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Special pages :
Protectionists (1847)
| Author(s) | Karl Marx |
|---|---|
| Written | 18 September 1847 |
Printed according to the manuscript
Published in English for the first time in Marx-Engels Collected Works, Volume 6
This is apparently a rough outline of a speech Marx intended to make on September 18, 1847 at the Congress of Economists in Brussels (see this volume, pp. 287-89 and notes 113 and 116).The outline was written on the last page of the tenth notebook containing extracts Marx made in the latter half of 1845 and in 1846. Some places in the manuscript are indecipherable because of ink blots (in the text they are marked by periods in square brackets). At the bottom of the text itself and in the margins there are several drawings by Engels apparently of participants in the Congress (see illustration between p. 578 and p. 579).
1) have never protected small industry, only machine industry. Example: the school of List in Germany. Gulich.[1]
2) If we believe what the protectionists say, they merely preserve the status quo. Protection will never effect sales of the protected product on foreign markets. Hence reactionary.[2]
3) The last consolation of the protectionists is that the country is not exploited by foreign but by domestic capitalists.
4) It is said, indeed, that internal reforms must first be made before one can think of free trade.[3] The power to reform the position of the classes is not ascribed to the protective system itself. But they say it would be foolish to reform international relations before domestic relations have been reformed. But what is the protective system? It is proof that the class which carries it into effect has power in its hands. Therefore, given the protective system [...] the capitalists will not concede anything. Moreover, gentlemen, great social and historical reforms are never made by concessions, by the generosity of the ruling classes, but only through the nécessité des choses. They must therefore be forced through. It is therefore ridiculous to believe that in a country where the protective system prevails [...] [...] [...] the relations between capital and labour are reformed in any way. I shall say no more of the protectionists [...] of the question.../