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Special pages :
The Anniversary of the Polish Revolution of 1830
First published: in La Réforme, December 5, 1847.
This item was in the form of a letter to the editor of La Réforme.
Dear Citizen!
I arrived yesterday evening just in time to attend the public meeting called to celebrate the anniversary of the Polish revolution of 1830.
I have been present at many similar celebrations but I have never seen such general enthusiasm, such perfect and cordial agreement between men of all nations.
The chairmanship was given to Mr. Arnott, an English workman.
The first speech was by Mr. Ernest Jones, editor of The Northern Star, who, while speaking against the behaviour of the Polish aristocracy during the insurrection of 1830, gave much praise to the efforts made by Poland to escape from the yoke of her oppressors. His brilliant and powerful speech was loudly applauded.
After him, M. Michelot gave a speech in French.
Mr. Schapper from Germany followed him. He told the meeting that the Brussels Democratic Association[1] had delegated to London Mr. Marx, German democrat and one of its vice-presidents, to establish relations of correspondence between the Brussels society and the London society of Fraternal Democrats[2], and also to prepare for a democratic congress of the different European nations.
Mr. Marx was received with prolonged applause, when he came forward to address the assembly.
In a speech in German, translated by Mr. Schapper, Mr. Marx declared that England would give the signal for the deliverance of Poland. Poland, he said, would be free only when the civilised nations of Western Europe had won democracy. Now, of all the democracies of Europe, the strongest and most numerous was that of England, organised throughout the whole country. It was in England that the antagonism between the proletariat and the bourgeoisie was most developed, that the decisive struggle between these two classes became more and more inevitable. It was therefore in England that in all probability the fight would begin which would end with the universal triumph of democracy and which would also break the Polish yoke. The success of other European democrats depended on the victory of the English Chartists; therefore Poland would be saved by England.
Mr. Harney, chief editor of The Northern Star, followed by thanking the democrats of Brussels for having immediately approached the democrats of London, taking no account of the advances made to them by the bourgeoisie of the London International League,[3] a society founded by the free traders in order to exploit foreign democrats in the interests of free trade and to compete with the society of Fraternal Democrats which was almost exclusively composed of workers.
Mr. Engels, from Paris, a German democrat, then declared that Germany had a special interest in the freedom of Poland because the German governments exercised their despotism over a part of Poland. German democracy ought to have at heart the ending of this tyranny which shamed Germany.
Mr. Tedesco, from Liège, in a vigorous speech, thanked the Polish fighters of 1830 for having loudly proclaimed the principle of insurrection. His speech, translated by Mr. Schapper, was warmly applauded.
After some remarks by Mr. Charles Keen, Colonel Oborski replied for Poland.
Mr. Wilson, an English workman who by his vigorous opposition recently almost brought about the break-up of a meeting of the International League, was the last to address the assembly.
On the proposal of Messrs Harney and Engels, three cheers were given for the three great European democratic newspapers: the Réforme, The Northern Star, and the Deutsche-Brüsseler-Zeitung; on the proposal of Mr. Schapper, three groans were given for the three anti-democratic papers: the Journal des Débats, The Times and the Augsburg Zeitung.
The meeting ended with the singing of the Marseillaise, in which everybody joined, standing and with hats off.
- ↑ The Democratic Association (Association démocratique) was founded in Brussels in the autumn of 1847 and united proletarian revolutionaries, mainly German emigrants and advanced ‘bourgeois and petty-bourgeois democrats. Marx and Engels took an active part in setting up the Association. On November 15, 1847 Marx was elected its Vice-President (the President was Lucien Jottrand, a Belgian democrat), and under his influence it became a centre of the international democratic movement. During the February 1848 revolution in France, the proletarian wing of the Brussels Democratic Association sought to arm the Belgian workers and to intensify the struggle for a democratic republic. However, when Marx was banished from Brussels in March 1848 and the most revolutionary elements were repressed by the Belgian authorities its activity assumed a narrower, purely local character and in 1849 the Association ceased to exist.
- ↑ Fraternal Democrats. The society embraced representatives of Left Chartists, German workers and craftsmen — members of the League of the Just — and revolutionary emigrants of other nationalities. During their stay in England in the summer of 1845, Marx and Engels helped in preparing for the meeting but did not attend it as they had by then left London. Later they kept in constant touch with the Fraternal Democrats trying to influence the proletarian core of the society, which joined the Communist League in 1847, and through it the Chartist movement. The society ceased its activities in 1853.
- ↑ The International League, or the People’s International League, was founded in 1847 by English radicals and free traders. Among its foundation and active members were Thomas Cooper, Sir William Fox, Sir John Bowring and the democratic publicist, poet and engraver William James Linton. The League was also joined by several Italian, Hungarian and Polish emigrants, Giuseppe Mazzini in particular, who was one of its initiators. Its activity was limited to organising meetings and lectures on international problems and distributing pamphlets, and ceased completely in 1848.