Letter to Friedrich Engels, November 29, 1858

Author(s) Karl Marx
Written 29 November 1858


First published abridged in Der Briefwech-sel zwischen F. Engels und K. Marx, Bd. 2, Stuttgart, 1913 and in full in: Marx and Engels, Works, First Russian Edition, Vol. XXII, Moscow, 1929
Published in English for the first time in Marx-Engels Collected Works, Volume 40


MARX TO ENGELS

IN MANCHESTER

[London,] 29 November 1858

DEAR Frederick,

ARTICLE received.[1] VERY GOOD. Quoad[2] Bonaparte, I have lately dealt with two separate points—the SHAM PROVOCATION of England in the Portuguese affair[3] and how the fellow is GENERALLY avenging Waterloo 2 7 only in so far as he can do so by SHAM DEMONSTRATIONS within the 'limits of the English alliance' and hence, IN FACT, with the permission of the English government, although he is, in reality, England's underling. Secondly, his edict re the CORN- GRANARIES,[4] by which this 'socialist' proposes to remedy the ruinously LOW PRICES OF CORN—dangerously low, in view of the grumbles of the PEASANTRY—by creating an artificial demand at the BAKERS expense.[5]

GENERALLY, A VERY DANGEROUS EXPERIMENT THIS, TO RAISE THE PRICE OF CORN THROUGH GOVERNMENT UKASES. Increasing the cost of bread will do more harm to his popularity in the towns than it can do good in the country.

I have not written about the GENERAL RISING of the bourgeoisie in Europe but did, of course, allude to it in what I wrote about Prussia. I have dealt with the Russian peasant movement ABOUT twice in 6 months,[6] the second time simply to show that on the first occasion my diagnosis was correct.

As regards the reform movement in England, all I have discussed latterly is Bright's meeting in Birmingham,[7] the gist of the article being THAT HIS PROGRAMME IS A REDUCTION OF THE PEOPLES CHARTER TO THE MIDDLE CLASS STANDARD.[8] Earlier on, ABOUT 8-12 WEEKS ago (I think Parliament was actually still sitting), a piece to the effect that WHIGGISM MUST DISSOLVE AND COALESCE WITH TORYISM INTO THE PARTY OF THE ARISTOCRACY.[9] T h a t is all.

My wife is copying the manuscript[10] and it's hardly likely to go off before the end of this month. T h e reasons for the delay: long intervals of physical indisposition which, with the cold weather, has now come to an end. T o o much domestic and financial TROUBLE. Finally, the first section is now longer because the two initial chapters, of which the first, The Commodity, did not appear at all in the rough draft while the second, Money, or Simple Circulation, was only sketched in the briefest outline, have been written at greater length than I originally planned.

Salut.

Your

K. M.

Mr Edgar Bauer is now the real, and Mr Lout and Weitlingian Scherzer the nominal, editor of the London Neue Zeit. Mr Edgar, of course, has a great deal to say on the subject of Mr Edgar and his lectures to the working men,[11] for he himself writes about everything concerning Mr Edgar. This CLOWN deems it necessary to take a revolutionary TURN. He presided at the Robert Blum ceremony. In an essay in the last issue the CLOWN makes the discovery that 'imperialism' has now been introduced into Prussia

in constitutional form.[12] This same issue is not uninteresting by reason of an article from Struve's Sociale Republik[13] which was, however, written over here by a certain Feibel and in which Freiligrath, on the occasion of the publication of his poems in America, had himself extolled AS THE TRUE HERO OF THE PROLETARIAN PARTY.

  1. ↑ F. Engels, 'Europe in 1858'.
  2. ↑ As regards
  3. ↑ A reference to the conflict between France and Portugal caused by the seizure of the French merchant vessel Charles et Georges by the Portuguese authorities in Mozambique on 29 November 1857. The vessel had on board a number of East-African Negroes who were to be shipped, allegedly as free emigrants, to the French island of Réunion. The Franco-Portuguese talks continued for almost a year but brought no results. On 13 October 1858 Napoleon III, whom Marx calls here Quasimodo (a character from Victor Hugo's Notre-Dame de Paris), sent a special Note to the Portuguese Government demanding the return of the confiscated vessel and the release of its captain. The demand was backed by the despatch of two French warships to the Portuguese capital. Portugal was compelled to yield. Marx touches on the subject in his article 'The French Slave Trade' published in the New-York Daily Tribune on 1 December 1858 with considerable editorial changes (see present edition, Vol. 16, pp. 621-23).—351, 357
  4. ↑ Napoleon Ill's decree on grain reserves of 16 November 1858, Le Moniteur universel, No. 322, 18 November 1858.
  5. ↑ K. Marx, 'Project for the Regulation of the Price of Bread in France'.
  6. ↑ K. Marx, 'Political Parties in England.—The Situation in Europe', 'The Question of the Abolition of Serfdom in Russia'.
  7. ↑ A reference to J. Bright's speech at a meeting of Birmingham constituents on 27 October 1858 (the meeting was reported in The Times, No. 23136, 28 October 1858).
  8. ↑ John Bright, a British radical and Free Trade leader, put forward a programme for electoral reform. Of the six points of the People's Charter (universal suffrage, annual Parliaments, vote by secret ballot, equal constituencies, abolition of property qualifications for candidates to Parliament, and payment of M.P.s), he retained only the demand for vote by secret ballot. The other demands were either omitted altogether or drastically moderated. Thus Bright suggested that suffrage should be granted only to persons paying property tax; in place of equal constituencies he suggested fairer representation for the existing constituencies.—358
  9. ↑ Marx expressed this idea in his article 'Political Parties in England.—The Situation in Europe'.
  10. ↑ K. Marx, A Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy.
  11. ↑ E. Bauer, 'Vorträge über die Geschichte der Politik...', Die Neue Zeit, No. 20, 6 November 1858.
  12. ↑ E. Bauer, 'Preußens constitutioneller Imperialismus', Die Neue Zeit, No. 22, 27 November 1858.
  13. ↑ [G. Struve,] 'Bildung macht frei!', Die Neue Zeit, No. 22, 27 November 1858.