Camphausen (1849)

Author(s)	Karl Marx
Written	3 February 1849

Source: Marx-Engels Collected Works, Volume 8, p. 295;
First published: in Neue Rheinische Zeitung No. 213, February 4, 1849.

Collection(s): Neue Rheinische Zeitung

Keywords : Germany, Government

Cologne, February 3. We learn from an entirely reliable source that the Brandenburg Ministry will resign before the Chambers open, and that Herr Camphausen will be presented to the Chambers at their opening as the new Prime Minister.

We were sure that something of the kind was being prepared when, a few days ago, the shrewd statesman’s friends here spread a rumour that he was tired of political activity:

Oh! the bustle makes me weary;
What use all the joy and pain?
Sweet peace come, and
In my heart begin your reign?
[Goethe, “Wandrers Nachtlied”]

and for that reason wanted to withdraw into peaceful domestic life and restrict his reflections to the less agitating field of speculation in dairy produce.

It should be clear to every intelligent person: Herr Camphausen felt the need to get himself invited once again to save the Crown and, “touched by his own magnanimity”, to play a second time the role of “midwife of the constitutional throne” with his well-known aplomb.

The bourgeois opposition in the Chamber will rejoice at this parliamentary “victory”. The Germans are forgetful and easily forgive. Those same Lefts who last year opposed Herr Camphausen will gratefully welcome his new accession to office as a great concession on the part of the Crown.

But in order that the people should not allow itself to be deceived a second time, we shall briefly recall the most outstanding deeds of this thinking statesman.

Herr Camphausen resurrected the United Diet that was buried on March 18 and reached agreement with it on some of the basic principles of the future Constitution. ^[1]

Herr Camphausen thereby reached agreement on the legal basis i.e. indirect denial of the revolution.

Herr Camphausen furthermore conferred on us the blessing of indirect elections. ^[2]

Herr Camphausen once again denied the revolution as regards one of its chief results, by transforming the Prince of Prussia’s flight into a study trip and recalling him from London.^[3]

Herr Camphausen organised the civic militia in such a way that from the outset it was transformed from being the arming of the people into the arming of a class, so that the people and the militia confronted each other as enemies.

At the same time Herr Camphausen allowed the old-Prussian bureaucracy and army to be reconstituted and to become daily more capable of preparing counter-revolutionary coups d'état.

Herr Camphausen was responsible for the memorable shrapnel slaughter of practically unarmed Polish peasants.^[4]

Herr Camphausen began the war against Denmark to provide an outlet for superabundant patriotism and to restore the popularity of the Prussian Guards. Having achieved this aim, he made every effort to help secure the adoption in Frankfurt of the disgraceful Malmö armistice^[5], which was essential for Wrangel’s march on Berlin.

Herr Camphausen confined himself to abolishing a few reactionary old-Prussian laws in the Rhine Province, but left the whole police-state civil-code legislation in existence in all the old provinces.

Herr Camphausen was the first to intrigue against the unity — at that time still definitely revolutionary — of Germany, first of all by convening alongside the Frankfurt National Assembly his Berlin agreement parliament and subsequently by acting in, every way against the decisions and influence of the Frankfurt Assembly.

Herr Camphausen demanded of his Assembly that it should restrict its constitutional mandate merely to ‘reaching agreement’. Herr Camphausen further demanded of it that it should issue an address to the Crown in which it acknowledged this — as if it were a constitutional chamber which could be adjourned or dissolved at will.

Herr Camphausen further demanded of it that it should deny the revolution and even made this a question of confidence in the Cabinet.

Herr Camphausen laid before his Assembly a draft Constitution, which is on much the same lines as the imposed Constitution and aroused a universal storm of indignation at the time.

Herr Camphausen boasted of having been the Minister of mediation, but this mediation was nothing but mediation between the Crown and the bourgeoisie for joint betrayal of the people.

Herr Camphausen at last resigned when this betrayal had been fully negotiated and was sufficiently mature to be put into practice by the Government of Action and its constables. ^[6]

Herr Camphausen became the ambassador to the so-called Central Authority and continued to be so under all the Ministries. He remained ambassador at the time when in Vienna the Croatian, Ruthenian and Wallachian troops violated German territory, fired on Germany’s leading city and set it ablaze and treated it more outrageously than any Tilly treated Magdeburg.^[7] He remained ambassador and did not lift a finger.

Herr Camphausen remained ambassador under Brandenburg, thereby taking his share in the Prussian counter-revolution, and subscribed his name to the recent Prussian Circular Note which openly and without disguise demanded the restoration of the old Federal Diet.^[8]

Herr Camphausen now at last takes over the Ministry in order to cover the retreat of the counter-revolutionaries and to safeguard the November and December achievements for us for a long time to come.

These are some of the great deeds of Herr Camphausen. If he now becomes Minister he will hasten to add to the list. For our part, we shall keep the most precise possible account of them.

↑ The law of April 6 — “Decision on Some Principles of the Future Prussian. Constitution” (“Verordnung über einige Grundlagen der künftigen Preussischen Verlassung”) — was adopted by the Second United Diet an assembly of representatives from the eight provincial diets of Prussia. Like the provincial diets, the United Diet was based on the estate principle. It sanctioned new taxes and loans, discussed new Bills and had the right to petition the King. The First United Diet opened on April 11, 1847, but was dissolved in June because it refused to grant a new loan. The Second United Diet met on April 2, 1848, after the revolution of March 18-19 in Prussia. It adopted decrees, decisions and a law on the elections to the Prussian National Assembly, and sanctioned the loan, following which its session was closed. Marx refers here to the numerous promises of the kings of Prussia to introduce a constitution and representative bodies in the country. On May 22, 1815, a decree as issued by the King in which he promised the setting up of provincial diets of estates, the convocation of an all-Prussia representative body, and a Constitution. Under the National Debt Law of January 17, 1820, state loans could only be issued with the consent of the provincial diets. But these promises made under pressure from the bourgeois opposition movement remained a dead letter. All that happened was that a law of June 5, 1823, established provincial diets with restricted advisory functions. Financial difficulties compelled Frederick William IV on February 3, 1847, to. issue an edict convening the United Diet (Vereinigte Landtag), a body consisting of representatives of all the provincial diets of Prussia. The United Diet refused to grant a loan to the Government and was soon dissolved. The electoral law of April 8, 1848 (Marx quotes it above, on p. 154 of this volume), promulgated as a result the March revolution, provided for the convocation of an Assembly to draft a Constitution by “agreement with the Crown”. The two-stage system of voting established by this law secured the majority for the representatives of the bourgeoisie and the Prussian officials.
↑ The electoral law of April 8, 1848, established a procedure of elections “to the Assembly for an agreement on a Prussian Constitution” on the basis of universal suffrage, which was, however, restricted by the system of indirect (two-stage) elections. The electoral law of December 6, 1848, promulgated immediately after the imposed Constitution, retained the two-stage elections to the Lower Chamber but gave the franchise only to “independent Prussians”, which allowed the Government arbitrarily to limit the electorate.
↑ During the March revolution of 1848 the Prince of Prussia fled to England, but on June 4, aided by the Camphausen Ministry, he returned to Berlin. At the sitting of the Prussian National Assembly on June 6 Camphausen sought to present this cowardly flight of the Prince as a journey undertaken for educational purposes.
↑ The reference is to the suppression of the Polish national liberation uprising in Posen in April-May 1848. After the March revolution of 1848 in Germany an insurrection of the Poles broke out in the Duchy of Posen for their liberation from the Prussian yoke. The mass of the Polish peasants and artisans took part in it together with members of the lesser nobility. The Prussian Government was forced to promise that a commission would be set up to carry out the reorganisation of Posen: creation of a Polish army, appointment of Poles to administrative and other posts, recognition of Polish as the official language etc. On April 14, 1848, however, the King ordered the division of the Duchy of Posen into an eastern Polish part and a western “German” part, which was not to be “reorganised”. During the months following the suppression of the Polish insurrection by the Prussian military, in violation of all agreements with the Poles, the demarcation line was pushed further and further east and the promised “reorganisation” was never carried out. Under the impact of the March revolution, the national liberation movement of the German population in the duchies of Schleswig and Holstein, which had been incorporated into the Kingdom of Denmark by decision of the Vienna Congress (1815), grew in strength and became radical and democratic, forming part of the struggle for the unification of Germany. Volunteers from all over the country rushed to the aid of the local population when it rose in arms against Danish rule. Prussia, Hanover and other states of the German Confederation sent to the duchies federal troops under the command of the Prussian General Wrangel. However, the Prussian Government which feared a popular outbreak and an intensification of the revolution sought an agreement with Denmark at the expense of the general German interests. The situation was complicated by the intervention of Britain, Sweden and Tsarist Russia in favour of the Kingdom of Denmark. The seven months armistice concluded between Prussia and Denmark at Malmö on August 26, 1848, in fact preserved Danish rule in Schleswig and Holstein. The war, resumed at the end of March 1849, ended in 1850 with the victory of the Danes and the two duchies remained part of the Kingdom of Denmark.
↑ The reference is to the armistice between Denmark and Prussia concluded in the Swedish city of Ma]m5 on August 26, 1848. Though the Prussian ruling circles waged the war against Denmark over Schleswig and Holstein in the name of the German Confederation, they sacrificed general German interests to dynastic and counter-revolutionary interests when they concluded the armistice. They were moved by the desire to release troops for the suppression of the revolution in Prussia, and also by pressure from Russia and Britain, which supported Denmark. Besides a cease-fire between Prussia and Denmark, the armistice provided for the replacement of the provisional authorities in Schleswig with a new government, to be formed by the two, contracting parties (representatives of the Danish monarchy were dominant in it), separation of the Schleswig and Holstein armed forces and other harsh terms for the national liberation movement in the duchies. The revolutionary-democratic reforms which had been introduced were now virtually eliminated.
The Malmö armistice and its ratification by the Frankfurt National Assembly caused popular dissatisfaction and protests in Germany.
↑ The Government of Action — Concerning Hansemann-Pinto An allusion to the similarity between the measures proposed by Hansemann, the Prussian Minister of Finance (i.e. a compulsory loan as a means to stimulate money circulation), and the views of Pinto, the eighteenth-century Dutch stockjobber, who regarded stockjobbing as a factor speeding up money circulation. Cf. the article “The Bill on the Compulsory Loan and Its Motivation”.
Constables — The Auerswald-Hansemann Government (the so-called Government of Action) was in power from June 25 to September 21, ‘ 1848 (see Note 153).
↑ Johan Tilly, the army commander of the Catholic League during the Thirty Years’ War (1618-48), stormed Magdeburg on May 20, 1631, and allowed his soldiers to plunder it. The town was almost completely burnt down and ruined and about 30 thousand people were killed
↑ The Prussian Government’s Circular Note of January 23, 1849, addressed to all Prussian diplomats in the German states, formulated a plan for restoring the Federal Diet. The Federal Diet — the representative body of the German Confederation, that ephemeral union of German states founded by decision of the Vienna Congress in 1815. Consisting of representatives of the German states, the Federal Diet had no real power and served as a vehicle of feudal and monarchist reaction. After the March 1848 revolution in Germany the Right-wing circles tried in vain to revive the Federal Diet and use it to undermine the principle of popular sovereignty and prevent the democratic unification of Germany. — the central body of the German Confederation established by decision of the Vienna Congress in 1815

[1] The law of April 6 — “Decision on Some Principles of the Future Prussian. Constitution” (“Verordnung über einige Grundlagen der künftigen Preussischen Verlassung”) — was adopted by the Second United Diet an assembly of representatives from the eight provincial diets of Prussia. Like the provincial diets, the United Diet was based on the estate principle. It sanctioned new taxes and loans, discussed new Bills and had the right to petition the King. The First United Diet opened on April 11, 1847, but was dissolved in June because it refused to grant a new loan. The Second United Diet met on April 2, 1848, after the revolution of March 18-19 in Prussia. It adopted decrees, decisions and a law on the elections to the Prussian National Assembly, and sanctioned the loan, following which its session was closed. Marx refers here to the numerous promises of the kings of Prussia to introduce a constitution and representative bodies in the country. On May 22, 1815, a decree as issued by the King in which he promised the setting up of provincial diets of estates, the convocation of an all-Prussia representative body, and a Constitution. Under the National Debt Law of January 17, 1820, state loans could only be issued with the consent of the provincial diets. But these promises made under pressure from the bourgeois opposition movement remained a dead letter. All that happened was that a law of June 5, 1823, established provincial diets with restricted advisory functions. Financial difficulties compelled Frederick William IV on February 3, 1847, to. issue an edict convening the United Diet (Vereinigte Landtag), a body consisting of representatives of all the provincial diets of Prussia. The United Diet refused to grant a loan to the Government and was soon dissolved. The electoral law of April 8, 1848 (Marx quotes it above, on p. 154 of this volume), promulgated as a result the March revolution, provided for the convocation of an Assembly to draft a Constitution by “agreement with the Crown”. The two-stage system of voting established by this law secured the majority for the representatives of the bourgeoisie and the Prussian officials.

[2] The electoral law of April 8, 1848, established a procedure of elections “to the Assembly for an agreement on a Prussian Constitution” on the basis of universal suffrage, which was, however, restricted by the system of indirect (two-stage) elections. The electoral law of December 6, 1848, promulgated immediately after the imposed Constitution, retained the two-stage elections to the Lower Chamber but gave the franchise only to “independent Prussians”, which allowed the Government arbitrarily to limit the electorate.

[3] During the March revolution of 1848 the Prince of Prussia fled to England, but on June 4, aided by the Camphausen Ministry, he returned to Berlin. At the sitting of the Prussian National Assembly on June 6 Camphausen sought to present this cowardly flight of the Prince as a journey undertaken for educational purposes.

[4] The reference is to the suppression of the Polish national liberation uprising in Posen in April-May 1848. After the March revolution of 1848 in Germany an insurrection of the Poles broke out in the Duchy of Posen for their liberation from the Prussian yoke. The mass of the Polish peasants and artisans took part in it together with members of the lesser nobility. The Prussian Government was forced to promise that a commission would be set up to carry out the reorganisation of Posen: creation of a Polish army, appointment of Poles to administrative and other posts, recognition of Polish as the official language etc. On April 14, 1848, however, the King ordered the division of the Duchy of Posen into an eastern Polish part and a western “German” part, which was not to be “reorganised”. During the months following the suppression of the Polish insurrection by the Prussian military, in violation of all agreements with the Poles, the demarcation line was pushed further and further east and the promised “reorganisation” was never carried out. Under the impact of the March revolution, the national liberation movement of the German population in the duchies of Schleswig and Holstein, which had been incorporated into the Kingdom of Denmark by decision of the Vienna Congress (1815), grew in strength and became radical and democratic, forming part of the struggle for the unification of Germany. Volunteers from all over the country rushed to the aid of the local population when it rose in arms against Danish rule. Prussia, Hanover and other states of the German Confederation sent to the duchies federal troops under the command of the Prussian General Wrangel. However, the Prussian Government which feared a popular outbreak and an intensification of the revolution sought an agreement with Denmark at the expense of the general German interests. The situation was complicated by the intervention of Britain, Sweden and Tsarist Russia in favour of the Kingdom of Denmark. The seven months armistice concluded between Prussia and Denmark at Malmö on August 26, 1848, in fact preserved Danish rule in Schleswig and Holstein. The war, resumed at the end of March 1849, ended in 1850 with the victory of the Danes and the two duchies remained part of the Kingdom of Denmark.

[5] The reference is to the armistice between Denmark and Prussia concluded in the Swedish city of Ma]m5 on August 26, 1848. Though the Prussian ruling circles waged the war against Denmark over Schleswig and Holstein in the name of the German Confederation, they sacrificed general German interests to dynastic and counter-revolutionary interests when they concluded the armistice. They were moved by the desire to release troops for the suppression of the revolution in Prussia, and also by pressure from Russia and Britain, which supported Denmark. Besides a cease-fire between Prussia and Denmark, the armistice provided for the replacement of the provisional authorities in Schleswig with a new government, to be formed by the two, contracting parties (representatives of the Danish monarchy were dominant in it), separation of the Schleswig and Holstein armed forces and other harsh terms for the national liberation movement in the duchies. The revolutionary-democratic reforms which had been introduced were now virtually eliminated.
The Malmö armistice and its ratification by the Frankfurt National Assembly caused popular dissatisfaction and protests in Germany.

[6] The Government of Action — Concerning Hansemann-Pinto An allusion to the similarity between the measures proposed by Hansemann, the Prussian Minister of Finance (i.e. a compulsory loan as a means to stimulate money circulation), and the views of Pinto, the eighteenth-century Dutch stockjobber, who regarded stockjobbing as a factor speeding up money circulation. Cf. the article “The Bill on the Compulsory Loan and Its Motivation”.
Constables — The Auerswald-Hansemann Government (the so-called Government of Action) was in power from June 25 to September 21, ‘ 1848 (see Note 153).

[7] Johan Tilly, the army commander of the Catholic League during the Thirty Years’ War (1618-48), stormed Magdeburg on May 20, 1631, and allowed his soldiers to plunder it. The town was almost completely burnt down and ruined and about 30 thousand people were killed

[8] The Prussian Government’s Circular Note of January 23, 1849, addressed to all Prussian diplomats in the German states, formulated a plan for restoring the Federal Diet. The Federal Diet — the representative body of the German Confederation, that ephemeral union of German states founded by decision of the Vienna Congress in 1815. Consisting of representatives of the German states, the Federal Diet had no real power and served as a vehicle of feudal and monarchist reaction. After the March 1848 revolution in Germany the Right-wing circles tried in vain to revive the Federal Diet and use it to undermine the principle of popular sovereignty and prevent the democratic unification of Germany. — the central body of the German Confederation established by decision of the Vienna Congress in 1815

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