Protest of the Democratic Society in Cologne against the Incorporation of Posen in the German Confederation

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This protest was made on August 11, 1848, at a general meeting of the Cologne Democratic Society. The meeting was presided over by Marx (see this volume, p. 562).

Cologne, August 12. The Democratic Society of Cologne has submitted the following protest to the National Assembly:

To the High National Assembly!

The Democratic Society of Cologne, considering

1. that Germany, which is engaged in a struggle for freedom, does not desire to oppress other nationalities but to promote their efforts for freedom and independence;

2. that the liberation of Poland is a vital question for Germany;

3. that Poland has in fact been repeatedly robbed of its freedom and national independence by three despots;

4. that since 1792 all attacks upon Poland and all partitions of Poland have always been aimed by reaction against the freedom of the whole of Europe, and, on the other hand, whenever a liberation of the peoples took place there was insistence also on the restoration of Poland;

5. that even the Committee of Fifty, in the name of the German people, indignantly rejected any share in the outrage committed against Poland and clearly proclaimed the duty of the

German people to co-operate in the restoration of an independent Poland;

6. that after the March revolution even the King of Prussia, compelled by the force of public opinion, solemnly assented to the reorganisation of Posen;

7. that despite that the National Assembly in Frankfurt, which, it is true, arose from indirect elections, in its sitting of July 27, 1848, voted for the incorporation of three-quarters of the Grand Duchy of Posen in the as yet non-existent German Empire and thereby incurred the guilt of a new partition of Poland and the flouting of liberty in the same way as did the Vienna Congress and the German Federal Diet;

8. that nevertheless the healthy part of the German people will not and cannot take any part in oppressing the Polish nation for the benefit of reaction and in the interests of a number of Prussian bureaucrats, landowners and hucksterers; resolves in its sitting today: to make a formal protest against the decision adopted by the German National Assembly on July 27, 1848, in regard to the Grand Duchy of Posen and herewith to lay before Germany, Poland and the whole of Europe its vigorous objections to this incorporation which is solely of advantage to the reactionary party in Prussia, Russia and Austria.

On behalf of the Democratic Society,

The Committee