primary, belong to the various schools of materialism. These two expressions, idealism and materialism, originally signify nothing else but this; and here too they are not used in any other sense. What confusion arises when some other meaning is put to them will be seen below. But the question of the relation of thinking and being had yet another side: in what relation do our thoughts about the world surrounding us stand to this world itself? Is our thinking capable of the cognition of the real world? Are we able in our ideas and notions of the real world to produce a correct reflection of reality? In philosophical language this question is called the question of identity of thinking and being, and the overwhelming majority of philosophers give an affirmative answer to this question. With Hegel, for example, its affirmation is self-evident; for what we cognize in the real world is precisely its thought-content that which makes the world a gradual realization of the absolute idea, which absolute idea has existed somewhere from eternity, independent of the world and before the world. But it is manifest without further proof that thought can know a content which is from the outset a thought-content. It is equally manifest that what is to be proved here is already tacitly contained in the premises. But that in no way prevents Hegel from drawing the further conclusion from his proof of the identity of thinking and being that his philosophy, because it is correct for his thinking, is therefore the only correct one, and that the identity of thinking and being must prove its validity by mankind immediately translating his philosophy from theory into practice and transforming the whole world according to Hegelian principles. This is an illusion which he shares with well-nigh all philosophers. In addition, there is yet a set of different philosophers those who question the possibility of any cognition, or at least of an exhaustive cognition, of the world. To them, among the more modern ones, belong Hume and Kant, and they played a very important role in philosophical development. What is decisive in the refutation of this view has already been said by Hegel, in so far as this was possible from an idealist standpoint. The materialistic additions made by Feuerbach are more ingenious than profound. The most telling refutation of this as of all other philosophical crotchets is practice namely, experiment and industry. If we are able to prove the correctness of our conception of a natural process by making it ourselves, bringing it into being out of its conditions and making it serve our own purposes into the bargain, then there is an end to the Kantian ungraspable thing-in-itself . The chemical substances produced in the bodies of plants and animals remained just such things-in-themselves until organic chemistry began to produce them one after another, whereupon the thing-in-itself became a thing for us as, for instance, alizarin, the coloring matter of the madder, which we no longer trouble to grow in the madder roots in the field, but produce much more cheaply and simply from coal tar. For 300 years, the Copernican solar system was a hypothesis with 100, 1,000, 10,000 to 1 chances in its favor, but still always a hypothesis. But then Leverrier, by means of the data provided by this system, not only deduced the necessity of the existence of an unknown planet, but also calculated the position in the heavens which this planet must necessarily occupy, and when [Johann] Galle really found this planet [Neptune, discovered 1846, at Berlin Observatory], the Copernican system was proved. If, nevertheless, the neo-Kantians are attempting to resurrect the Kantian conception in Germany, and the agnostics that of Hume in England (where in fact it never became extinct), this is, in view of their theoretical and practical refutation accomplished long ago, scientifically a regression and practically merely a shamefaced way of surreptitiously accepting materialism, while denying it before the world. But during this long period from Descartes to Hegel and from Hobbes to Feuerbach, these philosophers were by no means impelled, as they thought they were, solely by the force of pure reason. On the contrary, what really pushed them forward most was the powerful and ever more rapidly onrushing progress of natural science and industry. Among the materialists this was plain on the surface, but the idealist systems also filled themselves more and more with a materialist content and attempted pantheistically to reconcile the antithesis between mind and matter. Thus, ultimately, the Hegelian system represents merely a materialism idealistically turned upside down in method and content. It is, therefore, comprehensible that Starcke in his characterization of Feuerbach first of all investigates the latter s position in regard to this fundamental question of the relation of thinking and being. After a short introduction, in which the views of the preceding philosophers, particularly since Kant, are described in unnecessarily ponderous philosophical language, and in which Hegel, by an all too formalistic adherence to certain passages of his works, gets far less his due, there follows a detailed description of the course of development of Feuerbach s metaphysics itself, as this course was successively reflected in those writings of this philosopher which have a bearing here. This description is industriously and lucidly elaborated; only, like the whole book, it is loaded with a ballast of philosophical phraseology by no means everywhere unavoidable, which is the more disturbing in its effect the less the author keeps to the manner of expression of one and the same school, or even of Feuerbach himself, and the more he interjects expressions of very different tendencies, especially of the tendencies now rampant and calling themselves philosophical. The course of evolution of Feuerbach is that of a Hegelian a never quite orthodox Hegelian, it is true into a materialist; an evolution which at a definite stage necessitates a complete rupture with the idealist system of his predecessor. With irresistible force, Feuerbach is finally driven to the realization that the Hegelian premundane existence of the absolute idea , the pre-existence of the logical categories before the world existed, is nothing more than the fantastic survival of the belief in the existence of an extra-mundane creator; that the material, sensuously perceptible world to which we ourselves belong is the only reality; and that our consciousness and thinking, however supra-sensuous they may seem, are the product of a material, bodily organ, the brain. Matter is not a product of mind, but mind itself is merely the highest product of matter. This is, of course, pure materialism. But, having got so far, Feuerbach stops short. He cannot overcome the customary philosophical prejudice, prejudice not against the thing but against the name materialism. He says: Here, Feuerbach lumps together the materialism that is a general world outlook resting upon a definite conception of the relation between matter and mind, and the special form in which this world outlook was expressed at a definite historical stage namely, in the 18th century. More than that, he lumps it with the shallow, vulgarized form in which the materialism of the 18th century continues to exist today in the heads of naturalists and physicians, the form which was preached on their tours in the fifties by Buchner, Vogt, and Moleschott. But just as idealism underwent a series of stages of development, so also did materialism. With each epoch-making discovery even in the sphere of natural science, it has to change its form; and after history was also subjected to materialistic treatment, a new avenue of development has opened here, too. The materialism of the last century was predominantly mechanical, because at that time, of all natural sciences, only mechanics, and indeed only the mechanics of solid bodies celestial and terrestrial in short, the mechanics of gravity, had come to any definite close. Chemistry at that time existed only in its infantile, phlogistic form [A]. Biology still lay in swaddling clothes; vegetable and animal organisms had been only roughly examined and were explained by purely mechanical causes. What the animal was to Descartes, man was to the materialists of the 18th century a machine. This exclusive application of the standards of mechanics to processes of a chemical and organic nature in which processes the laws of mechanics are, indeed, also valid, but are pushed into the backgrounds by other, higher laws constitutes the first specific but at that time inevitable limitations of classical French materialism. The second specific limitation of this materialism lay in its inability to comprehend the universe as a process, as matter undergoing uninterrupted historical development. This was in accordance with the level of the natural science of that time, and with the metaphysical, that is, anti-dialectical manner of philosophizing connected with it. Nature, so much was known, was in eternal motion. But according to the ideas of that time, this motion turned, also eternally, in a circle and therefore never moved from the spot; it produced the same results over and over again. This conception was at that time inevitable. The Kantian theory of the origin of the Solar System [that the Sun and planets originated from incandescent rotating nebulous masses] had been put forward but recently and was still regarded merely as a curiosity. The history of the development of the Earth, geology, was still totally unknown, and the conception that the animate natural beings of today are the result of a long sequence of development from the simple to the complex could not at that time scientifically be put forward at all. The unhistorical view of nature was therefore inevitable. We have the less reason to reproach the philosophers of the 18th century on this account since the same thing is found in Hegel. According to him, nature, as a mere alienation of the idea, is incapable of development in time capable only of extending its manifoldness in space, so that it displays simultaneously and alongside of one another all the stages of development comprised in it, and is condemned to an eternal repetition of the same processes. This absurdity of a development in space, but outside of time the fundamental condition of all development Hegel imposes upon nature just at the very time when geology, embryology, the physiology of plants and animals, and organic chemistry were being built up, and when everywhere on the basis of these new sciences brilliant foreshadowings of the later theory of evolution were appearing (for instance, Goethe and Lamarck). But the system demanded it; hence the method, for the sake of the system, had to become untrue to itself. This same unhistorical conception prevailed also in the domain of history. Here the struggle against the remnants of the Middle Ages blurred the view. The Middle Ages were regarded as a mere interruption of history by a thousand years of universal barbarism. The great progress made in the Middle Ages the extension of the area of European culture, the viable great nations taking form there next to each other, and finally the enormous technical progress of the 14th and 15th centuries all this was not seen. Thus a rational insight into the great historical interconnectedness was made impossible, and history served at best as a collection of examples and illustrations for the use of philosophers. The vulgarizing pedlars, who in Germany in the fifties dabbled in materialism, by no means overcame this limitation of their teachers. All the advances of natural science which had been made in the meantime served them only as new proofs against the existence of a creator of the world; and, indeed, they did not in the least make it their business to develop the theory any further. Though idealism was at the end of its tether and was dealt a death-blow by the Revolution of 1848, it had the satisfaction of seeing that materialism had for the moment fallen lower still. Feuerbach was unquestionably right when he refused to take responsibility for this materialism; only he should not have confounded the doctrines of these itinerant preachers with materialism in general. Here, however, there are two things to be pointed out. First, even during Feuerbach s lifetime, natural science was still in that process of violent fermentation which only during the last 15 years had reached a clarifying, relative conclusion. New scientific data were acquired to a hitherto unheard-of extent, but the establishing of interrelations, and thereby the bringing of order into this chaos of discoveries following closely upon each other s heels, has only quite recently become possible. It is true that Feuerbach had lived to see all three of the decisive discoveries that of the cell, the transformation of energy, and the theory of evolution named after Darwin. But how could the lonely philosopher, living in rural solitude, be able sufficiently to follow scientific developments in order to appreciate at their full value discoveries which natural scientists themselves at that time either still contested or did not know how to make adequate use of? The blame for this falls solely upon the wretched conditions in Germany, in consequence of which cobweb-spinning eclectic flea-crackers had taken possession of the chairs of philosophy, while Feuerbach, who towered above them all, had to rusticate and grow sour in a little village. It is therefore not Feuerbach s fault that this historical conception of nature, which had now become possible and which removed all the one-sidedness of French materialism, remained inaccessible to him. Secondly, Feuerbach is quite correct in asserting that exclusively natural-scientific materialism is indeed the foundation of the edifice of human knowledge, but not the edifice itself . For we live not only in nature but also in human society, and this also no less than nature has its history of development and its science. It was therefore a question of bringing the science of society, that is, the sum total of the so-called historical and philosophical sciences, into harmony with the materialist foundation, and of reconstructing it thereupon. But it did not fall to Feuerbach s lot to do this. In spite of the foundation , he remained here bound by the traditional idealist fetters, a fact which he recognizes in these words: Backwards I agree with the materialists, but not forwards! But it was Feuerbach himself who did not go forwards here; in the social domain, who did not get beyond his standpoint of 1840 or 1844. And this was again chiefly due to this reclusion which compelled him, who, of all philosophers, was the most inclined to social intercourse, to produce thoughts out of his solitary head instead of in amicable and hostile encounters with other men of his calibre. Later, we shall see in detail how much he remained an idealist in this sphere. It need only be added here that Starcke looks for Feuerbach s idealism in the wrong place. In the first place, idealism here means nothing, but the pursuit of ideal aims. But these necessarily have to do at the most with Kantian idealism and its categorical imperative ; however, Kant himself called his philosophy transcendental idealism by no means because he dealt therein also with ethical ideals, but for quite other reasons, as Starcke will remember. The superstitition that philosophical idealism is pivoted round a belief in ethical, that is, social, ideals, arose outside philosophy, among the German philistines, who learned by heart from Schiller s poems the few morsels of philosophical culture they needed. No one has criticized more severely the impotent categorical imperative of Kant impotent because it demands the impossible, and therefore never attains to any reality no one has more cruelly derided the philistine sentimental enthusiasm for unrealizable ideals purveyed by Schiller than precisely the complete idealist Hegel (see, for example, his Phenomenology). In the second place, we simply cannot get away from the fact that everything that sets men acting must find its way through their brains even eating and drinking, which begins as a consequence of the sensation of hunger or thirst transmitted through the brain, and ends as a result of the sensation of satisfaction likewise transmitted through the brain. The influences of the external world upon man express themselves in his brain, are reflected therein as feelings, impulses, volitions in short, as ideal tendencies , and in this form become ideal powers . If, then, a man is to be deemed an idealist because he follows ideal tendencies and admits that ideal powers have an influence over him, then every person who is at all normally developed is a born idealist and how, in that case, can there still be any materialists? In the third place, the conviction that humanity, at least at the present moment, moves on the whole in a progressive direction has absolutely nothing to do with the antagonism between materialism and idealism. The French materialists no less than the deists Voltaire and Rousseau held this conviction to an almost fanatical degree, and often enough made the greatest personal sacrifices for it. If ever anybody dedicated his whole life to the enthusiasm for truth and justice using this phrase in the good sense it was Diderot, for instance. If, therefore, Starcke declares all this to be idealism, this merely proves that the word materialism, and the whole antagonism between the two trends, has lost all meaning for him here. The fact is that Starcke, although perhaps unconsciously, in this makes an unpardonable concession to the traditional philistine prejudice against the word materialism resulting from its long-continued defamation by the priests. By the word materialism, the philistine understands gluttony, drunkenness, lust of the eye, lust of the flesh, arrogance, cupidity, avarice, covetousness, profit-hunting, and stock-exchange swindling in short, all the filthy vices in which he himself indulges in private. By the word idealism he understands the belief in virtue, universal philanthropy, and in a general way a better world , of which he boasts before others but in which he himself at the utmost believes only so long as he is having the blues or is going through the bankruptcy consequent upon his customary materialist excesses. It is then that he sings his favorite song, What is man? Half beast, half angel. For the rest, Starcke takes great pains to defend Feuerbach against the attacks and doctrines of the vociferous assistant professors who today go by the name of philosophers in Germany. For people who are interested in this afterbirth of classical German philosophy this is, of course, a matter of importance; for Starcke himself it may have appeared necessary. We, however, will spare the reader this.

Ludwig Feuerbach and the End of Classical German Philosophy - Part 2: Materialism

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1886/ludwig-feuerbach/ch02.htm

According to Feuerbach, religion is the relation between human beings based on the affections, the relation based on the heart, which relation until now has sought its truth in a fantastic mirror image of reality in the mediation of one or many gods, the fantastic mirror images of human qualities but now finds it directly and without any mediation in the love between I and Thou . Thus, finally, with Feuerbach sex love becomes one of the highest forms, if not the highest form, of the practice of his new religion. Now relations between human beings, based on affection, and especially between the two sexes, have existed as long as mankind has. Sex love in particular has undergone a development and won a place during the last 800 years which has made it a compulsory pivotal point of all poetry during this period. The existing positive religions have limited themselves to the bestowal of a higher consecration upon state-regulated sex love that is, upon the marriage laws and they could all disappear tomorrow without changing in the slightest the practice of love and friendship. Thus the Christian religion in France, as a matter of fact, so completely disappeared in the year 1793 95 that even Napoleon could not re-introduce it without opposition and difficulty; and this without any need for a substitute in Feuerbach s sense, making itself in the interval. Feuerbach s idealism consists here in this: he does not simply accept mutual relations based on reciprocal inclination between human beings, such as sex love, friendship, compassion, self-sacrifice, etc., as what they are in themselves without associating them with any particular religion which to him, too, belongs to the past; but instead he asserts that they will attain their full value only when consecrated by the name of religion. The chief thing for him is not that these purely human relations exist, but that they shall be conceived of as the new, true, religion. They are to have full value only after they have been marked with a religious stamp. Religion is derived from religare [ to bind ] and meant, originally, a bond. Therefore, every bond between two people is a religion. Such etymological tricks are the last resort of idealist philosophy. Not what the word means according to the historical development of its actual use, but what it ought to mean according to its derivation is what counts. And so sex love, and the intercourse between the sexes, is apotheosized to a religion, merely in order that the word religion, which is so dear to idealistic memories, may not disappear from the language. The Parisian reformers of the Louis Blanc trend used to speak in precisely the same way in the forties. They, likewise, could conceive of a man without religion only as a monster, and used to say to us: Donc, l atheisme c est votre religion! [ Well, then atheism is your religion! ] If Feuerbach wishes to establish a true religion upon the basis of an essentially materialist conception of nature, that is the same as regarding modern chemistry as true alchemy. If religion can exist without its god, alchemy can exist without its philosopher s stone. By the way, there exists a very close connection between alchemy and religion. The philosopher s stone has many godlike properties and the Egyptian-Greek alchemists of the first two centuries of our era had a hand in the development of Christian doctrines, as the data given by Kopp and Bertholet have proved. Feuerbach s assertion that the periods of humanity are distinguished only by religious changes is decidedly false. Great historical turning-points have been accompanied by religious changes only so far as the three world religions which have existed up to the present Buddhism, Christianity, and Islam are concerned. The old tribal and national religions, which arose spontaneously, did not proselytize and lost all their power of resistance as soon as the independence of the tribe or people was lost. For the Germans, it was sufficient to have simple contact with the decaying Roman world empire and with its newly adopted Christian world religion which fitted its economic, political, and ideological conditions. Only with these world religions, arisen more or less artificially, particularly Christianity and Islam, do we find that the more general historical movements acquire a religious imprint. Even in regard to Christianity, the religious stamp in revolutions of really universal significance is restricted to the first stages of the bourgeoisie s struggle for emancipation from the 13th to the 17th century and is to be accounted for, not as Feuerbach thinks by the hearts of men and their religious needs, but by the entire previous history of the Middle Ages, which knew no other form of ideology than religion and theology. But when the bourgeoisie of the 18th century was strengthened enough likewise to posses an ideology of its own, suited to its own class standpoint, it made its great and conclusive revolution the French , appealing exclusively to juristic and political ideas, and troubling itself with religion only in so far as it stood in its way. But it never occurred to it to put a new religion in place of the old. Everyone knows how Robespierre failed in his attempt [to set up a religion of the highest being ]. The possibility of purely human sentiments in our intercourse with other human beings has nowadays been sufficiently curtailed by the society in which we must live, which is based upon class antagonism and class rule. We have no reason to curtail it still more by exalting these sentiments to a religion. And similarly the understanding of the great historical class struggles has already been sufficiently obscured by current historiography, particularly in Germany, so that there is also no need for us to make such an understanding totally impossible by transforming the history of these struggles into a mere appendix of ecclesiastical history. Already here it becomes evident how far today we have moved beyond Feuerbach. His finest passages in glorification of his new religion of love are totally unreadable today. The only religion which Feuerbach examines seriously is Christianity, the world religion of the Occident, based upon monotheism. He proves that the Christian god is only a fantastic reflection, a mirror image, of man. Now, this god is, however, himself the product of a tedious process of abstraction, the concentrated quintessence of the numerous earlier tribal and national gods. And man, whose image this god is, is therefore also not a real man, but likewise the quintessence of the numerous real men, man in the abstract, therefore himself again a mental image. Feuerbach, who on every page preaches sensuousness, absorption in the concrete, in actuality, becomes thoroughly abstract as soon as he begins to talk of any other than mere sex relations between human beings. Of these relations, only one aspect appeals to him: morality. And here we are again struck by Feuerbach s astonishing poverty when compared to Hegel. The latter s ethics, or doctrine of moral conduct, is the philosophy of right, and embraces: (1) abstract right; (2) morality; (3) social ethics [Sittlichkeit], under which are comprised: the family, civil society, and the state. Here the content is as realistic as the form is idealistic. Besides morality, the whole sphere of law, economy, politics is here included. With Feuerbach, it is just the reverse. In the form he is realistic since he takes his start from man; but there is absolutely no mention of the world in which this man lives; hence, this man remains always the same abstract man who occupied the field in the philosophy of religion. For this man is not born of woman; he issues, as from a chrysalis, from the god of monotheistic religions. He therefore does not live in a real world historically come into being and historically determined. True, he has intercourse with other men; however, each one of them is just as much an abstraction as he himself. In his philosophy of religion we still had men and women, but in his ethics even this last distinction disappears. Feuerbach, to be sure, at long intervals makes such statements as: Man thinks differently in a palace and in a hut. If because of hunger, of misery, you have no stuff in your body, you likewise have no stuff for morality in your head, in your mind, or heart. Politics must become our religion, etc. But Feuerbach is absolutely incapable of achieving anything with these maxims. They remain mere phrases, and even Starcke has to admit that for Feuerbach politics constituted an impassable frontier and the science of society, sociology, was terra incognita to him . He appears just as shallow, in comparison with Hegel, in his treatment of the antithesis of good and evil. One believes one is saying something great, Hegel remarks, if one says that man is naturally good . But one forgets that one says something far greater when one says man is naturally evil . With Hegel, evil is the form in which the motive force of historical development presents itself. This contains the twofold meaning that, on the one hand, each new advance necessarily appears as a sacrilege against things hallowed, as a rebellion against condition, though old and moribund, yet sanctified by custom; and that, on the other hand, it is precisely the wicked passions of man greed and lust for power which, since the emergence of class antagonisms, serve as levers of historical development a fact of which the history of feudalism and of the bourgeoisie, for example, constitutes a single continual proof. But it does not occur to Feuerbach to investigate the historical role of moral evil. To him, history is altogether an uncanny domain in which he feels ill at ease. Even his dictum: Man as he sprang originally from nature was only a mere creature of nature, not a man. Man is a product of man, of culture, of history with him, even this dictum remains absolutely sterile. What Feuerbach has to tell us about morals can, therefore, only be extremely meagre. The urge towards happiness is innate in man, and must therefore form the basis of all morality. But the urge towards happiness is subject to a double correction. First, by the natural consequences of our actions: after the debauch comes the blues , and habitual excess is followed by illness. Secondly, by its social consequences: if we do not respect the similar urge of other people towards happiness they will defend themselves, and so interfere with our own urge toward happiness. Consequently, in order to satisfy our urge, we must be in a position to appreciate rightly the results of our conduct and must likewise allow others an equal right to seek happiness. Rational self-restraint with regard to ourselves, and love again and again love! in our intercourse with others these are the basic laws of Feuerbach s morality; from them, all others are derived. And neither the most spirited utterances of Feuerbach nor the strongest eulogies of Starcke can hide the tenuity and banality of these few propositions. Only very exceptionally, and by no means to this and other people s profit, can an individual satisfy his urge towards happiness by preoccupation with himself. Rather, it requires preoccupation with the outside world, with means to satisfy his needs that is to say, food, an individual of the opposite sex, books, conversation, argument, activities, objects for use and working up. Feuerbach s morality either presupposes that these means and objects of satisfaction are given to every individual as a matter of course, or else it offers only inapplicable good advice and is, therefore, not worth a brass farthing to people who are without these means. And Feuerbach himself states this in plain terms: Do matters fare any better in regard to the equal right of others to satisfy their urge towards happiness? Feuerbach posed this claim as absolute, as holding good for all times and circumstances. But since when has it been valid? Was there ever in antiquity between slaves and masters, or in the Middle Ages between serfs and barons, any talk about an equal right to the urge towards happiness? Was not the urge towards happiness of the oppressed class sacrificed ruthlessly and by the right of law to that of the ruling class? Yes, that was indeed immoral; nowadays, however, equality of rights is recognized. Recognized in words ever since and inasmuch as the bourgeoisie, in its fight against feudalism and in the development of capitalist production, was compelled to abolish all privileges of estate, that is, personal privileges, and to introduce the equality of all individuals before law, first in the sphere in private law, then gradually also in the sphere of public law. But the urge towards happiness thrives only to a trivial extent on ideal rights. To the greatest extent of all it thrives on material means; and capitalist production takes care to ensure that the great majority of those equal rights shall get only what is essential for bare existence. Capitalist production has, therefore, little more respect, if indeed any more, for the equal right to the urge towards happiness of the majority than had slavery or serfdom. And are we better off in regard to the mental means of happiness, the educational means? Is not even the schoolmaster of Sadowa a mythical person? [A] More. According to Feuerbach s theory of morals, the Stock Exchange is the highest temple of moral conduct, provided only that one always speculates right. If my urge towards happiness leads me to the Stock Exchange, and if there I correctly gauge the consequences of my actions so that only agreeable results and no disadvantages ensue that is, I always win then I am fulfilling Feuerbach s precept. Moreover, I do not thereby interfere with the equal right of another person to pursue his happiness; for that other man went to the Exchange just as voluntarily as I did and in concluding the speculative transaction with me he has followed his urge towards happiness as I have followed mine. If he loses his money, his action is ipso facto proved to have been unethical, because of his bad reckoning, and since I have given him the punishment he deserves, I can even slap my chest proudly, like a modern Rhadamanthus. Love, too, rules on the Stock Exchange, in so far as it is not simply a sentimental figure of speech, for each finds in others the satisfaction of his own urge towards happiness, which is just what love ought to achieve and how it acts in practice. And if I gamble with correct prevision of the consequences of my operations, and therefore with success, I fulfil all the strictest injunctions of Feuerbachian morality and becomes a rich man into the bargain. In other words, Feuerbach s morality is cut exactly to the pattern of modern capitalist society, little as Feuerbach himself might desire or imagine it. But love! yes, with Feuerbach, love is everywhere and at all times the wonder-working god who should help to surmount all difficulties of practical life and at that in a society which is split into classes with diametrically opposite interests. At this point, the last relic of the revolutionary character disappears from his philosophy, leaving only the old cant: Love one another fall into each other s arms regardless of distinctions of sex or estate a universal orgy of reconciliation! In short, the Feuerbachian theory of morals fares like all its predecessors. It is designed to suit all periods, all peoples and all conditions, and precisely for that reason it is never and nowhere applicable. It remains, as regards the real world, as powerless as Kant s categorical imperative. In reality every class, even every profession, has its own morality, and even this it violates whenever it can do so with impunity. And love, which is to unite all, manifests itself in wars, altercations, lawsuits, domestic broils, divorces, and every possible exploitation of one by another. Now how was it possible that the powerful impetus given by Feuerbach turned out to be so unfruitful for himself? For the simple reason that Feuerbach himself never contrives to escape from the realm of abstraction for which he has a deadly hatred into that of living reality. He clings fiercely to nature and man; but nature and man remain mere words with him. He is incapable of telling us anything definite either about real nature or real men. But from the abstract man of Feuerbach, one arrives at real living men only when one considers them as participants in history. And that is what Feuerbach resisted,and therefore the year 1848, which he did not understand, meant to him merely the final break with the real world, retirement into solitude. The blame for this again falls chiefly on the conditions them obtaining in Germany, which condemned him to rot away miserably. But the step which Feuerbach did not take nevertheless had to be taken. The cult of abstract man, which formed the kernel of Feuerbach s new religion, had to be replaced by the science of real men and of their historical development. This further development of Feuerbach s standpoint beyond Feuerbach was inaugurated by Marx in 1845 in The Holy Family.

Ludwig Feuerbach and the End of Classical German Philosophy - Part 3: Feuerbach

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1886/ludwig-feuerbach/ch03.htm

Out of the dissolution of the Hegelian school, however, there developed still another tendency, the only one which has borne real fruit. And this tendency is essentially connected with the name of Marx (1). The separation from Hegelian philosophy was here also the result of a return to the materialist standpoint. That means it was resolved to comprehend the real world nature and history just as it presents itself to everyone who approaches it free from preconceived idealist crotchets. It was decided mercilessly to sacrifice every idealist fancy which could not be brought into harmony with the facts conceived in their own and not in a fantastic interconnection. And materialism means nothing more than this. But here the materialistic world outlook was taken really seriously for the first time and was carried through consistently at least in its basic features in all domains of knowledge concerned. Hegel was not simply put aside. On the contrary, a start was made from his revolutionary side, described above, from the dialectical method. But in its Hegelian form, this method was unusable. According to Hegel, dialectics is the self-development of the concept. The absolute concept does not only exist unknown where from eternity, it is also the actual living soul of the whole existing world. It develops into itself through all the preliminary stages which are treated at length in the Logic and which are all included in it. Then it alienates itself by changing into nature, where, unconscious of itself, disguised as a natural necessity, it goes through a new development and finally returns as man s consciousness of himself. This self-consciousness then elaborates itself again in history in the crude form until finally the absolute concept again comes to itself completely in the Hegelian philosophy. According to Hegel, therefore, the dialectical development apparent in nature and history that is, the causal interconnection of the progressive movement from the lower to the higher, which asserts itself through all zigzag movements and temporary retrogression is only a copy [Abklatsch] of the self-movement of the concept going on from eternity, no one knows where, but at all events independently of any thinking human brain. This ideological perversion had to be done away with. We again took a materialistic view of the thoughts in our heads, regarding them as images [Abbilder] of real things instead of regarding real things as images of this or that stage of the absolute concept. Thus dialectics reduced itself to the science of the general laws of motion, both of the external world and of human thought two sets of laws which are identical in substance, but differ in their expression in so far as the human mind can apply them consciously, while in nature and also up to now for the most part in human history, these laws assert themselves unconsciously, in the form of external necessity, in the midst of an endless series of seeming accidents. Thereby the dialectic of concepts itself became merely the conscious reflex of the dialectical motion of the real world and thus the dialectic of Hegel was turned over; or rather, turned off its head, on which it was standing, and placed upon its feet. And this materialist dialectic, which for years has been our best working tool and our sharpest weapon, was, remarkably enough, discovered not only by us but also, independently of us and even of Hegel, by a German worker, Joseph Dietzgen. (2) In this way, however, the revolutionary side of Hegelian philosophy was again taken up and at the same time freed from the idealist trimmings which with Hegel had prevented its consistent execution. The great basic thought that the world is not to be comprehended as a complex of readymade things, but as a complex of processes, in which the things apparently stable no less than their mind images in our heads, the concepts, go through an uninterrupted change of coming into being and passing away, in which, in spite of all seeming accidentally and of all temporary retrogression, a progressive development asserts itself in the end this great fundamental thought has, especially since the time of Hegel, so thoroughly permeated ordinary consciousness that in this generality it is now scarcely ever contradicted. But to acknowledge this fundamental thought in words and to apply it in reality in detail to each domain of investigation are two different things. If, however, investigation always proceeds from this standpoint, the demand for final solutions and eternal truths ceases once for all; one is always conscious of the necessary limitation of all acquired knowledge, of the fact that it is conditioned by the circumstances in which it was acquired. On the other hand, one no longer permits oneself to be imposed upon by the antithesis, insuperable for the still common old metaphysics, between true and false, good and bad, identical and different, necessary and accidental. One knows that these antitheses have only a relative validity; that that which is recognized now as true has also its latent false side which will later manifest itself, just as that which is now regarded as false has also its true side by virtue of which it could previously be regarded as true. One knows that what is maintained to be necessary is composed of sheer accidents and that the so-called accidental is the form behind which necessity hides itself and so on. The old method of investigation and thought which Hegel calls metaphysical , which preferred to investigate things as given, as fixed and stable, a method the relics of which still strongly haunt people s minds, had a great deal of historical justification in its day. It was necessary first to examine things before it was possible to examine processes. One had first to know what a particular thing was before one could observe the changes it was undergoing. And such was the case with natural science. The old metaphysics, which accepted things as finished objects, arose from a natural science which investigated dead and living things as finished objects. But when this investigation had progressed so far that it became possible to take the decisive step forward, that is, to pass on the systematic investigation of the changes which these things undergo in nature itself, then the last hour of the old metaphysic struck in the realm of philosophy also. And in fact, while natural science up to the end of the last century was predominantly a collecting science, a science of finished things, in our century it is essentially a systematizing science, a science of the processes, of the origin and development of these things and of the interconnection which binds all these natural processes into one great whole. Physiology, which investigates the processes occurring in plant and animal organisms; embryology, which deals with the development of individual organisms from germs to maturity; geology, which investigates the gradual formation of the Earth s surface all these are the offspring of our century. But, above all, there are three great discoveries which have enabled our knowledge of the interconnection of natural processes to advance by leaps and bounds: First, the discovery of the cell as the unit from whose multiplication and differentiation the whole plant and animal body develops. Not only is the development and growth of all higher organisms recognized to proceed according to a single general law, but the capacity of the cell to change indicates the way by which organisms can change their species and thus go through a more than individual development. Second, the transformation of energy, which has demonstrated to us that all the so-called forces operative in the first instance in inorganic nature mechanical force and its complement, so-called potential energy, heat, radiation (light, or radiant heat), electricity, magnetism, and chemical energy are different forms of manifestation of universal motion, which pass into one another in definite proportions so that in place of a certain quantity of the one which disappears, a certain quantity of another makes its appearance and thus the whole motion of nature is reduced to this incessant process of transformation from one form into another. Finally, the proof which Darwin first developed in connected form that the stock of organic products of nature environing us today, including man, is the result of a long process of evolution from a few originally unicellular germs, and that these again have arisen from protoplasm or albumen, which came into existence by chemical means. Thanks to these three great discoveries, and the other immense advances in natural science, we have now arrived at the point where we can demonstrate the interconnection between the processes in nature not only in particular spheres but also the interconnection of these particular spheres on the whole, and so can present in an approximately systematic form a comprehensive view of the interconnection in nature by means of the facts provided by an empirical science itself. To furnish this comprehensive view was formerly the task of so-called natural philosophy. It could do this only by putting in place of the real but as yet unknown interconnections ideal, fancied ones, filling in the missing facts by figments of the mind and bridging the actual gaps merely in imagination. In the course of this procedure it conceived many brilliant ideas and foreshadowed many later discoveries, but it also produced a considerable amount of nonsense, which indeed could not have been otherwise. Today, when one needs to comprehend the results of natural scientific investigation only dialetically, that is, in the sense of their own interconnection, in order to arrive at a system of nature sufficient for our time; when the dialectical character of this interconnection is forcing itself against their will even into the metaphysically-trained minds of the natural scientists, today natural philosophy is finally disposed of. Every attempt at resurrecting it would be not only superfluous but a step backwards. But what is true of nature, which is hereby recognized also as a historical process of development, is likewise true of the history of society in all its branches and of the totality of all sciences which occupy themselves with things human (and divine). Here, too, the philosophy of history, of right, of religion, etc., has consisted in the substitution of an interconnection fabricated in the mind of the philosopher for the real interconnection to be demonstrated in the events; has consisted in the comprehension of history as a whole as well as in its separate parts, as the gradual realization of ideas and naturally always only the pet ideas of the philosopher himself. According to this, history worked unconsciously but of necessity towards a certain ideal goal set in advance as, for example, in Hegel, towards the realization of his absolute idea and the unalterable trend towards this absolute idea formed the inner interconnection in the events of history. A new mysterious providence unconscious or gradually coming into consciousness was thus put in the place of the real, still unknown interconnection. Here, therefore, just as in the realm of nature, it was necessary to do away with these fabricated, artificial interconnections by the discovery of the real ones a task which ultimately amounts to the discovery of the general laws of motion which assert themselves as the ruling ones in the history of human society. In one point, however, the history of the development of society proves to be essentially different from that of nature. In nature in so far as we ignore man s reaction upon nature there are only blind, unconscious agencies acting upon one another, out of whose interplay the general law comes into operation. Nothing of all that happens whether in the innumerable apparent accidents observable upon the surface, or in the ultimate results which confirm the regularity inherent in these accidents happens as a consciously desired aim. In the history of society, on the contrary, the actors are all endowed with consciousness, are men acting with deliberation or passion, working towards definite goals; nothing happens without a conscious purpose, without an intended aim. But this distinction, important as it is for historical investigation, particularly of single epochs and events, cannot alter the fact that the course of history is governed by inner general laws. For here, also, on the whole, in spite of the consciously desired aims of all individuals, accident apparently reigns on the surface. That which is willed happens but rarely; in the majority of instances the numerous desired ends cross and conflict with one another, or these ends themselves are from the outset incapable of realization, or the means of attaining them are insufficient. thus the conflicts of innumerable individual wills and individual actions in the domain of history produce a state of affairs entirely analogous to that prevailing in the realm of unconscious nature. The ends of the actions are intended, but the results which actually follow from these actions are not intended; or when they do seem to correspond to the end intended, they ultimately have consequences quite other than those intended. Historical events thus appear on the whole to be likewise governed by chance. But where on the surface accident holds sway, there actually it is always governed by inner, hidden laws, and it is only a matter of discovering these laws. Men make their own history, whatever its outcome may be, in that each person follows his own consciously desired end, and it is precisely the resultant of these many wills operating in different directions, and of their manifold effects upon the outer world, that constitutes history. Thus it is also a question of what the many individuals desire. The will is determined by passion or deliberation. But the levers which immediately determine passion or deliberation are of very different kinds. Partly they may be external objects, partly ideal motives, ambition, enthusiasm for truth and justice , personal hatred, or even purely individual whims of all kinds. But, on the one hand, we have seen that the many individual wills active in history for the most part produce results quite other than those intended often quite the opposite; that their motives, therefore, in relation to the total result are likewise of only secondary importance. On the other hand, the further question arises: What driving forces in turn stand behind these motives? What are the historical forces which transform themselves into these motives in the brains of the actors? The old materialism never put this question to itself. Its conception of history, in so far as it has one at all, is therefore essentially pragmatic; it divides men who act in history into noble and ignoble and then finds that as a rule the noble are defrauded and the ignoble are victorious. hence, it follows for the old materialism that nothing very edifying is to be got from the study of history, and for us that in the realm of history the old materialism becomes untrue to itself because it takes the ideal driving forces which operate there as ultimate causes, instead of investigating what is behind them, what are the driving forces of these driving forces. This inconsistency does not lie in the fact that ideal driving forces are recognized, but in the investigation not being carried further back behind these into their motive causes. On the other hand, the philosophy of history, particularly as represented by Hegel, recognizes that the ostensible and also the really operating motives of men who act in history are by no means the ultimate causes of historical events; that behind these motives are other motive powers, which have to be discovered. But it does not seek these powers in history itself, it imports them rather from outside, from philosophical ideology, into history. Hegel, for example, instead of explaining the history of ancient Greece out of its own inner interconnections, simply maintains that it is nothing more than the working out of forms of beautiful individuality , the realization of a work of art as such. He says much in this connection about the old Greeks that is fine and profound, but that does not prevent us today from refusing to be put off with such an explanation, which is a mere manner of speech. When, therefore, it is a question of investigating the driving powers which consciously or unconsciously, and indeed very often unconsciously lie behind the motives of men who act in history and which constitute the real ultimate driving forces of history, then it is not a question so much of the motives of single individuals, however eminent, as of those motives which set in motion great masses, whole people, and again whole classes of the people in each people; and this, too, not merely for an instant, like the transient flaring up of a straw-fire which quickly dies down, but as a lasting action resulting in a great historical transformation. To ascertain the driving causes which here in the minds of acting masses and their leaders to so-called great men are reflected as conscious motives, clearly or unclearly, directly or in an ideological, even glorified, form is the only path which can put us on the track of the laws holding sway both in history as a whole, and at particular periods and in particular lands. Everything which sets men in motion must go through their minds; but what form it will take in the mind will depend very much upon the circumstances. The workers have by no means become reconciled to capitalist machine industry, even though they no longer simply break the machines to pieces, as they still did in 1848 on the Rhine. But while in all earlier periods the investigation of these driving causes of history was almost impossible on account of the complicated and concealed interconnections between them and their effects our present period has so far simplified these interconnections that the riddle could be solved. Since the establishment of large-scale industry that is, at least since the European peace of 1815 it has been no longer a secret to any man in England that the whole political struggle there pivoted on the claims to supremacy of two classes: the landed aristocracy and the bourgeoisie (middle class). In France, with the return of the Bourbons, the same fact was perceived, the historians of the Restoration period, from Thierry to Guisot, Mignet, and Thiers, speak of it everywhere as the key to the understanding of all French history since the Middle Ages. And since 1830, the working class, the proletariat, has been recognized in both countries as a third competitor for power. Conditions had become so simplified that one would have had to close one s eyes deliberately not to see in the light of these three great classes and in the conflict of their interests the driving force of modern history at least in the two most advanced countries. But how did these classes come into existence? If it was possible at first glance still to ascribe the origin of the great, formerly feudal landed property at least in the first instance to political causes, to taking possession by force, this could not be done in regard to the bourgeoise and the proletariat. Here, the origin and development of two great classes was seen to lie clearly and palpably in purely economic causes. And it was just as clear that in the struggle between landed property and the bourgeoisie, no less than in the struggle between the bourgeoisie and the proletariat, it was a question, first and foremost, of economic interests, to the furtherance of which political power was intended to serve merely as a means. Bourgeoisie and proletariat both arose in consequences of a transformation of the economic conditions, more precisely, of the mode of production. The transition, first from guild handicrafts to manufacture, and then from manufacture to large-scale industry, with steam and mechanical power, had caused the development of these two classes. At a certain stage, the new productive forces set in motion by the bourgeoisie in the first place the division of labor and the combination of many detail laborers [Teilarbeiter] in one general manufactory and the conditions and requirements of exchange, developed through these productive forces, became incompatible with the existing order of production handed down by history and sanctified by law that is to say, incompatible with the privileges of the guild and the numerous other personal and local privileges (which were only so many fetters to the unprivileged estates) of the feudal order to society. The productive forces represented by the bourgeoisie rebelled against the order of production represented by the feudal landlords and the guild-masters. The result is known, the feudal fetters were smashed, gradually in England, at one blow in France. In Germany, the process is not yet finished. But just as, at a definite stage of its development, manufacture came into conflict with the feudal order of production, so now large-scale industry has already come into conflict with the bourgeois order or production established in its place.Tied down by this order, by the narrow limits of the capitalist mode of production, this industry produces, on the one hand, an ever-increasingly proletarianziation of the great mass of the people, and on the other hand, an ever greater mass of unsalable products. Overproduction and mass misery, each the cause of the other that is the absurd contradiction which is its outcome, and which of necessity calls for the liberation of the productive forces by means of a change in the mode of production. In modern history at least it is, therefore, proved that all political struggles are class struggles, and all class struggles for emancipation, despite their necessarily political form for every class struggle is a political struggle turn ultimately on the question of economic emancipation. Therefore, here at least, the state the political order is the subordination, and civil society the realm of economic relations the decisive element. The traditional conception, to which Hegel, too, pays homage, saw in the state the determining element, and in civil society the element determined by it. Appearances correspond to this. As all the driving forces of the actions of any individual person must pass through his brain, and transform themselves into motives of his will in order to set him into action, so also all the needs of civil society no matter which class happens to be the ruling one must pass through the will of the state in order to secure general validity in the form of laws. That is the formal aspect of the matter the one which is self-evident. The question arises, however, what is the content of this merely formal will of the individual as well as of the state and whence is this content derived? Why is just this willed and not something else? If we enquire into this, we discover that in modern history the will of the state is, on the whole, determined by the changing needs of civil society, but the supremacy of this or that class, in the last resort, by the development of the productive forces and relations of exchange. But if even in our modern era, with its gigantic means of production and communication, the state is not an independent domain with an independent development, but one whose existence as well as development is to be explained in the last resort by the economic conditions of life of society, then this must be still more true of all earlier times when the production of the material life of man was not yet carried on with these abundant auxiliary means, and when, therefore, the necessity of such production must have exercised a still greater mastery over men. If the state even today, in the era of big industry and of railways, is on the whole only a reflection, in concentrated form, of the economic needs of the class controlling production, then this must have been much more so in an epoch when each generation of men was forced to spend a far greater part of its aggregate lifetime in satisfying material needs, and was therefore much more dependent on them than we are today. An examination of the history of earlier periods, as soon as it is seriously undertaken from this angle, most abundantly confirms this. But, of course, this cannot be gone into here. If the state and public law are determined by economic relations, so, too, of course, is private law, which indeed in essence only sanctions the existing economic relations between individuals which are normal in the given circumstances. The form in which this happens can, however, vary considerably. It is possible, as happened in England, in harmony with the whole national development, to retain in the main the forms of the old feudal laws while giving them a bourgeois content; in fact, directly reading a bourgeois meaning into the feudal name. But, also, as happened in Western continental Europe, roman law, the first world law of a commodity-producing society, with its unsurpassably fine elaboration of all the essential legal relations of simple commodity owners (of buyers and sellers, debtors and creditors, contracts, obligations, etc.) can be taken as the foundation. In which case, for the benefit of a still petty-bourgeois and semi-feudal society, it can either be reduced to the level of such a society simply through judicial practice (common law) or, with the help of allegedly enlightened, moralizing jurists it can be worked into a special code of law to correspond with such social level a code which in these circumstances will be a bad one also from the legal standpoint (for instance, Prussian Landrecht). But after a great bourgeois revolution it is, however, also possible for such a classic law code of bourgeois society as the French Code Civile to be worked out upon the basis of this same Roman Law. If, therefore, bourgeois legal rules merely express the economic life conditions of society in legal form, then they can do so well or ill according to circumstances. The state presents itself to us as the first ideological power over man. Society creates for itself an organ for the safeguarding of its common interests against internal and external attacks. This organ is the state power. Hardly come into being, this organ makes itself independent vis-a-vis society; and, indeed, the more so, the more it becomes the organ of a particular class, the more it directly enforces the supremacy of that class. The fight of the oppressed class against the ruling class becomes necessarily a political fight, a fight first of all against the political dominance of this class. The consciousness of the interconnection between this political struggle and its economic basis becomes dulled and can be lost altogether. While this is not wholly the case with the participants, it almost always happens with the historians. Of the ancient sources on the struggles within the Roman Republic, only Appian tells us clearly and distinctly what was at issue in the last resort namely, landed property. But once the state has become an independent power vis-a-vis society, it produces forthwith a further ideology. It is indeed among professional politicians, theorists of public law, and jurists of private law, that the connection with economic facts gets lost for fair. Since in each particular case, the economic facts must assume the form of juristic motives in order to receive legal sanction; and since, in so doing, consideration of course has to be given to the whole legal system already in operation, the juristic form is, in consequence, made everything and the economic content nothing. Public law and private law are treated as independent spheres, each being capable of and needing a systematic presentation by the consistent elimination of all inner contradictions. Still higher ideologies, that is, such as are still further removed from the material, economic basis, take the form of philosophy and religion. Here the interconnection between conceptions and their material conditions of existence becomes more and more complicated, more and more obscured by intermediate links. But the interconnection exists. Just as the whole Renaissance period, from the middle of the 15th century, was an essential product of the towns and, therefore, of the burghers, so also was the subsequently newly-awakened philosophy. Its content was in essence only the philosophical expression of the thoughts corresponding to the development of the small and middle burghers into a big bourgeoisie. Among last century s Englishmen and Frenchmen who in many cases were just as much political economists as philosophers, this is clearly evident; and we have proved it above in regard to the Hegelian school. We will now in addition deal only briefly with religion, since the latter stands further away from material life and seems to be most alien to it. Religion arose in very primitive times from erroneous, primitive conceptions of men about their own nature and external nature surrounding them. Every ideology, however, once it has arisen, develops in connection with the given concept-material, and develops this material further; otherwise, it would not be an ideology, that is, occupation with thoughts as with independent entities, developing independently and subject only to their own laws. In the last analysis, the material life conditions of the persons inside whose heads this thought process goes on determine the course of the process, which of necessity remains unknown to these persons, for otherwise there would be an end to all ideology. These original religious notions, therefore, which in the main are common to each group of kindred peoples, develop, after the group separates, in a manner peculiar to each people, according to the conditions of life falling to their lot. For a number of groups of peoples, and particularly for the Aryans (so-called Indo-Europeans) this process has been shown in detail by comparative mythology. The gods thus fashioned within each people were national gods, whose domain extended no farther than the national territory which they were to protect; on the other side of its boundaries, other gods held undisputed sway. They could continue to exist, in imagination, only as long as the nation existed; they fell with its fall. The Roman world empire, the economic conditions of whose origin we do not need to examine here, brought about this downfall of the old nationalities. The old national gods decayed, even those of the Romans, which also were patterned to suit only the narrow confines of the city of Rome. The need to complement the world empire by means of a world religion was clearly revealed in the attempts made to recognize all foreign gods that were the least bit respectable and provide altars for them in Rome alongside the native gods. But a new world religion is not to be made in this fashion, by imperial decree. The new world religion, Christianity, had already quietly come into being, out of a mixture of generalized Oriental, particularly Jewish, theology, and vulgarized Greek, particularly Stoic, philosophy. What it originally looked like has to be first laboriously discovered, since its official form, as it has been handed down to us, is merely that in which it became the state religion to which purpose it was adapted by the Council of Nicaea. The fact that already after 250 years it became the state religion suffices to show that it was the religion in correspondence with the conditions of the time. In the Middle Ages, in the same measure as feudalism developed, Christianity grew into the religious counterpart to it, with a corresponding feudal hierarchy. And when the burghers began to thrive, there developed, in opposition to feudal Catholicism, the Protestant heresy, which first appeared in Southern France among the Albigenses[A], at the time the cities there reached the highest point of their florescence. The Middle Ages had attached to theology all the other forms of ideology philosophy, politics, jurisprudence and made them subdivision of theology. It thereby constrained every social and political movement to take on a theological form. The sentiments of the masses were fed with religion to the exclusion of all else; it was therefore necessary to put forward their own interests in a religious guise in order to produce a great tempest. And just as the burghers from the beginning brought into being an appendage of propertyless urban plebeians, day laborers and servants of all kinds, belonging to no recognized social estate, precursors of the later proletariat, so likewise heresy soon became divided into a burgher-moderate heresy and a plebeian-revolutionary one, the latter an abomination to the burgher heretics themselves. The ineradicability of the Protestant heresy corresponded to the invincibility of the rising burghers. When these burghers had become sufficiently strengthened, their struggle against the feudal nobility, which till then had been predominantly local, began to assume national dimensions. The first great action occurred in Germany the so-called reformation. The burghers were neither powerful enough nor sufficiently developed to be able to unite under their banner the remaining rebellious estates the plebeians of the towns, the lower nobility, and the peasants on the land. At first, the nobles were defeated; the peasants rose in a revolt which formed the peak of the whole revolutionary struggle; the cities left them in the lurch, and thus the revolution succumbed to the armies of the secular princes who reaped the whole profit. Thenceforward, Germany disappears for three centuries from the ranks of countries playing an independent active part in history. But, beside the German Luther appeared the Frenchman Calvin. With true French acuity, he put the bourgeois character of the Reformation in the forefront, republicanized and democratized the Church. While the Lutheran Reformation in Germany degenerated and reduced the country to rack and ruin, the Calvinist Reformation served as a banner for the republicans in Geneva, in Holland, and in Scotland, freed Holland from Spain and from the German Empire, and provided the ideological costume for the second act of the bourgeois revolution, which was taking place in England. Here, Calvinism justified itself as the true religious disguise of the interests of the bourgeoisie of that time, and on this account did not attain full recognition when the revolution ended in 1689 in a compromise between one part of the nobility and the bourgeoisie. The English state Church was re-established; but not in its earlier form of a Catholicism which had the king for its pope, being, instead, strongly Calvinized. The old state Church had celebrated the merry Catholic Sunday and had fought against the dull Calvinist one. The new, bourgeoisified Church introduced the latter, which adorns England to this day. In France, the Calvinist minority was suppressed in 1685 and either Catholized or driven out of the country. But what was the good? Already at that time the freethinker Pierre Bayle was at the height of his activity, and in 1694 Voltaire was born. The forcible measures of Louis XIV only made it easier for the French bourgeoisie to carry through its revolution in the irreligious, exclusively political form which alone was suited to a developed bourgeoisie. Instead of Protestants, freethinkers took their seats in the national assemblies. Thereby Christianity entered into its final stage. It was incapable of doing any future service to any progressive class as the ideological garb of its aspirations. It became more and more the exclusive possession of the ruling classes; they apply it as a mere means of government, to keep the lower classes within bounds. Moreover, each of the different classes uses its own appropriate religion: the landed nobility Catholic Jesuitism, or Protestant orthodoxy; the liberal and radical bourgeoisie rationalism; and it makes little difference whether these gentlemen themselves believe in their respective religions or not. We see, therefore: religion, once formed, always contains traditional material, just as in all ideological domains tradition forms a great conservative force. But the transformations which this material undergoes spring from class relations that is to say, out of the economic relations of the people who execute these transformations. And here that is sufficient. In the above, it could only be a question of giving a general sketch of the Marxist conception of history, at most with a few illustrations, as well. The proof must be derived from history itself; and, in this regard, it may be permitted to say that is has been sufficiently furnished in other writings. This conception, however, puts an end to philosophy in the realm of history, just as the dialectical conception of nature makes all natural philosophy both unnecessary and impossible. It is no longer a question anywhere of inventing interconnections from out of our brains, but of discovering them in the facts. For philosophy, which has been expelled from nature and history, there remains only the realm of pure thought, so far as it is left: the theory of the laws of the thought process itself, logic and dialectics. Only among the working class does the German aptitude for theory remain unimpaired. Here, it cannot be exterminated. Here, there is no concern for careers,for profit-making, or for gracious patronage from above. On the contrary, the more ruthlessly and disinterestedly science proceeds the more it finds itself in harmony with the interest and aspirations of the workers. The new tendency, which recognized that the key to the understanding of the whole history of society lies in the history of the development of labor, from the outset addressed itself by preference to the working class and here found the response which it neither sought nor expected from officially recognized science. The German working-class movement is the inheritor of German classical philosophy.

Ludwig Feuerbach and the End of Classical German Philosophy - Part 4: Marx

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1886/ludwig-feuerbach/ch04.htm

Since then more than 40 years have elapsed and Marx died without either of us having had an opportunity of returning to the subject. We have expressed ourselves in various places regarding our relation to Hegel, but nowhere in a comprehensive, connected account. To Feuerbach, who after all in many respects forms an intermediate link between Hegelian philosophy and our conception, we never returned. In the meantime, the Marxist world outlook has found representatives far beyond the boundaries of Germany and Europe and in all the literary languages of the world. On the other hand, classical German philosophy is experiencing a kind of rebirth abroad, especially in England and Scandinavia, and even in Germany itself people appear to be getting tired of the pauper s broth of eclecticism which is ladled out in the universities there under the name of philosophy. In these circumstances, a short, coherent account of our relation to the Hegelian philosophy, of how we proceeded, as well as of how we separated, from it, appeared to me to be required more and more. Equally, a full acknowledgement of the influence which Feuerbach, more than any other post-Hegelian philosopher, had upon us during our period of storm and stress, appeared to me to be an undischarged debt of honor. I therefore willingly seized the opportunity when the editors of Neue Zeit asked me for a critical review of Starcke s book on Feuerbach. My contribution was published in that journal in the fourth and fifth numbers of 1886 and appears here in revised form as a separate publication. Before sending these lines to press, I have once again ferreted out and looked over the old manuscript of 1845 46 [The German Ideology]. The section dealing with Feuerbach is not completed. The finished portion consists of an exposition of the materialist conception of history which proves only how incomplete our knowledge of economic history still was at that time. It contains no criticism of Feuerbach s doctrine itself; for the present purposes, therefore, it was unusable. On the other hand, in an old notebook of Marx s I have found the 11 Theses on Feuerbach, printed here as an appendix. These are notes hurriedly scribbled down for later elaboration, absolutely not intended for publication, but invaluable as the first document in which is deposited the brilliant germ of the new world outlook.

Ludwig Feuerbach and the End of Classical German Philosophy — Foreword

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1886/ludwig-feuerbach/foreword.htm

The fact is there, stubborn and indisputable. To what an extent it had struck with terror the American ruling classes, was revealed to me, in an amusing way, by American journalists who did me the honor of calling on me last summer; the new departure had put them into a state of helpless fright and perplexity. But at that time the movement was only just on the start; there was but a series of confused and apparently disconnected upheavals of that class which, by the suppression of negro slavery and the rapid development of manufactures, had become the lowest stratum of American society. Before the year closed, these bewildering social convulsions began to take a definite direction. The spontaneous, instinctive movements of these vast masses of working people, over a vast extent of country, the simultaneous outburst of their common discontent with a miserable social condition, the same everywhere and due .to the same causes, made them conscious of the fact, that they formed a new and distinct class of American society; a class of practically speaking more or less hereditary wage-workers, proletarians. And with true American instinct this consciousness led them at once to take the next step towards their deliverance: the formation of a political working-men s party, with a platform of its own, and with the conquest of the Capitol and the White House for its goal. In May the struggle for the Eight Hours working-day, the troubles in Chicago, Milwaukee, etc., the attempts of the ruling class to crush the nascent uprising of Labor by brute force and brutal class-justice; in November the new Labor Party organized in all great centres, and the New York, Chicago and Milwaukee elections. May and November have hitherto reminded the American bourgeoisie only of the payment of coupons of U.S. bonds; henceforth May and November will remind them, too, of the dates on which the American working-class presented their coupons for payment. In European countries, it took the working class years and years before they fully realized the fact that they formed a distinct and, under the existing social conditions, a permanent class of modern society; and it took years again until this class consciousness led them to form themselves into a distinct political party, independent of, and opposed to, all the old political parties formed by the various sections of the ruling classes. On the more favored soil of America, where no medi val ruins bar the way, where history begins with the elements of modern bourgeois society as evolved in the seventeenth century, the working class passed through these two stages of its development within ten months., Still, all this is but a beginning. That the laboring masses should feel their community of grievances and of interests, their solidarity as a class in opposition to all other classes; that in order to give expression and effect to this feeling, they should set in motion the political machinery provided for that purpose in every free country that is the first step only. The next step is to find the common remedy for these common grievances, and to embody it in the platform of the new Labor Party. And this the most important and the most difficult step in the movement has yet to be taken in America. A new party must have a distinct positive platform; a platform which may vary in details as circumstances vary and as the party itself develops, but still one upon which the party, for the time being, is agreed. So long as such a platform has not been worked out, or exists but in a rudimentary form, so long the new party, too, will have but a rudimentary existence; it may exist locally but not. yet nationally, it will be a party potentially but not actually. That platform, whatever may be its first shape, must develop in a direction which may be determined beforehand. The causes that brought into existence the abyss between the working class and the capitalist class are the same in America as in Europe; the means of filling up that abyss are equally the same everywhere. Consequently, the platform of the American proletariat will in the long run coincide, as to the ultimate end to be attained, with the one which, after sixty years of dissensions and discussions, has become the adopted platform of the great mass of the European militant proletariat. It will proclaim, as the ultimate end, the conquest of political supremacy by the working class, in order to effect the direct appropriation of all means of production land, railways, mines, machinery, etc. by society at large, to be worked in common by all for the account and benefit of all. But if the new American party, like all political parties everywhere, by the very fact of its formation aspires to the conquest of political power, it is as yet far from agreed upon what to do with that power when once attained. In New York and the other great cities of the East, the organization of the working class has proceeded upon the lines of Trades Societies, forming in each city a powerful Central Labor Union. In New York the Central Labor Union, last November, chose for its standard-bearer Henry George, and consequently its temporary electoral platform has been largely imbued with his principles. In the great cities of the North-West the electoral battle was fought upon a rather indefinite labor platform, and the influence of Henry George s theories was scarcely, if at all, visible. And while in these great centres of population and of industry the new class movement came to a political head, we find all over the country two wide-spread labor organizations: the Knights of Labor and the Socialist Labor Party, of which only the latter has a platform in harmony with the modern European standpoint as summarized above. Of the three more or less definite forms under which the American labor movement thus presents itself, the first, the Henry George movement in New York, is for the moment of a chiefly local significance. No doubt New York is by far the most important city of the States; but New York is not Paris and the United States are not France. And it seems to me that the Henry George platform, in its present shape, is too narrow to form the basis for anything but a local movement, or at best for a short-lived phase of the general movement. To Henry George, the expropriation of the mass of the people from the land is the great and universal cause of the splitting up of the people into Rich and Poor. Now this is not quite correct historically. In Asiatic and classical antiquity, the predominant form of class oppression was slavery, that is to say, not so much the expropriation of the masses from the land as the appropriation of their persons. When, in the decline of the Roman Republic, the free Italian peasants were expropriated from their farms, they formed a class of poor whites similar to that of the Southern Slave States before 1861; and between slaves and poor whites, two classes equally unfit for self-emancipation, the old world went to pieces. In the middle ages, it was not the expropriation of the people from, but on the contrary, their appropriation to the land which became the source of feudal oppression. The peasant retained his land, but was attached to it as a serf or villein, and made liable to tribute to the lord in labor and in produce. It was only at the dawn of modern times, towards the end of the fifteenth century, that the expropriation of the peasantry on a large scale laid the foundation .for the modern class of wage-workers who possess nothing but their labor-power and can live only by the selling of that labor-power to others. But if the expropriation from the land brought this class into existence, it was the development of capitalist production, of modern industry and agriculture on a large scale which perpetuated it, increased it, and shaped it into a distinct class with distinct interests and a distinct historical mission. All this has been fully expounded by Marx ( Capital, Part VIII: The So-Called Primitive Accumulation ). According to Marx, the cause of the present antagonism of the classes and of the social degradation of the working class is their expropriation from all means of production, in which the land is of course included. If Henry George declares land-monopolization to be the sole cause of poverty and misery, he naturally finds the remedy in the resumption of the land by society at large. Now, the Socialists of the school of Marx, too, demand the resumption, by society, of the land, and not only of the land but of all other means of production likewise. But even if we leave these out of the question, there is another difference. What is to be done with the land? Modern Socialists, as represented by Marx, demand that it should be held and worked in common and for common account, and the same with all other means of social production, mines, railways, factories, etc.; Henry George would confine himself to letting it out to individuals as at present, merely regulating its distribution and applying the rents for public, instead of, as at present, for private purposes. What the Socialists demand, implies a total revolution of the whole system of social production; what Henry George demands, leaves the present mode of social production untouched, and has, in fact, been anticipated by the extreme section of Ricardian bourgeois economists who, too, demanded the confiscation of the rent of land by the State. It would of course be unfair to suppose that Henry George has said his last word once for all. But I am bound to take his theory as I find it. The second great section of the American movement is formed by the Knights of Labor. And that seems to be the section most typical of the present state of the movement, as it is undoubtedly by far the strongest. An immense association spread over an immense extent of country in innumerable assemblies, representing all shades of individual and local opinion within the working class; the whole of them sheltered under a platform of corresponding indistinctness and held together much less by their impracticable constitution than by the instinctive feeling that the very fact of their clubbing together for their common aspiration makes them a great power in the country; a truly American paradox clothing the most modern tendencies in the most mediaeval mummeries, and hiding the most democratic and even rebellious spirit behind an apparent, but really powerless despotism such is the picture the Knights of Labor offer to a European observer. But if we are not arrested by mere outside whimsicalities, we cannot help seeing in this vast agglomeration an immense amount of potential energy evolving slowly but surely into actual force. The Knights of Labor are the first national organization created by the American working class as a whole; whatever be their origin and history, whatever their shortcomings and little absurdities, whatever their platform and their constitution, here they are, the work of practically the whole class of American wage-workers, the only national bond that holds them together, that makes their strength felt to themselves not less than to their enemies, and that fills them with the proud hope of future victories. For it would not be exact to say, that the Knights of Labor are liable to development. They are constantly in full process of development and revolution; a heaving, fermenting mass of plastic material seeking the shape and form appropriate to its inherent nature. That form will be attained as surely as historical evolution has, like natural evolution, its own immanent laws. Whether the Knights of Labor will then retain their present name or not, makes no difference, but to an outsider it appears evident that here is the raw material out of which the future of the American working-class movement, and along with it, the future of American society at large, has to be shaped. The third section consists of the Socialist Labor Party. This section is a party but in name, for nowhere in America has it, up to now, been able actually to take its stand as a political party. It is, moreover, to a certain extent foreign to America, having until lately been made up almost exclusively by German immigrants, using their own language and for the most part, conversant with the common language of the country. But if it came from a foreign stock, it came, at the same time, armed with the experience earned during long years of class struggle in Europe, and with an insight into the general conditions of working-class emancipation, far superior to that hitherto gained by American working-men. This is a fortunate circumstance for the American proletarians who thus are enabled to appropriate, and to take advantage of, the intellectual and moral fruits of the forty years struggle of their European classmates, and thus to hasten on the time of their own victory. For, as I said before, there cannot be any doubt that the ultimate platform of the American working class must and will be essentially the same as that now adopted by the whole militant working class of Europe, the same as that of the German-American Socialist Labor Party. In so far this party is called upon to play a very important part in the movement. But in order to do so they will have to doff every remnant of their foreign garb. They will have to become out and out American. They cannot expect the Americans to come to them; they, the minority and the immigrants, must go to the Americans, who are the vast majority and the natives. And to do that, they must above all things learn English. The process of fusing together these various elements of the vast moving mass elements not really discordant, but indeed mutually isolated by their various starting-points will take some time and will not come off without a deal of friction, such as is visible at different points even now. The Knights of Labor, for instance, are here and there, in the Eastern cities, locally at war with the organized Trades Unions. But then this same friction exists within the Knights of Labor themselves, where there is anything but peace and harmony. These are not symptoms of decay, for capitalists to crow over. They are merely signs that the innumerable hosts of workers, for the first time set in motion in a common direction, have as yet found out neither the adequate expression for their common interests, nor the form of organization best adapted to the struggle, nor the discipline required to insure victory. They are as yet the first levies en masse of the great revolutionary war, raised and equipped locally and independently, all converging to form one common army, but as yet without regular organization and common plan of campaign. The converging columns cross each other here and there: confusion, angry disputes, even threats of conflict arise. But the community of ultimate purpose in the end overcomes all minor troubles; ere long the straggling and squabbling battalions will be formed in a long line of battle array, presenting to the enemy a well-ordered front, ominously silent under their glittering arms, supported by bold skirmishers in front and by unshakeable reserves in the rear. To bring about this result, the unification of the various independent bodies into one national Labor Army, with no matter how inadequate a provisional platform, provided it be a truly working-class platform that is the next great step to be accomplished in America. To effect this, and to make that platform worthy of the cause, the Socialist Labor Party can contribute a great deal, if they will only act in the same way as the European Socialists have acted at the time when they were but a small minority of the working class. That line of action was first laid down in the Communist Manifesto of 1847 in the following words: That is the line of action which the great founder of Modern Socialism, Karl Marx, and with him, I and the Socialists of all nations who worked along with us, have followed for more than forty years, with the result that it has led to victory everywhere, and that at this moment the mass of European Socialists, in Germany and in France, in Belgium, Holland and Switzerland, in Denmark and Sweden as well as in Spain and Portugal, are fighting as one common army under one and the same flag.

The Condition of the Working Class in England

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1887/01/26.htm

And, finally, the only war left for Prussia-Germany to wage will be a world war, a world war, moreover of an extent the violence hitherto unimagined. Eight to ten million soldiers will be at each other s throats and in the process they will strip Europe barer than a swarm of locusts. The depredations of the Thirty Years War compressed into three to four years and extended over the entire continent; famine, disease, the universal lapse into barbarism, both of the armies and the people, in the wake of acute misery irretrievable dislocation of our artificial system of trade, industry and credit, ending in universal bankruptcy collapse of the old states and their conventional political wisdom to the point where crowns will roll into the gutters by the dozen, and no one will be around to pick them up; the absolute impossibility of foreseeing how it will all end and who will emerge as victor from the battle. Only one consequence is absolutely certain: universal exhaustion and the creation of the conditions for the ultimate victory of the working class. That is the prospect for the moment when the development of mutual one-upmanship in armaments reaches us, climax and finally brings forth its inevitable fruits. This is the pass, my worthy princes and statesmen, to which you in your wisdom have brought our ancient Europe. And when no alternative is left to you but to strike up the last dance of war that will be no skin off our noses. The war may push us into the background for a while, it may wrest many a conquered base from our hands. But once you have unleashed the forces you will be unable to restrain, things can take their course: by the end of the tragedy you will be ruined and the victory of the proletariat will either been achieved or else inevitable.

Introduction to Borkheim by Frederick Engels 1887

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1887/12/15.htm

Dear Mrs. Wischnewetzky: ... Your fear as to my being unduly influenced by Aveling in my view of the American movement is groundless. As soon as there was a national American working-class movement, independent of the Germans, my standpoint was clearly indicated by the facts of the case. That great national movement, no matter what its first form, is the real starting point of American working-class development. If the Germans join it, in order to help it or to hasten its development in the right direction, they may do a great deal of good and play a decisive part in it. If they stand aloof, they will dwindle down into a dogmatic sect and be brushed aside as people who do not understand their own principles. Mrs. Aveling, who has seen her father at work, understood this quite as well from the beginning, and if Aveling saw it too, all the better. And all my letters to America, to Sorge, to yourself, to the Avelings, from the very beginning, have repeated this view over and over again. Still I was glad to see the Avelings before writing my preface, because they gave me some new facts about the inner mysteries of the German party in New York.... In the early hole-and-corner stages of the working-class movement, when the workingmen are still under the influence of traditional prejudices, woe be to the man who, being of bourgeois origin or superior education, goes into the movement and is rash enough to enter into money relations with the working-class element. There is sure to be a dispute upon the cash account and this is at once enlarged into an attempt at exploitation. Especially so if the bourgeois happens to have views on theoretical or tactical points that disagree with those of the majority or even of a minority. This I have constantly seen for more than forty years. The worst of all were the Germans; in Germany the growth of the movement has long since swept that failing away, but it has not died out with the Germans out of Germany. For that reason Marx and I have always tried to avoid having any money dealings with the party, no matter in what country....

Letters: Marx-Engels Correspondence 1887

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1887/letters/87_02_09.htm

I thank you very much for the Tales of Scedrin which I shall take in hand as soon as ever possible; a slight conjunctivitis of the left eye prevents me reading it at present, as the Russian type very much strains my eyesight.

Letters: Marx-Engels Correspondence 1887

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1887/letters/87_02_19.htm

Yesterday evening the Irish Coercion Bill was clause by clause hurried through the House of Commons in two minutes. It is a worthy counterpart of the Anti-Socialist Law and opens the door to completely arbitrary action by the police. Things regarded as fundamental rights in England are forbidden in Ireland and become crimes. This Bill is the tombstone of today s Tories, whom I did not consider so stupid, and of the Liberal Unionists , whom I hardly thought so contemptible. It is moreover intended, not to last for a limited period, but indefinitely. The British Parliament has been reduced to the level of the German Reichstag. Though certainly not for long.

Letters: Marx-Engels Correspondence 1885. Ireland

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1887/letters/87_06_18.htm

Dear Sorge: ...Affairs are on the move over there at last, and I must know my Americans badly if they do not astonish us all by the vastness of their movement, but also by the gigantic nature of the mistakes they make, through which they will finally work out their way to clarity. Ahead of everyone else in practice and still in swaddling-clothes in theory that s how they are, nor can it be otherwise. But it is a land without tradition (except for the religious), which has begun with the democratic republic, and a people full of energy as no other. The course of the movement will by no means follow the classic straight line, but travel in tremendous zigzags and seem to be moving backward at times, but that is of much less importance there than with us. Henry George was an unavoidable evil, but he will soon be obliterated, like Powderly or even McGlynn, whose popularity at the moment is quite understandable in that God-fearing country. In Autumn much will be I won t say cleared up, but more and more complicated, and the crisis will come closer. The annual elections, which force the masses to unite over and over again, are really most fortunate....

Letters: Marx-Engels Correspondence 1887

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1887/letters/87_08_08.htm

Dear Sorge: ... I am having a dreadful amount of commotion this summer: visits from all countries, which will keep on until the middle of October as I expect Bebel in about two weeks. I shall be able to look for and find Marx s letter on George only when I begin putting things in order, that is, as soon as some new bookcases I have ordered to give me more room arrive. Then you'll get a translation at once. There s no hurry George must still compromise himself some more. His repudiation of the socialists is the greatest good fortune that could happen to us. Making him the standard-bearer last November was an unavoidable mistake for which we had to suffer. For the masses are only to be set in motion along the road that corresponds to each country and to the prevailing circumstances, which is usually a roundabout road. Everything else is of subordinate importance, if only the actual arousing takes place. But the mistakes unavoidably made in doing this are paid for every time. And in this case it was to be feared that making the founder of a sect the standard-bearer would burden the movement with the follies of the sect for years to come. By expelling the founders of the movement, establishing his sect as the special, orthodox, George sect, and proclaiming his narrow-mindedness as the borne of the whole movement, George saves the latter and ruins himself. The movement itself will, of course, still go through many and disagreeable phases, disagreeable particularly for those who live in the country and have to suffer them. But I am firmly convinced that things are now going ahead over there, and perhaps more rapidly than with us, notwithstanding the fact that the Americans will learn almost exclusively in practice for the time being, and not so much from theory.

Letters: Marx-Engels Correspondence 1887

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1887/letters/87_09_16.htm

I am entirely pleased with the progress of socialism and the labor movement in England; however, this progress exists chiefly in the development of proletarian consciousness in the masses. The official labor organizations, Trade-Unions, which here and there are threatening to become reactionary, must lag behind like the Austrian Landsturm [Veterans Reserve].

Engels in New Yorker Volkszeitung 1888

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1888/09/20.htm

If the war was fought out to the end without internal disturbances a state of exhaustion would supervene such as Europe has not experienced for two hundred years. American industry would then conquer all along the line and would force us all up against the alternatives: either retrogression to nothing but agriculture for home consumption (American corn forbids anything else) or -- social transformation. I imagine, therefore, that the plan is not to push things to extremities, to more than a sham war. But once the first shot is fired, control ceases, the horse can take the bit between its teeth.

Letters: Marx-Engels Correspondence 1888

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1888/letters/88_01_07.htm

The stupidity of the present Tory government is appalling if old Disraeli was alive, he would box their ears right and left. But this stupidity helps on matters wonderfully. Home Rule for Ireland and for London is now the cry here; the latter a thing which the Liberals fear even more than the Tories do. The working class element is getting more and more exasperated, through the stupid Tory provocations, is getting daily more. conscious of its strength at the ballot-box, and more penetrated by the socialist leaven.

Letters: Marx-Engels Correspondence 1885. Ireland

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1888/letters/88_02_22.htm

Have heard nothing of the Irish tricolour to which you refer. Irish flags in Ireland and here are simply green with a golden harp, but without a crown (in the British coat-of-arms the harp wears a crown). In the Fenian days, 1865-67, many were green and orange to show the Orangemen of the North that they would not be destroyed, but accepted as brothers. However, no question of that any more.

Letters: Marx-Engels Correspondence 1885. Ireland

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1888/letters/88_02_29.htm

Dear Miss Harkness, I thank you very much for sending me your City Girl through Messrs Vizetelly. I have read it with the greatest pleasure and avidity. It is indeed, as my friend Eichhoff your translator calls it, ein kleines Kunstwerk... [a small work of art. DM] If I have anything to criticize, it would be that perhaps, after all, the tale is not quite realistic enough. Realism, to my mind, implies, besides truth of detail, the truthful reproduction of typical characters under typical circumstances. Now your characters are typical enough, as far as they go; but perhaps the circumstances which surround them and make them act, are not perhaps equally so. In the City Girl the working class figures are a passive mass, unable to help itself and not even showing (making) any attempt at striving to help itself. All attempts to drag it out of its torpid misery come from without, from above. Now if this was a correct description about 1800 or 1810, in the days of Saint-Simon and Robert Owen, it cannot appear so in 1887 to a man who for nearly fifty years has had the honour of sharing in most of the fights of the militant proletariat. The rebellious reaction of the working class against the oppressive medium which surrounds them, their attempts - convulsive, half conscious or conscious - at recovering their status as human beings, belong to history and must therefore lay claim to a place in the domain of realism. I am far from finding fault with your not having written a point-blank socialist novel, a Tendenzroman [social-problem novel. DM], as we Germans call it, to glorify the social and political views of the authors. This is not at all what I mean. The more the opinions of the author remain hidden, the better for the work of art. The realism I allude to may crop out even in spite of the author s opinions. Let me refer to an example. Balzac, whom I consider a far greater master of realism than all the Zolas pass s, pr sents et a venir [past, present and future], in La Com die humaine gives us a most wonderfully realistic history of French Society , especially of le monde parisien [the Parisian social world], describing, chronicle-fashion, almost year by year from 1816 to 1848 the progressive inroads of the rising bourgeoisie upon the society of nobles, that reconstituted itself after 1815 and that set up again, as far as it could, the standard of la viellie politesse fran aise [French refinement]. He describes how the last remnants of this, to him, model society gradually succumbed before the intrusion of the vulgar monied upstart, or were corrupted by him; how the grand dame whose conjugal infidelities were but a mode of asserting herself in perfect accordance with the way she had been disposed of in marriage, gave way to the bourgeoisie, who horned her husband for cash or cashmere; and around this central picture he groups a complete history of French Society from which, even in economic details (for instance the rearrangement of real and personal property after the Revolution) I have learned more than from all the professed historians, economists, and statisticians of the period together. Well, Balzac was politically a Legitimist; his great work is a constant elegy on the inevitable decay of good society, his sympathies are all with the class doomed to extinction. But for all that his satire is never keener, his irony never bitterer, than when he sets in motion the very men and women with whom he sympathizes most deeply - the nobles. And the only men of whom he always speaks with undisguised admiration, are his bitterest political antagonists, the republican heroes of the Clo tre Saint-M ry, the men, who at that time (1830-6) were indeed the representatives of the popular masses. That Balzac thus was compelled to go against his own class sympathies and political prejudices, that he saw the necessity of the downfall of his favourite nobles, and described them as people deserving no better fate; and that he saw the real men of the future where, for the time being, they alone were to be found - that I consider one of the greatest triumphs of Realism, and one of the grandest features in old Balzac. I must own, in your defence, that nowhere in the civilized world are the working people less actively resistant, more passively submitting to fate, more h b t s [bewildered] than in the East End of London. And how do I know whether you have not had very good reasons for contenting yourself, for once, with a picture of the passive side of working-class life, reserving the active side for another work?

Letters: Marx-Engels Correspondence 1888

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1888/letters/88_04_15.htm

Dear Sorge: My evening at work has been ruined by visitors, and that gives me some free time to write you. The criticism of Henry George that Marx sent you is such a masterpiece in content and so homogeneous in style that it would be a pity to weaken it by adding the desultory marginal notes written in English in Marx s copy. These will always remain for eventual use later. The whole letter to you was written with a view to subsequent publication verbatim, as Marx usually did in such cases. Thus you are not committing any indiscretion in having it printed. If it is to be printed in English, I'll translate it for you, since the translation of the Manifesto again shows that there doesn t seem to be anyone over there who can translate our German, at least, into literary, grammatical English. That requires training as a writer in both languages, and training not merely in the daily press. It is dreadfully hard to translate the Manifesto; the Russian translations are still by far the best I have seen. The third edition of Capital is giving me a tremendous amount of work. We have a copy in which Marx notes the changes and additions to be made according to the French edition, but all the detail work is yet to be done. I have completed it as far as Accumulation, but here an almost total reworking of the whole theoretical section is involved. Then there is the responsibility. For the French translation is in part a simplification of the German, and Marx would never have written like that in German. Moreover, the bookseller is pressing me. Before I finish with it I cannot think of undertaking Volume II. There exist at least four versions of the beginning; that is how often Marx began it, always being interrupted in editing the definitive text by illness. I cannot say as yet how the arrangement and the conclusion of the last one, dated 1878, will agree with the first, dating from 1870. Almost everything dating from the period before 1848 has been saved. Not only the manuscripts finished by him and me at the time are almost complete (except for those gnawed away by mice), but so is the correspondence. Everything since 1849 is complete, of course, and the material after 1862 is even classified to some degree. There is also very extensive written material on the International, enough, I think, for its whole history, but I haven t been able to look it over more closely. There are three or four mathematical manuscripts, too. I once showed your Adolf an example of Marx s new foundation of the differential calculus. If not for the voluminous American and Russian material (more than two cubic meters of books on Russian statistics alone), Volume II would have been printed long ago. These detailed studies detained him for years. As always, everything was to be complete down to the present day, and now all that has come to nought, with the exception of his excerpts, which I hope will contain, as was his custom, many critical remarks that can he used for the notes of Volume II.... I have already read five sheets of the final proofs of the third edition; the man promises to deliver three sheets a week. I simply haven t the time to answer the many long letters sent me by little Hepner. His reports always interest me, though mixed with much personal gossip and written with the superiority of one who has just landed. You must therefore convey my excuses to him. Schevitsch has replied to me dignifiedly, regretting my pettiness. Dignity sits well on him. He'll get no answer. Nor will Most, who must confirm everything I assert, and for that very reason is furious. I believe he will find support in that sectarian land, America, and cause trouble for some time. But that is precisely the character of the American movement: that all mistakes must be experienced in practice. If American energy and vitality were backed by European theoretical clarity, the business would be finished over there in ten years. But that is impossible historically.

Letters: Letters of Marx and Engels from Science and Society

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1888/letters/88_06_29.htm

Dear Sorge: Received the newspaper the day before yesterday and your letters today. Thanks! But I am sorry that your throat is not in shape yet, and, it seems, has even taken over my cough. If our visit has made us well and you sick, it is a very unpleasant business. Yesterday we were in Concord, visiting the reformatory and the town. We liked both of them very much. A prison in which the prisoners read novels and scientific books, establish clubs, assemble and discuss without warders present, eat meat and fish twice daily with bread ad libitum, with ice-water in every workroom and fresh running water in every cell, the cells decorated with pictures, etc., where the inmates, dressed like ordinary workers, look one straight in the eye without the hangdog look of the usual criminal prisoner that isn t to be seen in all Europe; for that the Europeans, as I told the superintendent, are not bold enough. And he answered in true American fashion, Well, we try to make it pay, and it does pay. I gained great respect for the Americans there. Concord is exceedingly beautiful, graceful, as one wouldn t have expected after New York and even after Boston; it s a splendid hamlet to be buried in, but not alive! In four weeks there I should perish or go crazy. My nephew, Willie Burns, is a splendid fellow, clever, energetic, in the movement body and soul. He is getting along well; he works on the Boston and Providence R.R. (now the Old Colony), earns $12.00 a week, and has a nice wife (brought along from Manchester) and three children. He wouldn t go back to England for any money; he is exactly the youngster for a country like America. Rosenberg s resignation and the strange debate on the Sozialist in the Volkszeitung seem to be symptoms of collapse. We hear but little and seldom of Europe here, merely through the New York World and Herald. Today Aveling will have finished all his work in America. The rest of the time is his own. Whether we'll go to Chicago is still uncertain; we have plenty of time for the rest of the program. Cordial greetings to your wife and to you from all of us, and especially from your

Letters: Marx-Engels Correspondence 1888

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1888/letters/88_08_31.htm

Dear Sorge: We arrived here yesterday, after having had to turn about between Toronto and Kingston because of a storm (it was merely a trifling breeze) and tie up in Port Hope. Thus the two days from Toronto to here turned into three. The St. Lawrence and the rapids are very pretty. Canada is richer in ruined houses than any other country but Ireland. We are trying here to understand the Canadian French that language beats Yankee English hollow. This evening we leave for Plattsburg and then into the Adirondacks and possibly to the Catskills, so that we can hardly be back in New York by Sunday. Since we must board our ship Tuesday evening and still have to see various sights in New York, while we must all be together during these last few days more than would otherwise be necessary, Schorlemmer and I will not be able to move out to you in Hoboken, much as we regret it, but must go to the St. Nicholas with the Avelings. In any event we are coming out to visit you as soon as we get there. It is a strange transition from the States to Canada. First one imagines that one is in Europe again, and then one thinks one is in a positively retrogressing and decaying country. Here one sees how necessary the feverish speculative spirit of the Americans is for the rapid development of a new country (if capitalist production is taken as a basis); and in ten years this sleepy Canada will be ripe for annexation the farmers in Manitoba, etc., will demand it themselves. Besides, the country is half-annexed already socially hotels, newspapers, advertising, etc., all on the American pattern. And they may tug and resist as much as they like; the economic necessity of an infusion of Yankee blood will have its way and abolish this ridiculous boundary line and when the time comes, John Bull will say Amen to the matter.

Letters: Marx-Engels Correspondence 1888

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1888/letters/88_09_10.htm

Seeing the constant interest you take in the questions raised with regard to the coming International Working Men s Congress, I hope you will allow a Frenchman and a Member of the so-called Marxist Organisation of France (Agglom ration Parisienne), to say a few words in reply to a circular published in the Bulletin of the Paris Labour Exchange and reproduced in English, in justice of April 27th. Now the Paris Labour Exchange is an out and out Possibilist institution. They have got hold of it with the help of the Opportunist and Radical Members of the Paris Town Council, and every trades union which dares openly oppose Possibilist principles and tactics, is at once excluded. This above mentioned circular, though issued in the name of 78 Paris Trades Unions, is therefore quite as much a Possibilist production as if issued by the Possibilist Committee themselves. This circular calls upon all the working class organisations of France, without distinction of the shades of Republican or Socialist opinion, to join in the Possibilist Congress. Now this seems fair enough. And as our section of the French Socialists has driven the Possibilists entirely out of the provinces, so much so that they dared not attend their own Congress at Troyes, as soon they heard that we were to be admitted, and as our organisations in the provinces are by far more numerous than all the Possibilist organisations in France put together, no doubt we should have the majority of French delegates even in this Possibilist Congress, if a fair basis of representation was secured. But there s the rub. The Possibilist Committee have made heaps of regulations for their Congress, but this most important point is never mentioned. Nobody knows whether each group is to send one, two, or more delegates, or whether the number of delegates is to be regulated by the number of members in each group. Now, as the Possibilists are acknowledged to be strongest in Paris, they might send two or three delegates for each group, where we, in our simplicity, send only one. They may manufacture as many delegates as they like. They have them ready at hand in Paris, and need merely nominate them. And thus, with all this apparent fairness, the French section of the Congress may be turned into a packed set of Possibilists, who might treat us as they liked, unless we had an appeal to the Congress. For this reason alone we could not give up the sovereignty of t e Congress with regard to all its internal concerns, if, indeed, that first and fundamental principle could be given up. It is not quite forgotten in London yet, I believe, that the Parliamentary Committee, last November, made it pretty clearly understood that they had hired the room, and that the Congress was there at their sufferance and we do not want to have that repeated in Paris.

Works of Frederick Engels 1889

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1889/05/04.htm

The German miners strike is an immense event for us. Like the miners in England in the Chartist times, the colliers of Germany are the last to join the movement, and this is their first start. The movement began in the Westfalian coalfield in the North a district producing 45 million tons annually, and not yet half-developed, coal having been bored at a depth of 500 yards. These miners hitherto good subjects, patriotic, obedient, and religious, and furnishing some of the finest infantry for the VII. army corps (I know them well, my native place is only 6 or 7 miles south of the coalfields), have now been thoroughly aroused by the oppression of their capitalists. While the mines almost all joint stock concerns paid enormous dividends, the real wages of the men were constantly being reduced, the nominal weekly wages were kept up, in some cases even raised in appearance, by forcing the men to work enormous overtime in place of single shifts of 8 hours they worked from 12 to 16 hours, thus making from 9 to 12 shifts weekly. Truck shops, disguised under the name of Co-operative shops, prevailed. Cheating, on the quantity of coal got by rejecting whole truckfuls of coal as being bad or not properly filled, was the rule. Well, since last winter, the men have given notice several times that they would strike unless this was remedied, but to no purpose, and at last they did strike, after having given due notice of their intention, and the owners lie when they maintain the contrary. In a week 70,000 men were out, and the masters had to feed the strike, for they paid wages once a month only, and always kept one month s wages in hand which they now had to fork out to the strikers. The masters were thus caught in their own net. Well, the men sent that celebrated deputation to the Emperor a snobby, conceited coxcomb of a boy who received them with a threatening speech; if they turned towards the social democrat and reviled the authorities, he would have them shot down without mercy. (That had in fact been tried already at Bochum, where a sublieutenant, a lad of 19, ordered his men to fire on the strikers, most of them fired in the air.) But all the same, the whole empire trembled before these men on strike. The military commander of the district went to the spot, so did the Home Secretary, and everything was tried to bring the masters round to make concession. The Emperor even told them to open their pockets, and said in a council of ministers My soldiers are there to keep order, but not to provide big profits to the mine-owners. Well, by the intervention of the Liberal Opposition (who have lost one seat in Parliament after another by the workmen passing over to us) a compromise was effected, and the men returned to work. But no sooner were they in than the masters broke their word, discharged some of the ringleaders (though they had agreed not to do so), refused arranging for overtime by agreement with the men, as agreed upon, etc. The strike threatened to break out again, but the matter is still in suspense, and, I am sure, the Government, who are in a devil of a funk, will make them give in at least for a time. Then the strike spread to Coalfield No. II. and III. This district has been kept, so far, free from Socialist contagion, as every man who went there to agitate, when caught in the meshes of the law, got as many years imprisonment as he would have got months anywhere else in Germany. The Government alone made concessions to the men, but whether these will suffice remains to be seen. Then the men in the Saxon Coalfield, and in the two Siberian Coalfields, still further east, took up the tune, so that in the last three weeks there have been at least 120,000 colliers on strike in Germany, and from them the Belgian and Bohemian miners caught the infection, while in Germany a number of other trades who had prepared strikes for this spring season, have also left work. Thus there is no doubt the German colliers have joined their brethren in the struggle against capital, and as they are a splendid body of men, and almost all have passed through the army, they form an important addition to our ranks. Their belief in emperor and priest has been shattered, and whatever the Government may do, no Government can give satisfaction to the men without upsetting the capitalist system and that the German Government neither can nor will attempt. It is the first time that the Government had to pretend to observe an impartial position in a strike in Germany: so its virginity in that respect has gone for ever, and both William and Bismarck had to bow before the array of 100,000 working men on strike. That alone is a glorious result.

Works of Frederick Engels 1889

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1889/06/01.htm

The partisans of the Possibilist Paris Congress the unmistakeable Mr. Smith Hedingley in the Star, Mr. H. Burrows and Mrs. Besant in the weekly Press are repeating over and over again that their Congress was a really representative one, while the Marxist Congress contained people who represented only themselves, and for that reason dared not accept the challenge of the Possibilists to show them their credentials. The English delegates to the Marxist Congress will no doubt seek, and find, an opportunity to prove the untruth of the charges brought against them; so we may for the present dismiss that part of the subject, and merely observe that the Possibilists could hardly offer a greater insult to the Marxist Congress than to ask it to ignore the process of the verification of its own credentials, completed as far back as the second (or third?) day, and to submit their credentials to a fresh examination; while the Possibilists, in their resolution on the subject, carefully avoided engaging themselves to an examination of their credentials by the Marxists. That the above is the correct view of the matter, and that the Possibilists, much more than the Marxists, had reason to show their credentials to none but friends, was proved by the observations of Dr. Adler, in the Marxist Congress, of what he had learnt about the Austrian Possibilist delegates. As the thing is characteristic of the way in which the Possibilists manufactured truly representative delegates, it deserves reproduction. In the Possibilist list of delegates we find under Austria the following bodies represented: Bakers Union of Vienna, Federation of Upper Austria and Salzburg, Federation of Workingmen of Bohemia-Moravia, and Silesia. Now Dr. Adler, who has during the last three years, with wonderful energy, tact, and perseverance, reorganised the Socialist movement in Austria, and who knows every workmen s society in every town in Austria, told the Congress that these various societies, whatever may be their other merits, have one fatal defect: they do not exist. When it became known in Paris that the Marxist Congress had met on the Sunday, and that there were delegates from Austria, there came to it on the Monday two Austrians and saw Dr. Adler. They told him they were bakers, for some time past working in Paris; that a Hungarian baker, of the name of Dobosy, had engaged them as delegates for a workingmen s congress; was this the same congress? Adler questioned them and found out that they were engaged for the Possibilist Congress, for which they had cards of membership; that they had told the people who had engaged them that they represented absolutely nobody but themselves, that they were told that did not matter, Austria being a despotic country, regular credentials were not required; that they now found the true Austrian delegates were at the other Congress; what were they to do? The Austrian delegates told them they had no business to play at delegates at any Congress. Well, they arranged for another interview. They came again a day or two after, assisted at the meeting of the Marxist Congress, and then declared they saw themselves they must get out of this false position, but how? They were told to return their credentials. They had none. Then return your cards of membership. This they promised to do, and returned to say they had done so. This is a sample of what the Possibilists and their English partisans call strictly representative. And the imposing list of Hungarian societies with names so well hidden under misprints that only with a few of them is the pretended locality recognizable, are, according to the true Hungarian delegates at the Marxist Congress, equally non-existent outside the wonderland of Possibilist fancy. Indeed, the concoction here is too flagrant. Circles of Social Study and Federation of Croatia, Slavonia, Dalmatia, Trieste, and Fiume this pompous title bears the stamp of its Parisian origin too conspicuously. And to think that behind all this there are not even the three tailors of Tooley Street! We are further told that it is absolutely false that the Possibilist Congress was a mere Trades Unions Congress. Mr. Herbert Burrows is quite indignant at such a calumny; with the exception of a few English Trades Unionists the whole of the delegates were revolutionary Socialists, and as such represented their respective societies. Well, to give but one example, what does El Socialista, of Madrid (26th July) say of the Spanish Possibilist delegates? That they say they represent 20,000 Socialists, when they are but delegates of societies in which there is room for the Carlist as well as for the revolutionary Socialist entirely non-political clubs, in fact, what is called, in England, Trades Unions.

Works of Frederick Engels 1889

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1889/08/10.htm

I envy you your work in the Dock Strike. It is the movement of the greatest promise we have had for years, and I am proud and glad to have lived to see it. If Marx had lived to witness this! If these poor downtrodden men, the dregs of the proletariat, these odds and ends of all trades, fighting every morning at the dock gates for an engagement, if they can combine, and terrify by their resolution the mighty Dock Companies, truly then we need not despair of any section of the working class. This is the beginning of real life in the East End, and if successful will transform the whole character of the East End. There for want of self-confidence, and of organisation among the poor devils grovelling in stagnant misery lasciate ogni speranza. ... If the dockers get organised, all other sections will follow. ... It is a glorious movement and again I envy those that can share in the work.

Works of Engels 1889

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1889/08/26.htm

I am returning herewith the Neue Zeit article with cursory marginal comments. Main shortcoming: lack of good material Taine and Tocqueville, idolized by the philistines, are inadequate here. If you had done the job here you would have found quite different material a better kind second-hand and loads of it first-hand. Besides, the best work on the peasants is by N. Kareyev [The Peasants and the Peasant Question in France during the Last Quarter of the Eighteenth Century Ed.] in Russian. However if you can get there Moreau de Jonn s, The Economic and Social System of France from Henry IV to Louis XIV, Paris 1868, you will find it useful reading. Section II, p. 3. Here there is missing a lucid exposition of how the absolute monarchy came into existence as a naturally evolved compromise between nobility and bourgeoisie and how it therefore had to protect certain interests of both sides and distribute favours to them. In this process the nobility retired politically got as its share the plundering of the peasantry and of the state treasury and indirect political influence through the court, the army, the church, and the higher administrative authorities, while the bourgeoisie received protection through tariffs, monopolies and a relatively orderly administration of public affairs and justice. If you start with these things much will become clearer and easier. Another thing missing in this section is mention of the judicial nobility (noblesse de robe) and the jurists la robe in general, who actually also formed a privileged estate and possessed great power in the parliaments vis- -vis the Crown. In their political capacity they acted as the defenders of the institutions that limited the authority of the Crown, hence sided with the people, but in their judicial capacity they were corruption incarnate (cf. the M moirs of Beaumarchais). What you say later on about this gang is not enough. On p. 50 this kind of bourgeois suddenly transforms himself into the bourgeois par excellence, which sharply contravenes the stratification of the bourgeois class, the subject under discussion. You generalize altogether too much, on account of which you often become absolute where the greatest relativity is imperative. I would say much less about the new mode of production. An enormous gulf always separates it from the facts you speak of, and presented in this direct form it appears as a pure abstraction which does not make the thing clearer but rather more obscure. As for the terror it was essentially a war measure so long as there was any sense to it. The class or the factional group of the class which alone could safeguard the victory of the revolution not only maintained itself in power by this means (that was the least after victory over the revolts) but ensured itself freedom of motion, elbow-room, the possibility of concentrating forces at the decisive spot, the border. At the end of 1793 that was already fairly secure; 1794 started well. French armies scored progress almost everywhere. The Commune with its extreme course became superfluous. Its propagation of revolution became a hindrance to Robespierre as well as to Danton both of whom, but each in his own way, wanted peace. From this conflict of three elements Robespierre emerged victorious, but now terror became in his hands a means of self-preservation and thus absurd. On June 26 Jourdan at Fleurus laid the whole of Belgium at the feet of the republic. Thereby terror became untenable. On July 27 Robespierre fell and the bourgeois orgy began. Well-being for all on the basis of labour still expresses much too definitely the aspirations of the plebeian fraternit of that time. No one could tell what they wanted until long after the fall of the Commune Babeuf gave the thing definite shape. Whereas the Commune with its aspirations for fraternity came too early, Babeuf in his turn came too late. The section on the peasantry suffers most because of the lack of all but the most ordinary sources. The blunders made by Ranke you showed up well. [In the above article Kautsky criticized Ranke s work Epochs of Modern History. Ed.] Unfortunately you did not make use of the Austrian publications with their objections, which are given by Sybel. Much relating to the second partition of Poland, etc. could still be dug up out of them and as they are based on archive material they are absolutely fit to use.... The conception of a fourth estate alongside the first, second, and third arose very early in the revolution. At the very beginning appeared Dufourny de Villiers, Mandate of the 4th estate, that of poor day labourers, invalids, indigents, etc., the estate of the disinherited, April 25, 1789. But the fourth estate is mostly taken to mean the peasants. For example Noilliac, The strongest of the pamphlets. The estate of the peasants in the States General, February 26, 1789, p. 9: Let us take the four estates from the Swedish constitution. Vertout, Letter of a peasant to his priest on a new way of summoning the States General. Sartrouville, 1789, p. 7: I heard it said that in a certain northern country ... the estate of the peasantry is admitted to the States-Assembled. One also comes across other interpretations of the fourth estate. One pamphlet argues for a fourth estate of the merchants, another pleads for one of the judiciary, etc. Kareyev, The Peasants and the Peasant Question in France in the Last Quarter of the Eighteenth Century, Moscow 1879, p. 327. It is significant that the number of impoverished persons (nischich, nischyi means poorest of the poor) was greatest in the provinces which were considered the most fertile, because in these localities there were very few peasants who owned land. But let the figures speak for themselves. In Argentr (Brittany) more than half of the population of 2,300 not earning a living in industry or trade can hardly keep the wolf from the door and over 500 people have been reduced to mendicancy. In Dainville (Artois) 60 out of 130 families are impoverished. Paule 200 farms, most of which should by rights be called refuges for beggars (National Archives, Vol. IV, p. 17). The mandate of Marboeuf parish bewails the fact that of the 500 inhabitants about 100 are beggars (Boivin-Champeaux, Historical Notes on the Revolution in the Eure Department, 1872, p. 83). The peasants of the village of Harville relate that on account of unemployment a full third of them are utterly destitute (Petition of the inhabitants of the Harville commune, National Archives). Nor were things any better in the towns. In 1787 Lyons had 30,000 pauperized workers. In Paris the population of 650,000 included 118,784 indigents (Taine, Vol. I, p. 507). In Rennes one out of three begged alms for a living and another third was constantly threatened with pauperization (Du Chatellier, Agriculture in Brittany, Paris 1863, p. 178). The little Jura town of Lons-de-Saunier was so pauperized that when the Constituent Assembly introduced qualifications for voters only 728 of its 6,518 inhabitants could be listed as active citizens (Sommier, History of the Revolution in the Jura, Paris 1846, p. 33). No wonder then that at the time of revolution charity cases were counted by the million. Thus a clerical pamphlet of 1791 stated that there were 6 million paupers in France ( Counsel to the Poor on the Present Revolution and on the Property of the Clergy, p. 15), which however is somewhat exaggerated; but the figure of 1,200,000 paupers given for 1774 is perhaps not underrated (Duval, Mandates of the Marche, Paris 1873, p. 116). (I thought you might like to have a few real illustrations.) If my remarks sound curt please consider that as being due solely to lack of time and marginal space on the paper. I had no time to compare sources, had to rely in everything on my memory hence many things are not as definite as I would have liked them to be.

Letters: Engels To Karl Kautsky February 20, 1889

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1889/letters/89_02_20.htm

My dear Lafargue, We have never called you anything but the so-called Marxists and I would not know how else to describe you. Should you have some other, equally succinct name, let us know and we shall duly and gladly apply it to you. But we cannot say aggregate , which no one here would understand, or anti-Possibilists, which you would find just as objectionable and which would not be accurate, being too all-embracing. Tussy must have returned you your letter to the Star yesterday. Since Tussy s translation of the Convocation had already been in the hands of the Star the day before that, your paraphrase of the said document stood no earthly chance of being inserted. What we need are letters from Paris, sent direct to the Star, bearing the Paris postmark and refuting the Possibilist calumnies which appeared in Saturday s and Tuesday s editions, namely, that Boul s election campaign was run on Boulangist money, that Vaillant had acted as an ally of the Boulangists, etc. I should say that you could do this perfectly well without ruffling your newly-found dignity as the one and only Catholic Church in matters connected with French Socialism. No other daily is so widely read by working men as the Star the only one to which we have a measure of free access. In Paris, Massingham had Adolphe Smith for his guide and interpreter and was steered by him into the arms of Brousse and Co., who took possession of him, refused to let him go, made him tipsy with absinthe and vermouth, and thus succeeded in winning over the Star to the cause of their congress and making it swallow their lies. If you wish us to be of use to you over here, you must help us regain some influence over the Star by demonstrating that the course which it has been led to embark upon is a dangerous one and that, in fact, Brousse and Co. have been feeding it with lies. And here nothing will serve but letters of complaint about such articles, sent direct from Paris. Otherwise we shall be told as before that no one in Paris has complained, hence these things must be true. Aside from the Star we have only the Labour Elector, a very obscure and distinctly shady paper which depends on money from unavowed sources and is therefore highly suspect. You could most assuredly do with a bit of publicity here in England, so bombard the Star with complaints you, Vaillant, Longuet, Deville, Guesde and tutti quanti. But if you leave us in the lurch, you can t complain if your congress is passed over in silence by the press and if the Possibilists are regarded over here as the only French Socialists and yourselves as a worthless clique of intriguers and nincompoops. For the past three months Tussy and I have done virtually nothing but labour on your behalf; we had won the first battle with Bernstein s pamphlet, when Liebknecht s inertia and irresolution lost us in rapid succession all the positions we had previously gained. Now that we are back on the defensive and threatened with the loss of even those positions we originally held, it is very hard to find ourselves similarly abandoned by the French when a few letters, however short, arriving at the right moment, could prove so very effective. But if you are bent on losing all means of publicity in England at the very time when it could be of greatest moment to you, there s nothing we can do about it; I, for one will certainly have learnt my lesson; I shall go back to Volume 3, abandoned for the past three months, and shall not be unduly upset if the congress comes to nothing. To organise lodgings and eating-places for the delegates is an excellent idea Bebel wrote and told me about it and, since Paris in July will be positively swarming with people, this is of the utmost importance. We shall have Laura s English translation printed. As for the German translation, one has appeared in the Sozialdemokrat of which one sentence towards the end was amended by Bernstein (No. 3 in your invitation) as being too dangerous for the Germans. Send the French text of the Convocation which is to be signed by everyone to Bebel and Liebknecht so that they can let you know what passages they cannot sign without compromising themselves in the eyes of the law, for otherwise you will run the risk of not getting any German signatures. I shall wait until I have heard from Bebel before printing the German translation here, and shall first submit to you the changes he suggests. It is some time since Labusqui re s name has appeared in the Possibilist press can he, too, have joined the ranks of the malcontents? The incipient disorganisation of the Possibilists is undoubtedly agreeable to ourselves, but our onslaughts upon them, combined with the congress, may well bring about a return to unity. In any case, the disintegration is not yet so far advanced as to make any impact on the Possibilists allies abroad. Herewith cheque for 20. As for Ferry s coup d' tat, it might well fall, for in 1889 the foot-slogger is much more of a Boulangist than he was a Republican when he disrupted MacMahon s coup. The worthy Boulanger would not be so stupid as to evoke a call to arms over the High Court affair, but the same might not apply if there were to be a direct violation of the Constitution. That Ferry will not surrender power, direct or indirect, without a struggle, I can readily believe. But there is a risk.

Letters: Frederick Engels Correspondence 1889

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1889/letters/89_05_11.htm

My dear Laura, At last, I can find a few minutes for a quiet chat with you. And first of all let me thank you for your charming invitation to Le Perreux for the Congress. But I am afraid I shall have as yet to delay accepting it. There are two things which I avoid visiting on principle, and only go to on compulsion: congresses and exhibitions. The din and throng of your world s fair , to speak the slang of the respectable Britisher, is anything but an attraction for me, and from the Congress I must keep away in any case; that would launch me in a new agitation campaign, and I should come back here with a load of tasks, for the benefit of a variety of nationalities, that would keep me busy for a couple of years. Those things one cannot decline at a congress, and yet I must, if the 3rd volume is to see the light of day. For more than 3 months I have not been able to look at it, and it is too late now to begin before the holidays I intend taking; nor am I sure that my congress troubles are quite over. So if I do not come over to Le Perreux this year, aufgeschoben ist nicht aufgehoben, but this summer I shall take a little rest in a quiet seaside place and try to put myself in condition again to be able to smoke a cigar which I have not done for more than two months, about a gramme of tobacco every other day being as much as I can stand but I sleep again, and a moderate drink does no longer affect me unpleasantly. Here is a bit of news for Paul; Sam Moore gives us tonight a parting dinner, he sails on Saturday for the Niger, where, at As ba, in the interior of Africa, he will be Chief Justice of the Territories of the Royal Niger Company, Chartered and Limited, with six months leave to Europe every other year, good pay, and the expectation of returning in 8 years or so an independent man. It was chiefly in honour of Paul that he consented to become Lord Chief Justice of the Niger Niggers, the very cream of Nigrition Niger Nigerdom. We are all very sorry to lose him, but he has been looking out for something of the sort for more than a year and this is an excellent place. He owes his appointment not only to his legal qualifications, but very much, also, to his being an accomplished geologist and botanist and ex-volunteer officer all qualities very valuable in a new country. He will have a botanical garden, and make a meteorological station; his judicial duties will mainly consist in punishing German smugglers of Bismarck s potato spirit and of arms and ammunition. The climate is far better than its reputation, and his medical examination was highly satisfactory, the doctor telling him he would have a better chance than young men who kill themselves out of pure ennui with whisky and black harems. Thus when the 3rd volume comes out, a portion, at least, of it will be translated in Africa as I shall send him the advance sheets. To return to our beloved congress. I consider these congresses to be unavoidable evils in the movement; people will insist on playing at congresses, and though they have their useful demonstrative side, and do good in bringing people of different countries together, it is doubtful whether le jeu vaut la chandelle when there are serious differences. But the persistent efforts of the Possibilists and Hyndmanites to sneak into the leadership of a new International, by means of their congresses, made a struggle unavoidable for us, and here is the only point in which I agree with Brousse: that it is the old split in the International over again, which now drives people into two opposite camps. On one side the disciples of Bakunin, with a different flag but with all the old equipment and tactics, a set of intriguers and humbugs who try to boss the working class movement for their own private ends; on the other side the real working-class movement. And it was this, and this alone that made me take the matter up in such good earnest. Debates about details of legislation do not interest me to such a degree. But the position reconquered upon the Anarchists after 1873 was now attacked by their successors, and so I had no choice. Now we have been victorious, we have proved to the world that almost all Socialists in Europe are Marxists (they will be mad they gave us that name!) and they are left alone in the cold with Hyndman to console them. And now I hope my services are no longer required. As they have nobody to come to them, they fall back upon non-Socialist or half-Socialist Trades Unions and thus their congress will have a quite distinct character from ours. That makes the question of fusion a secondary one; two such congresses may sit side by side, without scandal. My dear Laura, I was going to write a lot more, but I cannot see hardly, it is so foggy, and thus I had to interrupt for brighter intervals, until now it is post-time. So I can but enclose the cheque 10. about which Paul writes. As to money for Congress, the Germans ought to do something if I can, will write to Paul about that tomorrow. Ever yours

Letters: Frederick Engels Correspondence 1889

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1889/letters/89_06_11.htm

Furthermore, for lack of organisation and because of the passive vegetative existence of the real workers in the East End, the gutter proletariat has had the main say there so far. It has behaved like and has been considered the typical representative of the million of starving East Enders. That will now cease. The huckster and those like him will be forced into the background, the East End worker will be able to develop his own type and make it count by means of organisation. This is of enormous value for the movement. Scenes like those which occurred during Hyndman s procession through Pall Mall and Piccadilly will then become impossible and the rowdy who will want to provoke a riot will simply be knocked dead. In brief, it is an event. You can tell the stunning effect this thing has had by the way even the dastardly Daily News handles it. It s the same as the miners strike was for us: a new section enters the movement, a new corps of workers. And the bourgeois who only five years ago would have cursed and sworn must now applaud, albeit dejectedly, while and because his heart is palpitating with fear and trepidation. Hurrah!

Letters: Marx-Engels Correspondence 1889

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1889/letters/89_08_22.htm

Another great fact is the Dock Labourers strike. They are, as you know, the most miserable of all the miserable of the East End, the broken down ones of all trades, the lowest stratum above the Lumpenproletariat. That these poor famished broken down creatures who bodily fight amongst each other every morning for admission to work, should organise for resistance, turn out 40-50,000 strong, draw after them into the strike all and every trade of the East End in any way connected with shipping, hold out above a week, and terrify the wealthy and powerful dock companies that is a revival I am proud erlebt zu haben. And they have even bourgeois opinion on their side: the merchants, who suffer severely from this interruption of traffic, do not blame the workmen, but the obstinate Dock companies. So that if they hold out another week they are almost sure of victory. And all this strike is worked and led by our people, by Burns and Mann, and the Hyndmanites are nowhere in it.

Letters: Marx-Engels Correspondence 1889

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1889/letters/89_08_27.htm

Cannot write much being Sunday and our people always in and out; moreover have to write to Tussy about the strike which was in an important crisis yesterday. As the dock directors kept stubborn, our people were led to a very foolish resolution. They had outstripped their means of relief and had to announce that on Saturday no relief could be dealt out to strikers. In order to make this go down that is the way at least I take it they declared that if the dock directors had not caved in by Saturday noon, on Monday there would be a general strike reckoning chiefly on the supposition that the Gas works for want of coal or of workmen or both would come to a stand and London be in darkness and this threat was to terrify all into submission to the demands of the men. Now this was playing va banque, staking 1,000 to win, possibly, 10 ; it was threatening more than they could carry out; it was creating millions of hungry mouths for no reason but because they had some tens of thousands on hand which they could not feed; it was casting away willfully all the sympathies of the shopkeepers and even of the great mass of the bourgeoisie who all hated the dock monopolists, but who now would at once turn against the workmen. In fact it was such a declaration of despair and such a desperate game that I wrote to Tussy at once; if this is persisted in, the Dock Co. s have only to hold out till Wednesday and they will be victorious. Fortunately they have thought better of it. Not only has the threat been provisionally withdrawn but they have even acceded to the demands of the wharfingers (in some respect competitors of the docks), have reduced their demands for an increase of wages, and this has again been rejected by the Dock Companies. This I think will secure them the victory. The threat with the general strike will now have a salutary effect, and the generosity of the workmen, both in withdrawing it and in acceding to a compromise, will secure them fresh sympathy and help.

Letters: Marx-Engels Correspondence 1889

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1889/letters/89_09_01.htm

Since the Dock Strike Tussy has become quite an East Ender, organising Trades Unions and supporting strikes last Sunday we did not see her at all, as she had to speechify both morning and night. These new Trades Unions of unskilled men and women are totally different from the old organisations of the working-class aristocracy and cannot fall into the same conservative ways; they are too poor, too shaky and too much composed of unstable elements, for anyone of these unskilled people may change his trade any day. And they are organised under quite different circumstances all the leading men and women are Socialists, and socialist agitators too. In them I see the real beginning of the movement here.

Letters: Marx-Engels Correspondence 1889

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1889/letters/89_10_17.htm

Anyhow you have done a marvellous thing in the Senator, about the most difficult thing on earth to be put into English. Not only that you have done it with all the proper impropriety, but even with a near approach to the lightness of the original. And that while both subject and metre are rebellious to translation, the senator of Empire No. 142 being an unknown quantity over here. If you were a boy I should say: Molodetz, but I am not versed enough in Russian to know whether that epithet (equal about to the English: you're a brick!) can be feminised into: Molodtza!

Letters: Marx-Engels Correspondence 1893

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1889/letters/89_11_16.htm

In my opinion (and that of Marx) the book contains the first specific and correct account, based on a study of the archives, of the critical Period of the French Revolution, namely from 10 August to 9 Thermidor. Cloots and the Commune of Paris were for the propagandist war as the only means of salvation, whereas the Committee of Public Safety behaved like regular statesmen, were frightened of the European coalition and tried to get peace by dividing the allied powers. Danton wanted peace with England, that is with Fox and the English opposition, who hoped to come into power at the elections; Robespierre intrigued with Austria and Prussia at Basle in the hope of coming to an understanding with them. Both united against the Commune in order above all to overthrow the people who wanted the propagandist war and the republicanisation of Europe. They succeeded. The Commune (H bert, Cloots, etc.) was beheaded. But from that time onwards agreement became impossible between those who wanted to conclude peace only with England and those who wanted to conclude it only with the German powers. The English elections turned in favour of Pitt, Fox was shut out of the government for years, this ruined Danton's position, Robespierre was victorious and beheaded him. But and Avenel has not sufficiently stressed this while the reign of terror was now intensified to a pitch of insanity, because it was necessary in order to keep Robespierre in power under the existing internal conditions, it was rendered entirely superfluous by the victory of Fleurus on 24 June, 1794, which freed not only the frontiers but Belgium, and indirectly delivered over the left bank of the Rhine to France. Thus Robespierre also became superfluous and fell on July 27. The whole French Revolution is dominated by the War of Coalition, all its pulsations depend upon it. If the allied army penetrates into France predominant activity of the vagus nerves, violent heartbeat, revolutionary crisis. If it is driven back predominance of the sympathetic nerves, the heartbeat becomes slower, the reactionary elements again push themselves into the foreground; the plebeians, the beginning of the later proletariat, whose energy alone has saved the revolution, are brought to reason and order. The tragedy is that the party supporting war to the bitter end, war for the emancipation of the nations, is proved in the right, and that the Republic gets the better of all Europe, but only after that party itself has long been beheaded; while in place of the propagandist war comes the Peace of Basle and the bourgeois orgy of the Directory. The book must be completely revised and shortened the rhetoric cut out, the facts taken from the ordinary histories supplemented and clearly emphasised. Cloots, meanwhile, can be put quite into the background, the most important things from the Lundis r volut can be inserted and we may get a work on the revolution such as has never existed up till now. ... An explanation of how the battle of Fleurus put an end to the reign of terror was published in the (first) Rheinische Zeitung in 1842 by KF Koppen in an excellent criticism of H Leo s Geschichte der franz sischen Revolution [History of the French Revolution]. Best regards to your wife and Louise Kautsky

Letters: Marx-Engels Correspondence 1889

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1889/letters/89_12_04.htm

Letters of 8 and 29 October received. Thanks. Things won t turn out so well that the Socialist Labor Party will go into liquidation. Rosenberg has a lot of heirs besides Schewitsch, and the conceited doctrinaire Germans over there certainly have no desire to give up the position they have arrogated to themselves to teach the immature Americans. Otherwise they would be nobodies. ... Here in England one can see that it is impossible simply to drill a theory in an abstract dogmatic way into a great nation, even if one has the best of theories, developed out of their own conditions of life, and even if the tutors are relatively better than the S.L.P. [Socialist Labour Party of North America.] The movement has now got going at last and I believe for good. But it is not directly Socialist, and those English who have understood our theory best remain outside it: Hyndman because he is incurably jealous and intriguing, Bax because he is only a bookworm. Formally the movement is at the moment a trade union movement, but utterly different from that of the old trade unions, the skilled labourers, the aristocracy of labour. The people are throwing themselves into the job in quite a different way, are leading far more colossal masses into the fight, are shaking society much more deeply, are putting forward much more far-reaching demands: eight-hour day, general federation of all organisations, complete solidarity. Thanks to Tussy [Eleanor Marx Aveling] women s branches have been formed for the first time in the Gas Workers and General Labourers Union. Moreover, the people only regard their immediate demands themselves as provisional, although they themselves do not know as yet what final aim they are working for. But this dim idea is strongly enough rooted to make them choose only openly declared Socialists as their leaders. Like everyone else they will have to learn by their own experiences and the consequences of their own mistakes. But as, unlike the old trade unions, they greet every suggestion of an identity of interest between capital and labour with scorn and ridicule this will not take very long. I hope the next general election will be deferred for another three years 1. So that during the period of the greatest war danger Gladstone, the lackey of the Russians, should not be at the head of affairs; this might already be a sufficient reason for the Tsar [Alexander III] to provoke a war. 2. So that the anti-Conservative majority becomes so large that real Home Rule for Ireland becomes a necessity, otherwise Gladstone will cheat the Irish again, and this obstacle the Irish question will not be cleared away. 3. However, so that the labour movement may develop further and perhaps mature more rapidly as a result of the set-back caused by the business recession which will certainly follow the present period of prosperity. The next parliament may then comprise 20 to 40 labour deputies, and moreover of a very different kind from the Potters, Cremers and Co. The most repulsive thing here is the bourgeois respectability which has grown deep into the bones of the workers. The division of society into a scale of innumerable degrees, each recognised without question, each with its own pride but also its native respect for its betters and superiors, is so old and firmly established that the bourgeois still find it pretty easy to get their bait accepted. I am not at all sure, for instance, that John Burns is not secretly prouder of his popularity with Cardinal Manning, the Lord Mayor and the bourgeoisie in general than of his popularity with his own class. And Champion an ex-lieutenant has intrigued for years with bourgeois and especially with conservative elements, preached Socialism at the parsons Church Congress, etc. Even Tom Mann, whom I regard as the finest of them, is fond of mentioning that he will be lunching with the Lord Mayor. If one compares this with the French, one can see what a revolution is good for after all. However, it will not help the bourgeoisie much if they do succeed in enticing some of the leaders into their toils. The movement has been far enough strengthened for this sort of thing to be overcome.

Letters: Marx-Engels Correspondence 1889

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1889/letters/89_12_07.htm

That the Social-Democratic party of Germany was sure to obtain a startling success at the general election of 1890 could not be doubted by any one who had followed the political development of that country for the last decade. In 1878 the German Socialists were placed under rigorous coercion laws, in virtue of which all their newspapers had been suppressed, their meetings stopped or dissolved, their organisation annihilated, their every attempt to re-form it punished as a secret society, sentences summing up to more than a thousand years imprisonment having thus been pronounced against members of the party. Nevertheless, they succeeded in smuggling into the country, and regularly distributing every week some 10,000 copies of their organ printed abroad, the Sozialdemokrat, and thousands upon thousands of pamphlets; they succeeded in penetrating into the German Parliament (nine members) and into innumerable town councils, amongst others that of Berlin. The growing strength of the party was evident even to its most embittered enemies. Yet such a success as they have scored on the 20th February must surprise even the most sanguine among themselves. Twenty-one seats conquered: that is to say, in twenty electoral districts they proved stronger than all other parties put together. Fifty-eight second ballots, that is to say, in 58 districts they are either the strongest, or the strongest but one. of all parties which have put forward candidates, and the fresh election will finally decide between the two candidates who had the greatest number, while neither had the absolute majority of votes. As to the total number of Socialist votes given, we can only make an approximate estimate. In 1871 they summed up not more than 102,000; in 1877, 493,000; in 1884, 550,000; in 1887, 763,000; in 1890, they cannot be less than 1,250,000, and may be considerably more. The strength of the party has increased in three years by at least 60-70 per cent. In 1887 there were but three parties with more than a million voters, the National Liberals, 1,678,000; the Centre or Catholic party, 1,516,000; and the Conservatives, 1,147,000. This time the Centre will hold its own, the Conservatives have lost a good deal, and the National Liberals have lost enormously. Thus the Socialists will still be outnumbered by the Centre, but they will either fully come up to, or outnumber, the National Liberals as well as the Conservatives. This election establishes a complete revolution in the state of parties in Germany. It will indeed inaugurate a new epoch in the history of that country. It marks the beginning of the end of the Bismarck period. The situation, at the present moment, is as follows. With his rescripts on labour legislation and international labour conferences, young William broke loose from his mentor Bismarck. The latter thought it prudent to give his young master plenty of rope, and to wait quietly until William II, had got himself into a mess with his hobby of playing the working man s friend: then would be the time for Bismarck to step in as the deus ex machina. This time Bismarck did not care much how the elections went; an unmanageable Reichstag, to be dissolved as soon as the young Emperor had found out his mistake, would be rather an advantage to Bismarck, and considerable Socialist success might help to prepare a good cry to go to the country with when the time for dissolution arrived. And the wily Chancellor, this time, has indeed got a Reichstag that nobody will be able to manage. William II, will very soon find out the impossibility, for a man in his position, and with the present state of mind of both the landed aristocracy and the middle class, of carrying out even a shadow of the objects alluded to in his rescripts, while the elections have already convinced him that the working class of Germany will take anything he may offer them as an instalment, but will not give up one jot of their principles and demands, nor relax in their opposition against a Government which cannot live but by gagging the working majority of the people. Thus, before long there will be a conflict between Emperor and Parliament; the Socialists will be accused, by all rival parties, with being the cause of it all; the new election cry will be there, ready made; and then Bismarck, having given the necessary lesson to his lord and master, will step in and dissolve. But then he will find that things have changed. The Socialist workmen will be stronger and more determined than ever. The aristocracy Bismarck never could rely on; they always considered him as a traitor to true Conservatism, and will be ready to throw him overboard as soon as the Emperor chooses to drop him. The middle class were his mainstay, but they have lost confidence in him. The little family quarrel between Bismarck and the Emperor has come to be publicly known. It has proved that Bismarck is no longer all-powerful, and that the Emperor is not proof against dangerous crotchets. In which of the two, then, is the German middle class Philistine to trust? The wise man is becoming powerless, and the powerful man proves to be unwise. In fact, the confidence in the stability of the order of things established in 1871, a confidence which, as regards the German middle class, was unshakeable while old William reigned, Bismarck governed, and Moltke was at the head of the army that confidence is gone, and gone for ever. The growing load of taxation, the high price of living caused by ridiculous import duties on everything, food as well as manufactured goods, the unbearable burden of military service, the constant and ever-renewed fear of war, and that a war of European dimensions, when 4-5 millions of Germans would have to take up arms all this has done its work in alienating from the Government the peasant, the small tradesman, the workman, in fact the whole nation, with the exception of the few who profit by the State-created monopolies. All this would be borne, as inevitable, so long as old William, Moltke, and Bismarck formed a ruling triumvirate which seemed invincible. But now old William is dead, Moltke is pensioned off, and Bismarck has to face a young Emperor whom he himself filled with an unbounded vanity, who is consequently considering himself a second Frederick the Great, and is, after all, but a conceited coxcomb, eager to shake off the yoke of his Chancellor, and, withal, a plaything in the hands of court intriguers. With such a state of things, the immense pressure upon the people no longer is patiently borne; the old faith in the stability of things is gone; resistance, which formerly appeared hopeless, now becomes a necessity; and thus, unmanageable as this Reichstag seems, maybe it will be far less so than the next. Thus Bismarck very likely is miscalculating his game. If he dissolve, even the spectre rouge, the anti-Socialist cry, may fail him. But then he has one undoubted quality: reckless energy. If it suits him, he may provoke riots and try what effect a little bleeding may have. But then he ought not to forget that at least one-half of the German Socialists have passed through the army. There they have learned the discipline which has enabled them so far to withstand all provocation to riot. But there they have also learnt something more.

Works of Frederick Engels 1890

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1890/03/03.htm

...But whether you might not be doing more harm than good with your anti-Semitism is something I would ask you to consider. For anti-Semitism betokens a retarded culture, which is why it is found only in Prussia and Austria, and in Russia too. Anyone dabbling in anti-Semitism, either in England or in America, would simply be ridiculed, while in Paris the only impression created by M. Drumont s writings wittier by far than those of the German anti-Semites was that of a somewhat ineffectual flash in the pan. Moreover, now that he is standing for the Municipal Council he has actually had to declare himself an opponent of Christian no less than of Jewish capital. And M. Drumont would be read even were he to take the opposite view. In Prussia it is the lesser nobility, the Junkers with an income of 10,000 marks and outgoings of 20,000, and hence subject to usury, who indulge in anti-Semitism, while both in Prussia and Austria a vociferous chorus is provided by those whom competition from big capital has ruined the petty bourgeoisie, skilled craftsmen and small shop-keepers. But in as much as capital, whether Semitic or Aryan, circumcised or baptised, is destroying these classes of society which are reactionary through and through, it is only doing what pertains to its office, and doing it well; it is helping to impel the retarded Prussians and Austrians forward until they eventually attain the present-day level at which all the old social distinctions resolve themselves in the one great antithesis capitalists and wage-labourers. Only in places where this has not yet happened, where there is no strong capitalist class and hence no strong class of wage-labourers, where capital is not yet strong enough to gain control of national production as a whole, so that its activities are mainly confined to the Stock Exchange in other words, where production is still in the hands of the farmers, landowners, craftsmen and suchlike classes surviving from the Middle Ages there, and there alone, is capital mainly Jewish, and there alone is anti-Semitism rife. In North America not a single Jew is to be found among the millionaires whose wealth can, in some cases, scarcely be expressed in terms of our paltry marks, gulden or francs and, by comparison with these Americans, the Rothschilds are veritable paupers. And even in England, Rothschild is a man of modest means when set, for example, against the Duke of Westminster. Even in our own Rhineland from which, with the help of the French, we drove the aristocracy 95 years ago and where we have established modern industry, one may look in vain for Jews. Hence anti-Semitism is merely the reaction of declining medieval social strata against a modern society consisting essentially of capitalists and wage-labourers, so that all it serves are reactionary ends under a purportedly socialist cloak; it is a degenerate form of feudal socialism and we can have nothing to do with that. The very fact of its existence in a region is proof that there is not yet enough capital there. Capital and wage-labour are today indivisible. The stronger capital and hence the wage-earning class becomes, the closer will be the demise of capitalist domination. So what I would wish for us Germans, amongst whom I also count the Viennese, is that the capitalist economy should develop at a truly spanking pace rather than slowly decline into stagnation. In addition, the anti-Semite presents the facts in an entirely false light. He doesn t even know the Jews he decries, otherwise he would be aware that, thanks to anti-Semitism in eastern Europe, and to the Spanish Inquisition in Turkey, there are here in England and in America thousands upon thousands of Jewish proletarians; and it is precisely, these Jewish workers who are the worst exploited and the most poverty-stricken. In England during the past twelve months we have had three strikes by Jewish workers. Are we then expected to engage in anti-Semitism in our struggle against capital? Furthermore, we are far too deeply indebted to the Jews. Leaving aside Heine and B rne, Marx was a full-blooded Jew; Lassalle was a Jew. Many of our best people are Jews. My friend Victor Adler, who is now atoning in a Viennese prison for his devotion to the cause of the proletariat, Eduard Bernstein, editor of the London Sozialdemokrat, Paul Singer, one of our best men in the Reichstag people whom I am proud to call my friends, and all of them Jewish! After all, I myself was dubbed a Jew by the Gartenlaube and, indeed, if given the choice, I'd as lief be a Jew as a Herr von'!

On Anti-Semitism by Frederick Engels April 19 1890

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1890/04/19.htm

But on May 4 Vienna was thrown into the shade by London. And I hold it to be the most important and magnificent in the entire May Day celebration that on May 4, 1890, the English proletariat, rousing itself from forty years winter sleep, rejoined the movement of its class. To appreciate this, one must look into the events leading up to May 4. Towards the beginning of last year the world s largest and most wretched working-class district, the East End of London, stirred gradually to action. On April 1, 1889, the Gas Workers and General Labourers Union was founded; today it has a membership of some 100,000. Largely with the cooperation of this partner union (many are gas workers in winter and dock workers in summer), the dockers big strike started on its way and shook even the bottom-most section of the East London workers out of stagnation. As a result, trade union upon trade union began to form among these, mostly unskilled workers, while those already in existence there, which till then had barely kept themselves going, now blossomed forth quickly. But the difference between these new trade unions and the old was very great. The old ones, which admit none but skilled workers, are exclusive; they bar all workers who have not been trained according to the statutes of the guild concerned, and thereby even expose themselves to competition from those not in the guild; they are rich, but the richer they become, the more they degenerate into mere sick-funds and burial clubs; they are conservative and they steer clear above all of that socialism, as far and as long as they can. The new unskilled unions, on the other hand, admit every fellow-worker; they are essentially, and the Gas Workers even exclusively, strike unions and strike funds. And while they are not yet socialists to a man, they insist nevertheless on being led only by socialists. But socialist propaganda had already been going on for years in the East End, where it was above all Mrs. E. Marx-Aveling and her husband, Edward Aveling, who had four years earlier discovered the best propaganda field in the Radical clubs consisting almost exclusively of workers, and had worked on them steadily and, as is evident now, with the best of success. During the dock workers strike Mrs. Aveling was one of the three women in charge of the distribution of relief. ... Mrs. Aveling led almost unaided last winter s strike in Silvertown, also in the East End, and on the Gas Workers committee she represents a women s section she has founded there. Last autumn the Gas Workers won an eight-hour working day here in London, but lost it again, after an unhappy strike, in the southern part of the city, acquiring sufficient proof that this gain is by no means safe in the northern part either. Is it surprising, then, that they readily accepted Mrs. Aveling s proposal to hold the May Day celebration, decided on by the Paris Congress, in favour of a legalised eight-hour working day, in London? In common with several socialist groups, the Radical clubs and the other trade unions in the East End, they set up a Central Committee that was to organise a large demonstration for the purpose in Hyde Park. As it turned out that all attempts to hold the demonstration on Thursday, May 1, were bound to fail this year, it was decided to put it off till Sunday, May 4. To ensure that, as far as possible, all London workers took part, the Central Committee invited, with uninhibited naivete, the London Trades Council as well. This is a body made up of delegates from the London trades unions, mostly from the older corporations of skilled workers, a body in which, as might be expected, the anti-socialist elements still command a majority. The Trades Council saw that the movement for an eight-hour day threatened to grow over its head. The old trades unions stand likewise for an eight-hour working day, but not for one to be established by law. By an eight-hour day they mean that normal daily wages should be paid for eight hours so-and-so much per hour but that overtime should be allowed any number of hours daily, provided every overtime hour is paid at a higher rate say, at the rate of one and a half or two ordinary hours. The point therefore was to channel the demonstration into the fairway of this kind of working day, to be won by free agreement but certainly not to be made obligatory by parliamentary act. To this end the Trades Council allied itself with the Social-Democratic Federation of the above-mentioned Mr. Hyndman, an association which poses as the only true church of British socialism, which had very consistently concluded a life-and-death alliance with the French Possibilists and sent a delegation to their congress and which therefore regarded in advance the May Day celebration decided on by the Marxist Congress as a sin against the Holy Ghost. The movement was growing over the head of the Federation as well. but to adhere to the Central Committee would mean placing itself under Marxist leadership; on the other hand, if the Trades Council were to take the matter into its own hands and if the celebration were held on the 4th of May instead of on the 1st, it would no longer be anything like the wicked Marxist May Day celebration and so they could join in. Despite the fact that the Social-Democratic Federation calls in its program for a legalised eight-hour day, it eagerly clasped the hand proffered by the Trades Council. Now the new allies, strange bedfellows though they were, played a trick on the Central Committee which would, it is true, be considered not only permissible but quite skillful in the political practice of the British bourgeoisie, but which European and American workers will probably find very mean. The fact is that in the case of popular meetings in Hyde Park the organisers must first announce their intention to the Board of Works and reach an agreement with it on particulars, securing specifically permission to drive over the grass the carts that are to serve as platforms. Besides, regulations say that after a meeting has been announced, no other meeting may be held in the Park on the same day. The Central Committee had not yet made the announcement; but the organisations allied against it had scarcely heard the news when they announced a meeting in the Park for May 4 and obtained permission for seven platforms, doing it behind the backs of the Central Committee. The Trades Council and the Federation believed thereby to have rented the Park for May 4 and to have a victory in their pocket. The former called a meeting of delegates from the trades unions, to which it also invited two delegates from the Central Committee; the latter sent three, including Mrs. Aveling. The Trades Council treated them as if it had been master of the situation. It informed them that only trades unions, that is to say, no socialist unions or political clubs, could take part in the demonstration and carry banners. just how the Social-Democratic Federation was to participate in the demonstration remained a mystery. The Council had already edited the resolution to be submitted to the meeting, and had deleted from it the demand for a legalised eight-hour day; discussion on a proposal for putting that demand back in the resolution was not allowed, nor was it voted on. And lastly, the Council refused to accept Mrs. Aveling as a delegate because, it said, she was no manual worker (which is not true), although its own President, Mr. Shipton, had not moved a finger in his own trade for fully fifteen years. The workers on the Central Committee were outraged by the trick played on them. It looked as if the demonstration had been finally put into the hands of two organisations representing only negligible minorities of London workers. There seemed to be no remedy for it but to storm the platforms of the Trades Council as the Gas Workers had threatened. Then Edward Aveling went to the Ministry and secured, contrary to regulations, permission for the Central Committee as well to bring seven platforms to the Park. The attempt to juggle with the demonstration in the interest of the minority failed; the Trades Council pulled in its horns and was glad to be able to negotiate with the Central Committee on an equal footing over arrangements for the demonstration. One has to know this background to appreciate the nature and significance of the demonstration. Prompted by the East End workers who had recently joined in the movement, the demonstration found such a universal response that the two organisations which were no less hostile to each other than both of them together were to the fundamental idea of the demonstration had to ally themselves in order to seize the leadership and use the meeting to their own advantage. On the one hand, a conservative Trades Council preaching equal rights for capital and labour; on the other, a Social-Democratic Federation playing at radicalism, and talking of social revolution whenever it is safe to do so, and the two allied to do a mean trick with an eye to capitalising on a demonstration thoroughly hateful to both. Owing to these incidents, the May 4 meeting was split into two parts. On one side were the conservative workers, whose horizon does not go beyond the wage-labour system, flanked by a narrow-minded but ambitious socialist sect; on the other side, the great bulk of workers who had recently joined in the movement and who do not want to hear any more of the Manchesterism of the old trades unions and want to win their complete emancipation by themselves, jointly with allies of their own choice, and not with those imposed by a small socialist coterie. On one side was stagnation represented by trades unions that have not yet quite freed themselves from the guild spirit, and by a narrow-minded sect backed by the meanest allies, on the other, the living free movement of the reawakening British proletariat. And it was apparent even to the blindest where there was fresh life in that two-faced gathering and where stagnation. Around the seven platforms of the Central Committee were dense, immense crowds, marching up with music and banners, over a hundred thousand in the procession, reinforced by almost as many who had come severally; everywhere was harmony and enthusiasm , and yet order and organisation. At the platforms of the combined reactionaries, on the other hand, everything seemed dull; their procession was much weaker than the other, poorly organised, disorderly and mostly belated, so that in some places things got under way there only when the Central Committee was already through. While the Liberal leaders of some Radical clubs, and the officials of several trades unions rallied to the Trades Council, the members of the very same unions in fact, four entire branches of the Social-Democratic Federation marched with the Central Committee. For all that, the Trades Council succeeded in winning some attention, but the decisive success was achieved by the Central Committee. What the numerous onlooking bourgeois politicians took home with them as the overall effect was the certainty that the English proletariat, which for fully forty years had trailed behind the big Liberal party and served it as voting cattle, had awakened at last to new, independent life and action. There can be no doubt about that: on May 4, 1890, the English working class joined the great international army. And that is an epoch-making fact. The English proletariat has its roots in the most advanced industrial development and, moreover, possesses the greatest freedom of political movement. Its long slumber a result, on the one hand, of the failure of the Chartist movement of 1836-50 and, on the other, of the colossal industrial upswing of 1848-80 is finally broken. The grandchildren of the old Chartists are stepping into the line of battle.

Engels in Arbeiter Zeitung 1890

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1890/05/23.htm

My dear Laura, Prosit Neujahr avant tout! Et puis apr s, as I cannot bear the idea you should translate Walther von der Vogelweide from a modernisation, I send you a copy of the original. You are quite right, the metre and rhyme of the original ought to be preserved in every translation of poetry, or else go the whole hog like the French and turn it at once into prose.

Letters: Marx-Engels Correspondence 1890

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1890/letters/90_01_08.htm

Meanwhile there is all kinds of friction, as was only to be expected, between the gas workers and the dockers, for instance. But despite it all the masses are on the move and there is no holding them any more. The longer the stream is dammed up the more powerfully will it break through when the moment comes. And these unskilled are very different chaps from the fossilised brothers of the old trade unions; not a trace of the old formalist spirit, of the craft exclusiveness of the engineers, for instance; on the contrary, a general cry for the organisation of all trade unions in one fraternity and for a direct struggle against capital. In the dock strike, for instance, there were three engineers at the Commercial Dock who kept the steam engine going. Burns and Mann, both engineers themselves and Burns a member of the Amalgamated Eng. Trade Union Executive, were summoned to persuade these men to go away, as then none of the cranes would have worked and the dock company would have had to climb down. The three engineers refused, the Engineers' Executive did not intervene and hence the length of the strike! At the Silvertown Rubber Works, moreover, where there was a twelve-weeks' strike, the strike was broken by the engineers, who did not join in and even did labourers' work against their own union rules! And why? These fools, in order to keep the supply of workers low, have a rule that nobody who has not been through the correct period of apprenticeship may be admitted to their union. By this means they have created an army of rivals, so-called blacklegs, who are just as skilled as they are themselves and who would gladly come into the union, but who are forced to remain blacklegs because they are kept outside by this pedantry which has no sense at all nowadays. And because they knew that both in the Commercial Dock and in Silvertown these blacklegs would immediately have stepped into their place, they stayed in and so became blacklegs themselves against the strikers. There you see the difference: the new unions hold together; in the present gas strike, sailors (steamer) and firemen, lightermen and coal carters are all together, but of course not the engineers again, they are still working! However, these arrogant old great trade unions will soon be made to look small; their chief support, the London Trades Council, is being more and more subjugated by the new ones, and in two or three years at most the Trade Union Congress will also be revolutionised. Even at the next Congress the Broadhursts will get the shock of their lives. The fact that you have got rid of Rosenberg and Co. is the main point about the revolution in your American socialist teacup. The German party over there must be smashed up as such, it is the worst obstacle. The American workers are coming along already, but just like the English they go their own way. One cannot drum the theory into them beforehand, but their own experience and their own blunders and the evil consequences of them will soon bump their noses up against theory and then all right. Independent nations go their own way, and of them all the English and their offspring are surely the most independent. Their insular stiff-necked obstinacy annoys one often enough, but it also guarantees that once a thing gets started what is begun will be carried out.

Letters: Marx-Engels Correspondence 1890

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1890/letters/90_01_11.htm

I see no reason why we should not repay the Progressists for their infamous behaviour of 1887 and bring it home to them that they exist by our grace only. Parnell s decision of 1886 that the Irish in England should all vote against the Liberals, for the Tories, that is, for the first time since 1800 stop being a herd voting for the Liberals, transformed Gladstone and the Liberal chiefs into Home Rulers in a matter of six weeks. If anything can still be made out of the Progressists, then only by showing them in the by-elections ad oculos that they are dependent on us.

Letters: Marx-Engels Correspondence 1885. Ireland

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1890/letters/90_01_23.htm

The movement there, just like the one here and in the mining districts of Germany now as well, cannot be made by preaching alone. Facts must hammer the thing into people's heads, but then it will go quickly too, quickest, of course, where there is already an organised and theoretically educated section of the proletariat at hand, as in Germany. The miners are ours to-day potentially and necessarily: in the Ruhr district the process is proceeding rapidly, Aix la Chapelle and the Saar basin will follow, then Saxony, then Lower Silesia, finally the Polish bargemen of Upper Silesia. With the position of our party in Germany all that was needed in order to call the irresistible movement into being was the impulse arising from the miners' own conditions of life. Here it is going in a similar way. The movement, which I now consider irrepressible, arose from the dockers' strike, purely out of the absolute necessity of defence. But here too the ground had been so far prepared by various forms of agitation during the last eight years that the people without being Socialists themselves still only wanted to have Socialists as their leaders. Now, without noticing it themselves, they are coming on to the right theoretical track, they drift into it, and the movement is so strong that I think it will survive the inevitable blunders and their consequences and the friction between the various trade unions and leaders without serious damage. ... I think it will be the same with you in America too. The Schleswig-Holsteiners [Anglo-Saxons] and their descendants in England and America are not to be converted by lecturing, this pig-headed and conceited lot have got to experience it on their own bodies. And this they are doing more and more every year, but they are born conservatives just because America is so purely bourgeois, so entirely without a feudal past and therefore proud of its purely bourgeois organisation and so they will only get quit of the old traditional mental rubbish by practical experience. Hence the trade unions, etc., are the thing to begin with if there is to be a mass movement, and every further step must be forced upon them by a defeat. But once the first step beyond the bourgeois point of view has been taken things will move quickly, like everything in America, where, driven by natural necessity, the growing speed of the movement sets some requisite fire going under the backsides of the Schleswig-Holstein Anglo-Saxons, who are usually so slow; and then too the foreign elements in the nation will assert themselves by greater mobility. I consider the decay of the specifically German party, with its absurd theoretical confusion, its corresponding arrogance and its Lassalleanism, a real piece of good fortune. Not until these separatists are out of the way will the fruits of your work come to light again. The Socialist Laws were a misfortune, not for Germany, but for America to which they consigned the last Knoten. I often used to marvel at the many Knoten faces one met with over there; these have died out in Germany but are flourishing over yonder.

Letters: Marx-Engels Correspondence 1890

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1890/letters/90_02_08.htm

I receive the Nationalist regularly, but unfortunately it contains very little of interest. They are a poor imitation of the Fabians in this country. Superficial and shallow as the Dismal Swamp, but proud of the noble magnanimity with which they, the educated bourgeois, condescend to emancipate the workers; in return however the workers must keep quiet and obediently carry out the orders of the educated cranks and their isms. Let them amuse themselves for a little while, but one fine day the movement will efface all this. We continentals, who have felt the influence of the French Revolution in quite a different way, have the advantage that such things are quite impossible here... In a country with such an old political and labour movement there is always a colossal heap of traditionally inherited rubbish which has to be got rid of by degrees. There are the prejudices of the skilled Unions Engineers, Bricklayers, Carpenters and Joiners, Type Compositors, etc. which have all to be broken down; the petty jealousies of the particular trades, which become intensified in the hands and heads of the leaders to direct hostility and secret struggle; there are the mutually obstructive ambitions and intrigues of the leaders: one wants to get into Parliament and so does somebody else, another wants to get on to the County Council or School Board, another wants to organise a general centralisation of all the workers, another to start a paper, another a club, etc., etc. In short, there is friction upon friction. And among them all the Socialist League, which looks down on everything which is not directly revolutionary (which means here in England, as with you, everything which does not limit itself to making phrases and otherwise doing nothing) and the Federation, who still behave as if everyone except themselves were asses and bunglers, although it is only due to the new force of the movement that they have succeeded in getting some following again. In short, anyone who only looks at the surface would say it was all confusion and personal quarrels. But under the surface the movement is going on, it is seizing ever wider sections of the workers and mostly just among the hitherto stagnant lowest masses, and the day is no longer far off when this mass will suddenly find itself, when the fact that it is this colossal self-impelled mass will dawn upon it, and when that day comes short work will be made of all the rascality and wrangling.

Letters: Marx-Engels Correspondence 1890

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1890/letters/90_04_19.htm

I also send you The People s Press with report of Sunday last. It was tremendous. England at last is stirring, and no mistake. And it was a great victory for us specially, for Tussy and Aveling who with the help of the Gas Workers (by far the best Union out amongst the new ones) have done it all. In their naivete they had called in the Trades Council without ensuring to themselves the possession of the Park first. The Trades Council allying itself with Hyndman and Co., stole a march on them, and applied for platforms for Sunday at the office of Works and got them, thus hoping to shut us out and being able to command; they attempted at once to bully us down, but Edward went to the Office of Works and got us 7 platforms had the Liberals been in, we should never have got them. That brought the other side down at once, and they became as amiable as you please. They have seen they have to do with different people from what they expected. I can assure you I looked a couple of inches taller when I got down from that old lumbering waggon that served as a platform after having heard again, for the first time since 40 years, the unmistakeable voice of the English Proletariat. That voice has been heard by the bourgeois too, the whole press of London and the provinces bears witness to that. Paul spoke very well a slight indication of the universal strike dream in it, which nonsense Guesde has retained from his anarchist days (whenever we are in a position to try the universal strike, we shall be able to get what we want for the mere asking for it, without the roundabout way of the universal strike). But he spoke very well, and in remarkably grammatical English too, far more so than in his conversation. He was received best of all, and got a more enthusiastic cheer at the end than any one else. And his presence was very opportune as we had on our platform two or three philistine speakers qui faisaient dormir debout leurs auditeurs so that Paul had to waken them up again. The progress made in England these last 10-15 months is immense. Last May the 8 hours working day would not have brought as many thousands into Hyde Park as we had hundreds of thousands. And the best of it is that the struggle preceding the demonstration has brought to life a representative body which will serve as the nucleus for the movement, regardless of sect; the Central Committee consisting of delegates of the Gas Workers and numerous other Unions mostly small, unskilled Unions and therefore despised by the haughty Trades Council of the aristocracy of labour and of the Radical clubs worked for the last two years by Tussy. Edward is chairman of this Committee. This Committee will continue to act and invite all other trade, political and Socialist societies to send delegates, and gradually expand into a central body not only for the 8 hours Bill but for all other demands say, to begin with, the rest of the Paris resolutions and so on. The Committee is strong enough numerically not to be swamped by any fresh accessions, and thus the sects will soon be put before the dilemma either to merge in it and in the general movement or to die out. It is the East End which now commands the movement and these fresh elements, unspoiled by the Great Liberal Party, show an intelligence such as well, I cannot say better than such as we find in the equally unspoiled German workman. They will not have any but Socialist leaders.

Letters: Marx-Engels Correspondence 1890

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1890/letters/90_05_10.htm

Furthermore, I am not at all acquainted with what you call the feminist movement in Scandinavia; I only know some of Ibsen s dramas and have not the slightest idea whether or to what extent Ibsen can be considered responsible for the more or less hysterical effusions of bourgeois and petty bourgeois women careerists. On the other hand the field covered by what is generally designated as the woman question is so vast that one cannot, within the confines of a letter, treat this subject thoroughly or say anything half-way satisfactory about it. This much is certain, that Marx could never have "adopted the attitude" ascribed to him by Herr Bahr; after all, he was not crazy. As for your attempt to explain this matter from the materialist viewpoint, I must tell you from the very first that the materialist method is converted into its direct opposite if instead of being used as a guiding thread in historical research it is made to serve as a ready-cut pattern on which to tailor historical facts. And if Herr Bahr thinks he has caught you in a mistake, it seems to me that he is somewhat justified. You classify all Norway, and everything happening there, as petty bourgeois, and then, without the slightest hesitation, you apply to this Norwegian petty bourgeoisie your ideas about the German petty bourgeoisie. Now two facts stand in the way here. In the first place: at a time when throughout all Europe the victory over Napoleon spelled a victory of reaction over revolution, when only in its homeland, France, was the revolution still capable of inspiring enough fear to wrest from the re-established Bourbons a bourgeois liberal constitution, Norway was able to secure a constitution far more democratic than any constitution in Europe at that time. In the second place, during the course of the last twenty years Norway has had a literary renaissance unlike that of any other country of this period, except Russia. Petty bourgeois or not, these people are creating more than anywhere else, and stamping their imprint upon the literature of other countries, including Germany. If you study these facts carefully you will surely agree that they are incompatible with the fashion of ranking the Norwegians in a class with the petty bourgeoisie, particularly the German variety these facts demand, in my opinion, that we analyze the specific characteristics of the Norwegian petty bourgeoisie. You will no doubt then perceive that we are here faced with a very important difference. In Germany the petty bourgeoisie is the product of an abortive revolution, of an arrested, thwarted development; it owes its peculiar and very marked characteristics of cowardice, narrowness, impotence and ineffectuality to the Thirty Years War and the ensuing period during which almost all of the other great nations were, on the contrary, developing rapidly. These traits remained with the German petty bourgeoisie even after Germany had again been carried into the stream of historical development; they were pronounced enough to engrave themselves upon all the other German social classes as more or less typically German, until the day when our working class broke through these narrow boundaries. The German workers are with justification all the more violently without a country in that they are entirely free of German petty bourgeois narrowness. Thus the German petty bourgeoisie does not constitute a normal historical phase, but an extremely exaggerated caricature, a phenomenon of degeneration. The German petty bourgeoisie is classic only because of the extreme exaggeration of its petty bourgeois characteristics. The petty bourgeoisie of England, France, etc., are on an altogether different level than the German petty bourgeoisie. In Norway, on the other hand, the small peasantry and the petty bourgeoisie, together with a limited section of the middle class just as in England and France in the seventeenth century, for example have for several centuries represented the normal state of society. Here there can be no question of a violent return to outdated conditions as a consequence of some great defeated movement or a Thirty Years War. The country has lagged behind the times because of its isolation and natural conditions, but its situation has always corresponded to its conditions of production, and, therefore, been normal. Only very recently have manifestations of large scale industry sporadically made their appearance in the country, but that mighty lever of the concentration of capital, the Bourse, is lacking, and furthermore the powerful shipping industry also exerts a conservative influence, for while throughout the rest of the world steamboats are superseding sailing vessels, Norway is expanding considerably her sailing vessel navigation, and possesses, if not the greatest, then at all events the second greatest fleet of sailing ships in the world, belonging mostly to small shipowners, just as in England around 1720. Nevertheless this circumstance has infused new vitality into the old lethargic existence, and this vitality has made itself felt also in the literary revival. The Norwegian peasant has never known serfdom, and this fact gives an altogether different background to the whole development of the country, as it did in Castile. The Norwegian petty bourgeois is the son of a free peasant and for this reason he is a man compared to the miserable German philistine. Likewise the Norwegian petty bourgeois woman is infinitely superior to the wife of a German philistine. And whatever the weaknesses of Ibsen s dramas, for instance, they undoubtedly reflect the world of the petty and the middle bourgeoisie, but a world totally different from the German world, a world where men are still possessed of character and initiative and the capacity for independent action, even though their behavior may seem odd to a foreign observer.

Letters: Letter from Engels to Paul Ernst

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1890/letters/90_06_05.htm

Here in England, Rent is applied as well to the payment of the English capitalist farmer to his landlord, as to that of the Irish pauper farmer, who pays a complete tribute composed chiefly of a deduction from his fund of maintenance, earned by his own labour, and only to the smallest extent consisting of true rent. So the English in India transformed the land-tax paid by the ryot (peasant) to the State into rent, and consequently have, in Bengal at least, actually transformed the zemindar (tax-gatherer of the former Indian prince) into a landlord holding a nominal feudal tenure from the Crown exactly as in England, where the Crown is nominal proprietor of all the land, and the great nobles, the real owners, are by juridical fiction supposed to be feudal tenants of the Crown. Similarly when in the beginning of the 17th century the North of Ireland was subjected to direct English dominion, and the English lawyer Sir John Davies found there a rural community with common possession of the land, which was periodically divided amongst the members of the clan who paid a tribute to the chief, Davies <transformed> declared that tribute at once <into> to be rent. Thus the Scotch lairds-chiefs of clans profited, since the insurrection of 1745, of this juridical confusion, of the tribute paid to them by the clansmen, with a rent for the lands held by them, in order to transform the whole of the <common> clan-land, the common property of the clan, into their, the lairds, private property; for said the lawyers, if they were not the landlords, how could they receive rent for that land? And thus this confusion of tribute and rent was the basis of the confiscation of all the lands of the Scottish Highlands for the benefit of a few chiefs of clan who very soon after drove out the old clansmen and replaced them by sheep as described in C[apital] chapter 24,3/ (p.754, 3rd edition). .... We had heard here of the death of . . . [Cherneshevsky], and with much sorrow and sympathy. But perhaps it is better so.

Letters: Marx-Engels Correspondence 1885. Ireland

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[ ....] There has also been a discussion in the Volks-Tribune about the distribution of products in future society, whether this will take place according to the amount of work done or otherwise. The question has been approached very "materialistically" in opposition to certain idealistic phraseology about justice. But strangely enough it has not struck anyone that, after all, the method of distribution essentially depends on how much there is to distribute, and that this must surely change with the progress of production and social organization, so that the method of distribution may also change. But everyone who took part in the discussion, "socialist society" appeared not as something undergoing continuous change and progress but as a stable affair fixed once for all, which must, therefore, have a method of distribution fixed once for all. All one can reasonably do, however, is 1) to try and discover the method of distribution to be used at the beginning, and 2) to try and find the general tendency of the further development. But about this I do not find a single word in the whole debate. In general, the word "materialistic" serves many of the younger writers in Germany as a mere phrase with which anything and everything is labeled without further study, that is, they stick on this label and then consider the question disposed of. But our conception of history is above all a guide to study, not a lever for construction after the manner of the Hegelian. All history must be studied afresh, the conditions of existence of the different formations of society must be examined individually before the attempt is made to deduce them from the political, civil law, aesthetic, philosophic, religious, etc., views corresponding to them. Up to now but little has been done here because only a few people have got down to it seriously. In this field we can utilize heaps of help, it is immensely big, anyone who will work seriously can achieve much and distinguish himself. But instead of this too many of the younger Germans simply make use of the phrase historical materialism (and everything can be turned into a phrase) only in order to get their own relatively scanty historical knowledge for economic history is still as yet in its swaddling clothes! constructed into a neat system as quickly as possible, and they then deem themselves something very tremendous. And after that a Barth can come along and attack the thing itself, which in his circle has indeed been degraded to a mere phrase. However, all this will right itself. We're strong enough in Germany now to stand a lot. One of the greatest services which the Anti-Socialist Law did us was to free us from the obtuseness of the German intellectual who had got tinged with socialism. We are now strong enough to digest the German intellectual too, who is giving himself great airs again. You, who have really done something, must have noticed yourself how few of the young literary men who fasten themselves on to the party give themselves in the trouble to study economics, the history of economics, the history of trade, of industry, of agriculture, of the formations of society. How many know anything of Maurer except his name! The self-sufficiency of the journalist must serve for everything here and the result looks like it. It often seems as if these gentlemen think anything is good enough for the workers. If these gentlemen only knew that Marx thought his best things were still not good enough for the workers, how he regarded it as a crime to offer the workers anything but the very best! [ ....]

Letters: Marx-Engels Correspondence 1890

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1890/letters/90_08_05.htm

Ad. 1. To my mind, the so-called socialist society is not anything immutable. Like all other social formations, it should be conceived in a state of constant flux and change. Its crucial difference from the present order consists naturally in production organized on the basis of common ownership by the nation of all means of production. To begin this reorganization tomorrow, but performing it gradually, seems to me quite feasible. That our workers are capable of it is borne out by their many producer and consumer cooperatives which, whenever they're not deliberately ruined by the police, are equally well and far more honestly run than the bourgeois stock companies. I cannot see how you can speak of the ignorance of the masses in Germany after the brilliant evidence of political maturity shown by the workers in their victorious struggle against the Anti-Socialist Law. The patronizing and errant lecturing of our so-called intellectuals seems to me a far greater impediment. We are still in need of technicians, agronomists, engineers, chemists, architects, etc., it is true, but if the worst comes to the worst we can always buy them just as well as the capitalists buy them, and if a severe example is made of a few of the traders among them for traders there are sure to be they will find it to their own advantage to deal fairly with us. But apart from the specialists, among whom I also include schoolteachers, we can get along perfectly well without the other intellectuals. The present influx of literati and students into the party, for example, may be quite damaging if these gentlemen are not properly kept in check. The Junker latifundia east of the Elbe could be easily leased under the due technical management to the present day-laborers and other retinue, who work the estates jointly. If any disturbances occur, the Junkers, who have brutalized people by flouting all the existing school legislation, will alone be to blame. The biggest obstacles are the small peasants and the importunate super-clever intellectuals who always think they know everything so much the better, the less they understand it. Once we have a sufficient number of followers among the masses, the big industries and the large-scale latifundia farming can be quickly socialized, provided we hold the political power. The rest will follow shortly, sooner or later. And we shall have it all our own way in large-scale production. You speak of an absence of uniform insight. This exists but on the part of the intellectuals to stem from the aristocracy and the bourgeoisie and who do not suspect how much they still have to learn from the workers...

Letters: Marx-Engels Correspondence 1890

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1890/letters/90_08_21.htm

[....] According to the materialist conception of history, the ultimately determining element in history is the production and reproduction of real life. Other than this neither Marx nor I have ever asserted. Hence if somebody twists this into saying that the economic element is the only determining one, he transforms that proposition into a meaningless, abstract, senseless phrase. The economic situation is the basis, but the various elements of the superstructure political forms of the class struggle and its results, to wit: constitutions established by the victorious class after a successful battle, etc., juridical forms, and even the reflexes of all these actual struggles in the brains of the participants, political, juristic, philosophical theories, religious views and their further development into systems of dogmas also exercise their influence upon the course of the historical struggles and in many cases preponderate in determining their form. There is an interaction of all these elements in which, amid all the endless host of accidents (that is, of things and events whose inner interconnection is so remote or so impossible of proof that we can regard it as non-existent, as negligible), the economic movement finally asserts itself as necessary. Otherwise the application of the theory to any period of history would be easier than the solution of a simple equation of the first degree. We make our history ourselves, but, in the first place, under very definite assumptions and conditions. Among these the economic ones are ultimately decisive. But the political ones, etc., and indeed even the traditions which haunt human minds also play a part, although not the decisive one. The Prussian state also arose and developed from historical, ultimately economic, causes. But it could scarcely be maintained without pedantry that among the many small states of North Germany, Brandenburg was specifically determined by economic necessity to become the great power embodying the economic, linguistic and, after the Reformation, also the religious difference between North and South, and not by other elements as well (above all by its entanglement with Poland, owing to the possession of Prussia, and hence with international political relations which were indeed also decisive in the formation of the Austrian dynastic power). Without making oneself ridiculous it would be a difficult thing to explain in terms of economics the existence of every small state in Germany, past and present, or the origin of the High German consonant permutations, which widened the geographic partition wall formed by the mountains from the Sudetic range to the Taunus to form a regular fissure across all Germany. In the second place, however, history is made in such a way that the final result always arises from conflicts between many individual wills, of which each in turn has been made what it is by a host of particular conditions of life. Thus there are innumerable intersecting forces, an infinite series of parallelograms of forces which give rise to one resultant the historical event. This may again itself be viewed as the product of a power which works as a whole unconsciously and without volition. For what each individual wills is obstructed by everyone else, and what emerges is something that no one willed. Thus history has proceeded hitherto in the manner of a natural process and is essentially subject to the same laws of motion. But from the fact that the wills of individuals each of whom desires what he is impelled to by his physical constitution and external, in the last resort economic, circumstances (either his own personal circumstances or those of society in general) do not attain what they want, but are merged into an aggregate mean, a common resultant, it must not be concluded that they are equal to zero. On the contrary, each contributes to the resultant and is to this extent included in it. I would furthermore ask you to study this theory from its original sources and not at second-hand; it is really much easier. Marx hardly wrote anything in which it did not play a part. But especially The Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Bonaparte is a most excellent example of its application. There are also many allusions to it in Capital. Then may I also direct you to my writings: Herr Eugen D hring's Revolution in Science and Ludwig Feuerbach and the End of Classical German Philosophy, in which I have given the most detailed account of historical materialism which, as far as I know, exists. [The German Ideology was not published in Marx or Engels lifetime] Marx and I are ourselves partly to blame for the fact that the younger people sometimes lay more stress on the economic side than is due to it. We had to emphasise the main principle vis- -vis our adversaries, who denied it, and we had not always the time, the place or the opportunity to give their due to the other elements involved in the interaction. But when it came to presenting a section of history, that is, to making a practical application, it was a different matter and there no error was permissible. Unfortunately, however, it happens only too often that people think they have fully understood a new theory and can apply it without more ado from the moment they have assimilated its main principles, and even those not always correctly. And I cannot exempt many of the more recent "Marxists" from this reproach, for the most amazing rubbish has been produced in this quarter, too.... [....]

Letters: Marx-Engels Correspondence 1890

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1890/letters/90_09_21.htm

To Point I. First of all you will please note on p.19 of the Origin that the process of development of the Punaluan family is presented as having taken place so gradually that even in this century marriages of brother and sister (of one mother) have taken place in the royal family of Hawaii. And throughout antiquity we find examples of marriages between brother and sister, e.g., among the Ptolemies. Secondly, we must here distinguish between brother and sister deriving from the side of the mother, or deriving only from the side of the father; adelphos, adelphse come from delphos, womb, and originally signified, therefore, only brother and sister on the side of the mother. The feeling had survived a long time from the time of the mother-right that the children of the same mother who have different fathers, are more closely related than the children of the same father who have different mothers. The Punaluan form of the family excludes only marriages between the first group, but by no means between the second who according to the existing notion are not even related (since mother-right rules). As far as I know, the cases of marriage between brother and sister in ancient Greece are restricted either to those individuals who have different mothers or to those about whom this is not known, and for whom, therefore, the possibility is not excluded; hence, they are absolutely not in contradiction to the Punaluan usage. You have overlooked the fact that between the time of the Punaluan family and the time of Greek monogamy there lies the jump from the matriarchate to the patriarchate, which alters matters considerably. According to Wachsmuth s Hellen. Altertumern, in the heroic age of Greece, there is no sign of any concern about the too close blood relationship of husband and wife, except for the relation of parent and child (III, p.156). Marriage with one s own sister was not disapproved of in Crete (ibid., p.170). The last also according to Strabo, Bk.X, for the moment however, I cannot find the passage because of the absence of chapter divisions. By one s own sister I understand, until there is proof to the contrary, sisters on the father s side. To Point II. I qualify your first major proposition as follows: According to the materialistic conception of history, the production and reproduction of real life constitutes in the last instance the determining factor of history. Neither Marx nor I ever maintained more. Now when someone comes along and distorts this to mean that the economic factor is the sole determining factor, he is converting the former proposition into a meaningless, abstract and absurd phrase. The economic situation is the basis but the various factors of the superstructure the political forms of the class struggles and its results constitutions, etc., established by victorious classes after hard-won battles legal forms, and even the reflexes of all these real struggles in the brain of the participants, political, jural, philosophical theories, religious conceptions and their further development into systematic dogmas all these exercize an influence upon the course of historical struggles, and in many cases determine for the most part their form. There is a reciprocity between all these factors in which, finally, through the endless array of contingencies (i.e., of things and events whose inner connection with one another is so remote, or so incapable of proof, that we may neglect it, regarding it as nonexistent) the economic movement asserts itself as necessary. Were this not the case, the application of the history to any given historical period would be easier than the solution of a simple equation of the first degree. We ourselves make our own history, but, first of all, under very definite presuppositions and conditions. Among these are the economic, which are finally decisive. But there are also the political, etc. Yes, even the ghostly traditions, which haunt the minds of men play a role albeit not a decisive one. The Prussian state arose and developed also through historical, in the last instance, economic causes. One could hardly, however, assert without pedantry that among the many petty principalities of North Germany, just Brandenburg was determined by economic necessity and not by other factors also (before all, its involvement in virtue of its Prussian possessions, with Poland and therewith international political relations which were also decisive factors in the creation of the Austrian sovereign power) to become the great power in which was to be embodied the economic, linguistic and, since the Reformation, also the religious differences of North and South. It would be very hard to attempt to explain by economic causes, without making ourselves ridiculous, the existence of every petty German state of the past or present, or the origin of the shifting of consonants in High-German, which reinforced the differences that existed already in virtue of the geographical separating wall formed by the mountains from Sudeten to Taunus. Secondly, history is so made that the end-result always arises out of the conflict of many individual wills, in which every will is itself the product of a host of special conditions of life. Consequently there exist innumerable intersecting forces, an infinite group of parallelograms of forces which give rise to one resultant product the historical event. This again may itself be viewed as the product of a force acting as a whole without consciousness or volition. For what every individual wills separately is frustrated by what every one else wills and the general upshot is something which no one willed. And so the course of history has run along like a natural process; it also is subject essentially to the same laws of motion. But from the fact that the wills of individuals who desire what the constitution of their body as well as external circumstances, in the last instance economic (either personal or social) impel them to desire do not get what they wish, but fuse into an average or common resultant, from all that one has no right to conclude that they equal zero. On the contrary, every will contributes to the resultant and is in so far included within it. I should further like to beg of you to study the theory from its original sources and not at second hand. It is really much easier. Marx hardly wrote a thing in which this theory does not play a part. The Eighteenth Brumaire of Bonaparte is an especially remarkable example of its application. There are many relevant passages also in Capital. In addition, permit me to call your attention to my own writings, Herrn E. D hring s Umw lzung der Wissenschaft and L. Feuerbach und der Ausgang der klassischen deutschen Philosophie where I give the most comprehensive exposition of historical materialism which to my knowledge exists anywhere. Marx and I are partly responsible for the fact that at times our disciples have laid more weight upon the economic factor than belongs to it. We were compelled to emphasize this main principle in opposition; to our opponents who denied it, and there wasn t always time, place and occasion to do justice to the other factors in the reciprocal interaction. But just as soon as it was a matter of the presentation of an historical chapter, that is to say, of practical application, things became quite different; there, no error was possible. Unfortunately it is only too frequent that a person believes he has completely understood a new theory and is capable of applying it when he has taken over its fundamental ideas but it isn t always true. And from this reproach I cannot spare many of the recent Marxists . They have certainly turned out a rare kind of tommyrot. To Point I again. Yesterday (I am writing now on the 22nd of September), I found the following decisive passage, in Schoe-mann s Griechische Altert mer (Berlin, 1855, I, p.52), which completely confirms the view taken above: It is well known, however, that marriages between half-brothers or sisters of different mothers was not regarded as incest in late Greece. I hope that the appalling parenthetical expressions which, for brevity s sake, have slipped from my pen, won t frighten you off, and I remain.

Letters: Marx-Engels Correspondence 1890

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1890/letters/90_09_21a.htm

Your letter of the 3rd inst. was forwarded to me at Folkestone; but not having the book I needed I could not reply. Having returned on the 12th of the same month, I found such an amount of pressing work that only to-day am I able to write a few lines. Please excuse my delay. To your first question:- First of all you can see on p. 19 of my Origin of the Family, Private Property, and the State, the Punalua family is represented as developing so slowly that even in this century in the royal family there have been marriages between brothers and sisters. In antiquity we find examples of marriages between brothers and sisters, for instance, the Ptolemies. We must make a distinction between brothers and sisters on the mothers side and brothers and sisters on the fathers side. The Greek Adelphos (brother) and Adelphon (sister) are both derived from Delphos (mother), indicating thus the origin of brother and sister on the mother s side. And from the period of the Matriarchate there has been preserved for a long time the feeling that the children of one mother but of different fathers are more closely related than the children of one father but by different mothers. The Punalua form of the family excludes only marriages among the first, not among the second, since the latter, while the Matriarchate lasted, were not even considered relatives. Cases of matrimony between brothers and sisters in Ancient Greece are limited to those in which the contracting parties are descended from different mothers, or to those of whom the parental relationship was unknown, and hence the marriage was not forbidden. This, therefore, is not absolutely in contrast with the Punalua custom. You have noticed, then, that between the Punalua period and Greek monogamy there is a jump from the Matriarchate to the Patriarchate, which changes things considerably. According to the Greek Antiquities of Wachsmuth, one finds in the heroic period of Greece no trace of scruples due to a too close relationship of the contracting parties independently of the relationship between the parents and children. (P. 156.) Marriage with a carnal sister was not at all scandalous in Crete. (Ibid., p. 170.) This last affirmation is based on Strabone (X) but at the present moment I cannot find this passage because of faulty division of chapters. Under the expression carnal sister I understand, until proof to the contrary is furnished, a sister on the part of the father. I have interpreted your first main phrase in the following way: According to the Materialist Conception of History, the factor which is in the last instance decisive in history is the production and reproduction of actual life. More than this neither Marx nor myself ever claimed. If now someone has distorted the meaning in such a way that the economic factor is the only decisive one, this man has changed the above proposition into an abstract, absurd phrase which says nothing. The economic situation is the base, but the different parts of the structure-the political forms of the class struggle and its results, the constitutions established by the victorious class after the battle is won, forms of law and even the reflections of all these real struggles in the brains of the participants, political theories, juridical, philosophical, religious opinions, and their further development into dogmatic systems-all this exercises also its influence on the development of the historical struggles and in cases determines their form. It is under the mutual influence of all these factors that, rejecting the infinitesimal number of accidental occurrences (that is, things and happenings whose intimate sense is so far removed and of so little probability that we can consider them non-existent, and can ignore them), that the economical movement is ultimately carried out. Otherwise the application of the theory to any period of history would be easier than the solution of any simple equation. We ourselves make our history, but, primarily, under pre-suppositions and conditions which are very well determined. But even the political tradition, nay, even the tradition that man creates in his head, plays an important part even if not the decisive one. The Prussian State has itself been born and developed because of certain historical reasons, and, in the last instance, economic reasons. But it is very difficult to determine without pedantry that, among the many small States of northern Germany, precisely Brandenburg has been destined by economic necessity and not also by other factors (above all its complications with Poland after the Prussian conquest and hence, also, with international politics-which, besides has also been decisive in the formation of the power of the Austrian ruling family), to become that great power in which are personified the economic, linguistic, and-after the Reformation-also the religious difference between the North and South. It would be mighty difficult for one who does not want to make himself ridiculous to explain from the economic point of view the existence of each small German State of the past and present, or even the phonetic differentiation of High German which extended the geographic division formed already by the Sudetti mountains as far as the Faunus. In the second place history forms itself in such a way that the ultimate result springs always from the conflicts of many individual wills, each of which in its turn is produced by a quantity of special conditions of life; there are thus innumerable forces which cross each other, an infinite group of parallelograms of forces, from which is derived one resultant-the historical event -which in its turn again can be considered as the product of an active power, as a whole unconsciously and involuntarily, because that which each individual wishes is prevented by every other, and that which results from it is a thing which no one has wished. In this way history runs its course like a natural process, and has substantially the same laws of motion. But, because of the fact that the individual wills-each of which wishes that to which it is impelled by its own physical constitution or exterior circumstances, i.e., in the last analysis, all economic circumstances (either its own personal circumstances or the general conditions of society)-do not reach that which they seek but are fused in one general media in a common resultant, by this fact one cannot conclude that they are equal to zero. On the contrary, each contributes to produce the resultant, and is contained in it. I would further ask you to study the theory from its original sources and not from secondhand works; it is really much easier. One can say that Marx has written nothing in which some part of the theory is not found. An excellent example of its application in a specific way is the Eighteenth Brumaire of L. Bonaparte. Also in Capital (III) are many illustrations. And also permit me to recommend to you my writings, Herr E. Duehring s Umwalzung der Wissenchaft, and Feuerbach und der Ausgang der Klassischen deutschen Philosophie, in which I have given the most ample illustrations of Historical Materialism which to my knowledge exists. That the young people give to the economic factor more importance than belongs to it is in part the fault of Marx and myself. Facing our adversaries we had to lay especial stress on the essential principle denied by them, and, besides, we had not always the time, place, or occasion to assign to the other factors which participate in producing the reciprocal effect, the part which belongs to them. But scarcely has one come to the representation of a particular historical period, that is, to a practical application of the theory, when things changed their aspect, and such an error was no longer permissible. It happens too often that one believes he has perfectly understood a new theory, and is able to manage it without any aid, when he has scarcely learned the first principles, and not even those correctly. This reproof I cannot spare to some of our new Marxists; and in truth it has been written by the wearer of the marvellous robe himself. [That is, by Marx. Editor.] To the first question:-Yesterday (I am writing these words on the 22nd of Sept.) I also found in Schomann, Greek Antiquities, Berlin, 1855, Vol. I, p. 52, the following words, which confirm definitely the explanation given by me. It is noteworthy that in later Greece marriages between brothers and sisters of different mothers were not considered incest. I hope you will not be dismayed by the terrible parentheses which for the sake of brevity overflow from my pen. And I subscribe myself .

Marx-Engels Correspondence: Engels to J. Bloch 1890

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1890/letters/90_09_21b.htm

Where there is division of labour on a social scale there is also mutual independence among the different sections of work. In the last instance production is the decisive factor. But when the trade in products becomes independent of production itself, it follows a movement of its own, which, while it is governed as a whole by production, still in particular cases and within this general dependence follows particular laws contained in the nature of this new factor; this movement has phases of its own and in its turn reacts on the movement of production. The discovery of America was due to the thirst for gold which had previously driven the Portuguese to Africa (compare Soetbeer's Production of Precious Metals), because the enormously extended European industry of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries and the trade corresponding to it demanded more means of exchange than Germany, the great silver country from 1450 to 1550, could provide. The conquest of India by the Portuguese, Dutch and English between 1500 and 1800 had imports from India as its object nobody dreamt of exporting anything there. And yet what a colossal reaction these discoveries and conquests, solely conditioned by the interests of trade, had upon industry: they first created the need for exports to these countries and developed large-scale industry. So it is too with the money market. As soon as trading in money becomes separate from trade in commodities it has (under certain conditions imposed by production and commodity trade and within these limits) a development of its own, special laws and separate phases determined by its own nature. If, in this further development, trade in money extends in addition to trade in securities and these securities are not only government securities but also industrial and transport stocks and shares, so that money trade conquers the direct control over a portion of the production by which, taken as a whole, it is itself controlled, then the reaction of money trading on production becomes still stronger and more complicated. The money traders have become the owners of railways, mines, iron works, etc. These means of production take on a double aspect if their working has to be directed sometimes in the immediate interests of production but sometimes also according to the requirements of the shareholders, in so far as they are money traders. The most striking example of this is the American railways, whose working is entirely dependent on the stock exchange operations of a Jay Gould or a Vanderbilt, etc., these having nothing whatever to do with the particular railway concerned and its interests as a means of communication. And even here in England we have seen struggles lasting for tens of years between different railway companies over the boundaries of their respective territories struggles in which an enormous amount of money was thrown away, not in the interests of production and communications but simply because of a rivalry which usually only had the object of facilitating the stock exchange dealings of the shareholding money traders. With these few indications of my conception of the relation of production to commodity trade and of both to money trading, I have already also answered, in essence, your questions about "historical materialism" generally. The thing is easiest to grasp from the point of view of the division of labour. Society gives rise to certain common functions which it cannot dispense with. The persons selected for these functions form a new branch of the division of labour within society. This gives them particular interests, distinct too from the interests of those who gave them their office; they make themselves independent of the latter and the state is in being. And now the development is the same as it was with commodity trade and later with money trade; the new independent power, while having in the main to follow the movement of production, also, owing to its inward independence (the relative independence originally transferred to it and gradually further developed) reacts in its turn upon the conditions and course of production. It is the interaction of two unequal forces: on one hand the economic movement, on the other the new political power, which strives for as much independence as possible, and which, having once been established, is also endowed with a movement of its own. On the whole, the economic movement gets its way, but it has also to suffer reactions from the political movement which it established and endowed with relative independence itself, from the movement of the state power on the one hand and of the opposition simultaneously engendered on the other. Just as the movement of the industrial market is, in the main and with the reservations already indicated, reflected in the money market and, of course, in inverted form, so the struggle between the classes already existing and already in conflict with one another is reflected in the struggle between government and opposition, but also in inverted form, no longer directly but indirectly, not as a class struggle but as a fight for political principles, and so distorted that it has taken us thousands of years to get behind it again. The reaction of the state power upon economic development can be one of three kinds: it can run in the same direction, and then development is more rapid; it can oppose the line of development, in which case nowadays state power in every great nation will go to pieces in the long run; or it can cut off the economic development from certain paths, and impose on it certain others. This case ultimately reduces itself to one of the two previous ones. But it is obvious that in cases two and three the political power can do great damage to the economic development and result in the squandering of great masses of energy and material. Then there is also the case of the conquest and brutal destruction of economic resources, by which, in certain circumstances, a whole local or national economic development could formerly be ruined. Nowadays such a case usually has the opposite effect, at least among great nations: in the long run the defeated power often gains more economically, politically and morally than the victor. It is similar with law. As soon as the new division of labour which creates professional lawyers becomes necessary, another new and independent sphere is opened up which, for all its general dependence on production and trade, still has its own capacity for reacting upon these spheres as well. In a modern state, law must not only correspond to the general economic position and be its expression, but must also be an expression which is consistent in itself, and which does not, owing to inner contradictions, look glaringly inconsistent. And in order to achieve this, the faithful reflection of economic conditions is more and more infringed upon. All the more so the more rarely it happens that a code of law is the blunt, unmitigated, unadulterated expression of the domination of a class this in itself would already offend the conception of justice. Even in the Code Napoleon the pure logical conception of justice held by the revolutionary bourgeoisie of 1792-96 is already adulterated in many ways, and in so far as it is embodied there has daily to undergo all sorts of attenuation owing to the rising power of the proletariat. Which does not prevent the Code Napoleon from being the statute book which serves as a basis for every new code of law in every part of the world. Thus to a great extent the course of the development of law only consists: first in the attempt to do away with the contradictions arising from the direct translation of economic relations into legal principles, and to establish a harmonious system of law, and then in the repeated breaches made in this system by the influence and pressure of further economic development, which involves it in further contradictions (I am only speaking here of civil law for the moment). The reflection of economic relations as legal principles is necessarily also a topsy turvy one: it happens without the person who is acting being conscious of it; the jurist imagines he is operating with a priori principles, whereas they are really only economic reflexes; so everything is upside down. And it seems to me obvious that this inversion, which, so long as it remains unrecognised, forms what we call ideological conception, reacts in its turn upon the economic basis and may, within certain limits, modify it. The basis of the law of inheritance assuming that the stages reached in the development of the family are equal is an economic one. But it would be difficult to prove, for instance, that the absolute liberty of the testator in England and the severe restrictions imposed upon him in France are only due in every detail to economic causes. Both react back, however, on the economic sphere to a very considerable extent, because they influence the division of property. As to the realms of ideology which soar still higher in the air, religion, philosophy, etc., these have a prehistoric stock, found already in existence and taken over in the historic period, of what we should to-day call bunk. These various false conceptions of nature, of man's own being, of spirits, magic forces, etc., have for the most part only a negative economic basis; but the low economic development of the prehistoric period is supplemented and also partially conditioned and even caused by the false conceptions of nature. And even though economic necessity was the main driving force of the progressive knowledge of nature and becomes ever more so, it would surely be pedantic to try and find economic causes for all this primitive nonsense. The history of science is the history of the gradual clearing away of this nonsense or of its replacement by fresh but already less absurd nonsense. The people who deal with this belong in their turn to special spheres in the division of labour and appear to themselves to be working in an independent field. And in so far as they form an independent group within the social division of labour, in so far do their productions, including their errors, react back as an influence upon the whole development of society, even on its economic development. But all the same they themselves remain under the dominating influence of economic development. In philosophy, for instance, this can be most readily proved in the bourgeois period. Hobbes was the first modern materialist (in the eighteenth century sense) but he was an absolutist in a period when absolute monarchy was at its height throughout the whole of Europe and when the fight of absolute monarchy versus the people was beginning in England. Locke, both in religion and politics, was the child of the class compromise of 1688. The English deists and their more consistent successors, the French materialists, were the true philosophers of the bourgeoisie, the French even of the bourgeois revolution. The German petty bourgeois runs through German philosophy from Kant to Hegel, sometimes positively and sometimes negatively. But the philosophy of every epoch, since it is a definite sphere in the division of labour, has as its presupposition certain definite intellectual material handed down to it by its predecessors, from which it takes its start. And that is why economically backward countries can still play first fiddle in philosophy: France in the eighteenth century compared with England, on whose philosophy the French based themselves, and later Germany in comparison with both. But the philosophy both of France and Germany and the general blossoming of literature at that time were also the result of a rising economic development. I consider the ultimate supremacy of economic development established in these spheres too, but it comes to pass within conditions imposed by the particular sphere itself: in philosophy, for instance, through the operation of economic influences (which again generally only act under political, etc., disguises) upon the existing philosophic material handed down by predecessors. Here economy creates nothing absolutely new (a novo), but it determines the way in which the existing material of thought is altered and further developed, and that too for the most part indirectly, for it is the political, legal and moral reflexes which exercise the greatest direct influence upon philosophy. About religion I have said the most necessary things in the last section on Feuerbach. If therefore Barth supposes that we deny any and every reaction of the political, etc., reflexes of the economic movement upon the movement itself, he is simply tilting at windmills. He has only got to look at Marx's Eighteenth Brumaire, which deals almost exclusively with the particular part played by political struggles and events; of course, within their general dependence upon economic conditions. Or Capital, the section on the working day, for instance, where legislation, which is surely a political act, has such a trenchant effect. Or the section on the history of the bourgeoisie. (Chapter XXIV.) Or why do we fight for the political dictatorship of the proletariat if political power is economically impotent? Force (that is state power) is also an economic power. But I have no time to criticise the book now. I must first get Vol. III out and besides I think too that Bernstein, for instance, could deal with it quite effectively. What these gentlemen all lack is dialectic. They never see anything but here cause and there effect. That this is a hollow abstraction, that such metaphysical polar opposites only exist in the real world during crises, while the whole vast process proceeds in the form of interaction (though of very unequal forces, the economic movement being by far the strongest, most elemental and most decisive) and that here everything is relative and nothing is absolute this they never begin to see. Hegel has never existed for them.

Letters: Marx-Engels Correspondence 1890

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1890/letters/90_10_27.htm

Wherever there is a division of labor on a social scale, there will also be found the growing independence of workers in relation to each other. Production is in the last instance the decisive factor. However, as soon as the commercial exchange of commodities separates itself from actual production it follows a movement which, although as a whole still dominated by production, in turn obeys in its particular details and within the sphere of its general dependence, its own laws. These flow from the nature of the new factor involved. This movement has its own phases and reacts in turn upon the course of production. The discovery of America resulted from the hunger for money, which had already driven the Portuguese to Africa (cf. Soetbeer s Edelmetall-Produktion), because the tremendous expansion of European industry in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries together with the corresponding commercial activity demanded more means of exchange than Germany the great silver country from 1450 to 1550 could provide. The conquest of India by the Portuguese, Dutch, and English from 1500 to 1800 was undertaken for the sake of imports from India. At that time no one thought of exports. And yet what colossal counter-effects these discoveries and conquests which were determined purely by interests of trade, had upon exports to those countries and upon the development of large scale industry. The same is true for the money market. Just as soon as dealing in money is separated from commodity exchange, it acquires a development of its own, special laws determined by its particular nature, and its own phases. Yet they all take place within the given limits and conditions of production and commodity exchange. Where dealing in money is extended in the course of its further evolution to include securities that are not merely government consols but industrials and railroad stocks, and thereby wins direct control over a phase of the production which as a whole controls it, the reaction of the money market upon production becomes all the stronger and more complicated. The investment bankers are the owners of railroads, mines, steel mills, etc. These means of production take on a double aspect: business has to be run now with an eye to the interests of direct production, and now with an eye to the needs of the stock-holders in so far as they are money lenders. The crassest illustration of this is furnished by the activities of the North American railroads which depend completely, upon the immediate market operations of a Jay Gould, Vanderbilt and others operations that are totally foreign to the road in question and its interests as a common carrier. And even here in England we have witnessed decades of struggle between different railway companies in competitive territories in which an enormous amount of money went up in smoke not in the interest of production and communication but solely because of a rivalry whose main function was to make possible market operations of the wealthy stock-holders. In these few intimations of my conception of the relation between production and commodity exchange, and of both to the money market, I have already answered in essence your questions concerning historical materialism in general. The matter can most easily be grasped from the standpoint of the division of labor. Society gives rise to certain public functions which it cannot dispense with. The people who are delegated to perform them constitute a new branch of the division of labor within society. They acquire therewith special interests in opposition even to those who have designated them; make themselves independent of them, and the state is here. And now the same thing takes place as in commodity exchange and later in money exchange: while the new independent power must, on the whole, submit to the movement of production, in turn it also reacts, by virtue of its immanent, i.e., its once transmitted but gradually developed relative independence, upon the conditions and course of production. There is a reciprocity between two unequal forces; on the one side, the economic movement; on the other, the new political power which strives for the greatest possible independence and which having once arisen is endowed with its own movement. The economic movement, upon the whole, asserts itself but it is affected by the reaction of the relatively independent political movement which it itself had set up. This political movement is on the one hand the state power, on the other, the opposition which comes to life at the same time with it. Just as the money market reflects, on the whole, with the qualifications indicated, the movement of the industrial market, but naturally in an inverted fashion, so there is reflected in the struggle between government and opposition, the struggle between already existing and contending classes but again in an inverted form, no longer direct but indirect, not as a class struggle but as a struggle for political principles. So inverted is this reflection that it required thousands of years to discover what was behind it. The reaction of the state power upon economic development can take a three-fold form. It can run in the same direction, and then the tempo of development becomes accelerated; it can buck up against that development in which case today in every large nation the state power is sure to go to smash for good; or it can block economic development along some directions and lay down its path along others. This last case is ultimately reducible to one of either of the foregoing two. It is clear that in the second and third cases the political power can do great damage to the course of economic development and result in a great waste of energy and materials. We must add to the above the case of conquest and brutal destruction of economic resources in which under certain circumstances it was possible in the past for a local or national economic development to be completely destroyed. Today cases of this kind usually produce opposite effects, at least among the large nations. Often it is the conquered who in the long run wins more economically, politically and morally than the conqueror. The same is true for law. Just as soon as the necessity arises for the new division of labor which creates professional jurists, another new independent domain is opened which, for all its dependence upon production and trade in general, still possesses a special capacity to react upon these fields. In a modern state, law must not only correspond to the general economic situation and be its expression; it must also be its coherently unified expression, free from glaring internal inconsistencies. In order to achieve this, the fidelity with which the law reflects economic conditions constantly diminishes. This is all the truer, the more rarely it happens, that the legal code expresses the harsh, unrelieved and naked fact of class rule. For that contradicts the very concept of law . The pure and consistent jural concept of the revolutionary bourgeoisie of 1792-96 already appears falsified in many respects in the Code Napoleon. And in so far as it is incorporated it is subject to daily modifications of all kinds because of the growing power of the proletariat. That doesn t prevent the Code Napoleon from serving as a legal model for new codifications of law in all parts of the world. The course of legal development consists, in large part, first in the attempt to erect an harmonious system of law by eliminating the contradictions flowing from the direct translation of economic relations into jural propositions; and then in the fact that the influence and compulsion exerted by the further economic development keeps on upsetting the system and plunging it into new contradictions. (I speak here for the time being only of civil law.) The reflection of economic relations as principles of law is necessarily also an inverted one. The process takes place without the participants becoming conscious of it. The jurist imagines that he is operating with a priori propositions, while the latter are after all only reflections of the economic process. And so everything remains standing on its head. This inverted reflex so long as it is not recognized for what it is constitutes what we call ideological conceptions. That it is able to exert a reactive influence on the economic basis and within certain limits to modify it, seems to me to be self-evident. The foundations of the law of inheritance, corresponding stages in the development of the family being presupposed, are economic. Nonetheless it would be very hard to prove that, e.g., the absolute freedom of testamentary disposition in England, and the strongly restricted right in France. in all particulars have only economic causes. Yet both methods react in a very significant way upon the economic system in that they influence the distribution of wealth. And now as concerns those ideological realms which tower still higher in the clouds religion, philosophy, etc. they all possess from pre-historical days an already discovered and traditionally accepted fund of what we would today call idiocy. All of these various mistaken ideas of nature, of the very creation of man, of spirits, magical forces, etc., have as their basis, in the main, negative economic grounds. The primitive economic development of the pre-historical period is supplemented by false ideas of nature, but in places it is often also conditioned and even caused by them. However, even if economic need has been the chief driving force in the advance of natural knowledge, and has become even more so, it would be altogether pedantic to seek economic causes for all this primitive idiocy. The history of science is the history of the gradual elimination of this idiocy, i.e., its replacement by new, but always less absurd, idiocy. The people who supply it belong again to special spheres in the division of labor and imagine that they are working up an independent domain. And in so far as they constitute an independent group within the social division of labor, their products, inclusive of their errors, exerts a counter-acting influence upon the entire social development, even upon the economic. Nonetheless they still remain under the dominant influence of economic development. For example, in philosophy this is easiest to demonstrate for the bourgeois period. Hobbes was the first modern materialist (in the spirit of the eighteenth century) but an absolutist at a time when in the whole of Europe absolute monarchy was enjoying the height of its power and in England had taken up the struggle against the people. Locke was, in religion as in politics, a son of the class-compromise of 1688. The English Deists, and their more consistent followers, the French materialists, were the genuine philosophers of the bourgeoisie the French, even of the bourgeois revolution. In German philosophy from Kant to Hegel the German philistine makes his way now positively, now negatively. But as a definite domain within the division of labor, the philosophy of every age has as its presuppositions a certain intellectual material which it inherits from its predecessors and which is its own point of departure. That is why philosophy can play first violin in economically backward countries: France in the eighteenth century as opposed to England upon whose philosophy her own was based; and later Germany as opposed to both. But in France as in Germany, philosophy, like the general outburst of literary activity of that time, was a result of an economic upswing. The final supremacy of economic development even in these realms is now established but it takes place within the conditions which are set down by the particular realm: in philosophy, e.g., through the effect of economic influences (which in turn exert influence through disguised political, etc., forms) upon the existing philosophical material which our predecessors have handed down. Of itself economics produces no effects here directly; but it determines the kind of change and development the already existing intellectual material receives, and even that, for the most part, indirectly, since it is the political, jural and moral reflexes which exercize the greatest direct influence upon philosophy. I have said what is necessary about religion in the last section on Feuerbach. If Barth imagines that we deny all and every retroaction of the political, etc., reflexes of the economic movement upon that movement itself, he is simply contending against windmills. He ought at least take a glance at Marx s Eighteenth Brumaire, which almost restricts itself to the treatment of the special role that political struggles and events play, naturally within the sphere of their general dependence upon economic conditions; or in Capital, e.g., the section on the working day, where legislation, which certainly is a political act, operates so decisively; or the section on the history of the bourgeoisie (Chap.24). Or else, why are we struggling for the political dictatorship of the proletariat, if political power has no economic effects? Force (i.e., the state power) is also an economic power! But I have no time at present to criticize the book. The third volume must first come out, and besides I believe that, for example, even Bernstein can do the job quite well. What all these gentlemen lack is dialectics. All they ever see is cause here, effect there. They do not at all see that this is a bare abstraction; that in the real world such metaphysical polar opposites exist only in crises; that the whole great process develops itself in the form of reciprocal action, to be sure of very unequal forces, in which the economic movement is far and away the strongest, most primary and decisive. They do not see that here nothing is absolute and everything relative. For them Hegel has never existed. Yours, etc.

Letters: Marx-Engels Correspondence 1890

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1890/letters/90_10_27a.htm

In his work on Thomas More, Karl Kautsky has demonstrated how 15th- and 16th-century humanism, the first form of the bourgeois Enlightenment, subsequently developed into Catholic Jesuitry. In precisely the same way, we see here its second, fully mature form in the 18th century develop into modern Jesuitry, Russian diplomacy. This sudden change into the opposite, this ultimate arrival at a point diametrically opposed to the starting point, is the natural and inevitable fate of all historical movements which lack a clear idea of their origins and the conditions of their existence and therefore set themselves totally illusory goals. They are unmercifully chastised by the irony of history.

Marx Engels on Art and Literature

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1890/russian-tsardom/thomas-more.htm

The present draft differs very favourably from the former programme [at Gotha].The strong survivals of outmoded traditions both the specific Lassallean and vulgar socialistic have in the main been removed, and as regards its theoretical aspect the draft is, on the whole, based on present-day science and can be discussed on this basis. It is divided into three sections: I. The Preamble, II. Political Demands, III. Demands for Measures of Protection for the Workers. I. Preamble in Ten Paragraphs In general it suffers from the attempt to combine two things that are uncombinable: a programme and a commentary on the programme as well. The fear that a short, pointed exposition would not be intelligible enough, has caused explanations to be added, which make it verbose and drawn out. To my view the programme should be as short and precise as possible. No harm is done even if it contains the occasional foreign word, or a sentence whose full significance cannot be understood at first sight. Verbal exposition at meetings and written commentaries in the press take care of all that, and the short, precise phrase, once understood, takes root in the memory, and becomes a slogan, a thing that never happens with verbose explanations. Too much should not be sacrificed for the sake of popularity, and the mental ability and educational level of our workers should not be underestimated. They have understood much more difficult things than the shortest, most concise programme can offer them; and if the period of the Anti-Socialist Law has made more difficult, and here and there even prevented the spreading of comprehensive knowledge among the masses joining the movement, now that our propagandist literature can again be kept and read without risking trouble, lost time will soon be made up for under the old leadership. I shall try to make this entire section somewhat shorter and if I succeed shall enclose it or send it on later. Now, I shall deal with the individual paragraphs numbered from 1 to 10. Paragraph 1. The separation, etc., mines, pits, quarries three words for the same thing; two should be deleted. I would leave mines (Bergwerke), which is a word used even in the most level parts of the country, and I would designate them all by this widely used term. I would, however, add railways and other means of communication . Paragraph 2. Here I would insert: In the hands of their appropriators (or their owners) the social means of labour are and likewise below dependence ... on the owners (or appropriators) of the means of labour , etc. It has already been said in para. I that these gentlemen have appropriated these things as exclusive possession and will simply need to be repeated here if one absolutely insists on introducing the word monopolises . Neither this nor the other word adds anything to the sense. And anything redundant in a programme weakens it. these are precisely those that are at hand. Before the steam engine it was possible to do without it, now we couldn t. Since all the means of labour are nowadays directly or indirectly either by their design or because of the social division of labour social means of labour, these words express what is available at every given moment sufficiently clearly, correctly and without any misleading associations. If this conclusion is intended to correspond with the preamble of the Rules of the International, I should prefer it to correspond completely: to social misery (this is No. 1), mental degradation and political dependence [General Rules of the International Working Men s Association]. Physical degradation is part of social misery and political dependence is a fact, while the denial of political rights is a declamatory phrase which is only relatively true and for this reason does not belong in the programme. Paragraph 3. In my opinion the first sentence should be changed. First of all that which follows is an economic fact, which should be explained in economic terms. The expression domination of the individual owners creates the false impression that this has been caused by the political domination of that gang of robbers. Secondly, these individual owners include not only capitalists and big landowners (what does the bourgeoisie following here signify? Are they a third class of individual owners? Are the big landowners also bourgeois"? And, once we have turned to the subject of big landowners, should we ignore the colossal survivals of feudalism, which give the whole filthy business of German politics its specific reactionary character?). Peasants and petty bourgeois too are individual owners , at least they still are today; but they do not appear anywhere in the programme and therefore the wording should make it clear that they are not included in the category of individual owners under discussion. The wealth consists of 1. means of labour, 2. means of subsistence. It is therefore grammatically incorrect and illogical to mention one part of the wealth without the other and then refer to the total wealth, linking the two by and. What has happened to the big landowners and the bourgeoisie mentioned above? If it is enough to speak only of capitalists here, it should be so above as well. If one wishes to specify, however, it is generally not enough to mention them alone. This is incorrect when put in such a categorical way. The organisation of the workers and their constantly growing resistance will possibly check the increase of misery to a certain extent. However, what certainly does increase is the insecurity of existence. I should insert this. Paragraph 4. needs considerable improvement. I am familiar with capitalist production as a social form, or an economic phase; capitalist private production being a phenomenon which in one form or another is encountered in that phase. What is capitalist private production? Production by separate entrepreneurs, which is increasingly becoming an exception. Capitalist production by joint-stock companies is no longer private production but production on behalf of many associated people. And when we pass on from joint-stock companies to trusts, which dominate and monopolise whole branches of industry, this puts an end not only to private production but also to planlessness. If the word private were deleted the sentence could pass. Instead of this declamatory phrase, which looks as though we still regret the ruin of the bourgeois and petty bourgeois, I should state the simple fact: which by the ruin of the urban and rural middle classes, the petty bourgeois and small peasants, widen (or deepen) the chasm between the haves and have-nots . The last two phrases repeat the same thing. In the Appendix to Section 1, I give a draft amendment. The closing sentence: In their struggle ... are capable, would be better deleted. The imprecise wording which are capable ... of improving the position of the people in general (who is that?), can be taken to embrace everything, protective tariffs and free trade, guilds and freedom of enterprise, loans on landed security, exchange banks, compulsory vaccination and prohibition of vaccination, alcoholism and prohibition, etc., etc. What should be said here, has already been said earlier, and it is unnecessary to mention specifically that the demand for the whole includes every separate part, for this, to my mind, weakens the impact. If, however, this sentence is intended as a link to pass on to the individual demands, something resembling the following could be said: Social Democracy fights for all demands which help it approach this goal ( measures and arrangements to be deleted as repetitious). Or else, which would be even better: to say directly what it is all about, i.e., that it is necessary to catch up with what the bourgeoisie has missed; I have included a closing sentence to this effect in Appendix I. I consider this important in connection with my notes to the next section and to motivate the proposals put forward by me therein. II. Political Demands The political demands of the draft have one great fault. It lacks precisely what should have been said. If all the 10 demands were granted we should indeed have more diverse means of achieving our main political aim, but the aim itself would in no wise have been achieved. As regards the rights being granted to the people and their representatives, the imperial constitution is, strictly speaking, a copy of the Prussian constitution of 1850, a constitution whose articles are extremely reactionary and give the government all the real power, while the chambers are not even allowed to reject taxes; a constitution, which proved during the period of the conflict that the government could do anything it liked with it. The rights of the Reichstag are the same as those of the Prussian chamber and this is why Liebknecht called this Reichstag the fig-leaf of absolutism. It is an obvious absurdity to wish to transform all the instruments of labour into common property on the basis of this constitution and the system of small states sanctioned by it, on the basis of the union between Prussia and Reuss-Greiz-Schleiz-Lobenstein, in which one has as many square miles as the other has square inches. To touch on that is dangerous, however. Nevertheless, somehow or other, the thing has to be attacked. How necessary this is is shown precisely at the present time by opportunism, which is gaining ground in a large section of the Social-Democratic press. Fearing a renewal of the Anti-Socialist Law, or recalling all manner of over-hasty pronouncements made during the reign of that law, they now want the party to find the present legal order in Germany adequate for putting through all party demands by peaceful means. These are attempts to convince oneself and the party that present-day society is developing towards socialism without asking oneself whether it does not thereby just as necessarily outgrow the old social order and whether it will not have to burst this old shell by force, as a crab breaks its shell, and also whether in Germany, in addition, it will not have to smash the fetters of the still semi-absolutist, and moreover indescribably confused political order. One can conceive that the old society may develop peacefully into the new one in countries where the representatives of the people concentrate all power in their hands, where, if one has the support of the majority of the people, one can do as one sees fit in a constitutional way: in democratic republics such as France and the U.S.A., in monarchies such as Britain, where the imminent abdication of the dynasty in return for financial compensation is discussed in the press daily and where this dynasty is powerless against the people. But in Germany where the government is almost omnipotent and the Reichstag and all other representative bodies have no real power, to advocate such a thing in Germany, when, moreover, there is no need to do so, means removing the fig-leaf from absolutism and becoming oneself a screen for its nakedness. In the long run such a policy can only lead one s own party astray. They push general, abstract political questions into the foreground, thereby concealing the immediate concrete questions, which at the moment of the first great events, the first political crisis automatically pose themselves. What can result from this except that at the decisive moment the party suddenly proves helpless and that uncertainty and discord on the most decisive issues reign in it because these issues have never been discussed? Must there be a repetition of what happened with protective tariffs, which were declared to be a matter of concern only to the bourgeoisie, not affecting the interests of the workers in the least, that is, a matter on which everyone could vote as he wished? Are not many people now going to the opposite extreme and are they not, in contrast to the bourgeoisie, who have become addicted to protective tariffs, rehashing the economic distortions of Cobden and Bright and preaching them as the purest socialism the purest Manchesterism? This forgetting of the great, the principal considerations for the momentary interests of the day, this struggling and striving for the success of the moment regardless of later consequences, this sacrifice of the future of the movement for its present, may be honestly meant, but it is and remains opportunism, and honest opportunism is perhaps the most dangerous of all! Which are these ticklish, but very significant points? First. If one thing is certain it is that our party and the working class can only come to power under the form of a democratic republic. This is even the specific form for the dictatorship of the proletariat, as the Great French Revolution has already shown. It would be inconceivable for our best people to become ministers under an emperor, as Miquel. It would seem that from a legal point of view it is inadvisable to include the demand for a republic directly in the programme, although this was possible even under Louis Phillippe in France, and is now in Italy. But the fact that in Germany it is not permitted to advance even a republican party programme openly, proves how totally mistaken is the belief that a republic, and not only a republic, but also communist society, can be established in a cosy, peaceful way. However, the question of the republic could possibly be passed by. What, however, in my opinion should and could be included is the demand for the concentration of all political power in the hands of the people s representatives. That would suffice for the time being if it is impossible to go any further. Second. The reconstitution of Germany. On the one hand, the system of small states must be abolished just try to revolutionise society while there are the Bavarian-W rttemberg reservation rights and the map of present-day Thuringia, for example, is such a sorry sight. On the other hand, Prussia must cease to exist and must be broken up into self-governing provinces for the specific Prussianism to stop weighing on Germany. The system of small states and Prussianism are the two sides of the antithesis now gripping Germany in a vice, in which one side must always serve as the excuse and justification for the existence of the other. What should take its place? In my view, the proletariat can only use the form of the one and indivisible republic. In the gigantic territory of the United States, the federal republic is still, on the whole, a necessity, although in the Eastern states it is already becoming a hindrance. It would be a step forward in Britain where the two islands are peopled by four nations and in spite of a single Parliament three different systems of legislation already exist side by side. In little Switzerland, it has long been a hindrance, tolerable only because Switzerland is content to be a purely passive member of the European state system. For Germany, federalisation on the Swiss model would be an enormous step backward. Two points distinguish a union state from a completely unified state: first, that each member state, each canton, has its own civil and criminal legislative and judicial system, and, second, that alongside a popular chamber there is also a federal chamber in which each canton, whether large or small, votes as such. The first we have luckily overcome and we shall not be so childish as to reintroduce it, the second we have in the Bundesrat and we could do very well without it, since our federal state generally constitutes a transition to a unified state. The revolution of 1866 and 1870 must not be reversed from above but supplemented and improved by a movement from below. So, then, a unified republic. But not in the sense of the present French Republic, which is nothing but the Empire established in 1799 without the Emperor. From 1792 to 1799 each French department, each commune, enjoyed complete self-government on the American model, and this is what we too must have. How self-government is to be organised and how we can manage without a bureaucracy has been shown to us by America and the First French Republic, and is being shown even today by Australia, Canada and the other English colonies. And a provincial and communal self-government of this type is far freer than, for instance, Swiss federalism, under which, it is true, the canton is very independent in relation to the federation, but is also independent in relation to the district and the commune. The cantonal governments appoint the district governors and prefects, which is unknown in English speaking countries and which we want to abolish here as resolutely in the future as the Prussian Landr te and Regicrungsr te. Probably few of these points should be included in the programme. I mention them also mainly to describe the system in Germany where such matters cannot be discussed openly, and to emphasise the self-deception of those who wish to transform such a system in a legal way into communist society. Further, to remind the party executive that there are other important political questions besides direct legislation by the people and the gratuitous administration of justice without which we can also ultimately get by. In the generally unstable conditions these questions may become urgent at any time and what will happen then if they have not been discussed by us beforehand and no agreement has been reached on them? However, what can be included in the programme and can, at least indirectly, serve as a hint of what may not be said directly is the following demand: Complete self-government in the provinces, districts and communes through officials elected by universal suffrage. The abolition of all local and provincial authorities appointed by the state. Whether or not it is possible to formulate other programme demands in connection with the points discussed above, I am less able to judge here than you can over there. But it would be desirable to debate these questions within the party before it is too late. To item 2. Nowhere more so than in Germany does the right of association require guarantees also from the state. The closing phrase: for the regulation , etc., should be added as item 4 and be given a corresponding form. In this connection it should be noted that we would be taken in good and proper by labour chambers made up half of workers and half of entrepreneurs. For years to come the entrepreneurs would always have a majority, for only a single black sheep among the workers would be needed to achieve this. If it is not agreed upon that in cases of conflict both halves express separate opinions, it would be much better to have a chamber of entrepreneurs and in addition an independent chamber of workers. In conclusion I should like to request that the draft be compared once more with the French programme where some things seem better precisely for Section III. Being pressed for time, I unfortunately cannot search for the Spanish programme, which is also very good in many respects. Appendix to Section I

A Critique of the Draft Social-Democratic Program of 1891 by Engels

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1891/06/29.htm

Sir, In your issue of this morning your Paris correspondent, amongst other inaccuracies concerning the family of my late friend Karl Marx, states that after the Commune the French Minister of justice ordered the arrest of M. Paul Lafargue, recently elected deputy at Lille. He then continues Mrs. Aveling, the daughter of Mrs. Marx, being for the moment absent from London, the duty of repelling the above-mentioned accusation against her mother devolves upon me. The facts are these: M. Lafargue, while staying with his wife and his two sisters-in-law at Bagn res-de-Luchon, was informed of his impending arrest by a friendly Republican police-officer. He escaped the same day into Spain, passing the Pyren es on horseback. Mrs. Marx, who was then in London, therefore could not, even if she had been so minded, interfere on his behalf by betraying to the French Government anything whatever. The whole story of the pretended depot of arms is a mere fable, invented to blacken the memory of a woman whose noble and self-sacrificing nature was utterly incapable of a mean action. I am, Sir, your obedient servant. 122, Regent s-park-road, N.W., Nov. 17.

Works of Frederick Engels 1890

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1891/11/26.htm

But let us deal with the alleged "lying addition" once and for all by quoting the reports on our passage in all London morning papers on April 17, 1863. We have already had The Times, The Morning Star and The Morning Advertiser. Daily Telegraph: The eight newspapers cited all have their separate complete staff of parliamentary reporters. They are thus the same number of witnesses, fully independent of one another. In addition they are in their totality impartial, since they adhere to the most diverse party tendencies. And both of the two versions of the irrepressible sentence are vouched for by Tories and Whigs and radicals. According to four of them, Gladstone said: entirely confined to classes of property. According to four others he said: entirely confined to the augmentation of Capital. Eight irreproachable witnesses thus testify that Gladstone really uttered the sentence. The only question is whether this was in the milder version used by Marx, or in the stronger version given in four of the reports. Against them all, in isolated grandeur stands -- Hansard. But Hansard is not irreproachable like the morning papers. Hansard's reports are subject to censorship, the censorship of the speakers themselves. And precisely for this reason "it is the custom to quote according to Hansard. Eight non-suspect witnesses against one suspect witness! But what does that worry our victory-confident Anonymous? Precisely because the reports of the eight morning papers put "that notorious passage" in Gladstone's mouth, precisely because of this, they "speak for" our Anonymous, precisely by this they prove even more that Marx "lyingly added" it. Indeed, nothing actually exceeds the "impudence" of the anonymous Brentano.

1891: Brentano vs. Marx

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1891/brentano/ch02.htm

Already in his first reply to Marx (Documents, No. 5) Mr. Brentano hints at his intention, though bashfully as yet. The fatal Times report compels him to do so. This report, it is true, contains the "notorious", the "lyingly added" passage, but that is actually beside the point. For since it "fully coincides materially" with Hansard, it says "the direct opposite of that notorious passage", although it contains it word for word. Thus it is no longer a question of the wording of the "notorious passage", but of its meaning. It is no longer a question of denying the passage's existence, but of claiming that it means the opposite of what it says. And Marx having declared in his second reply that lack of time forces him to end, once and for all, his pleasurable exchange of opinions with his anonymous opponent, the latter can venture to deal with even greater confidence with this subject, which is not exactly proper at that. This he does in his rejoinder, reproduced here as No. 7 of the documents. Here he claims that Marx attempts to obscure the Times report, which materially fully coincides with Hansard, and this is in three ways. Firstly by an incorrect translation of CLASSES WHO ARE IN EASY CIRCUMSTANCES. I leave aside this point as absolutely irrelevant. It is generally known that Marx had a command of the English language quite different from that of Mr. Brentano. But exactly what Mr. Gladstone thought when he used this expression-and whether he thought anything-it is quite impossible to say today, 27 years later, even for himself. The second point is that Marx "simply suppressed" a certain "relative clause" in the Times report. The passage in question is previously cited at length in section II, p. 7. By suppressing this relative clause, Marx is supposed to have suppressed for his readers the fact that the augmentation of wealth, as shown by the income tax returns, is confined to classes which possess property, since the labouring classes do not fall under the income tax, and thus nothing may be learned from the returns about the increase in prosperity amongst the workers; this does not mean, however, that in reality the labouring classes remain excluded from the extraordinary augmentation of national wealth. The sentence in the Times report runs, in Mr. Brentano's own translation: Does his moral indignation at the fact that he had run aground with "mendacity" make Mr. Brentano blind? Or does he think that he can make all sorts of allegations, since Marx will no longer reply in any case? The fact is that the incriminated sentence begins, according to Marx, both in the Inaugural Address and in Capitol, with the words: "From 1842 to 1852 THE TAXABLE INCOME of the country increased by 6 per cent... In the eight years from 1853 to 1861, it has ..." etc. Does Mr. Brentano know another "taxable income" in England apart from that subject to income tax? And has the highly important "relative clause" anything at all to add to this clear declaration that only income subject to income tax is under discussion? Or does he believe, as it almost appears, that people "forge" Gladstone's budget speeches, make "lying additions" or "suppress" something in them if they quote them without, la Brentano, also providing the reader with an essay on English income tax in which they "falsify" income tax into the bargain, as Marx proved (Documents, No. 6),b and as Mr. Brentano was forced to admit (Documents, No. 7). And when the "lyingly added" sentence simply says that the augmentation just mentioned by Mr. Gladstone was confined to classes of property, does it not say essentially the same, since only classes of property pay income tax? But of course, whilst Mr. Brentano creates a deafening hullabaloo at the front door about this sentence as a Marxian falsification and insolent mendacity, he himself allows it to slip in quietly through the back door. Mr. Brentano knew very well that Marx quoted Mr. Gladstone as speaking about "taxable income" and no other. For in his first attack (Documents, No.3), he quotes the passage from the Inaugural Address, and even translated TAXABLE as "liable to tax" If he now "suppresses" this in his rejoinder, and if from now on until his pamphlet of 1890 he protests again and again that Marx concealed, intentionally and maliciously, the fact that Gladstone was speaking here solely of those incomes liable to income tax -- should we now sling his own expressions back at him: "lying", "forgery", "impudent mendacity", "simply nefarious"? To continue with the text: On the other hand the Inaugural Address -- and this is the document which Brentano accuses of falsifying a quotation -- states explicitly on p. 4, only a few lines before the "notorious" sentence, that the Chancellor of the Exchequer (Gladstone), during the millennium of free trade, told the House of Commons: In the whole polemic, from his first retort to Marx in 1872 (Documents, No.5) down to his introduction and appendix to Meine Polemik, etc., 1890, Mr. Brentano suppresses, with a sleight of hand which we must on no account describe as "insolent mendacity", the fact that Marx directly quoted in the Inaugural Address these Gladstonian declarations about the unparalleled improvement in the situation of the workers. And in this rejoinder, which, as already mentioned, remained unknown to Marx up to his death, and to me until the publication of the pamphlet Meine Polemik, etc., in 1890, in which the accusation about the lyingly added sentence was only apparently maintained, though in reality dropped, and the lyingly added sentence not only shamefacedly admitted as genuine Gladstonian property, but also as "speaking for us", i.e. for Brentano -- in this rejoinder a retreat is beaten to the new line of defence: Marx has distorted and twisted Gladstone's speech; Marx has Gladstone say that, it goes, the riches of the rich have grown enormously, but that the poor, the working population, have at the most become less poor. But in fact Gladstone said, in plain words, that the condition of the workers had improved to an unexampled degree. This second line of defence was pierced by the irresistible fact that precisely in the incriminated document, in the Inaugural Address, these same Gladstonian words were quoted explicitly. And Mr. Brentano knew this. "But what does it matter? The readers" of the Concordia "cannot check up on him!" Incidentally, regarding what Gladstone really said, on this we shall have a few short words to say in a little while. In conclusion, Mr. Brentano, in the security, first of his anonymity, and second of Marx's declaration that he has no wish to bother with him further, indulges in the following private jollity:

1891: Brentano vs. Marx

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1891/brentano/ch03.htm

Above all we note that here too there is no longer any mention of the "lyingly added" sentence. The sentence from the Inaugural Address is quoted right on the first page, and it is then claimed that Gladstone had "stated in direct opposition to Karl Marx's claim" that these figures referred only to those paying income tax (which Marx had Gladstone say too, since he explicitly limits these figures to taxable income) but that the condition of the working class had at the same time improved in unexampled fashion (which Marx also has Gladstone say, only nine lines before the challenged quotation). I would request the reader to compare for himself the Inaugural Address (Documents, No. 1) with Mr. Brentano's claim (Documents, No. 13) in order to see how Mr. Brentano either "lyingly adds", or fabricates in another manner, a contradiction where there is none at all. But since the charge about the lyingly added sentence has broken down ignominiously, Mr. Brentano, contrary to his better knowledge, must attempt to take in his readers by telling them Marx tried to suppress the fact that Gladstone had spoken here only of "taxable income", or the income of classes which possess property. And here Mr. Brentano does not even notice that his first accusation is thus turned into the opposite, in that the second is a slap in the face of the first. Having happily accomplished this "forgery", he is moved to draw the attention of the Concordia to the "forgery" allegedly committed by Marx, and the Concordia then asks him to send it an article against Marx. What now follows is too delicious not to be given verbatim: Since "it was to be expected that Marx would heap personal insults on his adversary", it could naturally "only be amusing to leave him in the dark as to the identity of his adversary". It was hitherto a mystery as to how you can heap personal insults upon a person you do not know. You can only get personal if you know something of the person in question. But Mr. Brentano, made anonymous in the interests of the paper's reputation, relieved his adversary of this trouble. He himself waded in with "insults", first with the "lyingly added" printed in bold type, and then with "impudent mendacity", "simply nefarious", etc. Mr. Brentano, the non-anonymous, obviously made a slip of the pen here. Mr. Brentano "on the other hand, had all the less objection" to the anonymity imposed upon himself, not so that the well-known Marx could "heap personal insults" upon the unknown Brentano, but so that the concealed Brentano could do this to the well-known Marx. And this is supposed to "be amusing"! That's what actually transpired, but not because Mr. Brentano wanted it. Marx, as later his daughter, and now myself, have all tried to see the amusing aspect of this polemic. Such success as we have had, be it great or small, has been at the expense of Mr. Brentano. His articles have been anything but "amusing". The only contributions to amusement are the rapier-thrusts aimed by Marx at the shady side of his "left-in-the-dark person", which the man at the receiving end now wishes to laugh off belatedly as the "loutishness of his scurrilous polemics". The Junkers, the priests, the lawyers and other right and proper opponents of the incisive polemics of Voltaire, Beaumarchais and Paul Louis Courier objected to the "loutishness of their scurrilous polemics", which has not prevented these examples of "loutishness" from being regarded as models and masterpieces today. And we have had so much pleasure from these and similar "scurrilous polemics" that a hundred Brentanos should not succeed in dragging us down to the level of German university polemics, where there is nothing but the impotent rage of green envy, and the most desolate boredom. However, Mr. Brentano once again regards his readers as so duped that he can lay it on thick again with a brazen face: But then the genuine university polemicist appears. When Brentano, emboldened by the scent of victory, has thus driven his enemy into the corner, the foe acts like the cuttlefish, darkening the water and hiding the subject of controversy by focusing attention on completely inconsequential secondary matters. The Jesuits say: Si fecisti, nega. If you have perpetrated something, deny it. The German university polemicist goes further and Says: If you have perpetrated a shady lawyer's trick, then lay it at your opponent's door. Scarcely has Marx quoted The Theory of the Exchanges and Professor Beesly, and this simply because they had quoted the disputed passage like he had, than Brentano the cuttlefish "clings" to them with all the suckers of his ten feet, and spreads such a torrent of his "dark fluid" all around that you must look hard and grasp firmly if you do not wish to lose from eye and hand the real "subject of controversy", namely the allegedly "lyingly added" sentence. In his rejoinder, exactly the same method. First he starts another squabble with Marx about the meaning of the expression CLASSES IN EASY CIRCUMSTANCES, a squabble which under the best of circumstances could produce nothing but that very "obscuration" which Mr. Brentano desires. And then dark fluid is again squirted in the matter of that renowned relative clause which Marx had maliciously suppressed, and which, as we have shown, could perfectly well be omitted, since the fact to which it indirectly alluded had already been stated quite clearly in an earlier sentence of the speech which had been quoted by Marx. And thirdly, our cuttlefish has enough dark sauce left over to obscure once again the subject of controversy, by claiming that Marx has again suppressed some sentences from The Times -- sentences which had absolutely nothing to do with the single point at issue between them at that time, the allegedly lyingly added sentence. And the same waste of sepia in the present self-apologia. First, naturally, The Theory of the Exchanges must be the whipping boy. Then, all of a sudden, we are confronted with the Lassallean "iron law of wages" with which, as everyone knows, Marx was as little connected as Mr. Brentano with the invention of gunpowder; Mr. Brentano must know that in the first volume of Capital Marx specifically denied all and every responsibility for any conclusions drawn by Lassalle, and that in the same book Marx describes the law of wages as a function of differing variables and very elastic, thus anything but iron. But when the ink-squirting has started there is no stopping it: the Halle congress, Liebknecht and Bebel, Gladstone's budget speech of 1843, the English trade unions, all manner of far-fetched things are resorted to so as, faced with an opponent who has gone over to the offensive, to cover by self-apologia the defensive line of Mr. Brentano and his lofty philanthropic principles, treated so scornfully by the wicked socialists. One gets the impression that a round dozen cuttlefish were helping him do the "hushing up" here. And all of this because Mr. Brentano himself knows that he has hopelessly run aground with his claim about the "lyingly added" sentence, and has not got the courage to withdraw this claim openly and honourably. To use his own words: Meanwhile Mr. Brentano has another piece of information for us in petto [in store], which in fact "could only be amusing". He has, in fact, been so lamentably treated that he can find no peace and quiet until he has moaned to us about all his misfortune. First the Concordia suppresses his name in the interests of the reputation of the paper. Mr. Brentano is magnanimous enough to consent to this sacrifice in the interests of the good cause. Then Marx unleashes upon him the loutishness of his scurrilous polemics. This too he swallows. Only he wished to reply to this "with the verbatim publication of the entire polemic". But sadly

1891: Brentano vs. Marx

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1891/brentano/ch05.htm

But it is na ve that here, at the end of the quotations, "the reproduction of the teal budget speech" is demanded from Marx. So that is what Mr. Brentano understands by correct quotation. However, if the whole actual speech is always to be reproduced, then no speech has ever been quoted without "forgery". In the second appendix Mr. Brentano has a go at me. In the fourth edition of Capital, volume one, I drew attention to The Morning Star in connection with the allegedly false quotation. Mr. Brentano utilises this to once again obscure completely, with spurts of sepia, the original point at issue, the passage in the Inaugural Address, and instead of this to hit out at the passage in Capital already quoted by Mr. S. Taylor. In order to prove that my source of reference was false, and that Marx could only have taken the "forged quotation" from The Theory of the Exchanges, Mr. Brentano prints in parallel columns the reports of The Times and The Morning Star and the quotation according to Capital This second appendix is printed here as document No. 14. Mr. Brentano has The Morning Star begin its report with the words "I MUST SAY FOR ONE" etc. He thus claims that the preceding sentences on the growth of taxable income from 1842 to 1852, and from 1853 to 1861 are missing in The Morning Star; from which it naturally follows that Marx did not use The Morning Star but The Theory of the Exchanges. "The readers" of his pamphlet "with whom he is concerned, cannot check up on him!" But other people can, and they discover that this passage is certainly to be found in The Morning Star. We reprint it here, next to the passage from Capital in English and German for the edification of Mr. Brentano and his readers. In German translation: The absence of this sentence in his quotation from The Morning Star is Mr. Brentano's main trump card in his claim that Marx quoted from The Theory of the Exchanges and not from The Morning Star. He confronts the claim that the quotation was taken from The Morning Star with the incriminating gap in the parallel column. And now the sentence is nevertheless to be found in The Morning Star, in fact exactly as in Marx, and the incriminating gap is Mr. Brentano's own invention. If that is not "suppression" and "forgery", into the bargain, then these words lack any sense. But if Mr. Brentano "forges" at the beginning of the quotation, and if he now very carefully refrains from saying that Marx "lyingly added" a sentence in the middle of the same quotation, this in no way prevents him from insisting repeatedly that Marx suppressed the end of the quotation. In Capital the quotation breaks off with the passage: Gladstone's sentence: "Whether the extremes of poverty are less, I do not presume to say" is a quite definite statement, complete in itself. If it makes sense, it makes sense when taken in isolation. If it makes no sense, no addition however long, tacked on behind a "yet", can give it sense. If the sentence in Marx's quotation is "completely senseless", then this is not due to Marx who quoted it, but to Mr. Gladstone who uttered it. To probe more deeply this important case, let us now turn to the only source which, according to Mr. Brentano, it is the "custom" to quote, let us turn to Hansard, pure of all original sin. According to Mr. Brentano's own translation, it says: For Mr. Brentano is anyway in correspondence with Mr. Gladstone. What he has written to the latter we do not learn, of course, and we only learn very little of what Mr. Gladstone has written to him. In any case, Mr. Brentano has published from Gladstone's letters two meagre little sentences (Documents, No.16) and in my reply (Documents, No. 17) I showed that "this arbitrary mosaic of sentences torn from their context" proves nothing at all in Mr. Brentano's favour whilst the fact that he indulges in this sort of ragged publication, instead of publishing the whole correspondence, speaks volumes against him. But let us assume for a moment that these two little sentences only permitted the interpretation most favourable to Mr. Brentano. What then? "You are completely correct, and Marx completely incorrect." "I undertook no changes of any sort." These are the alleged words -- for Mr. Gladstone does not usually write in German, as far as I know -- of the former minister. Does this mean: I did not utter the "notorious" sentence, and that Marx "lyingly added" it? Certainly not. The eight London morning papers of April 17, 1863 would unanimously give the lie to such a claim. They prove beyond all doubt that this sentence was spoken. If Mr. Gladstone made no changes in the Hansard report -- although I am twelve years younger than him, I would not like to rely so implicitly on my memory in such trivialities which occurred 27 years ago -- then the omission of the sentence in Hansard says nothing in Mr. Brentano's favour, and a great deal against Hansard. Aside from this one point about the "lyingly added" sentence, Mr. Gladstone's opinion is completely inconsequential here. For as soon as we disregard this point, we find ourselves exclusively in the field of inconsequential opinions, in which after years of strife each sticks to his guns. If Mr. Gladstone, should he happen to be quoted, prefers the quotation methods of Mr. Brentano, an admiring supporter, to those of Marx, a sharply critical opponent, then this is quite obvious, and his indisputable right. For us, however, and for the question as to whether Marx quoted in good or in bad faith, his opinion is not even worth as much as that of any old uninvolved third person. For here Mr. Gladstone is no longer a witness but an interested party.

1891: Brentano vs. Marx

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1891/brentano/ch06.htm

This pamphlet gives us too much and too little. Too much, because it "also" gives us at length Mr. Brentano's views on "the advance of the working class and its causes". These views have absolutely nothing to do with the point at issue. I remark only this: Mr. Brentano's constantly repeated declaration that labour protection legislation and trade association organisations are fitted to improve the condition of the working class is by no means his own discovery. From the Condition of the Working Class in England and The Poverty of Philosophy to Capital and down to my most recent writings, Marx and I have said this a hundred times, though with very sharp reservations. Firstly, the favourable effects of the resisting trade associations are confined to periods of average and brisk business; in periods of stagnation and crisis they regularly fail; Mr. Brentano's claim that they "are capable of paralysing the fateful effects of the reserve army" is ridiculous boasting. And secondly ignoring other less important reservations -- neither the protection legislation nor the resistance of the trade associations removes the main thing which needs abolishing: Capitalist relations, which constantly reproduce the contradiction between the Capitalist class and the class of wage labourers. The mass of wage labourers remain condemned to life-long wage labour; the gap between them and the Capitalists becomes ever deeper and wider the more modern large-scale industry takes over all branches of production. But since Mr. Brentano would gladly convert wage-slaves into contented wage-slaves, he must hugely exaggerate the advantageous effects of labour protection, the resistance of trade associations, social piecemeal legislation, etc.; and as we are able to confront these exaggerations with the simple facts -- hence his fury. The pamphlet in question gives too little, since it gives, of the documents in the polemic, only the items exchanged between Mr. Brentano and Marx, and not those which have appeared since with regard to this question. So in order to place the reader in a position to form an overall judgement, I give, in the appendix: 1. the incriminated passages from the Inaugural Address of the General Council of the International and from Capital; 2. the polemic between Mr. Brentano and Marx; 3. that between Mr. Sedley Taylor and Eleanor Marx; 4. my Preface to the 4th edition of Capital and Mr. Brentano's reply to it; and 5. passages relevant to Gladstone's letters to Mr. Brentano. It goes without saying that I thereby omit all those passages of Brentano's argument which do not touch upon the question of falsification of quotation, but only constitute his "contribution to the advance", etc.

1891: Brentano vs. Marx

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1891/brentano/preface.htm

Dear Schl ter: ... Unfortunately I cannot accept Serge s invitation. I am rooted with so many fibres here in Europe and have so infinitely much to do that a retreat to America can be considered only in the most extremely desperate situation. Moreover, my household is fully in order again ever since Louise Kautsky is with me. Many thanks for the calendar. The articles in the Cyclopedia are partly by Marx and partly by me, viz., entirely or almost entirely on military subjects: biographies of military leaders, the articles on Artillery, Cavalry, Fortifications, etc. Purely commercial work, nothing else; they can safely remain buried. I see clearly enough that things are going downhill with the S.L.P. from its fraternization with the Nationalists, compared to whom the Fabians here likewise bourgeois are radicals. I should have thought that the Sozialist would scarcely be able to beget extra boredom by cohabitating with the Nationalist. Serge sends me the Nationalist, but despite all my efforts I cannot find anyone who is willing to read it. Nor do I understand the quarrel with Gompers. His Federation is, as far as I know, an association of trade-unions and nothing but trade-unions. Hence they have the formal right to reject anyone coming as the representative of a labor organization that is not a trade-union, or to reject delegates of an association to which such organizations are admitted. I cannot judge from here, of course, whether it was propagandistically advisable to expose oneself to such a rejection. But it was beyond question that it had to come, and I, for one, cannot blame Gompers for it. But when I think of next year s international congress in Brussels, I should think it would have been well to keep on good terms with Gompers, who has more workers behind him, at any rate, than the S.L.P., and to ensure as big a delegation from America as possible there, including his people. They would see many things there that will disconcert them in their narrowminded trade-union standpoint and besides, where do you want to find a recruiting ground if not in the trade unions? Many thanks for the silver material. If you could find something for me containing material on the present silver production of the U. S., I should be grateful. The European double-standard currency jackasses are sheer dupes of the American silver producers and are quite ready to pull the latter s chestnuts out of the fire for them. See my footnote on the precious metals in the fourth edition of Capital. Please give me fuller details of Marx s speech on free trade you refer to. I recall merely that when debate grew slack in the Brussels German Workers Society, Marx and I agreed to stage a sham debate in which he defended free trade and I protective tariffs, and I still see the astounded faces of the people when they saw the two of us suddenly attacking each other. It is possible that this speech was printed in the Deutsche Brusseler Zeitung. I can t recall any other one. You will probably be unable to come to Germany for the first year or two. Tauscher has been released, it is true, but only because there was no evidence against him. It was disclosed, on the other hand, that the provisions of the statute of limitations have been regularly interrupted for the rest of you. Cordial regards to your wife and yourself from Louise Kautsky and

Letters: Marx-Engels Correspondence 1891

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1891/letters/91_01_29.htm

My dear Lafargue Like nine-tenths of the news published in Paris about Germany, that which alarmed you is nothing but a false report. The leading Committee of the German Party has not budged where May 1st is concerned. The parliamentary group (the socialist members of the Reichstag) passed a resolution, unanimous save for one vote, that in Germany (and nowhere else) it would be desirable to celebrate May Day on Sunday, May 3rd, and not on May 1st. That is all. As the Party constitution does not give the group any official standing, there is nothing more to it than the simple expression of a desire, which, however, will probably receive general sanction. As for the idea of suggesting to other nationalities that they should similarly change the date of the demonstration, our papers do not say a word. Nevertheless, it may be that individually this or that deputy thought of it; as Bebel is in Zurich for his daughter s wedding I shall write to Fischer to stop any such foolishness should anyone still have it in mind. You and Bonnier, from whom I have a long letter on the matter in my pocket, can say whatever you please the English will probably do like the Germans and celebrate on the Sunday. As for the Germans, it is pretty well an absolute necessity. Last year you found their behaviour flabby. Very well, but in Hamburg, the town where we are best organised and have the greatest strength relative to the rest of the population, and where we had very considerable funds (Party as well as trade union) in Hamburg May 1st was celebrated in defiance of the employers. But business was rather poor, so the latter took advantage of the one-day stoppage to close their factories and to announce that they would reopen them only to workers who should have left their trade unions and who promised never to rejoin a union. The fight lasted throughout the summer and until the autumn; in the end, the employers gave up their demands; but our trade union organisation in Hamburg was badly shaken, funds were exhausted there and elsewhere, owing to contributions to the lock-outs, and there is not the smallest desire to go through all this again in the spring, the industrial situation having grown worse. It s all very well for you to talk about hesitations and flabbiness. You have a republic, and the bourgeois republicans, to defeat the royalists, have been forced to grant you political rights which we are far from having in Germany. Moreover, for the time being, split as you are with the Broussists in tow to the government, you are not too dangerous; on the contrary, Constans would like to see you demonstrate and frighten the Radicals a bit. In Germany, our people are a genuine force, one and a half to two million voters, the only disciplined and growing party. If the government wishes the Socialists to hold demonstrations, it is because it wants to draw them into a riot so that they could crush them and be done with them for a decade. The German Socialists best demonstration is their existence and their slow, steady, irresistible progress. We are still far from being able to withstand an open fight, and we have the duty, in relation to the whole of Europe and America, of not suffering a defeat, but of winning, when the time comes, the first great battle. To that consideration I subordinate every other. Naturally it would be very fine to see all the socialist workmen in the Old and New World down tools on the same day, May 1st. But it would not be a simultaneous and uniform stoppage. You in Paris would strike, let us say from 8 a.m. until 8 p.m.. When the New Yorkers start at 8 a.m. it will be 1 p.m. in Paris, and the Californians will start three hours later still. The demonstration lost nothing last year by being spread over two days, and that will be still less the case this year. The Austrians are in a totally different situation: regular agitation and organisation are made so difficult for them that a one-day stoppage is their only means of making a demonstration, as Adler has shown very clearly. So console yourself. The movement will not suffer from this lack of unity, and such purely formal unity would not be worth the price we should have to pay for it in Germany and possibly in England too. ... I find your behaviour in relation to the anti-Broussists capital. To conclude a treaty of practical cooperation, to put aside any attempt at merging for the moment, to leave everything until the proper time comes and, in the last resort, until the International Congress there is no better way of benefiting from the situation. than you have done. It is what Marx proposed to Liebknecht at the time of the fusion with the Lassalleans, but our friend was in too much of a hurry. Guesde has played a fine trick on him in his reports for the Vorw rts. Liebknecht has always defended the bourgeois republic to annoy the Prussians; people like Constans, Rouvier, etc, were almost perfect according to him. And now Guesde comes and destroys this illusion. It s delightful, and also very good for Germany. Kiss Laura for me. My compliments to Doctor Z on his article on the Toulon affair. Louise is particularly grateful for it. She wishes to be remembered kindly to you and to Laura.

Letters: Marx-Engels Correspondence 1891

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1891/letters/91_01_31.htm

The gasworkers now have the most powerful organisation in Ireland and will put up their own candidates in the next election, unconcerned over either Parnell or MacCarthy. That Parnell is now so friendly with the workers, he owes to encounters with these same gasworkers, who had no compunctions about telling him the truth. Michael Davitt, too, who had at first wanted independent Irish Trades Unions, has learned from them: their constitution secures them perfectly free home rule. To them the credit for giving impetus to the labour movement in Ireland. Many of their branches consist of agricultural labourers.

Letters: Marx-Engels Correspondence 1891. Ireland

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1891/letters/91_02_11.htm

We have learned with great pleasure from your letter of the 2nd inst that your Spanish translation of Marx s Mis re de la Philosophie is about to be published. Of course we readily approve of this enterprise. It will certainly have a most favourable effect on the development of socialism in Spain. The Proudhonian theory, whose foundations were demolished by Marx s book, disappeared from the scene after the fall of the Paris Commune. But it is still the great arsenal from which the middle-class radicals and pseudo-socialists of Western Europe procure the phrases with which they lull the workers to sleep. And as the workers of these countries have inherited similar Proudhonist phrases from their predecessors the phraseology of the radicals still strikes a responsive chord among many of them. That is the case in France where the only Proudhonists still in existence are the middle-class radicals or republicans who call themselves Socialists. And if I am not mistaken you too have in your Cort s and in your press republicans of this type who call themselves Socialists because they see in the Proudhonian ideas a quite suitable means of opposing an adulterated middle-class socialism to true socialism, the rational and valid expression of the aspirations of the proletariat.

Letters: Karl Marx and Frederick Engels, Selected Correspondence 1891

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1891/letters/91_03_24.htm

The coal strike in the Ruhr is certainly awkward for you, but what gives? The ill-advised strike of angry passion is, as matters stand, the usual way that large new strata of workers are brought in our direction. These facts seem to me to have been given too little consideration in the treatment by Vorw rts. Liebknecht knows no shadings, he is either all black or all white; and if he thought he was duty-bound to prove to the world that our party did not egg on this strike, and even calmed it down, then God have mercy on the poor strikers for them less than a desirable amount of concern has been shown, to see that they come to us soon.

Letters: Marx-Engels Correspondence 1891

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1891/letters/91_05_01.htm

His criticism of Marx is really funny. First he makes up a materialist theory of history for himself, which Marx is supposed, in his opinion, to have held, and then he finds something quite different in Marx's works. But from this he does not conclude that he, Barth, has foisted something distorted on to Marx: no, on the contrary, Marx contradicts himself and cannot apply his own theory! Yes, if people could only read! as Marx used to exclaim at criticisms of this kind. I have not got the book here; if I had time I would show you hundreds more absurdities one by one. It is a pity: one sees that the man could accomplish something if he were not so hasty in passing his judgments. It is to be hoped that he will soon write something which will be attacked more; a regular dose of knocking about would do him a lot of good.

Letters: Marx-Engels Correspondence 1891

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1891/letters/91_07_01.htm

I am very grateful for the information regarding the Journal of the Knights of Labor I have to look through such a pile of papers that it is often very hard for me to get my bearings without such reports. Likewise, regarding Gompers and Sanial; very important, should I see them in London? ... Tussy, Aveling, Thorne, and others of the Gas Workers, Sanders (John Burns secretary), and several other Englishmen of our side are going to Brussels. I don t know as yet how matters stand with the old trade unions. The dockers are on the verge of collapse. Their strike was won solely as a result of the 30,000 blindly contributed from Australia; but they think they did it themselves. Hence they are making one mistake after another the last one was closing their lists, not accepting any more new members, and so breeding their own scabs. Then they refused to conclude a cartel with the gas workers. Many workers are dockers in summer, and gas workers in winter; the gas workers proposed that the ticket of one union should hold good for both with this alternating employment rejected! Up to now the gas workers have respected the dockers ticket nevertheless one can t say how much longer. Then the dockers are raising an outcry against the immigration of foreign paupers (Russian Jews). Of their leaders, Tom Mann is upright but boundlessly weak, and he has been made half-crazy by his appointment as a member of the Royal Commission on Labor; Ben Tillett is an ambitious intriguer. They have no money, their members are dropping out in droves, and discipline has vanished. Tussy s report to the Brussels Congress on behalf of the gasworkers and others, is very good. I shall send it to you. Tussy is going to Brussels with a mandate from the Dublin Congress of Gasworkers and General Labourers, thus representing 100,000. Aveling, too, has 3 or 4 mandates. To all appearances, the old Trades Unions will be poorly represented. So much the better this time!

Letters: Marx-Engels Correspondence 1891. Ireland

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1891/letters/91_08_11.htm

The proclamation to the French will have to come out rather differently in form. The Russian diplomats are not so stupid as to provoke a war in face of the whole of Europe. On the contrary, things will be so operated that either France appears as the provoking party or one of the Triple Alliance countries. Russia always has dozens of casus belli [occasions for war] of this kind to hand; the special answer to be given depends on the pretext for war put forward. In any case we must declare that since 1871 we have always been ready for a peaceful understanding with France, that as soon as our Party comes to power it will be unable to exercise that power unless Alsace-Lorraine freely determines its own future, but that if war is forced upon us, and moreover a war in alliance with Russia, we must regard this as an attack on our existence and defend ourselves by every method, utilising all positions at our disposal and therefore Metz and Strasbourg also. As to the conduct of the war itself, two aspects are immediately decisive: Russia is weak in attack but strong in defensive man-power. A stab in the heart is impossible. France is strong in attack but rendered incapable of attack, innocuous, after a few defeats. I do not give much either for Austrians as generals or for Italians as soldiers, so our army will have to lead and sustain the main push. The war will have to begin with the holding back of the Russians but the defeat of the French. When the French offensive has been rendered innocuous things may get as far as the conquest of Poland up to the Dvina and Dnieper, but hardly before. This must be carried out by revolutionary methods and if necessary by giving up a piece of Prussian Poland and the whole of Galicia to the Poland to be established. If this goes well revolution will doubtless follow in France. At the same time we must press for at least Metz and Lorraine to be offered as a peace offering to France. Probably, however, it will not go so well. The French will not allow themselves to be so easily defeated, their army is very good and better armed than ours, and what we achieve in the way of generalship does not look as if very much would come of it either. That the French have learnt how to mobilise has been shown this summer. And also that they have enough officers for their first field army which is stronger than ours. Our superiority in officers will only be proved with the troops brought up later into the line. Moreover the direct line between Berlin and Paris is strongly defended by fortifications on both sides. In short, in the most favourable case it will probably turn out a fluctuating war which will be carried on with constant drawing in of fresh reinforcements by both sides until one party is exhausted, or until the active intervention of England, who, by simply blockading corn imports can, under the then existing conditions, starve out whichever party she decides against, Germany or France, and force it to make peace. In the meantime what happens on the Russian frontier mainly depends on the way the Austrians conduct the war and is therefore incalculable. So much seems certain to me: if we are beaten, every barrier to chauvinism and a war of revenge in Europe will be thrown down for years hence. If we are victorious our Party will come into power. The victory of Germany is therefore the victory of the revolution, and if it comes to war we must not only desire victory but further it by every means.... What should have been categorically stated [by Bernstein] was that if France formally represents the revolution in relation to Germany, Germany, through its workers' Party, stands materially at the head of the revolution, and this is bound to come to light in the war in which we, and with us the revolution, will either be crushed or else come to power.

Letters: Marx-Engels Correspondence 1891

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1891/letters/91_09_29.htm

To my great astonishment I found unexpectedly cropping up in the Vorw rts text of your draft the term one reactionary mass . I am writing to you at once about it although I am almost afraid it is too late. This propaganda phrase spoils, like a shrill discordant note, the whole harmonious array of tersely and precisely worded scientific propositions. For it is a propaganda phrase and extremely one-sided at that and hence entirely wrong in the apodictically absolute form in which alone it seems convincing. Wrong because it enunciates an historical tendency, which is, correct as such, as an accomplished fact. The moment the socialist revolution starts all other parties appear to be a reactionary mass vis- -vis us. They may possibly be it already, and have lost all capacity for any progressive action whatsoever, although this is not inevitable. But at the present moment we cannot say that, at least not with the certainty with which we proclaim the other programmatic principles. Even in Germany conditions may arise under which the Left parties, despite their wretchedness, may be forced to sweep away part of the colossal anti-bourgeois, bureaucratic and feudal rubbish that is still lying there. And in that event they are by no means a reactionary mass. So long as we are not strong enough to seize the helm of state ourselves and realise our principles there can be no talk, strictly speaking, of one reactionary mass vis- -vis us. Otherwise the whole nation would be divided into a reactionary majority and an impotent minority. Did the people who broke up the system of small states in Germany, who gave the bourgeoisie elbow-room to make the industrial revolution, who introduced a unified communications system, both for persons and things, and who thereby were bound to give us greater freedom of movement did they do that as a reactionary mass'? Did the French bourgeois republicans, who in 1871-78 definitely vanquished the monarchy and the rule of the clergy and secured freedom of the press, of association and of assembly to an extent previously unheard-of in France in non-revolutionary times, who introduced compulsory education and made instruction general and improved it to such an extent that we in Germany could profit by their example did they act as a reactionary mass? The Englishmen belonging to either of the official parties, who have enormously extended the suffrage, quintupled the number of voters, equalised the election districts, introduced compulsory education and improved instruction, who at each session vote not only for bourgeois reforms but also for ever new concessions to the workers they proceed slowly and listlessly but nobody can condemn them offhand as one reactionary mass . In brief, we have no right to represent a tendency gradually becoming a reality as an already accomplished fact, and particularly not since in England for instance this tendency will never become an absolute fact. When the turning point comes here the bourgeoisie will still be ready to introduce various small reforms. But at that time it will be completely pointless to insist on introducing small reforms in a system that is being overthrown. The Lassallean phrase is justified under certain circumstances in agitation, although our people too have greatly misused it, for example since 1 October 1890 in the Vorw rts. But it does not belong in the Programme, for there it would be absolutely wrong and misleading. There it would look like banker Bethmann s wife on the balcony they wanted to build for his house: If you build me a balcony my wife will squat down on it and spoil the whole fa ade! I cannot mention any other changes in the Vorw rts text for I have mislaid the paper and the letter must be mailed. The Party Congress started on a glorious day; 14 October is the anniversary of the battles of Jena and Auerstedt where old, pre-revolutionary Prussia collapsed. May 14 October 1891 inaugurate for Prussianised Germany the internal Jena predicted by Marx.

Letters: Karl Marx and Frederick Engels, Selected Correspondence 1891

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1891/letters/91_10_14.htm

This is the general sequence of thought. As soon as the text is finally settled (I am of course expecting proposals for small alterations of detail) and the printing taken in hand I will translate the article into German and then we will see what can be done with it. I am not sure if your press conditions will allow of its being printed in Germany; perhaps if you make some reservations it can be all the same this will be seen. My articles do not in any case tie the Party very fortunate for us both, although Liebknecht imagines I regard it as unfortunate for myself, which never occurs to me. According to the reports, you said that I had prophesied the collapse of bourgeois society in 1898. There is a slight error there somewhere. All I said was that we might possibly come to power by 1898. If this does not happen, the old bourgeois society might still vegetate on for a while, so long as a shove from outside does not bring the whole ramshackle old building crashing down. A rotten old casing like this can survive its inner essential death for a few decades, if the atmosphere is undisturbed. So I should be very cautious about prophesying such a thing. Our arrival at the possibility of power, on the other hand, is a pure calculation of probability according to mathematical laws. For all that, I hope peace remains unbroken. In our present position we do not need to risk everything -but war would force us to do so. And then in another ten years we shall be quite differently prepared. And for the following reason. In order to take possession of and set in motion the means of production, we need people with technical training, and masses of them. These we have not got, and up till now we have even been rather glad that we have been largely spared the "educated" people. Now things are different. Now we are strong enough to stand any quantity of educated Quarcks and to digest them, and I foresee that in the next eight or ten years we shall recruit enough young technicians, doctors, lawyers and schoolmasters to enable us to have the factories and big estates administered on behalf of the nation by Party comrades. Then, therefore, our entry into power will be quite natural and will be settled up quickly relatively, if, on the other hand, a war brings us to power prematurely, the technicians will be our chief enemies; they will deceive and betray us wherever they can and we shall have to use terror against them but shall get cheated all the same. It is what always happened, on a small scale, to the French revolutionaries; even in the ordinary administration they had to leave the subordinate posts, where real work is done, in the possession of old reactionaries who obstructed and paralysed everything. Therefore I hope and desire that our splendid and secure development, which is advancing with the calm and inevitability of a process of nature, may remain on its natural lines.

Letters: Marx-Engels Correspondence 1891

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1891/letters/91_10_24.htm

Die Entwicklung des Sozialismus will be published here in a translation prepared by Aveling and edited by me (in Sonnenschein s Social Series). In face of this authorised translation the American pirate edition with its miserable English will be rather innocuous. It is moreover not even complete, whatever they found too difficult they have left out... ... Despite the famine in Russia the danger of war is becoming greater. The Russians want to exploit the new French alliance rapidly and thoroughly, and although I am convinced that Russian diplomacy does not want a war, and the famine would make it look ridiculous, nevertheless military and pan-Slav tendencies (now supported by the very strong industrial bourgeoisie in the interest of extended markets) may get the upper hand and it is equally likely that some stupidity may be perpetrated in Vienna, Berlin or Paris which will cause war to break out. Bebel and I have been in correspondence on this point and we are of the opinion that if the Russians start war against us, German Socialists must go for the Russians and their allies, whoever they may be, a l'outrance [in a fight to the death]. If Germany is crushed, then we shall be too, while in the most favourable case the struggle will be such a violent one that Germany will only be able to maintain herself by revolutionary means, so that very possibly we shall be forced to come into power and play the part of 1793. Bebel has made a speech about this in Berlin which has aroused a lot of attention in the French press. I shall try to make this clear to the French in their own language, which is not easy. But although I think it would be a great misfortune if it came to war and if this brought us prematurely into power, still one has got to be armed for this eventuality and I am glad that here I have Bebel, who is by far the most capable of our people, on my side.

Letters: Marx-Engels Correspondence 1891

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1891/letters/91_10_24a.htm

Dear Sir When your letter of 21 September arrived I was travelling in Scotland and Ireland; only today I find time and leisure to reply to it. Your letter of 20 January was indeed lost, which I regret doubly, first because the interesting information it contained was kept from me for so long, and second because it put you to the trouble of working it out again for me. Many thanks! The Z chtung von Million ren , as Bismarck puts it, seems indeed to go on in your country with giant steps. Such profits as your official statistics show are unheard-of nowadays in English, French or German textile manufactories. Ten, 15, at the outside 20 per cent, average profits, and 25 30 per cent in very very exceptional years of prosperity, are considered good. It was only in the childhood of modern industry that establishments with the very latest and best machinery, producing their goods with considerably less labour than was at the time socially necessary, were able to secure such rates of profit. At present, such profits are made only on lucky speculative undertakings with new inventions, that is to say on one undertaking out of a hundred, the rest mostly being dead failures. The only country where similar, or approximately similar profits are nowadays possible in staple industries, is the United States, America. There the protective tariff after the civil war, and now the McKinley tariff, have had similar results, and the profits must be, and are, enormous. The fact that this state of things depends entirely on tariff legislation, which may be altered from one day to another, is sufficient to prevent any large investment of foreign capital (large in proportion to the quantity of domestic capital invested) in these industries, and thus to keep out the principal source of competition and lowering of profits. Your description of the changes produced by this extension of modern industry in the life of the mass of the people, of the ruin of their home industry for the direct consumption of the producers, and by and by also of the home industry carried on for the capitalist purchaser, reminds me vividly of the chapter of our author on the Herstellung des innern Markts, and of what took place in most places of Central and Western Europe from 1820 to 1840. This change, of course, with you has different effects to some extent. The French and German peasant proprietor dies hard, he lingers for two or three generations in the hands of the usurer before he is perfectly ripe for being sold out of his land and house; at least in the districts where modern industry has not penetrated. In Germany the peasantry are kept above water by all sorts of domestic industries pipes, toys, baskets, etc carried on for account of capitalists, their spare time being of no value to them after they have tilled their little fields; they consider every kopek they receive for extra work as so much gain; hence the ruinously low wages and the inconceivable cheapness of such industrial products in Germany. With you, there is the resistance of the obshchina to be overcome (although I should say that that must be giving way considerably in the constant struggle with modern capitalism), there is the resource of farming land from the large proprietors which you describe, in your letter of 1 May a means of securing surplus value to the proprietor but also of continuing a lingering existence to the peasant as a peasant; and the kulaki, too, as far as I can see, on the whole prefer keeping the peasant in their clutches as a sujet exploitation, to ruining him once for all and getting his land transferred to them. So that it strikes me, the Russian peasant, where he is not wanted as a workman for the factory or the town, will also die hard, will take a deal of killing before he does die. The enormous profits secured by the youthful bourgeoisie in Russia, and the dependence of these profits on a good crop (harvest) so well exposed by you, explain many things otherwise obscure. Thus what should I make out of this morning s statement in the Odessa correspondence of a London paper: the Russian commercial classes seem to be possessed of the one idea, that war is the only real panacea for the ever increasing depression and distrust from which all Russian industries are now suffering what should I make of it and how explain it but for this complete dependence of a tariff-made industry on the home market and on the harvest of the agricultural districts on which depends the purchasing power of its only customers! And if this market fails, what seems more natural to naive people than its extension by a successful war? ... Very interesting are your notes on the apparent contradiction that, with you, a good harvest does not necessarily mean a lowering of the price of corn. When we study the real economic relations in various countries and at various stages of civilisation, how singularly erroneous and deficient appear the rationalistic generalisations of the 18th century good old Adam Smith who took the conditions of Edinburgh and the Lothians as the normal ones of the universe! Well, Pushkin already knew that:

Letters: Marx-Engels Correspondence 1891

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1891/letters/91_10_29.htm

In the Introduction you have the criticism, first (Par. 26, etc.) of Wolf's version of Leibnitz (metaphysics in the historical sense), then of English-French empiricism (par. 37, etc.) then Kant (par. 40, seq.) and finally (par. 61) of Jacoby's mysticism. In the first section (Being) do not spend too long over Being and Nothing; the last paragraphs on Quality and then Quantity and Measure are much finer, but the theory of Essence is the main thing: the resolution of the abstract contradictions into their own instability, where one no sooner tries to hold on to one side alone than it is transformed unnoticed into the other, etc. At the same time you can always make the thing clear to yourself by concrete examples; for instance, you, as a bridegroom, have a striking example of the inseparability of identity and difference in yourself and your bride. It is absolutely impossible to decide whether sexual love is pleasure in the identity in difference or in the difference in identity. Take away the difference (in this case of sex) or the identity (the human nature of both) and what have you got left? I remember how much this very inseparability of identity and difference worried me at first, although we can never take a step without stumbling upon it. But you ought on no account to read Hegel as Herr Barth has done, namely in order to discover the bad syllogisms and rotten dodges which served him as levers in construction. That is pure schoolboy's work. It is much more important to discover the truth and the genius which lie beneath the false form and within the artificial connections. Thus the transitions from one category or from one contradiction to the next are nearly always arbitrary often made through a pun, as when Positive and Negative (Par. 120) "zugrunde gehen" [perish] in order that Hegel may arrive at the category of "Grund" [reason, ground]. To ponder over this much is waste of time. Since with Hegel every category represents a stage in the history of philosophy (as he generally indicates), you would do well to compare the lectures on the history of philosophy (one of his most brilliant works). As relaxation, I can recommend the sthetic. When you have worked yourself into that a bit you will be amazed. Hegel's dialectic is upside down because it is supposed to be the "self-development of thought," of which the dialectic of facts therefore is only a reflection, whereas really the dialectic in our heads is only the reflection of the actual development which is fulfilled in the world of nature and of human history in obedience to dialectical forms. If you just compare the development of the commodity into capital in Marx with the development from Being to Essence in Hegel, you will get quite a good parallel for the concrete development which results from facts; there you have the abstract construction, in which the most brilliant ideas and often very important transmutations, like that of quality into quantity and vice versa, are reduced to the apparent self-development of one concept from another one could have manufactured a dozen more of the same kind.

Letters: Marx-Engels Correspondence 1891

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1891/letters/91_11_01.htm

Nothing particularly new; Tussy has the not entirely undeserved reputation of being the leader of the Union of Gasworkers and General Labourers, and was away to agitate eight days in Northern Ireland the week before last. These gasworkers are fine fellows, their Union by far the most progressive; they are so good at legal agitation that eighteen months ago in Leeds they won two real battles first against the police and then against the police and dragoons forcing the municipality, which owns the gasworks, to capitulate. As an old soldier, I can certify that I find no fault either in the strategic or tactical dispositions of Will Thorne, the General Secretary of the Union, who was in command in these battles.

Letters: Marx-Engels Correspondence 1891. Ireland

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1891/letters/91_12_02.htm

For the American edition, a new Preface and an Appendix were written in English by the author. The first had little to do with the book itself; it discussed the American Working-Class Movement of the day, and is, therefore, here omitted as irrelevant; the second the original preface is largely made use of in the present introductory remarks. The state of things described in this book belongs to-day, in many respects, to the past, as far as England is concerned. Though not expressly stated in our recognised treatises, it is still a law of modern Political Economy that the larger the scale on which capitalistic production is carried on, the less can it support the petty devices of swindling and pilfering which characterise its early stages. The pettifogging business tricks of the Polish Jew, the representative in Europe of commerce in its lowest stage, those tricks that serve him so well in his own country, and are generally practised there, he finds to be out of date and out of place when he comes to Hamburg or Berlin; and, again, the commission agent who hails from Berlin or Hamburg, Jew or Christian, after frequenting the Manchester Exchange for a few months, finds out that in order to buy cotton yarn or cloth cheap, he, too, had better drop those slightly more refined but still miserable wiles and subterfuges which are considered the acme of cleverness in his native country. The fact is, those tricks do not pay any longer in a large market, where time is money, and where a certain standard of commercial morality is unavoidably developed, purely as a means of saving time and trouble. And it is the same with the relation between the manufacturer and his hands. The revival of trade, after the crisis of 1847, was the dawn of a new industrial epoch. The repeal of the Corn Laws and the financial reforms subsequent thereon gave to English industry and commerce all the elbow-room they had asked for. The discovery of the Californian and Australian gold-fields followed in rapid succession. The colonial markets developed at an increasing rate their capacity for absorbing English manufactured goods. In India millions of hand-weavers were finally crushed out by the Lancashire power-loom. China was more and more being opened up. Above all, the United States then, commercially speaking, a mere colonial market, but by far the biggest of them all underwent an economic development astounding even for that rapidly progressive country. And, finally, the new means of communication introduced at the close of the preceding period railways and ocean steamers were now worked out on an international scale; they realised actually what had hitherto existed only potentially, a world-market. This world-market, at first, was composed of a number of chiefly or entirely agricultural countries grouped around one manufacturing centre England which consumed the greater part of their surplus raw produce, and supplied them in return with the greater part of their requirements in manufactured articles. No wonder England s industrial progress was colossal and unparalleled, and such that the status of 1844 now appears to us as comparatively primitive and insignificant. And in proportion as this increase took place, in the same proportion did manufacturing industry become apparently moralised. The competition of manufacturer against manufacturer by means of petty thefts upon the workpeople did no longer pay. Trade had outgrown such low means of making money; they were not worth while practising for the manufacturing millionaire, and served merely to keep alive the competition of smaller traders, thankful to pick up a penny wherever they could. Thus the truck system was suppressed, the Ten Hours Bill was enacted, and a number of other secondary reforms introduced much against the spirit of Free Trade and unbridled competition, but quite as much in favour of the giant-capitalist in his competition with his less favoured brother. Moreover, the larger the concern, and with it the number of hands, the greater the loss and inconvenience caused by every conflict between master and men; and thus a new spirit came over the masters, especially the large ones, which taught them to avoid unnecessary squabbles, to acquiesce in the existence and power of Trades Unions, and finally even to discover in strikes at opportune times a powerful means to serve their own ends. The largest manufacturers, formerly the leaders of the war against the working-class, were now the foremost to preach peace and harmony. And for a very good reason. The fact is that all these concessions to justice and philanthropy were nothing else but means to accelerate the concentration of capital in the hands of the few, for whom the niggardly extra extortions of former years had lost all importance and had become actual nuisances; and to crush all the quicker and all the safer their smaller competitors, who could not make both ends meet without such perquisites. Thus the development of production on the basis of the capitalistic system has of itself sufficed at least in the leading industries, for in the more unimportant branches this is far from being the case to do away with all those minor grievances which aggravated the workman s fate during its earlier stages. And thus it renders more and more evident the great central fact that the cause of the miserable condition of the working-class is to be sought, not in these minor grievances, but in the capitalistic system itself. The wage-worker sells to the capitalist his labour-power for a certain daily sum. After a few hours work he has reproduced the value of that sum; but the substance of his contract is, that he has to work another series of hours to complete his working-day; and the value he produces during these additional hours of surplus labour is surplus value, which costs the capitalist nothing, but yet goes into his pocket. That is the basis of the system which tends more and more to split up civilised society into a few Rothschilds and Vanderbilts, the owners of all the means of production and subsistence, on the one hand, and an immense number of wage-workers, the owners of nothing but their labour-power, on the other. And that this result is caused, not by this or that secondary grievance, but by the system itself this fact has been brought out in bold relief by the development of Capitalism in England since 1847. Again, the repeated visitations of cholera, typhus, small-pox, and other epidemics have shown the British bourgeois the urgent necessity of sanitation in his towns and cities, if he wishes to save himself and family from falling victims to such diseases. Accordingly, the most crying abuses described in this book have either disappeared or have been made less conspicuous. Drainage has been introduced or improved, wide avenues have been opened out athwart many of the worst slums I had to describe. Little Ireland had disappeared, and the Seven Dials are next on the list for sweeping away. But what of that? Whole districts which in 1844 I could describe as almost idyllic have now, with the growth of the towns, fallen into the same state of dilapidation, discomfort, and misery. Only the pigs and the heaps of refuse are no longer tolerated. The bourgeoisie have made further progress in the art of hiding the distress of the working-class. But that, in regard to their dwellings, no substantial improvement has taken place is amply proved by the Report of the Royal Commission on the Housing of the Poor, 1885. And this is the case, too, in other respects. Police regulations have been plentiful as blackberries; but they can only hedge in the distress of the workers, they cannot remove it. But while England has thus outgrown the juvenile state of capitalist exploitation described by me, other countries have only just attained it. France, Germany, and especially America, are the formidable competitors who, at this moment as foreseen by me in 1844 are more and more breaking up England s industrial monopoly. Their manufactures are young as compared with those of England, but increasing at a far more rapid rate than the latter; and, curious enough, they have at this moment arrived at about the same phase of development as English manufacture in 1844. With regard to America, the parallel is indeed most striking. True, the external surroundings in which the working-class is placed in America are very different, but the same economical laws are at work, and the results, if not identical in every respect, must still be of the same order. Hence we find in America the same struggles for a shorter working-day, for a legal limitation of the working-time, especially of women and children in factories; we find the truck-system in full blossom, and the cottage-system, in rural districts, made use of by the bosses as a means of domination over the workers. When I received, in 1886, the American papers with accounts of the great strike of 12,000 Pennsylvanian coal-miners in the Connellsville district, I seemed but to read my own description of the North of England colliers strike of 1844. The same cheating of the workpeople by false measure; the same truck-system the same attempt to break the miners resistance by the capitalists last, but crushing, resource, the eviction of the men out of their dwellings, the cottages owned by the companies. I have not attempted, in this translation, to bring the book up to date, or to point out in detail all the changes that have taken place since 1844. And for two reasons: Firstly, to do this properly, the size of the book must be about doubled; and, secondly, the first volume of Das Kapital, by Karl Marx, an English translation of which is before the public, contains a very ample description of the state of the British working-class, as it was about 1865, that is to say, at the time when British industrial prosperity reached its culminating point. I should, then, have been obliged again to go over the ground already covered by Marx s celebrated work. It will be hardly necessary to point out that the general theoretical standpoint of this book philosophical, economical, political does not exactly coincide with my standpoint of to-day. Modern international Socialism, since fully developed as a science, chiefly and almost exclusively through the efforts of Marx, did not as yet exist in 1844. My, book represents one of the phases of its embryonic development; and as the human embryo, in its early stages, still reproduces the gill-arches of our fish-ancestors, so this book exhibits everywhere the traces of the descent of Modern Socialism from one of its ancestors, German philosophy. Thus great stress is laid on the dictum that Communism is not a mere party doctrine of the working-class, but a theory compassing the emancipation of society at large, including the capitalist class, from its present narrow conditions. This is true enough in the abstract, but absolutely useless, and sometimes worse, in practice. So long as the wealthy classes not only do not feel the want of any emancipation, but strenuously oppose the self-emancipation of the working-class, so long the social revolution will have to be prepared and fought out by the working-class alone. The French bourgeois of 1789, too, declared the emancipation of the bourgeoisie to be the emancipation of the whole human race; but the nobility and clergy would not see it; the proposition though for the time being, with respect to feudalism, an abstract historical truth soon became a mere sentimentalism, and disappeared from view altogether in the fire of the revolutionary struggle. And to-day, the very people who, from the impartiality of their superior standpoint, preach to the workers a Socialism soaring high above their class interests and class struggles, and tending to reconcile in a higher humanity the interests of both the contending classes these people are either neophytes, who have still to learn a great deal, or they are the worst enemies of the workers wolves in sheep s clothing. The recurring period of the great industrial crisis is stated in the text as five years. This was the period apparently indicated by the course of events from 1825 to 1842. But the industrial history from 1842 to 1868 has shown that the real period is one of ten years; that the intermediate revulsions were secondary, and tended more and more to disappear. Since 1868 the state of things has changed again, of which more anon. I have taken care not to strike out of the text the many prophecies, amongst others that of an imminent social revolution in England, which my youthful ardour induced me to venture upon. The wonder is, not that a good many of them proved wrong, but that so many of them have proved right, and that the critical state of English trade, to be brought on by Continental and especially American competition, which I then foresaw though in too short a period has now actually come to pass. In this respect I can, and am bound to, bring the book up to date, by placing here an article which I published in the London Commonweal of March 1, 1885, under the heading: England in 1845 and in 1885 It gives at the same time a short outline of the history of the English working-class during these forty years, and is as follows: To this statement of the case, as that case appeared to me In 1885, I have but little to add. Needless to say that to-day there is indeed Socialism again in England, and plenty of it Socialism Socialism of all shades: Socialism conscious and unconscious, Socialism prosaic and poetic, Socialism of the working-class and of the middle-class, for, verily, that abomination of abominations, Socialism, has not only become respectable, but has actually donned evening dress and lounges lazily on drawing-room causeuses. That shows the incurable fickleness of that terrible despot of society, middle-class public opinion, and once more justifies the contempt in which we Socialists of a past generation always held that public opinion. At the same time we have no reason to grumble at the symptom itself. What I consider far more important than this momentary fashion among bourgeois circles of affecting a mild dilution of Socialism, and even more than the actual progress Socialism has made in England generally, that is the revival of the East End of London. That immense haunt of misery is no longer the stagnant pool it was six years ago. It has shaken off its torpid despair, has returned to life, and has become the home of what is called the New Unionism, that is to say, of the organisation of the great mass of unskilled workers. This organisation may to a great extent adopt the form of the old Unions of skilled workers but it is essentially different in character. The old Unions preserve the traditions of the time when they were, founded, and look upon the wages system as a once-for-all established, final fact, which they at best can modify in the interest of their members. The new Unions were founded at a time when the faith in the eternity of the wages system was severely shaken; their founders and promoters were Socialists either consciously or by feeling; the masses, whose adhesion gave them strength, were rough, neglected, looked down upon by the working-class aristocracy; but they had this immense advantage, that their minds were virgin soil, entirely free from the inherited respectable bourgeois prejudices which hampered the brains of the better situated old Unionists. And thus we see now these new Unions taking the lead of the working-class movement generally, and more and more taking in tow the rich and proud old Unions. Undoubtedly, the East Enders have committed colossal blunders; so have their predecessors, and so do the doctrinaire Socialists who pooh-pooh them. A large class, like a great nation, never learns better or quicker than by undergoing the consequences of its own mistakes. And for all the faults committed in past, present and future, the revival of the East End of London remains one of the greatest and most fruitful facts of this fin de si cle, and glad and proud I am to have lived to see it.

The Condition of the Working Class in England

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1892/01/11.htm

The following is the translation of an article which I wrote in French at the request of our Parisian friends for the Almanach du Parti Ouvrier pour 1892. I owe it to the French as well as the German socialists to publish it in German. To the French, because it must be known in Germany how openly it is possible to discuss with them the circumstances in which German socialists would undoubtedly take part in a war, even against France, and how free these Frenchmen are from the chauvinism and vengefulness which all the bourgeois parties, from the monarchists to the radicals, display in all their glory. To the Germans, because they are entitled to hear from me at first hand what I have been telling the French about them. It goes without saying-but let me make it quite clear once again- that in this article I speak purely in my own name and not in the name of the German party. The only ones entitled to do this are the elected bodies, representatives and delegates of this party. And, in addition, the international position which I have attained after fifty years work prevents me from acting as the representative of any particular national socialist party as opposed to another, although it does not prevent me from recalling that I am a German and being proud of the position which our German workers were the first to win for themselves through struggle. German socialism made its appearance well before 1848. At that time there were two independent tendencies. Firstly, a workers movement, a branch of French working-class communism, a movement which, as one of its phases, produced the utopian communism of Weitling. Secondly, a theoretical movement, emerging from the collapse of the Hegelian philosophy; this movement, from its origins, was dominated by the name of Marx. The Communist Manifesto of January 1848 marks the fusion of these two tendencies, a fusion made complete and irrevocable in the furnace of revolution, in which everyone, workers and philosophers alike, shared equally the personal cost. After the defeat of the European revolution in 1849, socialism was reduced in Germany to a secret existence. It was not until 1862 that Lassalle, a fellow student of Marx, again raised the socialist banner. But it was no longer the bold socialism of the Manifesto; what Lassalle demanded in the interest of the working class was cooperative production assisted by state credit; a reproduction of the programme of the Parisian workers affiliated before 1848 to the National of Marrast, of the programme proposed by the pure republicans, as the alternative to Louis Blanc s Organisation of Labour. Lassallean socialism was, as we can see, very moderate. Nevertheless, its appearance on the scene marks the starting point of the second phase of socialism in Germany; for Lassalle s talent, spirit and indomitable energy succeeded in creating a workers movement to which everything that had roused the German proletariat over the last ten years was attached by links positive or negative, amicable or hostile. Could, then, pure Lassalleanism on its own fulfil the socialist aspirations of the nation that had produced the Manifesto? It proved impossible. Therefore, thanks mainly to the efforts of Liebknecht and Bebel, a workers party was soon formed which loudly proclaimed the principles of 1848. Then, in 1867, three years after the death of Lassalle, Marx s Capital appeared. The decline of Lassalleanism as such dates from this day. Increasingly the theories of Capital became the common property of all the German socialists, Lassalleans and others. More than once entire groups of Lassalleans went over en masse, drums beating and banners flying, to Bebel s and Liebknecht s new party, called the Eisenach party. As this party continued to grow in strength, there was soon all-out hostility between the Lassalleans and their rivals; they fought with cudgels precisely at the moment when there was no longer any real difference between the combatants, when the principles, arguments, and even the methods of the struggle of one side were in all essentials identical with those of the other. At this point the presence in the Reichstag of deputies from the two socialist factions imposed on them the necessity of joint action. When confronted with bourgeois deputies, the ridiculous nature of this traditional hostility was obvious. The situation became intolerable. Then in 1875 the two factions merged. Since then the brother-enemies have continued to form a family united in harmony. If there was the slightest chance of a split, Bismarck himself undertook to eliminate it when, in 1878, he placed German socialism beyond the pale of the law with his notorious exceptional law. The hammer blows of shared persecution completed the work of forging Lassalleans and Eisenachers into a homogeneous mass. Today, whilst the socialist party publishes an official edition of Lassalle s works, it is removing from its programme, with the aid of the former Lassalleans, the last remaining traces of Lassalleanism as such. Need I recount in detail the vicissitudes, the struggles, the setbacks and the triumphs which have accompanied the career of the German party? Represented by two deputies and one hundred thousand votes from 1866, when universal suffrage opened up to it the doors of the Reichstag, today it has 35 deputies and a million-and-a-half voters, a figure which none of the other parties reached in the elections of 1890. Eleven years passed as an outlaw and in a state of siege have resulted in a quadrupling of its strength, to make it the strongest party in Germany. In 1867 the bourgeois deputies were able to regard their socialist colleagues as strange creatures that had arrived from another planet; today, whether they like it or not, they have to regard them as the avant-garde of the power to come. The socialist party which overthrew Bismarck, the party which after eleven years of struggle has broken the Anti-Socialist Law; the socialist party, which like a rising tide overflows all the dikes, invading towns and countryside, even in the most reactionary Vendees this party today has reached the point where it is possible to determine the date when it will come to power almost by mathematical calculation . The number of socialist votes was: In 1871 101,927 In 1874 351,670 In 1877 493,447 In 1884 549,990 In 1887 763,128 In 1890 1,427,298 Since the last elections the government has done its best to push the mass of people towards socialism; it has prosecuted associations and strikes; it has upheld, even m the present scarcity, import tariffs which make the bread and meat of the poor more expensive in order to benefit the big landowners. So at the elections in 1895 we can count on two and a half million votes at least, which will increase by 1900 to three and a half to four million out of ten million registered voters, a figure which will appear curiously fin de si cle to our bourgeois. Facing this compact and steadily growing mass of socialists there are only the divided bourgeois parties. In 1890 the conservatives (two factions combined) received 1,377,417 votes; the national liberals 1,177,807; the progressists (radicals) 1,159,915; the Catholics 1,342,113. There we have a situation in which one solid party able to muster two and a half million votes will be strong enough to force any government to capitulate. But the votes of the electors are far from constituting the main strength of German socialism. In our country you do not become a voter until the age of twenty-five, but at twenty you are a soldier. Moreover, since it is precisely the younger generation which provides the party with most of its recruits, it follows that the German army is becoming more and more infected with socialism. Today we have one soldier in five, in a few years time we shall have one in three, by 1900 the army, hitherto the most outstandingly Prussian element in Germany, will have a socialist majority. That is coming about as if by fate. The Berlin government can see it happening just as clearly as we can, but it is powerless. The army is slipping away from it. How many times have the bourgeois called on us to renounce the use of revolutionary means for ever, to remain within the law, now that the exceptional law has been dropped and one law has been re-established for all, including the socialists? Unfortunately we are not in a position to oblige messieurs les bourgeois. Be that as it may, for the time being it is not we who are being destroyed by legality. It is working so well for us that we would be mad to spurn it as long as the situation lasts. It remains to be seen whether it will be the bourgeois and their government who will be the first to turn their back on the law in order to crush us by violence. That is what we shall be waiting for. You shoot first, messieurs les bourgeois. No doubt they will be the first ones to fire. One fine day the German bourgeois and their government, tired of standing with their arms folded, witnessing the ever increasing advances of socialism, will resort to illegality and violence. To what avail? With force it is possible to crush a small sect, at least in a restricted space but there is no force in the world which can wipe out a party of two million men spread out over the entire surface-area of a large empire. Counter-revolutionary violence will be able to slow down the victory of socialism by a few years; but only in order to make it all the more complete when it comes. All the above was said with the reservation that Germany will be able to pursue its economic and political development in peace. A war would change all that. And war is liable to break out at any moment. Everyone knows what war means today. It would be Russia and France on one side; Germany, Austria and perhaps Italy on the other. Socialists in all these countries, conscripted whether they like it or not, will be forced to do battle against one another: what will the German socialist party do in such a case? The German empire is a monarchy with semi-feudal institutions, but dominated ultimately by the economic interests of the bourgeoisie. Thanks to Bismarck this empire has committed some grave blunders. Its domestic policy, a policy of harassment and meanness based on the police, unworthy of the government of a great nation, has earned it the scorn of all the bourgeois liberal countries; its foreign policy has excited the distrust, if not the hatred, of all its neighbours. With the violent annexation of Alsace-Lorraine the German government rendered any reconciliation with France impossible for a long time to come; without gaining any real advantage itself it has made Russia the arbiter of Europe. This is so evident that the day after Sedan the General Council of the International was able to predict the situation in Europe as it is today. In its address of September 9, 1870 it said: Do the Teuton patriots really believe that liberty and peace will be guaranteed to Germany by forcing France into the arms of Russia? If the fortune of her arms, the arrogance of success, and dynastic intrigue lead Germany to a dismemberment of France, there will then only remain two courses open to her. She must at all risks become the avowed tool of Russian aggrandisement, or, after some short respite, make again ready for another defensive war, not one of those new-fangled localised wars but a war of races, a war with the combined Slavonian and Roman races. There is no doubt: in relation to this German empire, the French republic as it is now represents revolution, the bourgeois revolution, to be sure, but still revolution. But the instant this republic places itself under the orders of the Russian tsar it is a different matter entirely. Russian tsarism is the enemy of all the Western nations, even of the bourgeois of these nations. By invading Germany, the tsarist hordes would be bringing slavery instead of liberty, destruction instead of development, degradation instead of progress. Arm in arm with Russia, France cannot bring a single liberating idea to Germany; the French general who spoke to the Germans about the republic would make Europe and America laugh. It would mean the abdication of France s revolutionary role b ; it would mean permitting Bismarck s empire to pose as the representative of Western progress against the barbarism of the East. But behind official Germany there is the German socialist party, the party to which belongs the future, the imminent future of the country. The moment this party comes to power it will neither be able to exercise it nor to retain it without making good the injustices committed by its predecessors towards the other nationalities. It will have to prepare for the restoration of Poland, so shamefully betrayed today by the French bourgeoisie; it will have to appeal to northern Schleswig and to Alsace-Lorraine freely to decide their own political future. All these questions will thus be resolved effortlessly, and in the near future, if Germany is left to itself. Between a socialist France and a socialist Germany there can be no Alsace-Lorraine question; the case will be settled in the twinkling of an eye. It is a matter, then, of waiting another ten years or so. The French, English and German proletariat is still awaiting deliverance; could not the patriots of Alsace-Lorraine wait? Is there any reason to devastate a continent and to subjugate it, ultimately, to the tsarist knout? Is the game worth the candle? In the event of war first Germany, then France would be the main battleground; these two countries in particular will pay the cost in devastation. And there is more. This war will be distinguished from the outset by a series of betrayals between allies unequalled in the annals of diplomatic betrayal to date; France or Germany, or both, will be the main victims. It is therefore almost certain that neither of these countries will provoke an open conflict in view of the risks they would be running. But Russia, protected by its geographical position and by its economic situation against the more disastrous consequences of a series of defeats-official Russia alone could find it in its interests to unleash such a terrible war; it is Russia who will be pressing for war. In any case, given the present political situation, the odds are ten to one that at the first sound of cannon on the Vistula the French armies will march on the Rhine. Then Germany will be fighting for its very existence. If victorious it will find nothing to annex. To the East as well as to the West it will only find provinces speaking foreign tongues; it has enough of those already. Beaten, crushed between the French hammer and the Russian anvil it will have to cede Old Prussia and the Polish provinces to Russia, Schleswig to Denmark, and the entire left bank of the Rhine to France. Even if France refused to accept, its ally would impose this conquest on it; what Russia needs more than anything else is a cause of permanent enmity between France and Germany. Reconcile these two great countries and that is the end of Russian supremacy in Europe. Dismembered in this way, Germany would be unable to play its part in Europe s civilising mission; reduced to the role imposed on it by Napoleon after Tilsit it could not live except by . preparing for a new war of national rehabilitation. But in the meanwhile it would be the humble tool of the Tsar, who would not fail to make use of it against France. What will become of the German socialist party in such circumstances? It goes without saying that neither the Tsar no: the French bourgeois republicans nor the German government itself would let pass such a good opportunity to crush the sole party which, for them, constitutes the enemy. We have seen how Thiers and Bismarck extended their hands to each other over the rums of the Paris Commune; we would then see the Tsar, Constans, Caprivi (or their successors) embracing one another over the corpse of German socialism. But the German socialist party, thanks to the efforts and the unceasing sacrifices of more than thirty years, has attained a position that none of the other socialist parties in Europe occupies: a position which guarantees it political power in a short while. Socialist Germany occupies in the international working-class movement the most advanced, the most honourable and the most responsible outpost; it is its duty to defend this outpost against all. Now, if the victory of the Russians over Germany means the crushing of socialism in this country, what will be the duty of the German socialists with regard to this eventuality? Should they passively endure the events that are threatening them with extinction, abandon the post they have conquered and for which they are answerable to the world proletariat without putting up a fight? Obviously not. In the interest of the European revolution, they are obliged to defend all the positions that have been won, not to capitulate to the enemy from without any more than to the enemy within; and they cannot accomplish that except by fighting Russia and its allies, whoever they may be, to the bitter end. If the French republic placed itself at the service of His Majesty the Tsar, Autocrat of all the Russias, the German socialists would fight it with regret, but they would fight it all the same. The French republic may represent vis- -vis the German empire the bourgeois revolution. But vis- -vis the republic of the Constanses, the Rouviers and even the Clemenceaus, especially vis- -vis the republic that is working for the Russian Tsar, German socialism represents the proletarian revolution. A war in which Russians and Frenchmen invaded Germany would be, for Germany, a war to the death, in which, in order to ensure its national existence, it would have to resort to the most revolutionary means. The present government, certainly, would not unleash revolution, unless it were forced to. But there is a strong party which would force it to, or if necessary replace it: the socialist party. We have not forgotten the marvellous example which France gave us in 1793. The centenary of 1793 is approaching. If the Tsar s thirst for conquest and the chauvinist impatience of the French bourgeoisie stop the victorious but peaceful march of the German socialists, the latter are ready, you may be sure, to prove that the German proletarians of today are not unworthy of the French sans-culottes of a hundred years ago, and that 1893 will equal 1793. And then the soldiers of Constans, on setting foot on German soil, will be greeted with the song: Let us sum up. Peace ensures the victory of the German socialist party in some ten years time; war offers it either victory m two or three years, or complete ruin, at least for the next fifteen to twenty years. In this position the German socialists would have to be mad to prefer the all-or-nothing of war to the certain victory which peace offers them. There is more. No socialist, of whatever country, can desire victory by war, either by the present German government or by the French bourgeois republic; even less by the Tsar, which would be tantamount to the subjugation of Europe. That is why socialists everywhere demand that peace be maintained. But if war is to break out nonetheless, one thing is certain. This war, in which fifteen to twenty million armed men would slaughter one another and devastate Europe as It has never been devastated before this war would either lead to the immediate triumph of socialism, or it would lead to such an upheaval in the old order of things, it would leave behind it everywhere such a heap of ruins, that the old capitalist society would become more impossible than ever, and the social revolution, set back by ten or fifteen years, would only be all the more radical and more rapidly implemented. That, then, was the article from the French workers calendar. It was written in the late summer, when the heads of the French bourgeoisie were still flushed with the champagne-induced inebriation of Kronstadt, and the great manoeuvres on the battle area of 1814 between the Seine and the Marne had brought patriotic enthusiasm to a head. At that time France the France that expresses itself in the big press and the parliamentary majority was indeed ripe for more or less unlimited stupidity in the service of Russia, and the eventuality of war moved into the foreground as a possibility. And in order, should it become a reality, to prevent any last minute misunderstanding between the French and German socialists, I considered it necessary to make it clear to the former what in my opinion the necessary attitude of the latter should be with regard to such a war. But then a powerful check was imposed on the Russian war-monger. First came the news of harvest failure at home, with every reason to expect a famine. Then came the failure of the Paris loan, signifying the final collapse of Russian state credit. The four hundred million marks were, it was said, oversubscribed many times; but when the Paris bankers sought to palm off the bonds onto the public, all their attempts failed ; the esteemed subscribers had to dispose of their good securities in order to cover these bad ones and to such an extent that the other large European stock exchanges were also forced down by these mass sales; the new Russians sank several per cent below their issue price in short, there was such a crisis that the Russian government had to take back a hundred and sixty millions worth of bonds and only received cover for two hundred and forty instead of four hundred million. At this the proclamation of a further Russian attempt to get credit this time for all of eight hundred million marks-which had been gaily crowed out to the world, fell through miserably. And at the same time it also became plain that French capital has no patriotism at all, but it does have -however much it may beat the drum in the press a salutory fear of war. Since then the failure of the harvest has indeed developed into a famine, and such a famine as we in Western Europe have not seen on this scale for a long time, such as rarely occurs even in India, the typical country for such calamities, indeed such as barely ever reached this height in the holy Russia of earlier times, when there were still no railways. How does this come about? How can it be explained? Very simply. The Russian famine is not the result of a mere failure of the harvest, it is a part of the tremendous social revolution which Russia has been undergoing since the Crimean War; it is simply the transformation of the chronic sufferings linked with this revolution into acute sufferings brought about by this bad harvest. Old Russia went irrevocably to its grave the day when Tsar Nicholas, despairing of himself and of old Russia, took poison. On its ruins the Russia of the bourgeoisie is being built. The beginnings of a bourgeoisie were already present at that time. Partly bankers and import merchants mostly Germans and German Russians or their descendants partly Russians who had risen through domestic trading, but particularly schnapps peddlers and army suppliers who had grown rich at the expense of the state and people, and also a few manufacturers. From now on this bourgeoisie, particularly the industrial bourgeoisie, was literally cultivated by means of massive government aid, by subsidies, premiums, and protective tariffs that were gradually raised to the utmost. The immeasurable Russian Empire was supposed to become a production area sufficient unto itself, which could dispense with imports from abroad entirely or almost entirely. And it is to ensure not only that the domestic market should continually grow, but also that the products of warmer climes should be produced inside the country itself, that there is this steady striving for conquests in the Balkan peninsula and in Asia, with Constantinople and British India respectively as the ultimate goals. This is the secret, the economic basis of the drive for expansion that is so rife among the Russian bourgeoisie, the branch that leads south-west being called Pan-Slavism. However, the serfdom of the peasants was absolutely inconsistent with such industrial plans. It fell in 1861. But how! The Prussian abolition of servitude and statute labour carried out slowly between 1810 and 1851 was taken as a model; but everything was to be settled in a few years. Consequently, in order to break the resistance of the big landowners and serf -owners, concessions had to be made to them which were quite different from those granted by the Prussian state and its corrupt officials to the gracious landlords of their day. And as for corruptibility, the Prussian bureaucrat was nothing but a babe-in-arms compared with the Russian tschinownik. Thus it was that in the partition of the land the nobility received the lion s share, and as a rule the land made fertile by the labour of many generations of peasants, while the peasants received only the minimum necessary for subsistence, and even this was generally allotted to them in poor wasteland. Common forest and common grazing went to the landlord; if the peasant wished to use them and without them he could not exist he had to pay the landlord for it. To ensure, however, that both landed nobility and peasants were ruined as quickly as possible, the nobility was given the capitalised redemption sum in state bonds from the government in a lump sum, while the peasants had to pay the redemption price in long-term instalments. As was only to be expected, the nobility for the most part squandered the money received immediately, while the peasant, facing what was, for someone in his position, enormous payments, was suddenly hurled out of a subsistence economy into a money economy. The Russian peasant, who previously had hardly had to make any money payments excepting relatively low taxes, is now supposed not only to live off the smaller and poorer plot allotted to him and, after the abolition of the free wood and free grazing on common land, feed his livestock through the winter and improve his plot but also to pay increased taxes as well as the annual redemption instalment, and in cash too. He was thus placed in a position in which he could neither live nor die. On top of this there was the competition of the newly developed large-scale industry, which deprived him of the market for his domestic industry domestic industry was the main source of money for countless Russian peasants or, where this was not yet quite the case, delivered up this domestic industry to the mercy of the merchant, i.e. the middleman, the Saxon entrepreneur or the English SWEATERS, thus turning the peasants engaged in domestic industry into nothing less than the slaves of capital. In short, anyone curious to know how the Russian peasants have been abused over the last thirty years need only look up the chapter on the Creation of the Home Market (Chapter 24, Section 5) in the first volume of Marx s Capital. The ravages wrought among the peasants by the transition from a subsistence economy to a money economy this chief means of producing the home market for industrial capital are depicted in a classic manner by Boisguillebert and Vauban from the example of France under Louis XIV. But what occurred then is child s play compared with what is happening in Russia. Firstly the scale is three or four times larger, and secondly the revolutionisation of the conditions of production, in whose service this transition is being forced on the peasants, is infinitely more thorough-going. The French peasant was slowly dragged into the sphere of manufacture, the Russian peasant is being swept overnight into the tornado of large-scale industry. If manufacture felled peasants with the flint-lock, large-scale industry is carrying out the job with a repeating-rifle. This was the position when the failure of the harvest in 1891 exposed at a stroke the entire upheaval and its consequences, which had been quietly taking place for years but had remained invisible to the European philistine. This position was such that the first bad harvest was bound to turn into a national crisis. And now there is a crisis that will not be mastered for years to come. In the face of a famine like this every government is powerless, but particularly the Russian, which expressly trains its officials in thieving. Since 1861 the old communist customs and institutions of the Russian peasants have partly been undermined by economic developments, partly destroyed systematically by the government. The old communist community has disintegrated, or is in the process of so doing, but at the very moment when the individual peasant is being placed on his own feet, the ground is removed from under them. Is it any wonder that last autumn winter .com was sown in extremely few districts? And where it was sown the weather ruined most of it. Is it any wonder that the main instrument of the peasant, the beast of burden, first had nothing to eat itself and then, for this irrefutable reason, was eaten by the peasant himself? Is it any wonder that the peasant is leaving house and home and fleeing to the cities, vainly looking for work but unfailingly bringing typhoid with him? In a word: here we have before us not an isolated famine but an immense crisis prepared by a prolonged, quiet economic revolution and merely rendered acute by the failure of the harvest. This acute crisis, however, is assuming in its turn a chronic form and threatens to stay for years. Economically it is accelerating the dissolution of the old communist peasant community, the enrichment of the village usurers (the kulaki) and their transformation into big landowners, and the transfer of the landed property of the nobility and the peasants into the hands of the new bourgeoisie. For Europe it means peace for the time being. Russian warmongering is paralysed for a good many years to come. Instead of millions of soldiers falling on the battlefields, millions of Russian peasants are dying of starvation. But its effects as far as Russian despotism is concerned remain to be seen.

Socialism in Germany by Friedrich Engels 1892

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1892/01/socialism-germany.htm

The ancient world was dominated by Fatum, Heimarmene, inescapable mysterious fate. These were the names given by the Greeks and Romans to that impalpable omnipotence which frustrated all human will and effort, which led all human deeds to results quite other than those intended, that irresistible force which has since then been called providence, predestination, etc. This mysterious force has slowly taken on a more palpable form, and for this we may thank the rule of the bourgeoisie and capital, the first system of class rule which seeks to find clarity about the causes and conditions of its own existence, thus opening the door to the recognition of the inevitability of its own imminent fall. Fate, providence that we know now consists of the economic conditions under which production and exchange take place, and these combine today in the world market. And this is the importance of the American presidential elect ...... that it is an event of the first order on the world market. Four years ago I published an essay on protective tariffs and free trade, in Boston in English and in Stuttgart in German. Here 1 demonstrated that England s industrial monopoly could not be reconciled with the economic development of the other civilised countries; that the protective tariffs introduced in America since the Civil War 307 showed Americans will to shake off the yoke of th IS monopoly; that thanks to the gigantic natural resources and the intellectual and moral talents of the American race this target has already, been reached, and the customs barrier has become in America, no less than in Germany, a fetter to industry. And then I wrote: If America introduces free trade, then it will beat England on the world market in ten years. Very well. The presidential election of November 8, 1892 has opened the way for free trade. The protective tariff in the form devised by MacKinley had become an unbearable fetter; the nonsensical price increase for all imported raw materials and foodstuffs, which affected the price of many domestic products, had largely closed world markets to American products, while the home market suffered a glut of American industrial products. In fact, in the past few years the protective tariff only served to ruin the small producers under the pressure of the large producers combined in cartels and trusts, and to surrender the market and thus the consuming nation to exploitation by the latter, that is to say the organised monopoly.. America can only escape from this permanent domestic industrial crisis caused by the protective tariff by, opening itself up to the world market, and for this it must emancipate itself from the protective tariff, at least in its present nonsensical form. The total turn-about of public opinion demonstrated by the election shows that it is determined to do this. Once established on the world market, America-like, and through England will irresistibly be driven further along the path of free trade. And then we shall experience an industrial battle as never before. On all markets English products, particularly textiles and iron goods, will have to fight with American products, and finally lose. Even now American cottons and linens chase the English from the field. Would you like to know who performed the miracle of convert rig in one short year the cotton operatives of Lancashire from furious opponents to enthusiastic advocates of the legal eight-hour day? Refer to the Neue Zeit, No. 2 of October this year, p. 56, where you can see how American cottons and linens are displacing the English step by, step on the domestic market, how English imports have, since 1881, never reached the American, and in 1891 only amounted to about one third of the latter. And China is, beside India, much the main market for these textiles. This is renewed proof that with the turn of the century, all relations are shifting. Transfer the centre of gravity of the textile and iron industries from England to America, and England will become either a second Holland, whose bourgeoisie live on their former greatness, and whose proletariat shrivels, or it will reorganise itself along socialist lines. The first is not possible, the English proletariat will not put tip with it, it is far too numerous and developed for this. Only the second remains. The fall of protective tariffs in America means the ultimate victory of socialism in England. And Germany? Back in 1878 it won a position on the world market, which it is now losing step by step thanks to its foolish protective tariff policy will it insist upon continuing obstinately to close for itself the path to the world market by taxing raw materials and foodstuffs, even against its American competitors, who will throw themselves into things quite differently from the English competition hitherto? Will the German bourgeoisie have the understanding and courage to follow the example set by America, or will it, lethargic as hitherto, wait until American industry, grown all-powerful, forcibly breaks the tariff-cartel between the Junkers and the large-scale manufacturers? And will the government and the bourgeoisie finally realise how marvellously clumsily this precise moment has been chosen to crush the economic forces of Germany with new and prohibitive military burdens, when it should be entering into industrial competition with the most youthfully strong nation in the world, which has easily paid off its colossal war debt in a few years, and whose government does not know what to do with the tax income? The German bourgeoisie have perhaps for the last time the opportunity finally to perform a great deed. One hundred to one they are too narrow-minded and too cowardly to utilise this opportunity for anything except to prove that once and for all their time is up.

The American Presidential Election by Frederick Engels 1892

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1892/11/16.htm

I shall give, therefore, a short historical sketch of the primitive agrarian conditions of the German tribes. A few traces of these have survived until our own time, but all through the Middle Ages they served as the basis and as the type of all public institutions and permeated the whole of public life, not only in Germany, but also in the north of France, England, and Scandinavia And yet they have been so completely forgotten, that recently G. L. Maurer has had to re-discover their real significance. Two fundamental facts, that arose spontaneously, govern the primitive history of all, or of almost all, nations: the grouping of the people according to kindred, and common property in the soil. And this was the case with the Germans. As they had brought with them from Asia the method of grouping by tribes and gentes, as they even in the time of the Romans so drew up their battle array that those related to each other always stood shoulder to shoulder, this grouping also governed the partitioning of their new territory east of the Rhine and north of the Danube. Each tribe settled down upon the new possession, not according to whim or accident, but, as Caesar expressly states, according to the gens-relationship between the members of the tribe. A particular area was apportioned to each of the nearly related larger groups, and on this again the individual gentes, each including a certain number of families, settled down by villages. A number of allied villages formed a hundred (old high German, huntari; old Norse, heradh). A number of hundreds formed a gau or shire. The sum total of the shires was the people itself. The land which was not taken possession of by the village remained at the disposal of the hundred. What was not assigned to the latter remained for the shire. Whatever after that was still to be disposed of generally a very large tract of land was the immediate possession of the whole people. Thus in Sweden we find all these different stages of common holding side by side. Each village had its village common land (bys alm nningar), and beyond this was the hundred common land (h rads), the shire common land (lands), and finally the people s common land. This last, claimed by the king as representative of the whole nation, was known therefore as Konungs alm nningar. But all of these, even the royal lands, were named, without distinction, alm nningar, common land. This old Swedish arrangement of the common land, in its minute subdivision, evidently belongs to a later stage of development. If it ever did exist in Germany, it soon vanished. The rapid increase in the population led to the establishment of a number of daughter villages on the Mark, i.e., on the large tract of land attributed to each individual mother village. These daughter villages formed a single mark-association with the mother village on the basis of equal or of restricted rights. Thus we find everywhere in Germany, so far as research goes back, a larger or smaller number of villages united in one mark association. But these associations were, at least, at first still subject to the great federations of the marks of the hundred, or of the shire. And, finally, the people, as a whole, originally formed one single great mark-association, not only for the administration of the land that remained the immediate possession of the people, but also a supreme court over the subordinate local marks. Until the time when the Frankish kingdom subdued Germany east of the Rhine, the center of gravity of the mark-association seems to have been in the gau or shire the shire seems to have formed the unit mark-association. For, upon this assumption alone is it explicable that, upon the official division of the kingdom, so many old and large marks reappear as shires. Soon after this time began the decay of the old large marks. Yet, even in the code known as the Kaiserrecht, the Emperor s Law of the thirteenth or fourteenth century, it is a general rule that a mark includes from six to twelve villages. In Caesar s time a great part at least of the Germans, the Suevi, to wit, who had not yet got any fixed settlement, cultivated their fields in common. From analogy with other peoples we may take it that this was carried on in such a way that the individual gentes, each including a number of nearly related families, cultivated in common the land apportioned to them, which was changed from year to year, and divided the products among the families. But after the Suevi, about the beginnning of our era, had settled down in their new domains, this soon ceased. At all events, Tacitus (150 years after Caesar) only mentions the tilling of the soil by individual families. But the land to be tilled only belonged to these for a year. Every year it was divided up anew and redistributed. How this was done is still to be seen at the present time on the Moselle and in the Hochwald, on the so-called Geh ferschaften. There the whole of the land under cultivation, arable and meadows, not annually it is true, but every three, six, nine or twelve years, is thrown together and parcelled out into a number of Gewanne, or areas, according to situation and the quality of the soil. Each Gewann is again divided into as many equal parts, long, narrow strips, as there are claimants in the association. These are shared by lot among the members, so that every member receives an equal portion in each Gewann. At the present time the shares have become unequal by divisions among heirs, sales, etc. ; but the old full share still furnishes the unit that determines the half, or quarter, or one-eighth shares. The uncultivated land, forest and pasture land, is still a common possession for common use. The same primitive arrangement obtained until the beginning of this century in the so-called assignments by lot (Loosg ter) of the Rhein palatinate in Bavaria, whose arable land has since been turned into the private property of individuals. The Geh ferschaften also find it more and more to their interest to let the periodical redivision become obsolete and to turn the changing ownership into settled private property. Thus most of them, if not all, have died out in the last forty years and given place to villages with peasant proprietors using the forests and pasture laud in common. The first piece of ground that passed into the private property of individuals was that on which the house stood. The inviolability of the dwelling, that basis of all personal freedom, was transferred from the caravan of the nomadic train to the log house of the stationary peasant, and gradually was transformed into a complete right of property in the homestead. This had already come about in the time of Tacitus. The free German s homestead must, even in that time, have been excluded from the mark, and thereby inaccessible to its officials, a safe place of refuge for fugitives, as we find it described in the regulations of the marks of later times, and to some extent, even in the leges Barbarorum, the codifications of German tribal customary law, written down from the fifth to the eighth century. For the sacredness of the dwelling was not the effect but the cause of its transformation into private property. Four or five hundred years after Tacitus, according to the same law-books, the cultivated land also was the hereditary, although not the absolute freehold property of individual peasants, who had the right to dispose of it by sale or any other means of transfer. The causes of this transformation, as far as we can trace them, are two-fold. First, from the beginning there were in Germany itself, besides the close villages already described, with their complete ownership in common of the land, other villages where, besides homesteads, the fields also were excluded from the mark, the property of the community, and were parcelled out among the individual peasants as their hereditary property. But this was only the case where the nature of the place, so to say, compelled it: in narrow valleys, and on narrow, flat ridges between marshes, as in Westphalia; later on, in the Odenwald, and in almost all the Alpine valleys. In these places the village consisted, as it does now, of scattered individual dwellings, each surrounded by the fields belonging to it. A periodical re-division of the arable land was in these cases hardly possible, and so what remained within the mark was only the circumjacent untilled land. When, later, the right to dispose of the homestead by transfer to a third person became an important consideration, those who were free owners of their fields found themselves in an advantageous position. The wish to attain these advantages may have led in many of the villages with common ownership of the land to the letting the customary method of partition die out and to the transformation of the individual shares of the members into hereditary and transferable freehold property. But, second, conquest led the Germans on to Roman territory, where, for centuries, the soil had been private property (the unlimited property of Roman law), and where the small number of conquerors could not possibly altogether do away with a form of holding so deeply rooted. The connection of hereditary private property in fields and meadows with Roman law, at all events on territory that had been Roman, is supported by the fact that such remains of common property in arable land as have come down to our time are found on the left bank of the Rhine-i. e., on conquered territory, but territory thoroughly Germanized. When the Franks settled here in the fifth century, common ownership in the fields must still have existed among them, otherwise we should not find there Geh ferschaften and Loosguter. But here also private ownership soon got the mastery, for this form of holding only do we find mentioned, in so far as arable land is concerned, in the Riparian law of the sixth century. And in the interior of Germany, as I have said, the cultivated land also soon became private property. But if the German conquerors adopted private ownership in fields and meadows-i. e., gave up at the first division of the land, or soon after, any re-partition (for it was nothing more than this), they introduced, on the other hand, everywhere their German mark system, with common holding of woods and pastures, together with the over-lordship of the mark in respect to the partitioned land. This happened not only with the Franks in the north of France and the Anglo-Saxons in England, but also with the Burgundians in Eastern France, the Visigoths in the south of France and Spain, and the Ostrogoths and Langobardians in Italy. In these last-named countries,, however, as far as is known, traces of the mark government have lasted until the present time almost exclusively in the higher mountain regions. The form that the mark government has assumed after the periodical partition of the cultivated land had fallen into disuse, is that which now meets us, not only in the old popular laws of the fifth, sixth, seventh and eighth centuries, hut also in the English and Scandinavian law-books of the Middle Ages, in the many German mark regulations (the so-called Weisth mer) from the fifteenth to the seventeenth century, and in the customary laws (cout mes) of Northern France. While the association of the mark gave up the right of, from time to time, partitioning fields and meadows anew among its individual members, it did not give up a single one of its other rights over these lands. And these rights were very important. The association had only transferred their fields to individuals with a view to their being used as arable and meadow land, and with that view alone. Beyond that the individual owner had no right. Treasures found in the earth, if they lay deeper than the ploughshare goes, did not, therefore, originally belong to him, but to the community. It was the same thing with digging for ores, and the like. All these rights were, later on, stolen by the princes and landlords for their own use. But, further, the use of arable and meadow lands was under the supervision and direction of the community and that in the following form: Wherever three-field farming obtained-and that was almost everywhere-the whole cultivated area of the village was divided into three equal parts, each of which was alternately sown one year with winter seed, the second with summer seed, and the third lay fallow. Thus the village had each year its winter field, its summer field, its fallow field. In the partition of the land care was taken that each member s share was made up of equal portions from each of the three fields, so that everyone could, without difficulty, accommodate himself to the regulations of the community, in accordance with which he would have to sow autumn seed only in his winter field, and so on. The field whose turn it was to lie fallow returned, for the time being, into the common possession, and served the community in general for pasture. And as soon as the two other fields were reaped, they likewise became again common property until seed-time, and were used as common pasturage. The same thing occurred with the meadows after the aftermath. The owners had to remove the fences upon all fields given over to pasturage. This compulsory pasturage, of course, made it necessary that the time of sowing and of reaping should not be left to the individual, but be fixed for all the community or by custom. All other land, i. e., all that was not house and farmyard, or so much of the mark as had been distributed among individuals, remained, as in early times, common property for common use; forests, pasture lands, heaths, moors, rivers, ponds, lakes, roads and bridges, hunting and fishing grounds. Just as the share of each member in so much of the mark as was distributed was of equal size, so was his share also in the use of the common mark. The nature of this use was determined by the members of the community as a whole. So, too, was the mode of partition, if the soil that had been cultivated no longer sufficed, and a portion of the common mark was taken under cultivation. The chief use of the common mark was in pasturage for the cattle and feeding of pigs on acorns. Besides that, the forest yielded timber and firewood, litter for the animals, berries and mushrooms, while the moor, where it existed, yielded turf. The regulations as to pasture, the use of wood, etc., make up the most part of the many mark records written down at various epochs between the thirteenth and the eighteenth centuries, at the time when the old unwritten law of custom began to he contested. The common woodlands that are still met with here and there, are the remnants of these ancient unpartitioned marks. Another relic, at all events in West and South Germany, is the idea, deeply rooted in the popular consciousness, that the forest should be common property, wherein every one may gather flowers, berries, mushrooms, beechnuts and the like, and generally so long as he does no mischief, act and do as he will. But this also Bismarck remedies, and with his famous berry-legislation brings down the Western Provinces to the level of the old Prussian squirearchy. Just as the members of the community originally had equal shares in the soil and equal rights of usage, so they had also an equal share in the legislation, administration and jurisdiction within the mark. At fixed times and, if necessary, more frequently, they met in the open air to discuss the affairs of the mark and to sit in judgment upon breaches of regulations and disputes concerning the mark. It was, only in miniature, the primitive assembly of the German people, which was, originally, nothing other than a great assembly of the mark. Laws were made, but only in rare cases of necessity. Officials were chosen, their conduct in office examined, but chiefly judicial functions were exercised. The president had only to formulate the questions. The judgment was given by the aggregate of the members present. The unwritten law of the mark was, in primitive times, pretty much the only public law of those German tribes, which had no kings; the old tribal nobility, which disappeared during the conquest of the Roman empire, or soon after, easily fitted itself into this primitive constitution, as easily as all other spontaneous growths of the time, just as the Celtic clan-nobility, even as late as the seventeenth century, found its place in the Irish holding of the soil in common. And this unwritten law has struck such deep roots into the whole life of the Germans, that we find traces of it at every step and turn in the historical development of our people. In primitive times, the whole public authority in time of peace was exclusively judicial, and rested in the popular assembly of the hundred, the shire, or the whole tribe. But this popular tribunal was only the popular tribunal of the mark adapted to cases that did not purely concern the mark, but came within the scope of the public authority. Even when the Frankish kings began to transform the self-governing shires into provinces governed by royal delegates, and thus separated the royal shire courts from the common mark tribunals, in both the judicial function remained vested in the people. It was only when the old democratic freedom had been long undermined, when attendance at the popular assemblies and tribunals had become a severe burden upon the impoverished freemen, that Charlemagne, in his shire courts, could introduce judgment by Sch ffen, lay assessors, appointed by the king s judge, in the place of judgment by the whole popular assembly. But this did not seriously touch the tribunals of the mark. These, on the contrary, still remained the model even for the feudal tribunals in the Middle Ages. In these, too, the feudal lord only formulated the issues, while the vassals themselves found the verdict. The institutions governing a village during the Middle Ages are but those of an independent village mark, and passed into those of a town as soon as the village was transformed into a town, i. e., was fortified with walls and trenches. All later constitutions of cities have grown out of these original town mark regulations. And, finally, from the assembly of the mark were copied the arrangements of the numberless free associations of medieval times not based upon common holding of the land, and especially those of the free guilds. The rights conferred upon the guild for the exclusive carrying on of a particular trade were dealt with just as if they were rights in a common mark. With the same jealousy, often with precisely the same means in the guilds as in the mark, care was taken that the share of each member in the common benefits and advantages should be equal, or as nearly equal as possible. All this shows the mark organization to have possessed an almost wonderful capacity for adaptation to the most different departments of public life and to the most various ends. The same qualities it manifested during the progressive development of agriculture and in the struggle of the peasants with the advance of large landed property. It had arisen with the settlement of the Germans in Germania Magna, that is, at a time when the breeding of cattle was the chief means of livelihood, and when the rudimentary, half-forgotten agriculture which they had brought with them from Asia was only just put into practice again. It held its own all through the Middle Ages in fierce, incessant conflicts with the land-holding nobility. But it was still such a necessity that wherever the nobles had appropriated the peasants land, the villages inhabited by these peasants, now turned into serfs, or at best into coloni or dependent tenants, were still organized on the lines of the old mark, in spite of the constantly increasing encroachments of the lords of the manor. Farther on we will give an example of this. It adapted itself to the most different forms of holding the cultivated land, so long as only an uncultivated common was still left, and in like manner to the most different rights of property in the common mark, as soon as this ceased to be the free property of the community. It died out when almost the whole of the peasants lands, both private and common, were stolen by the nobles and the clergy, with the willing help of the princes. But economically obsolete and incapable of continuing as the prevalent social organization of agriculture it became only, when the great advances in farming of the last hundred years made agriculture a science and led to altogether new systems of carrying it on. The undermining of the mark organization began soon after the conquest of the Roman empire. As representatives of the nation, the Frankish kings took possession of the immense territories belonging to the people as a whole, especially the forests, in order to squander them away as presents to their courtiers, to their generals, to bishops and abbots. Thus they laid the foundation of the great landed estates, later on, of the nobles and the Church. Long before the time of Charlemagne, the Church had a full third of all the land in France, and it is certain that, during the Middle Ages. this proportion held generally for the whole of Catholic Western Europe. The constant wars, internal and external, whose regular consequences were confiscations of land, ruined a great number of peasants, so that even during the Merovingian dynasty, there were very many free men owning no land. The incessant wars of Charlemagne broke down the mainstay of the free peasantry. Originally every freeholder owed service, and not only had to equip himself, but also to maintain himself under arms for six months. No wonder that even in Charlemagne s time scarcely one man in five could be actually got to serve. Under the chaotic rule of his successors, the freedom of the peasants went still more rapidly to the dogs. On the one hand, the ravages of the Northmen s invasions, the eternal wars between kings, and feuds between nobles, compelled one free peasant after another to seek the protection of some lord. Upon the other hand, the covetousness of these same lords and of the Church hastened this process; by fraud, by promises, threats, violence, they forced more and more peasants and peasants land under their yoke. In both cases, the peasants land was added to the lord s manor, and was, at best, only given back for the use of the peasant in return for tribute and service. Thus the peasant, from a free owner of the land, was turned into a tribute-paying, service-rendering appanage of it, into a serf. This was the case in the western Frankish kingdom, especially west of the Rhine. East of the Rhine, on the other hand, a large number of free peasants still held their own, for the most part scattered, occasionally united in villages entirely composed of freemen. Even here, however, in the tenth, eleventh, and twelfth centuries, the overwhelming power of the nobles and the Church was constantly forcing more and more peasants into serfdom. When a large landowner clerical or lay got hold of a peasant s holding, he acquired with it, at the same time, the rights in the mark that appertained to the holding. The new landlords were thus members of the mark, and, within the mark, they were, originally, only regarded as on an equality with the other members of it, whether free or serfs, even if these happened to be their own bondsmen. But soon, in spite of the dogged resistance of the peasants, the lords acquired in many places special privileges in the mark, and were often able to make the whole of it subject to their own rule as lords of the manor. Nevertheless the old organization of the mark continued, though now it was presided over and encroached upon by the lord of the manor. How absolutely necessary at that time the constitution of the mark was for agriculture, even on large estates, is shown in the most striking way by the colonization of Brandenburg and Silesia, by Frisian and Saxon settlers, and by settlers from the Netherlands and the Frankish banks of the Rhine. From the twelfth century, the people were settled in villages on the lands of the lords according to German law, i. e., according to the old mark law, so far as it still held on the manors owned by lords. Every man had house and homestead; a share in the village fields, determined after the old method by lot, and of the same size for all; and the right of using the woods and pastures, generally in the woods of the lord of the manor, less frequently in a special mark. These rights were hereditary. The fee simple of the land continued in the lord, to whom the colonists owed certain hereditary tributes and services. But these dues were so moderate, that the condition of the peasants was better here than anywhere else in Germany. Hence, they kept quiet when the peasants war broke out. For this apostasy from their own cause they were sorely chastised. About the middle of the thirteenth century there was everywhere a decisive change in favor of the peasants. The crusades had prepared the way for it. Many of the lords, when they set out to the East, explicitly set their peasant serfs free. Others were killed or never returned. Hundreds of noble families vanished, whose peasant serfs frequently gained their freedom. Moreover, as the needs of the landlords increased, the command over the payments in kind and services of the peasants became much more important than that over their persons. The serfdom of the earlier Middle Ages, which still had in it much of ancient slavery, gave to the lords rights which lost more and more their value; it gradually vanished, the position of the serfs narrowed itself down to that of simple hereditary tenants. As the method of cultivating the land remained exactly as of old, an increase in the revenues of the lord of the manor was only to be obtained by the breaking up of new ground, the establishing new villages. But this was only possible by a friendly agreement with the colonists, whether they belonged to the estate or were strangers. Hence, in the documents of this time, we meet with a clear determination and a moderate scale of the peasants dues, and good treatment of the peasants, especially by the spiritual landlords. And, lastly, the favorable position of the new colonists reacted again on the condition of their neighbors, the bondmen, so that in all the north of Germany these also, while they continued their services to the lords of the manor, received their personal freedom. The Slav and Lithuanian peasants alone were not freed. But this was not to last. In the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries the towns rose rapidly, and became rapidly rich. Their artistic handicraft, their luxurious life, throve and flourished, especially in South Germany and on the Rhine. The profusion of the town patricians aroused the envy of the coarsely-fed, coarsely-clothed, roughly-furnished, country lords. But whence to obtain all these fine things? Lying in wait for traveling merchants became more and more dangerous and unprofitable. But to buy them, money was requisite. And that the peasants alone could furnish. Hence, renewed oppression of the peasants, higher tributes and more corv e; hence renewed and always increasing eagerness to force the free peasants to become bondmen, the bondmen to become serfs, and to turn the common mark land into land belonging to the lord. In this the princes and nobles were helped by the Roman jurists, who, with their application of Roman jurisprudence to German conditions, for the most part not understood by them, knew how to produce endless confusion, but yet that sort of confusion by which the lord always won and the peasant always lost. The spiritual lords helped themselves in a more simple way. They forged documents, by which the rights of the peasants were curtailed and their duties increased. Against these robberies by the landlords, the peasants, from the end of the fifteenth century, frequently rose in isolated insurrections, until, in 1525, the great Peasants War overflowed Suabia, Bavaria, Franconia, extending into Alsace, the Palatinate, the Rheingau and Thuringen. The peasants succumbed after hard fighting. From that time dates the renewed predominance of serfdom among the German peasants generally. In those places where the fight had raged, all remaining rights of the peasants were now shamelessly trodden under foot, their common land turned into the property of the lord, they themselves into serfs. The North German peasants, being placed in more favorable conditions, had remained quiet; their only reward was that they fell under the same subjection, only more slowly. Serfdom is introduced among the German peasantry from the middle of the sixteenth century in Eastern Prussia, Pomerania, Brandenburg, Silesia, and from the end of that century in Schleswig-Holstein, and henceforth becomes more and more their general condition. This new act of violence had, however, an economic cause. From the wars consequent upon the Protestant Reformation, only the German princes had gained greater power. It was now all up with the nobles favorite trade of highway robbery. If the nobles were not to go to ruin, greater revenues had to be got out of their landed property. But the only way to effect this was to work at least a part of their own estates on their own account, upon the model of the large estates of the princes, and especially of the monasteries. That which had hitherto been the exception now became a necessity. But this new agricultural plan was stopped by the fact that almost everywhere the soil had been given to tribute-paying peasants. As soon as the tributary peasants, whether free men or coloni, had been turned into serfs, the noble lords had a free hand. Part of the peasants were, as it is now called in Ireland, evicted, i. e., either hunted away or degraded to the level of cottars, with mere huts and a bit of garden land, while the ground belonging to their homestead was made part and parcel of the demesne of the lord, and was cultivated by the new cottars and such peasants as were still left, in corv e labor. Not only were many peasants thus actually driven away, but the corv e service of those still left was enhanced considerably, and at an ever increasing rate. The capitalist period announced itself in the country districts as the period of agricultural industry on a large scale, based upon the corv e labor of serfs. This transformation took place at first rather slowly. But then came the Thirty Years War. For a whole generation Germany was overrun in all directions by the most licentious soldiery known to history. Everywhere was burning, plundering, rape, and murder. The peasant suffered most where, apart from the great armies, the smaller independent bands, or rather the freebooters, operated uncontrolled, and upon their own account. The devastation and depopulation were beyond all bounds. When peace came, Germany lay on the ground helpless, down-trodden, cut to pieces, bleeding; but, once again, the most pitiable, miserable of all was the peasant. The land-owning noble was now the only lord in the country districts. The princes, who just at that time were reducing to nothing his political rights in the assemblies of Estates, by way of compensation left him a free hand against the peasants. The last power of resistance on the part of the peasants had been broken by the war. Thus the noble was able to arrange all agrarian conditions in the manner most conducive to the restoration of his ruined finances. Not only were the deserted homesteads of the peasants, without further ado, united with the lord s demesne; the eviction of the peasants was carried on wholesale and systematically. The greater the lord of the manor s demesne, the greater, of course, the corv e required from the peasants. The system of unlimited corv e was introduced anew; the noble lord was able to command the peasant, his family, his cattle, to labor for him, as often and as long as he pleased. Serfdom was now general; a free peasant was now as rare as a white crow. And in order that the noble lord might be in a position to nip in the bud the very smallest resistance on the part of the peasants, he received from the princes of the land the right of patrimonial jurisdiction, i. e., he was nominated sole judge in all cases of offense and dispute among the peasants, even if the peasant s dispute was with him, the lord himself, so that the lord was judge in his own case! From that time, the stick and the whip ruled the agricultural districts. The German peasant, like the whole of Germany, had reached his lowest point of degradation. The peasant, like the whole of Germany, had become so powerless that all self-help failed him, and deliverance could only come from without. And it came. With the French Revolution came for Germany also and for the German peasant the dawn of a better day. No sooner had the armies of the Revolution conquered the left bank of the Rhine, than all the old rubbish vanished, as at the stroke of an enchanter s wand corv e service, rent dues of every kind to the lord, together with the noble lord himself. The peasant of the left bank of the Rhine was now lord of his own holding; moreover, in the Code Civil, drawn up at the time of the Revolution and only baffled and botched by Napoleon, he received a code of laws adapted to his new conditions, that he could not only understand, but also carry comfortably in his pocket. But the peasant on the right bank of the Rhine had still to wait a long time. It is true that in Prussia, after the well-deserved defeat at Jena, some of the most shameful privileges of the nobles were abolished, and the so-called redemption of such peasants burdens as were still left was made legally possible. But to a great extent and for a long time this was only on paper. In the other German States, still less was done. A second French Revolution, that of 1830, was needed to bring about the redemption in Baden and certain other small States bordering upon France. And at the moment when the third French Revolution, in 1848, at last carried Germany along with it, the redemption was far from being completed in Prussia, and in Bavaria had not even begun. After that, it went along more rapidly and unimpeded; the corv e labor of the peasants, who had this time become rebellious on their own account, had lost all value. And in what did this redemption consist? In this, that the noble lord, on receipt of a certain sum of money or of a piece of land from the peasant, should henceforth recognize the peasant s land, as much or as little as was left to him, as the peasant s property, free of all burdens; though all the land that had at any time belonged to the noble lord was nothing but land stolen from the peasants. Nor was this all. In these arrangements, the Government officials charged with carrying them out almost always took the side, naturally, of the lords, with whom they lived and caroused, so that the peasants, even against the letter of the law, were again defrauded right and left. And thus, thanks to three French revolutions, and to the German one, that has grown out of them, we have once again a free peasantry. But how very inferior is the position of our free peasant of to-day compared with the free member of the mark of the olden time! His homestead is generally much smaller, and the unpartitioned mark is reduced to a few very small and poor bits of communal forest. But, without the use of the mark, there can be no cattle for the small peasant; without cattle, no manure; without manure, no agriculture. The tax-collector and the officer of the law threatening in the rear of him, whom the peasant of to-clay knows only too well, were people unknown to the old members of the mark. And so was the mortgagee, into whose clutches nowadays one peasant s holding after another falls. And the best of it is that these modern free peasants, whose property is so restricted, and whose wings are so clipped, were created in Germany, where everything happens too late, at a time when scientific agriculture and the newly-invented agricultural machinery make cultivation on a small scale a method of production more and more antiquated, less and less capable of yielding a livelihood. As spinning and weaving by machinery replaced the spinning-wheel and the hand-loom, so these new methods of agricultural production must inevitably replace the cultivation of land in small plots by landed property on a large scale, provided that the time necessary for this be granted. For already the whole of European agriculture, as carried on at the present time, is threatened by an overpowering rival, viz., the production of corn on a gigantic scale by America. Against this soil, fertile, manured by nature for a long range of years, and to be had for a bagatelle, neither our small peasants, up to their eyes in debt, nor our large landowners, equally deep in debt, can fight. The whole of the European agricultural system is being beaten by American competition. Agriculture, as far as Europe is concerned, will only be possible if carried on upon socialized lines, and for the advantage of society as a whole. This is the outlook for our peasants. And the restoration of a free peasant class, starved and stunted as it is, has this value-that it has put the peasant in a position, with the aid of his natural comrade, the worker, to help himself, as soon as he once understands how.

The Mark by Frederick Engels 1892

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1892/12/mark.htm

Dear Sorge: You received our New Year s card of greeting, I hope. Today I am answering your letters of November 20th and 23rd, and December 9th. I have safely passed my seventy-first birthday, and all in all, I am healthier and stronger than five or six years ago. If I should live on to 1900 I don t know, to be sure, whether this would be good fortune or hard luck I think I shall live through very much indeed. You in America have a movement that moves in ups and downs, continually produces disappointments, and hence can easily lead to pessimism. Here I have the European movement right in front of my eyes, making gigantic strides on the whole, at its center the German movement calmly progressing with irresistible natural strength, and therefore I tend to the other extreme. I have written something about this in the French calendar, which I shall send you as soon as I have a second copy. Fortunately, war with Russia has been postponed for three or four years if no acts of madness happen anywhere. As peaceful development in Germany promises us victory under the most favorable conditions, all the more surely though somewhat later, we have no reason to stake everything on one card in such a war. There is no place yet in America for a third party, I believe. The divergence of interests even in the same class group is so great in that tremendous area that wholly different groups and interests are represented in each of the two big parties, depending on the locality, and almost each particular section of the possessing class has its representatives in each of the two parties to a very large degree, though today big industry forms the core of the Republicans on the whole, just as the big landowners of the South form that of the Democrats. The apparent haphazardness of this jumbling together is what provides the splendid soil for the corruption and the plundering of the government that flourish there so beautifully. Only when the land the public lands is completely in the hands of the speculators, and settlement on the land thus becomes more and more difficult or falls prey to gouging only then, I think, will the time come, with peaceful development, for a third party. Land is the basis of speculation, and the American speculative mania and speculative opportunity are the chief levers that hold the native-born worker in bondage to the bourgeoisie. Only when there is a generation of native-born workers that cannot expect anything from speculation any more will we have a solid foothold in America. But, of course, who can count on peaceful development in America! There are economic jumps over there, like the political ones in France to be sure, they produce the same momentary retrogressions. The small farmer and the petty bourgeois will hardly ever succeed in forming a strong party; they consist of elements that change too rapidly the farmer is often a migratory farmer, farming two, three, and four farms in succession in different states and territories, immigration and bankruptcy promote the change in personnel, and economic dependence upon the creditor also hampers independence but to make up for it they are a splendid element for politicians, who speculate on their discontent in order to sell them out to one of the big parties afterward. The tenacity of the Yankees, who are even rehashing the Greenback humbug, is a result of their theoretical backwardness and their Anglo-Saxon contempt for all theory. They are punished for this by a superstitious belief in every philosophical and economic absurdity, by religious sectarianism, and by idiotic economic experiments, out of which, however, certain bourgeois cliques profit. Louise asks you to send her only the Woman s Journal (Boston) and even this only until March 31st, unless we do not write otherwise before then. She needed it for the Vienna Arbeiterzeitung (she, Laura, and Tussy are the chief contributors) and she says that it could never occur to her to force the drivel of the American swell-mob ladies upon the working women. What you have so kindly sent her has enabled her to become well-posted again and has convinced her that these ladies are still as supercilious and narrowminded as ever; she merely wants to give this one magazine a couple of months trial. In the interim she thanks you most sincerely for your kindness. The first time Lafargue spoke in the Chamber he let himself be put out of countenance somewhat by the heckling and shouting. This will iron itself out, however. The Frenchmen always improve in actual battle. The story of Gompers is as follows: He wrote me and sent me detailed papers of his organization. I was out of town much at the time in summer and tremendously busy in-between. Nor was I at all clear about the matter; I thought Iliacos extra peccatur muros et intra. Then it was said that Gompers would come to Brussels or over here, and so I thought I would settle the matter orally. Afterward, when he didn t come, I forgot about the matter. But I shall look up the documents and write him that I decline the role with thanks. I wrote K. Kautsky a few days ago and instructed him to inquire of Dietz regarding the reprinting of your articles in a separate book; I am still waiting for a reply. Haste makes waste is the motto in Germany, especially in Stuttgart on the banks of the Neckar. Blatchford is out of the Workman s Times, which is a great gain. What is more, the paper exhibits the defects that a private enterprise of this sort must always have as long as there is no party behind it strong enough to control it. I now have: (1) to read proofs of the reprint of the Condition of the Working Class in England in 1841; (2) to look over Aveling s translation of Socialism: Utopian and Scientific; (3) some other minor things; and then (4) I return to Volume III, where I have the hardest chapters ahead of me. But I think that with the energetic rejection of all interludes, it will move ahead. What is left after that will, I think, offer me merely formal difficulties. Cordial greetings to your wife and you from Louise Kautsky and

Letters: Marx-Engels Correspondence 1892

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1892/letters/92_01_06.htm

... The situation in Germany is indeed becoming acute. Things must have gone far if oppositional tendencies repeatedly appear among the National Liberals and Richter can dream of a German great Liberal Party . Capitalist society, which formally has not yet subordinated the state to itself, is compelled to leave the actual rule to a hereditary monarchist-bureaucratic-squirearchal caste and content itself with the idea that by and large its own interests decide matters in the end. This society, in view of its situation in Germany, wobbles between two trends. On the one hand an alliance of all official and possessing strata of society against the proletariat. This trend leads in the long run to one reactionary mass and, in a tranquil development, finally retains the upper hand. On the other hand there is a trend which continually places on the agenda that old conflict which out of cowardice has never been fought out, the conflict between the monarchy with its absolutist relics, the landed aristocracy, and the bureaucracy, which deems itself superior to all parties, and, opposed to all of them, the industrial bourgeoisie, whose material interests are suffering every day and hour at the hands of these obsolete elements. Such contingencies as personality, locality and the like determine which of these trends has the upper hand at any given moment. At the present moment the ascendency of the second one seems about to start, in which event the industrial barons la Stumm and the shareholders of the industrial companies will naturally side in the main with the decrepit reaction. But this rehash of the old conflict of 1848 that has been dished up an infinite number of times can become very serious only if the government and the landed aristocracy, flushed with their successes so far, should commit some monstrous imbecilities. I do not consider that impossible as the strange personal desires in top quarters are finding support in the increasing conviction of the Junkers that in the end industry will be unable to stand the taxes on raw materials and foodstuffs. What point this conflict will reach depends, as I have said, on the fortuitousness of the personal element. A characteristic feature in this context is that the old way of doing things is being used. They hit the bag but mean to hit the donkey (or rather both). They give it to the Social-Democracy but incidentally the bourgeoisie gets a good dose too; at first politically, with regard to its liberal principles, which it has been lavishly displaying for the past sixty years, and with regard to the tiny share it has directly in the government; but later on, if things fare well, also economically, sacrificing its interests to those of landed property. A sharp turn to the right seems therefore to be in preparation, its pretext being the need to halt our advance...

Letters: Karl Marx and Frederick Engels, Selected Correspondence 1892

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1892/letters/92_02_19.htm

... I am very glad that the disturbances in Berlin have blown over and that our people have so firmly kept out of them. There was always the possibility that some shooting might occur, and that would have served as a sufficient reason to cause us all sorts of trouble. If shooting had taken place in Berlin the National-Liberals might have gladly voted the elementary-school law and finally turn against us the sporadic fits of anger of certain people. The one reactionary mass which is gradually coming into being is from our point of view at present undesirable; as long as we are unable to participate actively in the making of history it is not in our interest that historical development should cease and to that end the brawls between the bourgeois parties come in useful. In this respect the present regime is priceless, for it helps to create this situation. If, however, shooting starts too early, that is before the old parties are tightly locked in combat with one another, they will be induced to come to terms and form a united front against us. That is as certain as twice two is four. If this happens when we are twice as strong as now, it won t do us any harm. And even if it were to happen now, the personal regime would surely see to it that squabbles start again among our opponents. But it is best to be on the safe side. At present things are going so well that we can only hope that nothing will interfere with their further progress. As regards unemployment, it is indeed possible that this will become worse next year. Protectionism has had exactly the same consequences as Free Trade, namely to glut individual national markets and in fact it has done so almost everywhere except that it is so far not as bad here as in your parts. But even here, where since 1867 we have experienced two or three lingering minor crises, it seems that an acute crisis is in the offing. The colossal cotton harvests of the last two or three years, reaching over nine million bales per year, have brought down prices to as low a level as during the worst period of the 1846 crisis and are, moreover, exerting an enormous pressure on industry so that the manufacturers here must over-produce because the American planters have produced too much. In doing so they constantly lose money, because, as a result of the falling prices of raw material, their products that are being made from expensive cotton depreciate before they reach the market. This is also the cause of the cries of distress uttered by the German and Alsatian spinners; but this is passed over in silence in the Imperial Diet. Other branches of industry too are no longer in a particularly good state; railway revenues and the export of industrial commodities have been certainly declining during the past 15 months, so that next winter things may become rather difficult here as well. An improvement in the continental protectionist states can hardly be expected, trade agreements may bring some temporary relief, but their effect will be counterbalanced within a year. If next winter a similar row, on a larger scale, begins in Paris, Berlin, Vienna, Rome, Madrid, and is re-echoed from London and New York it can become serious. In that case it is good that at least Paris and London have town councillors who know only too well their dependence on the workers votes, and who will therefore not be inclined to offer serious resistance to demands that can be put into operation immediately, such as employment on public works, short working hours, wages in accordance with trade-union demands since they realise this is the best and only way of saving the masses from worse socialist really socialist heresies. We will then see whether the town councillors in Vienna and Berlin, elected on the basis of a system of class voting and of electoral qualification, will have to follow them willy-nilly...

Letters: Karl Marx and Frederick Engels, Selected Correspondence 1892

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1892/letters/92_03_08.htm