Record of the International Popular Movement

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January

GERMANY

The months of October and November have been almost wholly given over to “Luther Festivals.” From the Emperor and his keeper Bismarck, down to the Radicals, Progressists, and Liberals, the governing classes have united in rendering homage to the “Great Reformer,” — that perfect embodiment of the bourgeois ideal. Very much was said about the freedom of speech and of the press that Germans owe to Martin Luther. A delicious comment on the liberty of speech was the prohibition of a lecture on Luther, by Wilhelm Liebknecht, (just released from prison), and on the liberty of the press, by the prohibition of Bebel’s excellent book “Die Frau, in der Vergangenheit, Gegenwart & Zukunft,” and T. Frohme’s “Entwicklung der Eigenthumsverhältnisse.” It may interest English readers to know that Wilhelm Liebknecht is a direct descendant of Martin Luther.

It is difficult for English people — in spite of Irish Coercion Bills, and Holloway Gaol, to realize the difficulties under which the Socialist campaign is carried on in Germany. Expelled from one town after another, their papers suppressed, their meetings prohibited, Socialists are none the less actively carrying on their Propaganda, and daily growing in numbers. That the “official” organ of the party, the “Sozial Democrat” published at Zurich, numbers over 9000 subscribers, (and be it remembered that every copy has to be smuggled into Germany, and that one copy often does duty for a whole town), and that within a few months Engels’s admirable work “Entwicklung des Sozialismus von der Utopie zur Wissenschaft” has reached a third edition, sufficiently proves that all the repressive laws have utterly failed to arrest the spread of the Socialist doctrines.

To give English readers some idea of the persecution to which a German Socialist may be subjected, I translate the following from the “Sozial Democrat.” “A Socialist workingman, industrious and thorough, is one evening while talking to some fellow workmen in a cafe, pounced upon by the police, who declare they have come upon a “Secret meeting.” After the usual preliminary arrest the men are brought up for trial, and the allegations of the police naturally believed. The man is condemned to imprisonment. On the expiration of his sentence he wants to return to his work, but this does not suit the police, who expel him as a “Foreigner.” [Under the Socialist Law the police can thus expel men from one town after another.] Not content with this they give him a passport, stating that he has been expelled for contravening the Socialist Law. And now begins the chase. The workingman is denounced to the whole German police. Everywhere he is asked for his passport, which becomes in his hands as the letter carried by the unfortunate Uriah from David to Joab. If the police are merciful they only go to his master, and warn him that he has a dangerous Socialist in his employ — with the inevitable result that the man is dismissed. If the police are not mercifully inclined, they expel him at once. It is no use remonstrating, no use appealing to the celebrated “Practical Christianity.” Go the man must, and only now and then is he allowed to rest in prison when he is arrested as a “Vagabond,” and for “begging,” because, thanks to the police, he has nowhere to lay his head, and perhaps asks for a piece of bread on his dreadful marches. This “hunting-down” has gone on for six months. How will it end? Either the man will die exhausted and despairing by the road-side, or in a prison or hospital, or he will commit what is called a “crime.” But who is to blame if the man thus dies, or is driven to become a “criminal?” Is not the police “the criminal, the murderer?”

Bismarck is not happy. The Socialists will none of his State Socialism, and neither cajolery nor coercion has prevented his making a perfect fiasco. Meantime the monstrous “Socialist Law,” i.e., the law directed against the Socialists is to be renewed.

The “Christlichsoziale Korrespondenzblatt” of that really logical Christian Herr Stocker expresses disapprobation of English institutions. “ What conditions are they” it says, “where such things (Stocker’s Memorial Hall, reception) are possible? Truly we do not envy Englishmen the “freedom” that suffers such things …. There are things where all else fails, and only the knout would be in place.” There are.

In a circular addressed to the German press the Socialist deputy Vollmar has called attention to the latest infamy of the Prussian government — the arresting of Russian subjects and handing them over to the Russian government. Keppelmann and Kutienewki have thus been given over to the tender mercies of the Russian police, and Kusabutski has only escaped the same penalty by timely flight. Vollmar further points out that five Russians, Mendelssohn, Irussolowski, Padlewski, Enzukiewitsch and Sotwinski are still imprisoned, and he asks if these men too are to be “delivered into Russian dungeons.” And the whole press — Conservative, Liberal, Progressist, Christian, has been so busy celebrating the boldness of Martin Luther, that it has not found time even to protest against this iniquitous proceeding.

FRANCE

It is satisfactory to find that a real labour party is at work in France, a party which repudiates alike the sound and fury of Anarchism, that bitter experience has taught us signifies nothing, and the cowardly trimmers, known as “Possibilists.” The “parti ouvrier” is a revolutionary party, but the revolution it is helping to bring about is merely the means to the end pursued by all Socialists, and that is best summed up in my father’s words, “the expropriation of the expropriators.” Two of the leaders of the party, Jules Guesde and Paul Lafargue were released from Ste. Pelagie, on the 21st of November. The government has been looking after them for the last six months, because they had at public meetings denounced our present capitalist regime. On the evening of their release they held a meeting in the Salle Levis. At least 4,000 persons were present, and numbers could not get in. The “prisoners” received a hearty welcome, and warm sympathy was expressed with Dormoy who is still in gaol.

It is perhaps hardly necessary to refer to the so-called “International Working Men’s Congress,” lately held in Paris. The names of Messrs. Broadhurst, Brousse, and Costa speak for themselves. Had, however, any doubts been possible where Possibilists are concerned, the enthusiastic admiration of Meyer Oppert (of Blowitz in Silesia) and the paeans of praise sent up from the bourgeois press for the “moderation,” and the “practical good sense” of the congress, must have set them at rest.

M. Ferry, who thanks to the cowardice of the Chamber is now indulging in a “little war” of his own, has also been posing as a martyr because he was nearly shot at. With regard to the poor boy Curien, the Cri du Peuple says: “Curien is neither mad nor a police agent. So much is certain. We say this frankly because the Socialist Party has no interest in concealing the truth. Curien belongs to those embittered ones, who, like Fournier at Roanne, and Florion at Rheims cannot await the time propitious for a general rising, and who imagine that with a pistol shot they can shatter the basis of our Society. We do not approve of these individual acts because they seem to us useless, and at times even harmful. Gambetta, whom Florion wanted to remove, is dead, but capitalistic exploitation flourishes. The life of a statesman does not count in the life of a people. We wage no war against individuals, but against institutions … and we hold that the struggle against the bourgeoisie can be no personal or isolated one, but a common and general one, CLASS AGAINST CLASS.”

How thoroughly the class character of the struggle is understood by the government is illustrated by certain events that have just occurred in the great mining district — Monceau-les-mines. Some time ago, without rhyme or reason, the gendarmerie was suddenly set in motion; houses were searched, arrests made, and all with the ostensible object of looking for dynamite. Of course no dynamite was found, and the arrested men were released. But the object of the police was attained — for a list of subscribers for the candidature of the Socialist Bonnot had been found. Fifty workmen were there and then dismissed by their employers, a proceeding that called forth protestations from the people of Monceau. These protestations, consisting of the meeting of some workmen, had been of a perfectly pacific nature, when we were informed by the bourgeois press that a battalion of the 134th Line had been telegraphed for, and that a squadron of dragoons from Dijon had already reached Monceau. The object of the government and of the Company that works the mines is clear. It is to provoke the people into rising, and so afford fresh grounds for a persecution of the Socialist Party. It is to be hoped the miners of Monceau will not fall into the shameful trap laid for them.

The “bitter cry of out-cast London,” has once again called attention to the wretched condition of the poor in this Christian city. An equally bitter cry is just now going up from Paris, where the condition of the poor seems almost more appalling than in London. Cases of death from starvation are becoming so common that they are now only recorded under the “faits divers.” What an answer is this to the christian or atheistic bourgeois, who would have us believe that a “remedy,” nay the “one remedy” for all this misery is to be found in the teachings of Parson Malthus. The French are practical Malthusians — and the French working-class is even more wretched than are their prolific English brethren.

After twelve long years the grave of Charles Delescluze has been traced out, and the remains of the heroic old man removed to Pere Lachaise. May I remind the readers of To-day that a subscription for raising a monument to his memory has been set on foot? Delescluze devoted his long noble life to the cause of the people; he died for them in that terrible May week of 1871, and his name truly deserves to be “enshrined in the great heart of the working class.” Any one who wishes to contribute anything towards this fund may send to the journal La Bataille (Souscription Delescluze) 9, Rue d'Aboukir, Paris, or to myself. All contributions will be acknowledged in La Bataille.

SPAIN

A Spanish friend has sent me some extremely interesting notes on the “situation.” Space allows me to make only the following extract: “The National Working Men’s Congress at Barcelona in August, 1882, definitely constituted the ‘Democratic-Socialist Working Men’s Party,’ and issued a manifesto almost identical with those of the French ‘parti ouvrier,’ and the German Social Democrats. In it is set forth the necessity for the Spanish proletariat of seizing political power ‘in order to transform individual and corporate property into common property belonging to the whole community.’ Besides this ‘Socialist Workmen’s Party,’ the Congress founded the ‘National Association of Spanish Working-men,’ principally with the object of grouping the forces of the Spanish proletariat for its economic struggles with capital. The Statutes of this Association are almost identical with those of the old International. This is the situation of the Socialist group; the bourgeois parties are much in the same position as after the fall of the Republic. The Federalist Party has gained in popularity since the defeat of the Cantonalists, and the long resistance of Cartagena, and the heroic defence of Seville, Malaga, etc., have given it an indisputable influence with the people. It has for it all the revolutionary elements in the country. On the other hand the fraction of the ‘Possibilists,’ the partisans of Castelar, has lost ground, and is considered merely as a monarchical reserve-force. These men have no prestige whatever, and the monarchy will be badly off indeed, when it is reduced to leaning upon them. The partisans of Zorilla will join the Federalists. Zorilla, who has little intellectual or political value, owes his influence to his relations with the army. Since the restoration he has declared himself frankly republican, almost revolutionary, and he has placed himself at the head of all those who desire the speedy overthrow of Alfonso. Zorilla’s integrity, firmness, and loyal nature have given him much authority with the men of action. The late insurrectional movements, which attained such striking dimensions were organised and directed by Zorilla. They were premature and failed, but they have added immensely to Zorilla’s prestige. Everyone in Spain is now convinced that it is he who will make the next revolution, which as usual, will begin with a ‘pronunciamento.’ ... . All that is being said about an alliance between Spain and Germany is absurd, and rests on absolute ignorance of the situation in the peninsula. The day the government sent an army to the Pyrennees, would see the overthrow of Alfonso.” On October 4th, the Annual Conference of the Spanish Working Men was held; 120 delegates were present, many of whom were representatives of the Agricultural Labourers.

HOLLAND

The “Sozial Democrat” reports the remarkable growth of the Socialist movement in Holland, due, not a little, to the energy of F. Dowela Neuwenhuis. The best proof of the spread of our doctrines is to be found in the demand of the bourgeois press that the sale in the streets of the Socialist Organ “Recht voor Allen” shall be prohibited, and that landlords should refuse to let their halls for Socialist meetings.

RUSSIA

News direct from Russia is necessarily scanty, but such news as we get is enough to show us that despite the wholesale arrests, the terrific struggle is still going on with unabated vigour. Especially noteworthy is the fact that of late so many of the arrests have been made among officers in the army. The “little father’s” position must be getting more and more unpleasant when even the army is not to be relied on. Of great interest, also, is the declaration of the most powerful sections of the Revolutionists, that they have abandoned “pure anarchy” for the programme of the Communist Revolutionary Party. A series of standard Socialist works is just now being issued, under the editorship of Lavroff, by the Russians at Geneva. A new periodical is also being brought out by Lavroff and Tichomiroff. May it be as successful as its predecessor “Vorwärts.”

POLAND

In no country is the Socialist movement of greater interest. A few years ago the party did not exist here. All the revolutionary tendencies of the heroic country were directed to the one object of throwing off the hateful yoke of Russia. The Polish people to-day, however, recognise that they have to fight something besides Russian despotism, and that is class despotism. In their organ — now unhappily seized and suppressed — the “Proletarian,” the Polish Socialists had the generosity and courage to hold out a hand of brotherly love to the Socialists of Russia. Truly the work of the International has not been in vain!

SERVIA

Milan has been trying to prove that he has profited by the example of his imperial brethren, and has been shooting political opponents as energetically as if he were a great potentate.

ENGLAND

That so frankly Socialist a periodical as To-day — a periodical that does not weaken its Socialism by labelling it with any modifying word — has been founded, is yet another proof of the extraordinary spread of Socialism in England. A few months ago such as anomaly as a Socialist lecturing in Oxford would have been impossible. Now we hardly feel surprised that William Morris was not only listened to in Oxford, but met with the greatest sympathy. It suffices to announce a discussion on Socialism to ensure a large audience, and the “Conferences” held by our Christian friends have been largely attended. It is a little difficult to understand by what chain of reasoning these gentlemen reconcile Christianity and Socialism, and they must forgive us if we cannot quite believe that after nearly 1900 years it has been reserved for them to discover what Christ really meant to teach, though he forgot to make his meaning plain. We are very willing to work with Christian, Pagan, or Jew, in the great cause of Socialism, but it is our duty to protest against Socialism being made a stalking-horse for any creed. Let us not be mis-understood. We know the perfect sincerity of men like Mr. Headlam and his friends, but we also know there are Christians less honest than these who would use this Socialist movement to their own advantage, and to our loss.

The English Police feel it to be their constabulary duty to keep pace with the times, and they have been trying their hand at plots. They are still such novices in the business that it would be unkind to criticise their first failures. Perhaps in time they may succeed almost as well as their confrères of France and Germany.

Eleanor Marx.

February

ENGLAND

The appearance of To-day — “which at last gives Socialism an organ in England” — has been most cordially welcomed by the Socialist press of the Continent. In addition to these public utterances I have received numbers of letters, from one or two of which I quote, as they may interest English readers. My dear and honored old friend, P. Lavroff, wishes us “all success” and “long life.” August Bebel writes: “I accept the flattering invitation to contribute to To-day, but I am bound to add that I cannot say positively when I shall be able to send in my first contribution, as, just now, I am overwhelmed with work. … I am exceedingly glad that, from all appearances, the Socialist movement is beginning to take serious proportions in England. With this much is gained for the whole movement. With England, the victory is certain — the course of events will become irresistible.” Liebknecht writes to me in the same sense; and from Austria and France I have had most kindly letters, all wishing To-day “ long life “ and “beaucoup d'abonnés.”

The great meeting held by Mr. George in St. James’s Hall on January 9th is, it seems to me, chiefly remarkable for two facts; that every utterance of Mr. George’s that could be construed into going further than his own theories, and touching upon Socialist principles, was enthusiastically applauded; and that Michael Davitt received a real ovation. That this Fenian, this rebel, this “felon,” and “ticket-of-leave-man,” met with such a reception from an English audience is assuredly worth recording. Till the Irish and English people understand they are fighting the same enemy there is no hope for either.

As to Mr. George, his lecture was an exposé of his views as stated in “Progress and Poverty,” with a good deal of God Almighty thrown in. It is hardly necessary to say in To-day that Socialists fully recognise the immense importance of this great land question, and are grateful to Mr. George for the good work he is doing. But to represent the land question as anything more than a part of the whole Socialist programme is most mischievous, for it is simply playing into the hands of the capitalists. When Mr. George points out the importance of the land question we are entirely with him, but when he says that nationalizing the land (were such a thing possible under our present conditions of production) solves all social problems, we are forced to protest. I must, for my own part, also protest against Mr. George’s continued references to God. I am sure Mr. George is quite sincere in his belief that God is a sort of supernatural King Lear, with chiefly Gonerils, Regans, and Cornwalls for children, and Mr. George to play Cordelia. But, no doubt those landlords who say an Almighty God would never have let them enjoy their land so long had they been wrong, are sincere too, and logical to boot. It was almost grotesque to hear Mr. George’s vivid description of the horrible miseries of the people, and his references in the same breath to a “beneficent and Almighty father.” Mr. George is doing good work in waging war against the land thieves, but let him confine himself to work for the “Himmelreich auf erden”:-

“Den Himmel aber lassen wir

Den Engeln und den Spatzen,”

There is so much to record concerning this Socialist movement in England that I rather hesitate to take up these columns for speaking of a personal matter. As, however, I have no other means of refuting a very serious charge brought against my father, I hope the readers of To-day will forgive my touching on the matter here. On the 29th of last November a letter from Mr. Sedley Taylor appeared in the Times, which repeated the old calumny that my father had knowingly misquoted a passage from one of Mr. Gladstone’s speeches to suit his own purpose.

There has never been a better calumniated man than my father, but his calumniators were, as a rule, too contemptible to be worth answering. In this particular case my father did answer his anonymous accuser, because the alleged misquotation appeared in the inaugural address of the International Workingmen’s Association.

On reading Mr. Taylor’s letter, which is only a rechauffé of the old story, I at once wrote to the Times. So often had I read in English papers of the “fairness” of the English press that I never doubted my answer would be given the same publicity as that accorded to Mr. Taylor’s accusation. Days passed, and my letter did not appear. Still impressed with the idea that even the Times might be honest in a personal matter, I again wrote to the editor. With no result. Then I addressed myself to the Daily News, which I had so far found very fair. But apparently a dead lion may be kicked with impunity by living professors, and the Liberal Daily News could not stretch its liberality to the length of publishing my letter. I therefore publish both Mr. Taylor’s letter and my own reply:

To THE EDITOR OF THE “TIMES.”

Sir, — I ask leave to point out in the Times that the origin of the misleading quotation from Mr. Gladstone’s Budget speech of April 16, 1863, which so eminent a publicist as Professor Emile de Laveleye has been led to reproduce through reliance on German sources, and with respect to which he inserts a correction in the Times of this day, is to be found as far back as 1864 in an address issued by the council of the famous International Working Men’s Association.

What appears extremely singular is that it was reserved for Professor Brentano (then of the University of Breslau, now of that of Strasburg) to expose, eight years later in a German newspaper, the bad faith which had manifestly dictated the citation made from Mr. Gladstone’s speech in the address. Herr Karl Marx, who as the acknowledged author of the address attempted to defend the citation, had the hardihood, in the deadly shifts to which Brentano’s masterly conduct of the attack speedily reduced him, to assert that Mr. Gladstone had ‘manipulated’ (zurechtgestumpert) the. report of his speech in the Times of April 17, 1863, before it appeared in ‘Hansard,’ in order ‘to obliterate’ (wegzupfuschen) a passage which was certainly compromising for an English Chancellor of the Exchequer.’ On Bretano’s showing, by a detailed comparison of texts, that the reports of the Times and of ‘ Hansard ‘ agreed in utterly excluding the meaning which craftily-isolated quotation had put upon Mr. Gladstone’s words, Marx withdrew from further controversy under the plea of ‘want of time!’

The whole of the Brentano-Marx correspondence is eminently worthy of being unearthed from the files of newspapers under which it lies buried, and republished in an English form, as it throws upon the latter disputant’s standard of literary honesty a light which can be ill spared at a time when his principal work is presented to us as nothing less than a fresh gospel of social renovation,

I am, Sir, your obedient servant,

Trinity College, Cambridge, November 26th.

SEDLEY TAYLOR.

To THE EDITOR OF THE “ TIMES.”

Sir, — In the Times of November 29th Mr, Sedley Taylor refers to a certain quotation of a speech by Mr. Gladstone, ‘to be found as far back as 1864, in an address issued by the council of the famous International Working Men’s Association.’ He continues: (I here quote Mr. Taylor’s letter from “What appears” to “want of time,”)

The facts are briefly these, The quotation referred to consists of a. few sentences from Mr. Gladstone’s Budget speech of April 16th, 1863. After describing the immense increase of wealth that took place in this country between 1853 and 1861 Mr. Gladstone is made to say: ‘This intoxicating augmentation of wealth and power is entirely confined to classes of property,’ An anonymous writer, who turns out to be Professor Brentano, published in a German paper, Concordia, of the 7th March, 1872 a reply in which it was stated: ‘This sentence does not exist in Mr. Gladstone’s speech, Marx has added it lyingly, both as to form and contents’ (formel und materiel hinzugelogen).

This was the only point at issue between my father and his anonymous opponent.

In his replies in the Leipzig Volkstaat, June 1st and August 7th, 1872, Dr, Marx quotes the reports of Mr, Gladstone’s speech as follows;. “The Times, April 17th — The augmentation I have described, and which is founded, I think, on accurate returns, is an augmentation entirely confined to classes of property. Morning Star, 17th April-This augmentation is an augmentation confined entirely to the classes possessed of property, Morning Advertiser, April 17th — The augmentation stated is altogether limited to classes possessed of property.”

The anonymous Brentano, in the ‘deadly shifts to which his own masterly conduct of the attack had reduced him,’ now took refuge under the assertion usual in such circumstances, that if the quotation was not a forgery it was, at all events, ‘misleading,’ in ‘bad faith,’ ‘craftily isolated,’ and so forth. I am afraid you would not allow me space to reply to this accusation of Herr Brentano, repeated now, after eleven years, by Mr., Taylor, Perhaps it will not be required as Mr. Taylor says; ‘The whole of this Brentano-Marx correspondence is eminently worthy of being unearthed from the file of newspapers in which it lies buried and republished in an English form.’ I quite agree with this. The memory of my father could only gain by it, As to the discrepancies between the newspaper’ reports of the speech in question and the report in ‘Hansard ‘ I must leave this to be settled by those most interested in it.

Out of thousands and thousands of quotations to be found in my father’s writings this is the only one the correctness of which has ever been disputed, The fact that this single and not very lucky instance is brought up again and again by the professorial economists is very characteristic. In the words of Mr Taylor, ‘it throws upon the latter disputant’s (Dr. Marx), standard of literary honesty a light which can ill be spared at a time when his principal work is presented to us as nothing less than a fresh gospel of social renovation.’

I am, Sir, yours faithfully,

London, November 30, 1883.

ELEANOR MARX,

Having spoken of the bourgeois press which, after giving publicity to a libel on a dead man refuses to insert the reply, I must also refer to a paper that pretends to represent the working class. In the Labour Standard of Dec. 8th appeared an article, a leader (I emphasize the word leader, because some of Mr. Shipton’s friends have tried to make Continental workmen believe the article in question was a mere “unofficial” contribution from an outsider), positively begging Sir William Harcourt to hang O'Donnell. Said the trades-union oracle; “We most earnestly hope the Home Secretary will listen to none of those appeals for mercy which are certain now to flow in; that, upon the contrary, he will insist upon justice"! To appeal to our virtuous Home Secretary not to show mercy is worthy of Mr. W. S. Gilbert at his wildest.

I hope the readers of To-day will not forget that on the morning of Monday, February 25th, George William Foote will be released from Holloway Gaol. All who admire Mr. Foote for his courage and devotion, all who are grateful to him for what he has suffered in the cause of freedom of speech and of the press, should be outside Holloway Gaol on the 25th to give him a hearty welcome.

RUSSIA

The apparent calm of Holy Russia has been rudely disturbed by the execution of Sudeikin. Not that such an act was unexpected. The Nihilist Executive Committee distinctly said, after the death of Alexander II., that they would wait a certain time before taking any fresh measures, in order to give the Czar a chance. Even the reactionary press of Europe was astounded at the modest demands of the Nihilist Committee. To these demands Alexander III. replied by fresh persecutions, and since the trembling despot will not make peace, it must be war.

A Russian friend writes me concerning Sudeikin; “Details of the act you will, for the present, find in the bourgeois press. All our friends, whether innocent or guilty, whether Nihilists or not, are jealously watched; hundreds are being daily arrested, so that to send letters, save in a roundabout way, is impossible. Soon, no doubt, an official account (i.e., in one of the “secret” papers of the Nihilists) will be published. As soon as it is, or as I have any sort of news, I will let you know.”

Meantime, all who are interested in the Russian movement, and can read Russian, should get “Westnik Narodni Woli,” Lavroff and Tichomiroff’s new periodical. It is a large volume (400 8vo pages), and is full of most interesting matter. It contains, besides the “programme” of the Review by its .editors, articles on the “Mission of Socialism,” by Lavroff; “Two Years of the Life of One Escaped from Siberia,” by Debagori-Mokriewitsch; “The Bankruptcy of Bourgeois Science,” by Tichomiroff; “The Financial Crisis,” by Rjäsanoff; and an exhaustive account of the revolutionary movement, its martyrs, literature, and so forth, by Tichomiroff, who is especially qualified to deal with this subject.

FRANCE

One of the French Socialist leaders, in spite of the heavy work entailed by “la propagande,” sends me some very interesting notes, which I cannot do better than translate:

“French workingmen had seen in the Republic the Eldorado that was to ameliorate their condition, They have been sorely disappointed. They have had to go on doing the same hard labour for the same meagre wages, and they are beginning to ask themselves if in overturning Napoleon, and in raising to power all the large and small Gambettas, they had not been merely fooling themselves. For some time discontent with the Republican Government has grown greater and greater, and the men in power while trying to appease the people are only displeasing the bourgeoisie. M. Waldeck Rousseau — the real successor of Gambetta — for M. Ferry is only a man the opportunists uphold till it suits them to kick him out — has just like Bismarck manufactured a “State Socialism” that is to satisfy the workers without injuring the masters. His State Socialism is confined to the developing of the “Chambres Syndicales,” the equivalents. of your Trades’ Unions, with this difference, that certain “Chambres Syndicales” — as for instance those of the masons, carpenters, &c. — would do the works undertaken by the State and by the Municipalities. But the employers at once made M. Ferry, M. Rousseau, and other Gambettists understand that this would be creating dangerous rivals to themselves in all the great public works.

“The Socialism of M. Waldeck Rousseau has received a further defeat in the mining departments of the North, The workmen, acting on the advice contained in the Minister’s speeches, wanted to organize Miners’ Trades’ Unions, but the directors of the mining companies of Augin, and of Denain have put a stop to any such attempt at organisation. They have dismissed every one of the workmen belonging to the Union. The other workmen made common cause with the latter, and proposed a general strike to force the company working the mines to modify its despotic orders and to take back the dismissed miners. The government was about to be placed in a very awkward position. Had it been, I do not say intelligent, but even a little careful of its dignity, it would have defended the miners. It is true that in every great miners’ strike in France, not a single government has remained impartial. Each one has enthusiastically lent its police, its gendarmes, its soldiers, and its magistrates in order to put down the strikes, to shoot some of the miners, and to arrest and condemn others to months or years of imprisonment. For the moment the situation has been saved by a certain Roudet, who has mediated between the government, the companies and the miners, and whose conduct is very suspicious. But matters are becoming every day more critical. The working men demand some rights under this Republic which they have made and which they are ready to defend, while the government is only seeking to place the riches and the forces of the State at the disposal of the capitalists.”

One of the great misfortunes of France has been the indifference of the provinces to all the great revolutionary movements. It is therefore of the utmost interest to note that at this moment the provinces are ahead of Paris in the great Socialist work. In many provincial towns groups of the “parti ouvrier” have been constituted. A friend writes “Guesde, immediately after his release from prison, together with Bazin, and the Citoyenne Paule Minke, went on a large propagandist tour in the south and west of France. At Bordeaux, Albi, Carcassonne, Montpelier, Perpignan, Nismes, Cette, Lovère, and Narbonne they have been lecturing, and numerous groups have been founded.” Darboy, too, though only just released from prison, has at once taken up his propagandist work.

The Socialist press is increasing. Besides the very excellent Defense des Travailleurs, [following 4 lines corrupted in British Library. — ERC]

"The French Working Men’s Party,” writes Paul Lafargue, “follows in this the German Social Democrats, who, before Bismarck suppressed the Socialist press possessed some thirty or forty journals.”

At Paris the Cercle de la Bibliotheque Socialiste is to begin this month (January) a series of lectures “for the propaganda of the communistic theories of Karl Marx.” The first lecture will be by Lafargue, on “The Economic Materialism of Karl Marx, and of the Action on Men and Societies of the Economic Condition in which they are placed.”

In the last number of To-day I spoke of the memorial stone which is to be erected to the memory of Ch. Delescluze. The committee have very properly decided to erect a monument, not to Charles Delescluze alone, but to him and the Communistic combatants who lie buried near him.

January 6th was the anniversary of the death of Blanqui. The people of France have not forgotten the forty years of imprisonment, under every form of Government, that Blanqui endured for their cause, and Pere Lachaise was visited by thousands. The modest little stone erected to his memory was covered with wreaths and flowers.

GERMANY

We have to record a whole series of successful Socialist candidatures in the municipal elections. In Berlin two more Socialists have been elected (the total number being now five). At Esslingen the Working Men’s party gained three out of six seats; at Heppens and at Besigheim Socialists achieved a victory, while in the other towns where elections took place they were defeated by insignificant majorities. These victories have made Bismarck anxious for the Reichstag election next year, and, as a first measure, “secret voting” is to be abolished. In other words, workmen who vote for Socialists will be dismissed by their employers, and subjected to fresh persecution [corruption here — ERC] If this last chance of speaking out is taken from the people, why so much the worse for Bismarck and the class he represents.

Last month I tried to give English people — Irish people are accustomed to this sort of thing — some idea how German working men are persecuted. Let me supplement this with an account of the proceedings at the funeral of a Socialist at Frankfort.

Rudolf Doll, one of our most energetic workers, died of consumption last December. “On the morning of the 10th,” writes the Sozial Democrat,” one saw masses of people approaching the house where Doll had died, but there was also the police busy “prohibiting” the red ribbon attached to some of the crowns …. In order to avoid difficulties, two large crowns, one sent by the ‘Socialist Working Men’s Party of Germany,’ and the other from the ‘Frankfort Socialists,’ were tied with black ribbon ….. When the mourning coach appeared the cross-bearer stepped forward in order to open the procession, but he was asked to bear his own cross — home, which, after some demur, he did.

“Although a week-day, at least 1,500 friends had come …. and in the churchyard the police had to object to many more red ribbons.

“After the coffin had been lowered into the grave a chorus of male voices sang a most touching song, with which the Cemetery Commissary tried to interfere, by attempting to fill up the grave while the chorus was proceeding. Then our friend Frohme (one of the members of the Reichstag) advanced to the grave, and said; ‘In the name of the Social Democrats of Germany I lay this crown upon the grave’ — when Police Commissary Meier stepped forth and threatened to ‘disperse the meeting.’ ‘You have made a demonstration,’ he cried. “No; you are provoking us,” answered the crowd. When suddenly all were silenced — even the Police Commissary keeping quiet with shamefaced mien — the young wife of one of our friends, surrounded by numbers of women, mounted upon the little mound by the grave, and, in a clear and penetrating voice cried, while placing a large wreath tied with red ribbon on the grave, ‘ I dedicate this in the name of Germany’s Socialist women and girls.’ It was. a thrilling sight. On the one side Doll’s bride, bowed down with grief, and supported by old friends; on the right side of the grave the representatives of the State, and opposite to them the group of women, full of earnestness, dignity, and enthusiasm. Surrounding these the masses of people, while from the background of leafless trees, half hidden in the fog, arose the threatening memorial stone to the ‘fallen of ‘48.’ — a picture worthy a great painter …. But this was too much for the Commissary. ‘The meeting is dissolved,’ he yelled — no one stirred. ‘We will each throw in some earth,’ said Frohme, and, despite all the efforts to prevent it, this was done. Now Frohme advised the people to disperse; advice quietly followed. The Commissary then tried to explain to Frohme. ‘If you had not used the word Social Democracy,’ he said, ‘I should not have interfered, but that is forbidden!'”

As another example of the joys of German citizens, I may say that Liebknecht, during the serious illness of three of his children, was unable to be with them and his poor wife, as, he has been, under the ‘ Socialist Law,’ expelled from Leipzig, and can live no nearer that town than Borsdorf.

SWITZERLAND

On the 9th of last September 176 delegates, representing 250 trades-unions, met at Zurich, to consider the condition of the workmen of Switzerland. The committee, in an address to the “Working Men of all Countries,” report that the chief resolutions come to were for international action in demanding Factory Acts. After energetically protesting against the action of certain English trades-unions on this question, the address ends with the good old cry, “Proletarians of all countries unite!”

Eleanor Marx.

March

FRANCE

The French Chamber, feeling that it must pretend to do something during the crisis, has at length decided to make an enquiry into the condition of the working class. A commission of forty-four deputies has been appointed, and M. Clemenceau has come to London that he may learn how to set about his work. As this gentleman is pursuing his enquiries at the Reform Club, at dinners given in his honour by the French Embassy, and under the direction of Potter and other Broadhursts, it is not difficult to foresee in what his labours will result. Meantime some groups of working men are drawing up reports for themselves. One of these reports concludes, “To put an end to this situation, from which according to the working men’s party, the only escape is in the socialization of the means of production, it is your duty, gentlemen, who do not share our views, to seek and find some other solution since you assert that such a one exists. It is for this your commission has been appointed, and we eagerly await your report. If you can suggest nothing, you pronounce the condemnation of the bourgeois order.” Referring to the debate in the Chamber, a correspondent writes: — “Various panaceas were put forward. The high price of lodgings is one of the “sores” of Parisian civilization. The municipal council instead of attacking the proprietors by taxing the lodgings — as the “parti ouvrier” demanded, has preferred sentimental twaddle about erecting working men’s houses, a la Peabody. At this the financiers have pricked up their ears, and have at once offered their services; and the Credit Foncier offers a loan of 22,000,000 guaranteed by the town. It will be an excellent business for the jobbers.” While the bourgeois Chamber is about to “enquire into. the condition of the working class,” the working men are preparing for their Seventh National Congress, to be held at Roubaix. Of this Congress Gabriel Deville writes: “By the side of this parliamentary enquiry, another one of like nature will be opened by those themselves interested; this enquiry will be placed first in order of discussion at the Congress. Thanks to the zeal of the various groups this inquiry will produce some result, and thus the manoeuvres of the governing classes, anxious to hide the ill they neither can nor will remedy, will be frustrated.” …. On this subject a friend also writes me: “The Congress now being organised by the “parti ouvrier,” should be one of special interest for ,English workmen. English capitalists, unable to exploit English women and children quite as much as they would like, owing to the Factory Acts, are beginning to transfer their capital to France, where they can exploit French women and children untrammelled by any laws. To remedy the inequality in the situations of the working classes of Europe, the International agitated for the general adoption of a normal working day of eight hours. This idea has now been .revived by the Swiss working men. They have forced their Federal Government to make diplomatic overtures to the governments of Europe for the purpose of summoning a Congress with the object of fixing the working day at eight hours, just as the Postal Congress fixed the tariff of letters. The governments have, of course, refused, but what is stranger Messrs. Broadhurst and other Trades’ Unionists who lately attended a Possibilist conference here, have done their utmost to bury this question of international labour-legislation. But the Swiss workmen will not give in. They have addressed a circular to the workmen of Europe and America, calling upon them to agitate for this question, and’ to force their governments to take some steps in the matter. The French “Parti Ouvrier,” has warmly responded to this appeal, and the question will be discussed at the National Congress. An International Working Men’s Congress will also be summoned, to consider it. French workers hope the. Socialists of England will be represented at this Congress, and discuss with them this great labour question.”

HOLLAND

I have already referred to the remarkable spread of Socialism in this little country. I am now able to supplement my former note with some interesting details, given me by F.. Domela Neuwenhuis. I may here tell my English readers that the success of the movement in Holland is chiefly due to this man. Some years ago Mr. Neuwenhuis was a clergyman. Like the honest and brave man he is, he has left the church, and is now an outspoken Freethinker and Socialist. He writes as follows: “I have received the first number of ‘To-day’ with delight ... If England takes part in our movement much is won, and I rejoice as though I myself lived in England … The movement here is going on though under the most adverse conditions, as we have no large industries nor large labour-class, and also because in this plutocratic paradise Capital is Almighty. Still our five year’s work has not been fruitless, as the fears of the bourgeoisie sufficiently prove. We have our weekly organ Recht veer Allen, we have started a printing office of our own, and have an Assembly Hall that holds 1,000 persons. Every week we gain in the estimation of the working men who once opposed us, and then too the quality of our adherents gets better and better, and so we pursue our way in spite of all. For scientific Socialism my extract of your father’s work (all Socialists are anxiously awaiting the appearance of the second volume, that will fill the world with joy and fear) has done much, though the so-called Radicals will not hear of it. If true anywhere it is especially so of Holland, that all parties form one reactionary mass as opposed to us. For some weeks a ribald publication, (Schimpfschift) chiefly directed against myself has been published here in which Clericals and Freethinkers, Reactionists and Radicals, Believers and Unbelievers work side by side in genial good-fellowship to combat Socialism. Happily we can afford to say “les gens que vous tuez se portent assez bien.” Such publications produce the very opposite effect they are intended to have, for they really make propaganda for our party and are a weapon in our hands … Naturally I am hated as a very Anti-christ, the more that I belong to a bourgeois family and was formerly a priest of the Evangelical Church … but I say with Luther “Ich kann nicht anders.” “Hearty greetings to our Socialist friends.”

AUSTRIA

I have received the following letter from an Austrian friend, which, at this moment, may interest readers of To-day. “I am, the more pleased to give you information as to the situation at Vienna that, even in Germany, it is not a little misunderstood. The attempt on the life of the Detective Bloch is treated in the same way as that on Sudeikin. But there is an immense difference. The Russians are acting in self-defence. The Vienna Anarchists merely in order to provoke. The Russians are fighting for the sake of gaining ground tocarry on the war of classes, the Vienna Anarchists start from the idea that freedom makes people conservative, (and they point to England); that one must make oppression bitter and that then the people will become revolutionary. They wanted the Exceptional Laws, they have frivolously provoked them …. . The murder of Bloch was quite unjustified. For years the Socialist movement in Austria had not enjoyed so much liberty of action as since 1881. Of course this was not .due to any platonic love of liberty of Count Taaffe’s, but simply because he wanted to play off the workmen against the Liberals. For this reason a Workmen’s Protection Law was brought in by the Right, that is better than that of any other country. For instance it establishes a normal working day of 10 hours. The Anarchists have declared they will not hear of normal working days, and instead of using their greater freedom in order to perfect their class organisation, they used it to play at conspiracy.

It is only wonderful that the working men of Vienna could have approved of this folly. The reasons are, I believe, the following. There is no Austrian Working Men’s Party. Just as Austria is nationally divided, so is the working men’s party. We have Servian, Italian, Hungarian, Polish, Tschech, German-Bohemian, and Austrian working-class movements. The German-Austrian party has never been independent, more than the German-Swiss. It has always theoretically and actually depended on the German movement. Then came the (German) Exceptional Laws; some mistakes were made; the Vorwärts, which had really been our central organ, ceased to appear, and was not replaced. While Germany thus left us leaderless, Russian Terrorism achieved one victory after the other. This impressed us Austrians, who rather resemble the French, and like them are easily moved by dramatic effects. A kind of robber-romance was invented, which gained ground the more readily that the years 1878, 1879, and even 1880, represented a period of exceptional material and political oppression. Of a class-war there was no word. No wonder the Freiheit was enthusiastically received, and that the Austrian workmen went over to the anarchical camp …. Then, too, we have the fact that our officials have always systematically attempted to corrupt the movement, and to “buy” the leaders. Of course the men thus to be bribed were carefully chosen; then imprisoned, given thereby a martyr’s crown, and then bought over by the police. The anarchists have supplied a strong contingent of such men. Hotze, Zinner, Marschall, Bilek, etc., etc., all well-known anarchist leaders. I have reason to believe that Peukert is also untrustworthy ... . As a matter of fact the murder of Bloch has come more opportunely for the Minister-President than anyone else. The Right is as displeased with him as the Left, and the Left, in order to attain more easily its object of displacing him, intended to resign. Then came the Bloch business. Taaffe is now a Saviour of Society, the Left deems it “patriotic” to remain in. It remains in, and with it the Taaffe Cabinet … I never thought the Anarchists had much sense, but I believed them brave, and I had fully expected to see them attempt something. They have done nothing but voluntarily dissolve their Unions; at the decisive moment Peukert disappeared … The Austrian movement is now in a critical condition. Let us hope, as I believe it will, that it may soon enter the true course, that of the really revolutionary Socialist movement.”

Since the promulgation of the Exceptional Laws, some 300 persons have been expelled from Vienna; and many more, it is said 3000, are still to be sent away. Endless arrests have been made, many of them due to the denunciations of the Anarchist Stellmacherr.

The condition of the houses of the Viennese workmen seems as terrible as that of their brethren in Paris and London. I take the following cases at random from a long list. In the second Division, Wintergasse, 24, where there is also a school, in one house, consisting of a sitting room and two small Kabinetten there were twenty-three persons living. In the Bettlerstiege, in one room, twelve persons. In Taborstrasse, in a house, consisting of one room, and kitchen, and small Kabinet twenty-four persons, of whom seventeen were children. In the Tenth Division, small kitchens were frequently sub-let, in which there were often six or eight persons, in most cases several sleeping in one bed! In Strozzigasse, a scullery was let to nine persons, all of whom slept upon the floor. And M. Gambetta said “Il n'y a pas de question sociale.”

GERMANY

In no German town are the Socialists better organised than in Berlin, and consequently they are there subjected to every form of petty persecution. Of late every meeting of Socialists have been dissolved. English readers perhaps imagine that some very blood-thirsty speeches were the reasons for such a high-handed proceeding. I therefore give the words which induced the police to disperse two meetings held on Sunday week. At the one, Gönki said: “ Let us now send men to Parliament who will do something to lighten the misery of the people. It is absolutely necessary that men should raise their voices there, to paint, from their own know-ledge the poverty that grinds clown the working-class. And when their warning words have had some effect, then future generations will at least see worthier, brighter days than ours.” ... here the Commissary interposed. At the second meeting the speech was stopped when Paul Singer said: “ It is high time that working-men called Bismarck’s attention to the social wrongs of the people, and pointed out to him what reforms were likely really to benefit the working class.” ... The dissolution of the meetings was received with loud ironical cheers.

Eleanor Marx.

April

FRANCE

The Anzin strike is not yet over, and the brave miners seem more resolved to hold out than ever. Despite the universal distress of the workers, they are making strenuous efforts throughout France to support the miners in their struggle.

The reports of the different “syndicates” on the condition of the working classes are full of interest. They disclose a state of affairs simply appalling. Yet in the face of these terrible revelations bourgeois economists and the corrupt bourgeois press affirm with a light heart, that things are for the best, and that if only working-men would “eat less” (this is literal) and be more thrifty, there need be no distress. Eat less! Why the people are literally starving, and starving, as Lafargue says, in order that their exploiters may die of indigestion.

Notwithstanding all this misery — or because of it? — the anniversary of the Commune has been celebrated with greater enthusiasm than ever. Meetings and banquets were held everywhere, and these, as the Falstaffian Meyer Oppert (Falstaffian in courage, not in wit), who calls himself Von Blowitz, and other penny-a-liners tell us, “passed off without any disturbance.”

All the revolutionary organs devoted special articles and “etudes” to the subject. The two Socialist papers Le Travailleur and La Defense des Travailleurs were printed on red paper. Both these excellent little journals contain most interesting articles on the Commune, that of Gabriel Deville being especially noteworthy. In it he compares the revolutionary rising of Lyons in 1831, of Paris in June, 1848, and of the Commune, and he shows how in each case not only the repression had grown in ferocity, but how “the idea” of the combatants had become enlarged. “Each time,” says Devine, “the repression has become more implacable, the number of killed, arrested, condemned, has increased. But the repression has not progressed alone. Its gradations correspond with the continual development of the forces and aspirations of the proletariat. Compare the number of combatants, and you will see it was far greater in 1848 than in 1831, far greater in 1871 than in 1848.” And to-day, concludes Devine, the ‘parti ouvrier’ has a stronger position than ever, because its demands are no longer founded on a vague sense of something being wrong, but on a scientific basis, and this scientific basis is a guarantee for the success of the labourers in their great struggle against class despotism.

I have spoken of the monument about to be erected to the memory of the martyrs of 1871. The Paris Municipal Council by the immense majority of 35 votes against 5 has decided to allow the erection of this monument. M. Poubelle the Prefect — a very remarkable man who has achieved the well-nigh impossible task of making himself even more obnoxious than his predecessor Andrieux — M. Poubclle has declared against the project, but he will probably have to give way. One thing is certain, whether a memorial stone is erected or not, the people will not forget the men who died for them in that terrible May week of 1871.

French Socialists at the Roubaix Congress will give the English delegates Ernest Belfort Bax and H. Quelch, an especially kindly reception, and listen to all they say with the greatest interest. The Possibilists have, with the help of the bourgeois press, repeated so often that Mr. Broadhurst is the true representative of the English working man, that most French working men have begun to believe them. It is high time they were undeceived.

The Congress opens on the 29th March, and closes on the 7th April. There will be public and private meetings, when many important questions will be discussed. Not the least important will be that on “International Labour Legislation.”

GERMANY

The news from Germany is very encouraging. Our army of Social Democrats grows daily, and the Government acknowledges their services by demanding a prolongation of the “Socialist Law.” The reasons advanced for this demand deserve to be recorded. “The Socialist law has attained its object” and must therefore be renewed. “The Socialist law has not shattered the organisation of the Socialist party” — and must, therefore, be renewed. And a third reason is the Viennese “outrages.” It is perfectly well known that the Social Democrats have no more to do with these childish and wicked attempts than with Messrs. Wolf and Bondurand’s “conspiracy;” but reasons are as plentiful as blackberries with the police-government of Germany. There is no doubt whatever that these repressive laws will be renewed; but they can no more “suppress Socialism” than Bismarck can suppress his neuralgia and his temper by drinking “ Schnapps.” No doubt this Socialist law makes it difficult for our friends to do their good work, and numbers of our men are always in prison, but our party has never been so flourishing, as at this moment. Wherever bye-elections, or municipal elections have taken place, our numbers have more than doubled; and that despite the fact that Socialists may not print hand-bills, placards, or pamphlets, and that all their meetings are prohibited.

DENMARK

A friend tells me that the Socialist party is especially well organised in Denmark. The fact that the Danish Sozial Democrat sells 1,200 copies daily, sufficiently proves this. The party moreover is strong not only in Copenhagen, but in the whole country.

RUSSIA

There is but little reliable news from Russia, as a well-informed Russian friend has just told me. What news there is cannot at present be made public, but I am asked to tell all Socialist friends to believe nothing that appears in the reactionary press. All the details given so far about the Sudeikin execution, are more or less incorrect. A full and accurate account will shortly appear in the Will of the People. Meantime, Degaieff is in safety. The part played by him in this affair is most extraordinary. The Executive Committee, I hear, will shortly give all particulars in their organ which is still, despite the police, appearing at St. Petersburg. There is one point of especial interest for us in the latest phase of the so-called “Nihilist” movement — the part taken by the working class. Till now, the Nihilists were almost entirely confined to the “upper classes.” This is no longer the case. Truly the seed is sown “even in the bosom of the North.”

ENGLAND

The “dynamiters” have caused not a little panic within the last few weeks. It is almost needless to point out that with such “attempts” as those at Victoria, Ludgate Hill, &c. Socialists have no sympathy. Such isolated and foolish acts do us all harm, and can do no good. But why the men who from a mistaken sense of duty risk their lives for what they believe a good cause, should be called “dastardly wretches” and “cowards,” while General Graham and his butchers are called “heroes,” it is somewhat difficult to understand. In dealing with these Irish “dynamiters” there is one thing we are all too apt to overlook, and that is the treatment to which many of these men were subjected in English and Irish gaols. Few men can, like Michael Davitt, pass through such a hell and come out the purer, the nobler, and the stronger. Weaker and coarser natures must be brutalized by such sufferings as these men underwent. For thirty-five days O'Donovan Rossa for a trivial “offence” to a warder, had his hands chained behind his back; for month after month he was tortured. The prison regime drove him mad, and if his madness takes the form of dynamite what right have his English torturers to complain?

On Sunday 16th March between five and six thousand people assembled outside Highgate Cemetery. They had met to celebrate the anniversary of the proclamation of the Paris Commune, and it was felt that there could be no fitter place of meeting than by the grave of him who died on the 14th of March last year, of him whose whole life was devoted to the cause of the people, and who in a time of danger and reaction had dared defend the insurgents of 1871 as he had defended those of 1848 — by the grave of Karl Marx.

The Commune of Paris was something more than even the revolution of 1848. That at most was national in character, while the Commune was INTERNATIONAL. The heroic working men and women of Paris died for the working men of all countries, even as working men of all countries gave up their life for the Commune. We know alas! but too well what were the faults of the Commune, but if we still remember them it is only that they may serve us as a lesson in the future. If to-day we can see where lay the weakness of the Communists, we none the less feel the profoundest reverence, the deepest gratitude to those who fought and died for us all. And it is well that the Socialists of England should have united with those of France, Germany, Italy, Russia, the United States in commemorating the anniversary of the greatest class-struggle we have yet seen.

The Highgate Cemetery Company had the gates closed, and “defended” by a force of 500 police. The request that at least the women bearing wreaths should be admitted was refused, and a request that I might be allowed to go alone and take these crowns and flowers to my father’s grave shared the same fate. So we were obliged to leave our flowers in the hands of the police (I may here say for the information of friends that all have been duly placed on the grave,) and we adjoined to the top of the hill at Dartmouth Park, to hold our meeting. The first speaker was Dr. Edward Aveling whose splendid speech touched the hearts of all his hearers — who, thanks to his lungs, were many. He said they had assembled to celebrate the memory of a dead man, and for the sake of a living cause — the cause which that man had laboured for all his life, and whose triumphs his clear eyes had foreseen. That cause nothing could prevent from triumphing, but its speedy triumph depended upon us — upon the workers of all countries, upon our solidarity, our energy, our self-sacrifice.

After Dr. Aveling, Frohme, the representative of the German Social Democrats, spoke — and spoke admirably. Frohme is one of our deputies in the Reichstag — he represents Frankfort — and is one of our best speakers. He has since told me that he spoke the more easily because surrounded by police and forbidden to enter the cemetery he felt as if he had never left the dear Fatherland. Frohme was followed by a French working man, Lavache, who called on all proletarians to forget their nationalities, and unite in the great fight against Capitalism. After the speeches the meeting quietly dispersed.

The “Agglomeration Parisienne” sent greetings, and expressed its sympathy with our demonstration. Russian friends expressed themselves in the same sense. From Holland we had news that the Dutch Socialists would be “with us in spirit,” and the Poles sent us the following telegram: “Le comité du proletariat de Varsovie s'unit aux delégués socialistes, reunis ce jour à 1'occasion de 1'anniversaire de la mort de Karl Marx dans les sentiments de regrets que leur inspire la mémoire de 1'illustre lutteur pour 1'affranchissement des travailleurs. Pour le Comité …

All this is very hopegiving. English Socialists will work the better for this meeting and for the feeling of their solidarity with the working men of all countries. It is not only in memory of the 35,000 martyrs of the horrible “semaine sanglante” — but because it contains a promise and a hope for the future that we cry

Vive la Commune!

Eleanor Marx.

May

AMERICA

The belief of so many persons that although there may be a great deal of poverty in the larger towns, the condition of working-men in America is, on the whole, very satisfactory, would be rudely disturbed by the reading of certain factory laws (those of Massachusetts, for example), or a perusal of the official factory reports. As a matter of fact, the bourgeois is, perhaps, nowhere so ferocious an exploiter of the “free labourer as in this free republic. No wonder, then, that the Socialist movement is making such strides in the United States. The papers of the party grow in number daily, and report a daily growth of Socialistic organisations.

At this moment there are several large strikes — that of the New York cigar makers has lasted for many weeks — but the most remarkable one, and the best deserving our careful attention, is that of the Chinamen in San Francisco. These despised Asiatics have formed a Union, and following the example of their New York brethren, 3,000 Chinese cigar makers are demanding higher wages. But this is not all. The masters hope to use against these poor “coolies” white workmen from the East! “Twenty-eight manufacturers,” the New York Volkzeitung reports from San Francisco, “with a capital representing 5,000,000 dollars, yesterday held a meeting, at which it was resolved to send for 2,500 white workmen from New York and the Eastern States. For this purpose telegraphic messages were despatched, and it is said that in less than two weeks most of the white labourers will be here.”

As an instance of tyranny upon which a European “employer of labour” would hardly venture, take this fact, recorded in a Philadelphian paper. The mine owners of Ohio had so systematically cheated the miners in the weighing of the coal that after a great deal of agitation the workmen obtained a law permitting them to control the weighing. But now the company cheats its labourers by ringing the bell that signals cessation from labour long after the regular hours, and in order to prevent the men from avoiding this new form of exploitation, the company has issued an edict forbidding the working men, on pain of dismissal, to take watches with them into the mines. So much for the individual freedom of workers in this freest of free bourgeois lands.

The following figures will help to explain why Henry George’s land nationalisation movement is spreading so rapidly. “Sir E. J. Reed, M.P., owns (in America) 2,000,000 acres; the Duke of Sutherland, 400,000; the Earl of Dunmore, 100,000; the Earl of Dunraven, 60,000; Messrs. Philipps, Marshall, & Co., 1,300,000; the heirs of Col. Murphy, 1,100,000; H. Diston, 12,000,000; the Standard Oil Co., 1,000,000. Nine men own a territory equal to that of New Hampshire, Massachusetts, and Rhode Island combined. The railroads have got from Congress gifts of upwards of 200,000,000 acres. Eleven of these companies alone have received 120,000,000 acres.” As the old song said, in the West “the humblest may gather the fruits of the soil” — only he must gather them for his landlord.

GERMANY

There is nothing of special interest to report this month save the discussion in the Reichstag on the Anti-Socialist Law. Referring to this discussion the Emperor told the deputies who went to congratulate him on his 88th birthday, that like Hamlet’s uncle, he was “much offended” that the renewal of the law had not been voted there and then. It was, he said, necessary for his personal safety. How pleasant to feel so beloved of one’s people!

The speeches of the Socialist Deputies have been so grossly misrepresented that it is only fair readers of To-Day should know what they really did say. Bebel has been accused of “denouncing” the Austrian people, and of attacking the Anarchists with unnecessary bitterness. He did nothing of the kind, but as the German Government partly bases its demands for the prolongation of this Law on the supposed alliance between the German Socialists and the Viennese Anarchists (though no one knows better than the Government itself that no such alliance exists), it was Bebel’s duty to speak out on the subject. He “denounced” not the Austrian people — with whom everyone must sympathise in their struggle with an infamous government — but those individuals who have acted only as agents provocateurs, and whose direct or indirect relations with the police are notorious. “My friends,” Bebel said, “have already pointed out to you — and I consider it my duty to do so again — that if there are Anarchists in Germany, and I can assure you there are very few, they have been made possible by these exceptional laws, and so we are justified in saying that the fathers of the Anti-Socialist law are also the fathers of Anarchism in Germany … Anarchists, it must not be forgotten, are, with the exception of certain disreputable individuals, honestly convinced people (ueberzeugungstreue Leute), …. and Anarchism is, to a great extent, the expression of a hopelessness driven to desperation, of certain element in the working-class.” Speaking of the “bargain” that the Government wanted to strike with the Socialists, Bebel said, “What the Government wants is our unconditional support, of its ‘social reforms.’ What it really said is, ‘if you are against the reforms of the Government, the Law will be renewed; if you are for them, the Law shall be repealed.’ Gentlemen, we do not sell our principles, even though you renew the Law ten times over. To such a bargain we cannot be parties: of this you may rest assured …. We are to-day what we ever have been, we ever shall be what we are to-day.” Liebknecht spoke in the same uncompromising tone. “As regards the suggestion,” he said, “that if a commission (for considering the law) is appointed, Social Democrats should be elected to it, I declare in the name of our whole party that we refuse. We will never join a commission where we should be relegated to the part of accused. We will speak on this tribune as heretofore, not as accused, but as alone becomes us — your accusers ….. And since physical force is spoken of, and Marx’s word has been, quoted that force is the midwife of all political and social reconstruction — was the new German Empire, or its predecessor the North German “Bund” brought about by use of lavender and rose water? Assuredly that was a “birth by aid of forceps,” a reconstruction in which, in the fullest sense of the word, force was midwife, and the regime whose chief representative placed the policy of blood and iron on his programme, should in truth not be so nice nor so afraid of a word …. I and several of my friends have been accused of taking part in an International manifesto at Paris.. Well, it was not exactly that, but it is perfectly true that we wrote the letter from which extracts have been read here. We are in relationship with our French party friends; we look on them as brothers. We are International …The Honourable Deputy Dr. Windhorst on former occasions truly said to a National-Liberal, who spoke of German Science, that Science is no more German than it is French or Roman; that it is International, Cosmopolitan. And whosoever denies the International principle places himself beyond the pale of modern culture. We naturally reserve to ourselves the right to associate with our friends of other lands …. The Deputy Von Kardorff remarked that twelve years ago Bebel had in the Reichstag defended the Paris Commune, and said he had defended rabble who destroyed the holiest national traditions of French history.’ What were these holy traditions of French history? The Vendome column, this symbol of French history written in blood and iron that signified hatred of Germany, a policy of conquest; a government by force, in short the blood and iron system. With this policy of barbarism the French proletariat wished to break, and to emphasise this break, to give expression to this high civilising ideal, they pulled down the Vendome column. The German Vendome columns will also be overthrown.”

Of course the law will be renewed, but no more than in the past, will it effect the spread of the “New Gospel.”

FRANCE

The great Anzin strike is over — but many such victories will be fatal to the mining companies. The strike lasted nearly two months, but despite the combined efforts of gendarmerie, agents provocateurs and military to provoke a riot the miners did not allow themselves to be misled into any “acts of violence.” Though the strike has resulted in the defeat of the miners it has not been altogether vain. It has aroused a feeling of sympathy and solidarity among all workers that cannot fail to help in the great struggle. The Municipal Council of Paris sent 10,000 francs to the miners, and it is worth noting that this was opposed by the notorious M.Yves Guyot, the same Yves Guyot who took the initiative in starting a subscription for raising a monument to the monster Thiers. In the Chamber M. Giard — supported by some of the deputies of the Extreme Left has brought forward a “projet de loi” by which the State would again possess itself of all French mines, remain their proprietor, and concede their working to various companies. It may be necessary’ to explain to English readers that this bill would not be one of confiscation but of restitution. Never either in feudal nor bourgeois law have the riches of the mines, etc. (of the sous-sol) been the property of the landlord, but they have always been considered the property of the French nation. Before the Revolution and the law of 1810 the mines were temporarily ceded to companies for periods varying from 20 to 50 years. Since the law of 1810, however, these grants have been made absolute. The deputies of the Extreme Left therefore only demand a return to the old order of things. Of course the bourgeois chamber will reject this bill, but all this agitation is calling the attention of the people to the shameless confiscation — without compensation — of their property by the bourgeois lovers of property, order and religion.

“The Socialists are preparing'’ a correspondent writes me “for the municipal elections that are shortly to take place. It is a purely propagandist campaign, for the municipal councillors are not paid, and the masters in the provincial towns being in the habit of dismissing working men elected to the post, to elect these would be simply condemning them to starvation. Our greatest difficulty is therefore to find working men candidates. At Roanne out of five municipal councillors three were forced to resign. At Reims various political prisoners — Louise Michel among others — will be put forward for election.”

The French Socialist Congress at Roubaix has been in all respects a great success, and cannot fail to strengthen the “international counter-organisation of labour against the cosmopolitan conspiracy of capital.”

The German Socialists were unfortunately not able to send representatives, but they addressed a letter of adhesion to the Congress, which was read amid enthusiastic cries of Vive l'Allemagne.” Similar letters, received with like expressions of sympathy, were sent from Spain, Holland and Belgium. The presence of the English delegates “produced an excellent impression.” French working men, were delighted to hear from H. Quelch — a “genuine” working man, and no “ouvrier pour rire” — how Socialism is spreading among the English people, and that Broadhurst is by no means our only wear. Ernest Belfort Bax was unanimously elected chairman at the first meeting, and his speech evoked loud cheers. He said:

“Citoyens et Citoyennes — Votre invitation fraternelle de nous joindre à votre congres nous a donné on grand plaisir, encore plus 1'accueil cordiale que nous avons reçu de vous. Cela prouve que quoique nos organisations sont, en ce moment, nationales, le Socialisme reste au fond internationale.

La loi bourgeoise pent defendre une organisation Internationale mais aucune loi ne saura empêcher les sentiments fraternellcs poursuivant (chacun à sa façon) le même but, et encore moins la marche de l’évolution sociale.

Dans la mythologic grecque au-dessous des dieux se trouvaient les Parques. Traduisons cette conception dans la langue scientifique d'aujourd'hui, et nous pouvons dire que au-dessous de nos dieux bourgeois, nos lois, nos gouvernements, nos réligions, se trouvent les forces économiques de la société.

Quant à votre mouvement en Angleterre, i1 est encore jeune mais néanmoins c'est un pouvoir politique. La Federation Democratique possède de nombreuses branches affiliées répandues en Angleterre et en Ecosse.

La classe ouvrière Anglaise que nous representons ici n'a que de la sympathie pour le grand mouvement révolutionaire depuis l'Irlande jusqu'à la Russie et condamne sans mésure les marchands et les tripoteurs qui volent les races faibles en Afrique et en Asie. Vive la Révolution Sociale.”

Many questions of the greatest interest were discussed, and on the suggestion of the English delegates London was the town chosen for holding an International Congress next year, for the purpose of “reviving” the International. But surely the reception by the French Socialists of the German address and of the English delegates and their hearty “Vive l'Allemagne et Vive l'Angleterre,” must have convinced all present the International needs no “reviving.”

“The fury of the bourgeoisie at this Congress” a French Socialist says “knows no bounds, and this fury has manifested itself in the arrest — for no reason whatever but the good will of our rulers — of several persons, who have been, condemned to three months imprisonment.”

ENGLAND

The Socialist propaganda goes on vigorously among all sections of Society. On the 8th of April at the opening of Mr. Barnett’s exhibition of pictures for the poor East enders, William Morris made a splendid speech. The room was crowded with ladies and gentlemen who had come there thoroughly satisfied with themselves and each other, and with a pleasing sense of virtuous superiority. It was amusing to note the astonishment not unmingled with irritation of these good people when the poet in very plain prose told them they were not so very superior after all. But William Morris’s earnest words did more than make a few of his hearers feel uncomfortable and aggrieved. Many a one was set thinking of the horrible conditions of a society under which such men and women can exist as those for whom the exhibition is, intended.

Among the Secularists good work is being done too, Dr. Edward Aveling — the only scientific man among the Free-thought leaders — working hard for “the cause.” He has given successful Socialist lectures in Manchester and Birmingham, and is shortly to visit Liverpool.

On Thursday, the 17th April, the long looked for debate on Socialism between H.M. Hyndman and Mr. Bradlaugh came off before an immense audience in St. James’s Hall. As verbatim reports have been published in Justice and the National Reformer, I need only refer to it in passing.

To begin with, the greatest credit is due to both the debaters for their courage. To H. M. Hyndman for undertaking to plead our cause against one who has had thirty years’ experience of platform oratory; and to Mr. Bradlaugh for endeavouring to discuss a subject of which he is so profoundly ignorant. Perhaps he had tried to read up for the occasion, but still he must have felt conscious — certainly those of his audience who were not as ignorant as himself did — that a few weeks of cramming could not give him even the most superficial comprehension of the very simplest principles of Scientific Socialism. There can be no doubt that in familiarity with all “stage business,” and in the management of his powerful voice, Mr. Bradlaugh had a great advantage over H.N. Hyndman. But if Hyndman had not his voice quite under control, he had complete command over his temper, which is more than can be said for his opponent, who told one gentleman in the audience to “hold his tongue,” called others “ignorant,” and Socialists “quacks,” and then almost pathetically complained that Socialists are not polite.

In his opening address Mr. Bradlaugh accused the Socialist speaker of having given no clear definition of Socialism, and proceeded to give one himself. It was not unlike that of the clergyman who said he could sum up Darwinism in one sentence — “man, according to Darwin, is descended not from God but an oyster.” It is to be regretted that H.M. Hyndman did not demonstrate the absurdity of Mr. Bradlaugh’s platitudes, but he was, not unnaturally, anxious to stick to the main point under discussion, front which his opponent, “like a knotless thread,” kept slipping away.

Among his many remarkable discoveries perhaps Mr. Bradlaugh’s most wonderful ones are that “the wage-earning class are largely property owners”; that the general condition of the same class in England is a very pleasant one (the speaker was almost moved to tears at the thought of the happy homes of the poor); and that the factory-labourers of the North, notwithstanding the till now undisputed fact that the physique of this factory population is rapidly deteriorating, are a “new race” of such happy men, so satisfied with their present condition that they will prevent the advent of Socialism. Mr. Bradlaugh told us that we Socialists could not succeed because the majority is against us. If the great “Iconoclast” really believes fighting a majority useless, one would like to know the object of his thirty years’ fight against the religious belief of the large majority of his countrymen. Further, we were assured that without a chance of personal profit, we should have neither scientific men, nor poets, nor painters, nor musicians, nor actors. What blasphemy against the great men of the past, what blasphemy against all that is best and noblest in Nature! It is worse than the Christian dogma that there can be no good, no salvation save through an Almighty Fiend. Finally, the anti-Socialist maintained that he who would work for the good of all works for none, and that personal advantage and gain are the end-all and be-all of humanity. Thanks to the Science that has given us knowledge, thanks to the art and poetry that make life beautiful, thanks to the “Music that is divine,” we Socialists have a nobler faith than this.

Eleanor Marx.

June

FRANCE

The municipal elections have resulted in a great victory for Socialism. It is not only that in Paris, the number of votes has more than doubled in three years. Far more significant is the success of the Socialists in the Provinces, where the-movement is assuming quite “alarming” proportions — according to the reactionary press. On this subject a Parisian correspondent sends me the following: “The burning question of the day has been the municipal elections, and the number of votes recorded bears witness to the immense progress made by us. In 1881, when the party was only in embryo, (for no really organised Socialist Movement was possible till the amnesty question had been decided and the vanquished of the Commune were not amnestied till July 1880), it already gave some proof of its existence, our candidates receiving in Paris 17,895 votes. At this time there was but a single programme, accepted by all the newly founded groups. In 1884 the Socialist vote has risen to 38,729, having doubled in three years. But the union that existed in 1881 has disappeared, and at the present moment we may look upon the. Socialists as divided into four groups. First, the Anarchists who make up in sound and fury for the smallness of their numbers and their general paucity of ideas of any sort. The second group is that of the Possibilists, who are nothing more than Trades Unionists, à la française, that is, à la phrase à patache. Then we have the Blanquists, active, devoted, well-disciplined men, but giving too great importance to the political, as compared with the social question; and finally the Collectivists. These belong to the school of Marx, and believe that the emancipation of the working class can only be accomplished by the nationalization of the instruments of labour, and that this revolution will only be accomplished when the working class has possessed itself of the political powers of the nation.

“At Paris only two groups officially and actively took part in the municipal struggle — the Possibilists and Blanquists. For reasons of tactics the Collectivists only put forward 6 out of the 80 candidates, but their men made common cause with the Blanquists. This progress in the Paris election is analogous to what has happened in Berlin, where in 1871 the Social Democrats obtained only 1,135 votes; in 1874, 16,549; in 1877, 33,629; and in 1878, 56,712.

“But it is above all in the Provinces that the party has grown. At Lyons, Roubaix, Rheims, Alais, in all the chief industrial centres the Collectivists have obtained thousands of votes. At Denain six working men candidates have been elected. At Marseilles Socialism has three representatives. At Roanne, Fouilland was at the head of the poll. At Lavaley-aux-mines, out of 17 municipal councillors, 15 belong to the “ Parti Ouvrier.” At Anzin Basly, the director of the miners’ strike and two of his companions have been returned. The result of these elections proves a general revival of the Socialist movement in France.”

Although the Socialists received nearly 39,000 votes in Paris, only two candidates have been returned — a working man, Chabert, and the ex-member of the Commune, Vaillant. The election of our friend Vaillant, whose erudition, and devotion to the cause of the people are well-known, is especially satisfactory.

Charles Fouilland, the working man who is returned at the head of the poll at Roanne, has, by an almost incredible piece of infamy, been condemned to twelve months imprisonment. Fouilland, who had been sent as delegate to the Roubaix Conference by all the working men’s groups and syndicates of his native town, Roanne, immediately after his return was arrested, by mistake, for assaulting a gendarme. It was pointed out that the real culprit was another person altogether, whose only connection with Charles Fouilland is that he happens to bear the same surname. But no notice was taken of this, and in order to get rid of Fouilland during the electioneering campaign the adjournment of the trial that was asked for, refused, and the innocent man condemned to 20 days’ imprisonment. This is bad enough, but not all. Fouilland “appealed.” On the 5th May the case was heard at Lyons. The court refused to hear witnesses, refused to adjourn at the request of the barrister, Cesar Bouchage, retained at Paris, and augmented the penalty from 20 days to 12 months imprisonment. And so, this man, guilty of no crime, save that of being a well-known Socialist, and whose old father is entirely dependent upon him, will for 12 months have to bear the horrors of the ‘Central prison,’ for he is not even looked upon as a political prisoner. “We have no words,” says Jules Guesde in the “Cri du Peuple,” “to stigmatize this double judicial murder, a moral murder of the most estimable of workmen, condemned to the disgrace of the ‘Central prison,’ a physical murder of the poor old father, whom Charles Fouilland supports. Charles Fouilland has nothing, and can have nothing, to do with the act for which he is to be buried alive; it is only because he is a working man, a member of the ‘Parti Ouvrier,’ that he has been struck down by the magistrates.” Many of even the French bourgeois radical papers have had the decency to protest against this iniquitous sentence. I have seen no allusion to the matter in any English paper.

In an early number of To-day I referred to the monument which, with the consent of the Paris Municipal Council was about to be erected at the Père Lachaise. in memory of the thousands of Communists buried there. The Prefect of the Seine has, however, taken upon himself to veto the vote of the Council, and an attempt to begin working at the monument was at once stopped. But the matter is not yet finally decided. It would be interesting to know if the Prefect would object to a monument in memory of Clement Thomas, or to one in honour of the murderer, Gallifet, who has “shed more blood and drunk more wine than any man in” Paris.

There was a slight error in my notes last month. I spoke of a thousand francs having been sent by the Paris municipality to the Anzin miners, and of M. Yves Guyot as opposing this donation. I should have said that he spoke against the proposition to send this money, which was not voted. The Parisians, have not forgotten M. Yves Guyot’s conduct in this matter. He has been ignominiously beaten in the municipal elections, even friends and supporters admitting that his defeat is due to his anti-Socialist, and not to his political views.

GERMANY

The Anti-Socialist Law has been renewed, and not content with this, a sort of “Explosives Act” has also been passed. Just before the vote it began to hail dynamite plots, and the Reichstag seemed to think that after the great Chancellor had taken so much trouble, and produced plots quite regardless of expense and common sense, the least it could do was to vote for his bi1s. Germany is becoming more and more pleasant to live out of.

We are all mortal! The Almighty Chancellor has more than once of late come down to the Reichstag having apparently dined, not wisely but too well.

The report of the Factory Inspectors for 1882, reveals a horrible state of things in Germany. Everywhere the same story; women and children replacing the men of the family in factories; long hours and such starvation wages that as a last chance parents are forced into exploiting their own children; everywhere immorality, disease and death for the workers. Even such acts for the protection of women and children as exist are continually violated, not of course through any fault of the noble employer of “sated virtue, and solvent morals,” but through the perversity of the employed. Thus the law that prohibits the employment of women in factories less than three weeks after confinement is infringed “through the fault of the women, who make false statements in order that they may return the sooner to work.” The reason for these “false statements” is not far to seek. “These women,” the Inspector says, “try to get back to work as soon after their confinement as possible in order to lessen the loss of wages, and also from fear that if they are absent from the factory too long their places will be lost.”

In the same way children are represented as over school age, or when this cannot be done “the work of the factory, so far as possible, is continued in the home, and the children kept working till late into the night.” Thus in Hesse children are employed in lace-making, even before they are old enough to go to school! The Inspectors also report that children are employed in labour altogether unfit for them — for instance where, as in match-making, they are exposed to the effects of phosphorus, or in carting away stone, there “little boys are almost exclusively employed,” with the result that “the lads (under I4 years of age!). not unfrequently after a first campaign die of consumption.” One Saxon manufacturer frankly says he employs young girls 11½ hours, and that he “is not ignorant of the law, but he does not observe it because he considers it is not in, but against the interests of the working class." The picture given us in this report of the “family life” of the labourers is simply hideous. A beautiful system under which such conditions are possible!

RUSSIA

A Russian friend tells me that the latest piece of news is the suppression of the best known of the large Russian magazines, the “Annals of the Fatherland.” The text of the ukase, which he has been lucky enough to procure, is signed by the four ministers of Public Instruction, of the Interior, of Public Worship, and of Justice, and has been issued under the new law of August 27th, 1882, by which ministers “have the right to suppress periodical publications not in accord with the general welfare of the country.” The order says, “the liberty that was accorded to the press, has been misused by some of the organs which have dared to express theories quite contrary to the general principles of the social and political state.” Referring to some revelations made by certain political prisoners that “members of the Executive Committee” contributed to Russian magazines, the governmental notice goes on to say that “the similarity of ideas, and even of the style of the ‘underground,’ and permitted press a long time ago, induced the government to think that the Russian magazines and contributors were in direct connection with the revolutionists. This supposition is now proved by facts. Investigations have shown that the secretary of one periodical held communications with persons belonging to the ‘criminal party,’ and that members of that party have contributed to this magazine. We are further aware that the “Annals of the Fatherland,” was read by a number of persons connected with the revolutionary organisations. Last year, one of the leading men on the editorial staff was sent out of St. Petersburg for addressing the students of the High Schools in an incendiary speech.” My friend tells me that the person here referred to is M. Michaelovsky, a very able populariser of the theory of Evolution, and an opponent of the strange way in which warm admirers of the Manchester school, interpret the Darwinian “struggle for existence.” He was sent first to Wyborg (Finland), and is now in a small village on the railway route between Moscow and St. Petersburg. In order to see his wife, who lives in the capital, he is obliged to get a special permission to go there, and this is only accorded when the Czar is at Gatchina. The ukase then continues: “the police have been obliged to arrest two other contributors to this magazine …. That authors with criminal intentions wrote for it will strike no one who has observed the general tone adopted by this publication during the last two years, which has introduced among a considerable portion of society, a complete confusion of ideas. The government intends prosecuting only responsible persons, but it thinks that the continued appearance of a magazine which not only publishes articles expressing wrong and dangerous ideas, but even contributions from members of secret societies cannot be tolerated.”

I wish to call the attention of readers of To-Day to the very interesting article on the Russian revolutionary movement that appeared in the April number of the Nouvelle Revue. The writer is thoroughly acquainted with the subject, and all the, remarkable facts related are taken from the best and most trustworthy sources.

Eleanor Marx.

July

FRANCE

The fact that although Socialists obtained a seventh of the votes at the late Municipal Elections in Paris, only two Socialist candidates were returned, has strongly impressed our Parisian friends with the necessity for a better organisation of their forces and especially for greater union among the different groups that compose the party. The Communist, or as it is called in France, the “Marxist,” Party has taken the initiative in trying to bring about an understanding between the groups, and convened a conference composed of delegates from all those Socialist sections and trades unions whose only aim is the political and economic expropriation of the bourgeoisie. At a large meeting held at Menilmontant (one of the working men’s quarters of Paris), this proposition for union in the Socialist Party was discussed and adopted. That English readers may see how important the movement for union is, I translate some passages from a letter describing the different parties within the Party:

“There are four different fractions among the Socialists. The French Working Men’s Party was founded at the Congress of Marseilles, where 160 delegates of the French working classes voted the nationalisation of the instruments of labour, (land, mines, machinery, railways, &c). So great was the enthusiasm called forth by this Congress that for a time it paralysed the action of the party in favour of co-operation. From 1880 to 1881, there was but one Socialist Party in France. The organs of the party ware the weekly journal L'Egalité, and the Socialist review, edited by Guesde, Devine, Lafargue, &c. It is these two papers, together with Engel’s pamphlet Utopian and Scientific Socialism, that propagated the Socialist theories of Marx in France. Since the Marseilles Congress many other Congresses, national and local (regional), have upheld these theories, and established the Parti Ouvrier” which has sections in almost every town in France. All the sections of a town unite to form a local council. All the local councils of a region (France is divided into five regions) unite to form a federal council for the region, and the five regional councils are connected by a national council, that consists of five members who are elected at the Annual National Congress. The seat of the present national council is Rheims. After a short period of depression the co-operative party took heart again, and started a new Socialist Party. But not daring to come out with their co-operative theories, which have no chance of success with the French working class, they disguise them as ‘service publique.’ They do not speak of politically and economically expropriating the bourgeoisie, but of competing with them by means of co-operation which would take a municipal form. Thus at Paris instead of demanding, like the communist party the legal reduction of rents, they wish the town to spend some millions annually in constructing workmen’s lodging houses on the Peabody plan. They thus wish the town to construct railways, &c., etc. The “Possibilistes,” of whom the co-operative party consists, are practically what the Lassalle party was in Germany — only they have no Lassalle. Indeed there is not a man of talent among them. These two parties, Communist and Possibilist, have long been at daggers drawn. The personalities indulged in by them have had a most disastrous effect on the movement. It must be said that the Communists were forced to become “personal” in self-defence, and they have for a long time now closed this kind of warfare, which the Possibilists however are pursuing with unabated vigour, for it is here that they shine.”

“By the side of these two parties there are yet two others — the Blanquist and Anarchist. The Blanquists, although there are many Communists in their ranks, are a merely revolutionary party. The end of all their efforts is to organise a part of the working class, to agitate the population about general political questions, to wait for a propitious moment in order to possess themselves of political power. The question that they are agitating at the present time is that of the abolition of the standing army; large meetings have been held by them on this subject in Paris and the provinces. What distinguishes the Blanquists is that they have never quarrelled with the other groups. Thus during the last election in the 20th arrondissement the Marxists and Blanquists made common cause in order to support Vaillant, one of the most remarkable members of the Blanquist Party. And Vaillant in the very first sitting of the Municipal Council, emphasized the two-fold character of his election. As Blanquist he demanded an amnesty for all political prisoners now in gaol, and as Communist he proposed the creation of a labour-bureau to examine all questions of especial interest to working men.”

“As to the Anarchists, they themselves do not know what they want; they are everything and nothing. About eight months ago there was a discussion between various Anarchists, on the subject of their economical theories, which by its absurdity convulsed all Paris with laughter. Individualism pushed to its last consequences seems the theory advocated by the greater number of Anarchists, and there are some who do not hesitate to tell you that one will have to go and heat his own steam-engine if he wants to make a journey. During the well-known Lyons process, where the Anarchists were so unjustly condemned, they drew up a manifesto in which while they called themselves communist anarchists (an impossible combination), they state that the end and aim of anarchism is the establishment of a right of free contract perpetually revisable and revocable. This manifesto was written by Krapotkine and Gauthier. Anarchists, for the most part, have a profound contempt for knowledge and for logic, and do not understand that the only result of their system would be an augmentation of profits for the lawyers. For a little time French Anarchists spoke a great deal about propaganda “par le fait,” i.e., by dynamite and the revolver, but since the terrible Lyons sentences they have talked less of this kind of action. To-day Anarchists differ from the other groups in their refusal to make use of elections and in their attacks on universal suffrage.”

“These are the four principal Socialist groups in France. Beyond them there are a few others that belong to none of the existing parties, but which are loudly demanding ‘union,’ and will shortly no doubt join one or the other faction.

“It is almost certain that only the Blanquist and Marxist groups will unite. The other two — really mere transition parties — will probably dissolve with time, a certain number of the Possibilists going over to the bourgeois camp (their true place), while others, more especially working-men, being deserted by the rest, will throw in their lot with the Communists.”

All Socialists must heartily wish to see this union of the Blanquists and Communists, and that we shall hear no more of all the small personal questions that have already done enough harm. Like my correspondent, Guesde has pointed out in the Cri du Peuple that the Communists only for a time, when absolutely forced to it, condescended to these personalities, and that in the true Socialist party there can only be differences on questions of principle.

It will be remembered that last winter Guesde and Lafargue were in prison for six months for Socialist propaganda in central France. They are now to be prosecuted by the treasury to recover the fine they were also condemned to, and the costs of the process. They will have to pay or go to prison for another four months.

BELGIUM

All the bourgeois Liberal-Radical papers are bemoaning the defeat of the Liberals at the late election. Socialists know that not even an Ultramontane government can commit greater infamies than this “Liberal” one. They remember how these Liberals for the last six years fawned and cringed to the Czar and to Bismarck, and at their behest persecuted the unhappy victims of German and Russian tyranny who had taken refuge in Belgium. Socialists remember the delivering up of Cyvoct to France — an act so shameful that some of the bourgeois press, not lost to all sense of honour, protested; they remember how bayonet and sabre have again and again been placed at the disposal of capitalist exploiters who wanted to use “energetic measures” with their work-people on strike; they remember how only last year when the workingmen asked for their political rights the Liberal government answered by raising new taxes that are crushing the people. “The late election,” writes our Socialist contemporary of Gand, the Toekomst, “was no political struggle, but a struggle of material interests.”

It is characteristic also that a Belgian friend writing to tue, says: “I hope the International Congress will be held at Anvers instead of London, for now the Liberals are gone we should probably be allowed to hold it!”

From Gand — where our party is strong — another friend writes me that the misery among the weavers and spinners is terrible, and threatens to become worse. Several of the largest mills are closed. Others are trying to introduce new machines, which they are to some extent already working in villages near Gand. At one of these villages “the peasants work,” my correspondent says, “for a ludicrous salary, 9 to 11 francs for 72 hours of labour.” Under such conditions it is at least some comfort to think that Socialism is making immense progress, especially in Flanders. The men and women who work 72 hours for 9 to 11 francs find the present slavery harder to bear than anything Mr. Spencer could foreshadow in the future.

HOLLAND

The Dutch Party Organ, “Recht Voor Allen,” of which I have already spoken, has now so good a circulation that the paper is beginning to be a paying one. For years our friend Domela Nieuwenhuis who was its founder, published it at his own expense, not only giving his money but his whole time to it. Now that (thanks to his energy) the paper is a success, Citizen Nieuwenhuis has made a present of it to the party, which has thus become possessed of a property that will be of great help in the fight. How many bourgeois radicals, I wonder, would be capable of such an act of generosity as this Socialist? Citizen Nieuwenhuis sends me a report on the condition of the party in Holland, which I am sure readers of To-Day will like to see. He says: “We have had a fight with the official freethinkers here, and when at the beginning of last year Socialist-baiting began, we withdrew from their party. With this split the Freethought Party has lost its most thorough (tüchtigen) members, and is doomed to drag on a miserable existence. All this bears a strong resemblance to your own position in England, where the best people among the Freethinkers are becoming Socialists. From the Freethinkers as a party we expect nothing. Too lazy to think, they believe that under the cloak of “Free-thought” they may be free from thinking. It is a convenient game for tenth-rate people, who do not understand the a.b.c. of philosophy.

“We have also had our debate. A bourgeois, a lawyer, Mr. Cohen Stuart challenged me to meet him, which of course I did. We took care to have a verbatim report, from which everyone may see that here as with you, the bourgeois speaker was absolutely ignorant of the subject. The debate has brought us many new friends, and has made hundreds think on this great question.”

“The Socialist movement has made giant strides here. The fear of the Government, the pamphlets and daily attacks in the press give us proof of it. Many understand the question so little, that they actually look upon it as a personal fancy of my own. To these I am the devil incarnate, who has for a time been let loose on society.”

“The Government makes one blunder after another, and is our greatest helper. Last year at the opening of Parliament the gallery for the public had been filled with young girls from the Orphan Asylum, for fear that a demonstration might be made in favour of universal suffrage. The military was kept in readiness in the barracks ! We have been agitating about the waste of public money. For instance £120 on the through-journey of the Queen of England. Even these small questions are useful in stirring up the people.”

“The crisis is also very much felt here in all branches of trade; thousands are without work — i.e. without bread. We are in fear of famine-riot, which could do no good, and would be a great danger.”

“Our fellow-workers in the Lower Netherlands are making enormous progress. Lately a large fete was held by them to celebrate the opening of a new hall, which went off admirably, and it was decided that we Dutch Socialists should publish fly-sheets, pamphlets, etc., together with them.”

“Everything here is very promising, and though we are not at the head of the movement, when the great time comes I hope we shall not be far behind.”

“The English movement interests us extremely, and we read TO-DAY with the utmost pleasure and interest. It is one of the best organs the Socialists have.”

GERMANY

The newest panacea for saving Germany suggested by the intelligent German bourgeois — is colonisation. Meantime while Bismarck is playing with that two-edged tool the “right to labour,” and the bourgeois press is proving that over-production and over-population must, in a well-ordered society, go together and can only be cured by emigration, the Socialists are quietly going on with the great work in spite of all difficulties.

The following report, re-printed by the Sozial-Democrat, of a sitting of the Agricultural Society of Riesengebirg, illustrates very sufficiently the condition of the German agricultural labourers. Regret was expressed that the railways and industry drew so many agricultural labourers away. “As especially bad,” says the report, “the fixed wages and hours of labour on the railroads, etc., were pointed out, as these had a depressing effect on the agricultural labourers. If the workmen on the railways and railroads, with higher wages were free in the evening just when the agricultural labourer began to sweat hardest (recht zu schwitzen anfange) this must cause discontent. The society will therefore petition the railway-directors to make some changes in this respect, so that the agricultural labourers may no longer have reason to envy the working men on the railways.” What must the position of the people be, who envy the worst-paid and hardest-worked of workmen?

Eleanor Marx.