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Special pages :
Letter to Friedrich Engels, August 31, 1867
| Author(s) | Karl Marx |
|---|---|
| Written | 31 August 1867 |
Published in English in full for the first time in Marx-Engels Collected Works, Volume 42
MARX TO ENGELS[1]
IN MANCHESTER
[London,] 31 August 1867
Dear FRED,
Received both your letters with the calculations. THANKS. I have got to pay £4 between 2 shitty épiciers[2] by next Tuesday (3 September), and that's only a part of what I owe them both. I have the feeling these fellows are pressing harder this year than ever.
The children are returning a week on Sunday (morning).[3] I wish they had stayed away longer. They were enjoying themselves over there. But Lafargue has to get back to his school. (It always vexes him if I ask: N'allez-vous pas à votre école?[4])
For the congress at Lausanne (INTERNATIONAL)[5] from here: Eccarius, Lessner, Dupont. Also, the president of the Coventry RIBBON WEAVERS'[6] and A. Walton, Esq. (from Wales). Eccarius has safely received the contribution about the congress for The Times—having previously made enquiry of the latter. Judging from all the news from Paris, Bonaparte's position there is looking very shaky.
Salut.
Your
K. M.
- ↑ Part of this letter was published in English for the first time in Karl Marx, On the First International. Arranged and edited, with an introduction and new translations by Saul K. Padover, New York, 1973.
- ↑ shopkeepers
- ↑ See this volume, pp. 396-97.
- ↑ Are you not going to your school?
- ↑ The Lausanne Congress of the International was held from 2 to 8 September 1867. Marx took part in the preparations but he was unable to attend the congress, since he was busy reading the proofs of Volume One of Capital.
The Congress was attended by 64 delegates from six countries (Britain, France, Germany, Switzerland, Belgium and Italy). Apart from the report of the General Council (see present edition, Vol. 20), the Congress heard reports from the local sections which showed the increased influence of the International on the proletariat and the growing strength of its organisations in different countries. The delegates holding Proudhonist views, especially those from France, sought to change the orientation of the International's activity and its programme principles. Having managed, despite the efforts of the General Council's delegates, to impose their agenda on the Congress, they sought to get the Congress to revise the Geneva Congress resolutions in a Proudhonist spirit. They did succeed in carrying through a number of their own resolutions, in particular the one on co-operation and credit, which they regarded as the principal instruments of changing society by means of reform.
However, the Proudhonists failed to achieve their principal aim. The Congress retained as valid the Geneva Congress resolutions on the economic struggle and strikes. The Proudhonist dogma on abstaining from political struggle was countered by the resolution on political freedom passed by the Lausanne Congress which emphasised that the social emancipation of the working class was inseparable from its political liberation. The Proudhonists likewise failed to seize the leadership of the International. The Congress re-elected the General Council in its former composition and retained London as its seat. - ↑ Daniel Swan