Letter to George Julian Harney, January 21, 1871

Author(s) Karl Marx
Written 21 January 1871


First published in The Harney Papers, ed. by F. G. Black and R. M. Black, Assen, 1969
Reproduced from the book
Published in English for the first time in Marx-Engels Collected Works, Volume 44


MARX TO G. JULIAN HARNEY

IN BOSTON

London, 21 January 1871 1 a Maitland Park Road, Haverstock Hill, N.W.

Dear Harney,

I want for the second volume of my Criticism of Political Economy documents on the disposal of public lands in the United States since the beginning of the Civil War.[1] Mr S. Meyer, a friend of mine at New York, has advised me to address myself to Mr Wilson, Commissioner of the General Land Office, Washington. As I am not at all acquainted with the form in which this ought to be done, I address myself to you. Perhaps, you will act as my negotiator.[2]

In spring, there will be offered a second edition in Germany of the first volume of my work.[3] A Russian translation at St Petersburg has been stopped by the Moscovite police,[4] a French edition at Paris by the war.[5] An homme de lettres[6] at New York proposed me preparing an English translation for the United States[7] but I declined the offer since he seemed to me not a competent man for the task.

By our International Council[8] we have stirred the English working class and provoked numerous demonstrations in favour of the French Republic[9] and against the policy of unctuous Gladstone, who has become a servile tool in the hands of the granddaughter of George III and the mother-in-law of 'Fritz'.[10]

Unfortunately, some of the leading workmen—like Mr Mottershead, an old Chartist and a member of our Council—have been bought up by the Peace Society.[11] They can do no harm at London but they do in the provinces.

The Trades' Councils at Manchester and Birmingham have lately become active agents of the General Council of the 'International'. At London I regret saying, most of the workmen's representatives use their position in our council only as a means of furthering their own petty personal aims. To get into the House of Commons by hook or by crook, is their ultima Thule[12] and they like nothing better than rubbing elbows with the lords and M.P.'s by whom they are petted and demoralised.

The state of things in Germany you may judge from my letter to The Daily News which I enclose.[13]

Mrs Marx and F. Engels send you their best compliments. Salut et fraternité.

Yours,

Karl Marx

  1. ↑ In April 1849 the French bourgeois government, in alliance with Austria and Naples, intervened against the Roman Republic for the purpose of suppressing it and restoring the Pope's secular power. Despite its heroic resistance the Roman Republic was overthrown and Rome occupied by French troops.
  2. ↑ Marx is referring to his work on the third book of Capital, which was, with the second book, to form Volume II of Capital (see also Note 219). Marx planned to make a special study of agrarian relations in the United States in connection with his examination of the origin of rent. The American Civil War (1861-65) was caused mainly by the struggle between two social systems—the capitalist system of wage labour in the North and the slave system in the South. Workers, farmers and the Black population played a decisive role in the defeat of the slave-owners of the South and the conclusion of the war in favour of the North.
  3. ↑ In early February 1871, at Marx's request, Harney sent a written inquiry to the General Land Office in Washington (see The Harney Papers. Ed. by F. G. Black and R. M. Black, Van Gorcum and Co., Assen, 1969, pp. 267-69).
  4. ↑ The second German edition of Volume I of Capital appeared between July 1872 and April 1873 in nine separate instalments, and in June 1873 it was published as a book. While preparing this edition Marx partly revised the text and introduced some changes in its structure.
  5. ↑ Volume I of Capital was translated into Russian by Hermann Lopatin, Nikolai Danielson and Nikolai Lyubavin. It was the first translation of his work into any foreign language. The book was published in full in the spring of 1872 except for the portrait of Marx, because the censor had forbidden its reproduction in the Russian edition.
  6. ↑ man of letters
  7. ↑ The translation of Volume I of Capital into French, started by Charles Keller, was interrupted by the Franco-Prussian War. The first French edition appeared in separate instalments between 1872 and 1875 in a translation by Joseph Roy. Roy's translation being too literal, Marx virtually retranslated the whole book, introducing changes as against the second German edition.
  8. ↑ General Council of the International Working Men's Association
  9. ↑ This may refer to Nahmer, a German émigré living in New York, who wrote to Marx on 20 September 1867 offering his services as a translator of Capital. The English translation of Volume I of Capital, edited by Engels, was published in London in 1887; half of the printed copies were distributed in the USA. Later the London edition was reprinted in New York.
  10. ↑ Marx refers to Queen Victoria, whose daughter, Victoria Adélaïde Marie Louise, married Frederick William, Crown Prince of Prussia.
  11. ↑ The Peace Society—a pacifist organisation founded by the Quakers in London in 1816. The Society, which was actively supported by the Free Traders, donated £20 for the dissemination of the 'First Address of the General Council of the International Working Men's Association on the Franco-Prussian War'. Johann Philipp Becker used this money in Switzerland to have 30,000 copies of the Address printed in German and French. At a meeting of the General Council on 2 August 1870, John Weston, who acted as chairman, announced that John Stuart Mill had commended the Address.
  12. ↑ Here: most cherished goal.
  13. ↑ K. Marx, 'On the Freedom of the Press and Meetings in Germany'.