Letter to Wilhelm Liebknecht, January 18, 1872

Author(s) Friedrich Engels
Written 18 January 1872


First published, in Russian, in Marx-Engels Archives, Vol. I (VI), Moscow, 1932
Printed according to the original
Published in English for the first time in Marx-Engels Collected Works, Volume 44


ENGELS TO WILHELM LIEBKNECHT

IN LEIPZIG

London, 18 January 1872[1]

Dear Liebknecht,

The facts about the Belgians are these: De Paepe is the only one who is worth anything, but he is not very active. Steens is a jackass, a schemer and perhaps worse, and Hins is a Proudhonist who by that very fact, but even more because of his Russian wife, has leanings towards Bakunin. The others are puppets. On the other hand, the Belgian workers show no inclination to spark off a rebellion in the International. Hence the bad grace evident in the formulation of the resolution.[2] Fortunately, Mr Hins has been the victim of his own super-smartness, for the workers' papers, which have not been able to look behind the scenes, interpret the resolution literally and so read it as a declaration in our favour. E.g. the Tagwacht and the Emancipation in Madrid,[3] etc.

Conference resolutions[4] have no necessary binding force, since a conference is, in itself, an illegal mechanism, justified only by the gravity of the situation. Hence recognition is always desi- rable.

It would be good if you were to follow the lead of the Tagwacht and interpret the Belgian resolution as indicated above, adding that the resolution about revising the Rules amounts to a rejection of the Bakuninist call for an immediate congress. This is implicit because the revision would first have to be debated at their congress in June and only after that could it be brought before the regular congress of the International, which could not be held before the regular time scheduled in September. You could further remark that if the Belgians imagined that the General Council was nothing more than a correspondence bureau, they must have forgotten the Basle resolutions,[5] which are of an entirely different nature and which at all events remain in force until they are revoked by a regular International congress.

Up to now we intend to convene the congress at the regular

time. It is still early to decide on the place, but it almost certainly will not be Switzerland, or Germany for that matter.[6]

I have received one copy of the issue of the Volksstaat with my article,[7] and of the next issue nothing at all Marx received the next, but not the one with my article! No doubt a mix-up in despatching them. Send me half a dozen copies of No. 3 and one of No. 4 by return. I need several for correspondents in Italy who can read German, etc.

Warmest thanks from Marx for your discretion in sending the Neuer Social-Demokrat which, without preparation and before any counter-action had been initiated, would only have upset his wife unnecessarily. The Workers' Society[8] will reply and send its answer to the Volksstaat; there will be also a reply to Schneider's article.[9] In the meantime, I enclose an item which is unlikely to give the gentlemen any pleasure.[10] Apropos the Workers' Society, there have been some funny goings-on there, too.[11] Schneider and that asinine old scoundrel, Scherzer, thought they had got a majority, and together with Weber, who acted as intermediary, they made common cause with the dissident French and then proposed that the Society should resign from the International. Our people had become lax, had squandered their advantage and admitted far too much riff-raff. But this time things had gone too far. They were called out in force and the proposal was defeated by 27 votes to 20. A motion to expel the 20 was then tabled. The disorder made a vote impossible. Whereupon our people im- mediately salvaged all the Society's property, moved to another pub and expelled the 20. The rebels are now out in the cold and don't know what to do, but they had the impertinence to send Scherzer as their delegate to the General Council on Tuesday[12] ! Naturally, he was not admitted.

The alliance of the ultra-federalist French with the ultra- centralist Germans is likewise no bad thing.[13] Moreover, these French are already completely divided. When Vésinier was elected secretary, Theisz, Avrial et Co. resigned (for the second time). The remnant has split into two bodies, one of which is led by the nose by Vésinier, the other by Vermersch (of the Père Duchêne, and here the editor of the Qui Vive! and at present of the Vermersch Journal). Personally and politically, the two are equally disreputable and at least 3 others are more than suspected of being spies. The French police have so overshot the mark with

their cunning that their mouchards[14] now only spend their time spying on each other.

The news about the Saxons' resolution gave us great pleasure. We shall see to publication in the appropriate form.[15] Letters about INDIVIDUAL MEMBERS have not yet arrived.[16]

To your questions:

1. The [membership] cards have been superseded by stamps following the resolution.[17]

2. The stamps were to have been ready yesterday at Jung's and in any case will be available by the time you reply, so that we are just waiting to hear from you how many you need. We shall be sure to send them off to you.

3. You should have given us the names or addresses of the Italian Freethinkers at once. Everyone we have contact with in Italy is a Freethinker. I assume you are referring to Stefanoni in Florence; he is an industrialist, a Bakuninist and—the founder of a rival international Freethinking, socialist society.[18]

There is no urgency about Marx's second anti-Proudhon edition.[19] It is much more important for Capital to appear in French,[20] and that will not be long in coming now. Negotiations are pending. It would be better not to say anything about the second edition of Capital[21] since the remaining copies of the first edition have still to be disposed of and it would be better for this bomb to strike the Roschers, Fauchers & Co. unawares.

Marx has said nothing to me about printing the essay on Proudhon from the Social-Demokrat.[22] If I do not write anything to the contrary within a day or so, go ahead and print it.

Sorge is a BUSYBODY who forgets that correspondence between here and New York takes 3 weeks, and that the General Council has other things on its mind apart from the American squabbles. Had they only waited just 1 day before staging their coup d'état,[23]

they would have had the answer from here, which would have rendered it superfluous. First, they admit a mass of unknown riff-raff in an incredibly casual fashion, and then, when the balloon goes up, we have to extricate them from the mess!

Goegg was here a few days ago. He really has improved greatly, and has progressed roughly to the stage reached by the German artisans in 1848. But from petty bourgeois to artisan is a real step forward. It is at least possible to talk to him now, a thing which

was quite out of the question 4 years ago. He says that my article[24] killed Vogt stone-dead, and appears in general to be of the opinion that we were always in the right about him. It is quite possible that he may develop even further in time, or rather, that he may be developed by the course of events.

The news from Spain is good as far as it concerns the Federal Council. There is still a lot of intrigue going on in Barcelona and there is a strong Bakuninist influence in the Federation, but since in Spain the matter will be discussed by the Congress (in April)[25]

and since workers are in the majority there rather than lawyers and doctors, etc., I surmise that all will be well. Lafargue is fortunately still in Madrid; the information about the Neuer Social-Demokrat comes from him.[26] Mesa, the editor of the Emancipacion, is completely on our side.

In Italy we have Cuno in Milan, a Swiss engineer who knows Bebel and yourself and who up to now has blocked any Bakuninist resolutions there—apart from that, there are either Bakuninists or people who hang back. It is very difficult terrain and gives me a fiendish amount of work.

I enclose reports of 2 meetings[27] together with a polemic against Bradlaugh[28] ; furthermore the circular of Sonvillier[29] in case you do not have it.

Best regards from us all to you and yours.

Your

F. E.

  1. ↑ The original mistakenly has '1871'.
  2. ↑ December 1871 in Brussels declined to back the demand of the Jura Federation that a General Congress of the International be convened without delay, yet at the same time instructed the Belgian Federal Council to draw up new draft Rules for the Association. Those behind the project were motivated by the desire to deprive the General Council of its powers. A short report on the congress was published in L'Internationale, No. 155, 31 December 1871, and also in Der Volksstaat, No. 5, 17 January 1872.
  3. ↑ Engels means the publication of the resolutions passed by the congress of the Belgian Federation (see Note 404) by Die Tagwacht, No. 1, 6 January 1872 (in the 'Belgien' column), and by La Emancipacion, No. 30, 7 January 1872.
  4. ↑ K. Marx and F. Engels, 'Resolutions of the Conference of Delegates of the International Working Men's Association Assembled at London from 17th to 23rd September 1871'.
  5. ↑ On 23 December 1871 the Deutsche Allgemeine Zeitung, No. 300, and on 28 December, the Norddeutsche Allgemeine Zeitung, No. 302, printed a report on the 1871 London Conference, including the texts of its resolutions. At Marx's request Eleanor Marx informed Liebknecht on 29 December (see this volume, p. 571) that the report was a falsification. On 30 December Der Volksstaat, No. 104, printed a statement in its 'Politische Uebersicht' column pointing out that the above-mentioned resolutions were falsified.
    Engels referred to it as the 'Stieberian escapade' after Wilhelm. Stieber, the organiser of the trumped-up Communist trial in Cologne (1852). On the trial, see Note 138.
  6. ↑ On 5 January 1872 Liebknecht wrote to Engels asking when the next Congress of the International was to take place, and suggested Germany or a country bordering on it as its venue.
  7. ↑ F. Engels, 'The Congress of Sonvillier and the International'.
  8. ↑ the German Workers' Educational Society in London
  9. ↑ On 7 January 1872 the Neuer Social-Demokrat, No. 3, printed a letter written by a number of Lassalleans. It was signed by Heinrich Schenck and Christian Winand, who had been expelled from the German Workers' Educational Society in London (see Note 135), and contained libellous attacks on Marx and the General Council.
    On 27 January 1872 Der Volksstaat, No. 8, carried a reply signed by A. Caulaincourt, secretary of the German Workers' Educational Society, under the heading 'Die Gegner der Internationalen Arbeiterassoziation'. Der Volks staat, No. 14 (17 February 1872), printed an article headed 'Wer ist Joseph Schneider?' criticising the Lassallean views expounded by Schneider in his article 'An die Socialdemokraten Deutschlands'. Directed against the Interna tional (see Note 386), it had appeared in the Neuer Social-Demokrat, No. 67, 3 December 1871.
  10. ↑ A reference to the editorial statement in the 'Sucesos de la semana' column published by La Emancipacion, No. 31, 14 January 1872, which described the Neuer Social-Demokrat as a newspaper which had sold out to Bismarck. This piece was translated by Engels and published by Der Volksstaat, No. 10, 3 February 1872.
  11. ↑ After the 1871 London Conference the Lassalleans in the German Workers' Educational Society in London began campaigning against the General Council. They acted jointly with the Bakuninists and the petty-bourgeois refugees from the French Section of 1871. Joseph Schneider's article 'An die Socialdemokraten Deutschlands' was published in No. 67 of the Neuer Social-Demokrat, 3 December 1871. In it he calumniated Marx, Bebel and the International, citing, in particular, the 'Protestation' of 15 members of the French Section of 1871 (see Note 358).
    The Neuer Social-Demokrat, Nos. 68 and 69, 6 and 8 December 1871, published contributions by 'a socialist living in London' which contained attacks on the International. They could have been written by E. J. Weber.
    In December 1871 the Lassalleans were expelled from the Society, and it declared its solidarity with the General Council and the decisions of the London Conference.
  12. ↑ 16 January
  13. ↑ In April 1872 the Universal Federalist Council was formed in London, comprising what was left of the French Section of 1871 (see Note 338), some of the Lassalleans expelled from the German Workers' Educational Society in London, and representatives of the bourgeois Universal Republican League and the Land and Labour League. The Council proclaimed itself a 'true' leading body of the International in a pamphlet called Conseil fédéraliste universel de l'Association Internationale des Travailleurs et des Sociétés républicaines socialistes adhérentes. This prompted Marx to write the 'Declaration of the General Council Concerning the Universal Federalist Council'. In September 1872 the Universal Federalist Council convened a congress in London which claimed to be a congress of the International Working Men's Association. Its subsequent activities amounted to in-fighting between the various cliques which laid claim to leadership of the workers' movement.
  14. ↑ spies
  15. ↑ The Pan-Slavic Congress met in Prague on 2 June 1848. It was attended by representatives of the Slavic countries forming part of the Habsburg Empire. The Right, liberal moderate wing, sought to solve the national problem through autonomy of the Slavic countries within the framework of the Habsburg monarchy. The Left, radical wing, wanted to act in alliance with the revolutionary-democratic movement in Germany and Hungary. Mikhail Baku- nin affiliated with the Left. Radical delegates took an active part in the popular uprising in Prague (12-17 June 1848), directed against the arbitrary rule of the Austrian authorities, and were subjected to cruel reprisals.
  16. ↑ Membership of the International could be either collective or individual. In countries where its activities were officially banned (Germany, for instance), the General Council issued membership cards to each new recruit individually.
    The Congress of Saxonian Social-Democrats (see Note 418) passed a resolution in favour of recruiting individual applicants to the International.
  17. ↑ Resolution IV of the 1871 London Conference introduced penny stamps for the payment of membership dues. 'These stamps are to be affixed to a special sheet of the livret or to the Rules which every member is held to possess' (see present edition, Vol. 22, p. 424). Consequently, the General Council ceased to issue membership cards.
  18. ↑ Luigi Stefanoni, a bourgeois democrat and member of the Bakuninist Alliance of Socialist Democracy, presented himself in November 1871 as the initiator of the Universal Society of Rationalists (Società Universale dei Razionalisti) allegedly intended to put into practice the principles of the International but free of 'its negative features'. Stefanoni advanced as a social panacea the Utopian idea of buying land from the landlords and establishing agricultural colonies. The draft programme of the Society was printed by II Libero Pensiero, No. 18, 2 November 1871. Later, Stefanoni published a number of slanderous articles directed against the General Council and Marx and Engels personally. Marx's and Engels' writings (e.g. Engels' letter to the editors of the Gazzettino Rosa, Marx's article 'Stefanoni and the International Again', present edition, Vol. 23, pp. 74-75, 160-63), which exposed Stefanoni's real ambitions, contributed to the failure of Stefanoni's attempts to subject the workers' movement in Italy to bourgeois influence.
  19. ↑ K. Marx, The Poverty of Philosophy. Answer to the 'Philosophy of Poverty by M. Proudhon.
  20. ↑ In his letter to Marx of 28 November 1871 Meissner wrote that almost the whole of the first German edition of Volume I of Capital, issued in 1867, had been sold out. He suggested that Marx should start preparing the second German edition (see Note 145).
  21. ↑ Ferdinand Freiligrath wrote his poem 'An Wolfgang im Felde' on 12 August 1870 and dedicated it to his son whom he had sent to the front as a volunteer.
  22. ↑ K. Marx, 'On Proudhon'.
  23. ↑ A reference to the split in the Central Committee of the International Working Men's Association for North America, which occurred in December 1871.
    After the London Conference of 1871 strife flared up within the Committee between the proletarian and the bourgeois-reformist elements. As a result of the split two committees were formed, the Provisional Federal Council (Committee No. I), which comprised representatives of the 14 sections adhering to the proletarian stand (Friedrich Adolph Sorge, Friedrich Boite, etc.), and the separatist council (Committee No. II), headed by Victoria Woodhull and other bourgeois reformists belonging to Section No. 12. At its meetings of 5 and 12 March the General Council voiced its support for the proletarian wing of the North American Federation; Section No. 12 was suspended from the International pending the next Congress. On 28 May 1872 the General Council declared the Provisional Federal Council the sole leading body of the North American sections. The congress of the North American Federation held in July 1872 elected the standing Federal Council which included all members of the provisional body (see Engels' 'The International in America' and Marx's 'American Split', present edition, Vol. 23, pp. 177-83, 636-43).
  24. ↑ F. Engels, 'Once Again "Herr Vogt"'.
  25. ↑ The second congress of the Spanish Federation of the International was held in Saragossa on 4-11 April 1872, attended by 45 delegates representing 31 local federations. The congress voted down the demand of Swiss Bakuninists that a General Congress be convened without delay, but, under the influence of the anarchists, decided to support the revision of the General Rules proposed by the Belgian Federation with a view to granting greater autonomy to the local sections. Opposing the Bakuninists, the congress ruled the expulsion of the editors of La Emancipacion from the Federation to be illegal and restored their rights. However, when it came to electing the new Federal Council the Bakuninists managed to fill it mostly with members of the Alliance.
  26. ↑ Engels means the editorial note in La Emancipacion, No. 31, 14 January 1872, to which he referred above.
  27. ↑ Presumably, the reports on the General Council meetings of 2 and 9 January 1872, published in The Eastern Post, Nos. 171 and 172, 6 and 14 January 1872.
  28. ↑ The bourgeois radical Charles Bradlaugh made slanderous attacks on Marx in a public lecture delivered on 11 December 1871 and in a letter to The Eastern Post printed in its second edition on 16 December. At the General Council meeting of 19 December Marx pointed to the close link between Bradlaugh's behaviour and the harassment of the International by the ruling circles and the bourgeois press.
    Replying to the slanderous letters printed in January 1872 by The National Reformer, which was edited by Bradlaugh, Marx sent several statements exposing them to The Eastern Post (see present edition, Vol. 23, pp. 62-63, 71, 72-73).
  29. ↑ The Congress of the Bakuninist Jura Federation held in Sonvillier on 12 November 1871 adopted the Sonvillier circular, 'Circulaire à toutes les fédérations de l'Association Internationale des Travailleurs'. It was directed against the General Council and the 1871 London Conference, and countered the Conference decisions with anarchist phrases about the sections' political indifferentism and complete autonomy. The Bakuninists proposed that all the federations demand the immediate convocation of a congress to revise the General Rules and to condemn the General Council's actions.
    The International's sections in Germany, Britain, France, Belgium, Holland, the USA, and also the Section in Milan, came out against the circular. Engels gave the Bakuninists a vigorous rebuff in his article 'The Congress of Sonvillier and the International' (present edition, Vol. 23).