Letter to Friedrich Adolph Sorge, June 4, 1887

Author(s) Friedrich Engels
Written 4 June 1887


First published, slightly abridged, in Briefe und Auszüge aus Briefen von Joh. Phil. Becker, Jos. Dietzgen, Friedrich Engels, Karl Marx u. A. an F. A. Sorge und Andere, Stuttgart, 1906 and in full in Marx and Engels, Works, First Russian Edition, Vol. XXVII, Moscow, 1935
Published in English in full for the first time in Marx-Engels Collected Works, Volume 48


ENGELS TO FRIEDRICH ADOLPH SORGE[1]

IN HOBOKEN

London, 4 June 1887

Dear Sorge,

No movement causes so much fruitless work as one that is still at the sectarian stage. You know that as well as I do. For everything then still revolves round tittle-tattle. As will this letter about English affairs.

Well, last Sunday the conference of the Socialist League was held.[2] The anarchist elements which had gained admission to it were victorious, being supported by Morris, who has a mortal hatred of all things parliamentary, is generally muddle-headed and, as a poet, considers himself above science. Resolution—in itself quite innocuous as there can after all be no question of parliamentary action here and now—adopted by 17 votes to 11 (see Commonweal, 4 June[3] ). Of these one was cast by an ad hoc reconstituted bogus branch (three men, their three wives and—Mrs Schack!) and three by London delegates with mandates from the provinces, which, however, involved an obligation to vote against any such pro-abstention resolution. Hence three stolen votes and one invalid one.

What really clinched the matter was Morris' declaration that he would quit the moment any parliamentary action was accepted in principle. And since Morris makes good the Commonweal's deficit to the tune of £4 a week, this was for many the decisive factor.

Our people now intend to get the provinces organised, which they are at present well on the way to doing, and to call an extraordinary conference in about three or four months' time with a view to quashing the above. But it's unlikely to succeed; in the fabrication of voting sections, the anarchists are vastly superior to ourselves and can make eight enfranchised sections out of seven men. But nevertheless the farce is not without its good points and, having regard to the mood of the working men in the League, it was unavoidable. Bax is for us, of course, and, of the working men, Donald, Binning and Mahon amongst others—the best. None of ours stood for election to the Executive Council. The anarchists, by the way, may shortly throw our people out, and that might be all to the good.

The main thing is that, with the emergence of a genuine labour movement in the offing, our people should not be shackled with an organisation which lays claim to the leadership of the whole—à la Executive in New York and the Social Democratic Federation[4] over here. Everywhere in the provinces the workers are organising local associations (socialist) independently of London. They have a tremendous contempt for everything that hails from London.

Now for some further tittle-tattle. Hardly had we finished dealing with the New York Executive[5] than Mother Schack wrote to say she could no longer frequent my house because unable to meet Aveling, against whom there were grave imputations far more serious than the charges made in America, etc. On my request that she should specify and provide evidence, she replied with mysterious insinuations worthy of the most inveterate scandalmonger, refused to provide any details or evidence, suggested that I should myself make inquiries in London about Aveling's antecedents and promised her help! I, of course, replied[6] saying that / felt neither obliged nor inclined to supply proof of anything she might assert; this was up to her and, as she refused to do so, I could only thank her profusely for her decision not to call on me in future.

I am bothering you with this only because la Schack will undoubtedly write to her bosom friend, Mrs Wischnewetzky, expatiating on the subject, and people might come pestering you about it. All this tittle-tattle emanates from pious souls enraged by the fact that Aveling, the son of a parson of high repute (Congregationalist)[7] '[8] —with whom, by the by, he was on the best of terms until his death not long ago—had joined in Bradlaugh's disreputable atheist campaign; and now that Aveling has gone over to socialism, it is being gleefully redisseminated by Bradlaugh & Co. It revolves round two points, first the fact that his first wife lives apart from him and runs him down—she left him for a parson—and, secondly, his being up to his eyes in debt. He contracted those debts 1. through being stupid enough to endorse substantial bills for Bradlaugh's printer out of sheer willingness to oblige, and all unaware that Bradlaugh had sacked the man, thus forcing him into bankruptcy; 2. because, in company with Bradlaugh, he had set up a physiological laboratory and school[9] in Newman St, and the crafty Bradlaugh—a former attorney's clerk—had so arranged matters as to place sole legal responsibility on Aveling. When things went wrong and it came to a split between Aveling and Bradlaugh, it was easy for the latter to encumber Aveling with all the liabilities while himself openly appropriating all the assets. Aveling has now got to go on discharging these debts till he's blue in the face. He is as easy to diddle in money-matters as a three-year-old—only appeal to his sense of honour and he'll do anything you want. And as always, it's those people who are honourable to the point of absurdity when it comes to money, who are reviled as swindlers. All this la Schack could have learned from me simply by asking. But that wouldn't have suited her book. It was something quite different she was after.

La Schack—in other respects a sociable, amusing person—is intent on cutting a figure, à tout prix. Having been pushed into our party as a result of harassment by the police, with whom she had crossed swords over their control of prostitution, she embarked on a women's campaign in Germany which, under different circumstances, might have had some point but which, because of the Anti-Socialist Law,[10] brought down upon the party, or so Singer tells me, three prosecutions for conspiracy; for no sooner did the women fall out among themselves than they began to gossip about, if not denounce, the activities of the men in the party organisation. Here again the police fortunately put a spoke in her wheel. Thereupon she comes over here, consorts continually with the pious bourgeois women of the Anti-Contagious-Diseases Acts Agitation (against the attempt to introduce state-licensed and state-controlled brothels, and in favour of free trade in whores, a cause for which there is much to be said), from whom she picks up all the tittle-tattle about Aveling etc., also with the anarchist elements in the League[11] —some of whom listen avidly as she retails the self-same tittle-tattle, while others redisseminate it themselves—and throws herself more and more into anarchistic goings-on. When things came to a head in the League,[12] she realised that her regular visits to me must cease, and cast around for a seemly or unseemly pretext for breaking off relations herself before they were broken off for her. Aveling was to serve as scapegoat to this end and hence all this tittle-tattle, which for me has meant nothing but an extra dose of correspondence about cock-and-bull stories and hasn't done my eyes much good.

And with that, goodbye for today. By the same post I am sending off a parcel containing I To-Day, 2 Commonweals, I Gleichheit, 5 English and 5 German copies of Aveling's circular.[13]

I have now sent Mrs Wischnewetzky the preface in German[14] by registered post (Wednesday's[15] steamer).

Your

F. Engels

  1. ↑ An excerpt from this letter was published in English in The Labour Monthly, London, 1934, No. 2.
  2. ↑ On 29 May 1887 the third annual conference of the Socialist League (see note 21) was held in London. Delegates from 24 sections attended. The anarchists gained the upper hand; a resolution was adopted saying: 'This conference endorses the policy of abstention from parliamentary action, hitherto pursued by the League, and sees no sufficient reason for altering it.
  3. ↑ 'The Socialist League', Commonweal, No. 73, 4 June 1887
  4. ↑ The Social Democratic Federation was a British socialist organisation, the successor of the Democratic Federation, reformed in August 1884. It consisted of heterogeneous socialist elements, mostly intellectuals, but also politically active workers. The programme of the Federation provided for the collectivisation of the means of production, distribution and exchange. Its leader, Henry Hyndman, was dictatorial and arbitrary, and his supporters among the Federation's leaders denied the need to work among the trade unions. In contrast to Hyndman, the Federation members grouped round Eleanor Marx-Aveling, Edward Aveling, William Morris and Tom Mann sought close ties with the mass working-class movement. In December 1884, differences on questions of tactics and international co-operation led to a split in the Federation and the establishment of the independent Socialist League (see note 21). In 1885-86 the Federation's branches were active in the movement of the unemployed, in strike struggles and in the campaign for the eight-hour day.
  5. ↑ Aveling's answer to the second circular of the Executive of the Socialist Labor Party (see note 98) was printed in the form of a pamphlet, containing Aveling's statement of 27 May 1887 (a detailed reply to the charges levelled at him); a statement by Eleanor Marx-Aveling of 24 May, confirming her husband's arguments and adding certain details; a statement by Wilhelm Liebknecht in defence of Aveling of 16 May.
  6. ↑ The whereabouts of this letter is unknown.
  7. ↑ Thomas Aveling
  8. ↑ Congregationalists (Independents) - adherents of one of the Protestant trends in England. In the 1580s and 1590s they formed the Left wing of the Puritans. Consisting of members of the commercial and fledgling industrial bourgeoisie and the 'new' bourgeois nobility, they constituted a radical opposition to absolutism and the Church of England. During the English revolution of the seventeenth century the Congregationalists formed an independent political party, which came to power under Oliver Cromwell at the end of 1648. The Congregationalists rejected every kind of Church deriving from the State. They favoured complete autonomy for every congregation of believers and did not tolerate any coercion in matters of faith.
  9. ↑ The Science School
  10. ↑ The Anti-Socialist law (Gesetz gegen die gemeingefährlichen Bestrebungen der Sozialdemokratie) was introduced by the Bismarck government, with the support of the majority of the Reichstag, on 21 October 1878, as a means of combating the socialist and working-class movement. It imposed a ban on all Social Democratic and working-class organisations and on the socialist and workers' press; socialist literature was subject to confiscation, and Social Democrats to reprisals. However, under the Constitution, the Social Democratic Party retained its group in parliament. By combining underground activities with the use of legal possibilities, in particular by working to overcome reformist and anarchist tendencies in its own ranks, the party was able to consolidate and expand its influence among the masses. Marx and Engels gave the party leaders considerable help. Under the pressure of the mass working-class movement the Anti-Socialist Law was repealed (1 October 1890). For Engels' characterisation of the law see his article 'Bismarck and the German Workers Party' (present edition, Vol. 24, pp407-09).
  11. ↑ The Socialist League was founded in December 1884 by a group of English socialists who had withdrawn from the Social Democratic Federation (see note 62). The League's organisers included Eleanor Marx Aveling, Ernest Belfort Bax and William Morris. 'The Manifesto of the Socialist League' (see The Commonweal No.1, February 1885) stated that its members advocated 'the principles of Revolutionary International Socialism' and sought 'a change in the basis of Society ... which would destroy the distinctions of classes and nationalities'. The tasks of the League included the formation of a national socialist party, the conquest of political power through the election of socialists to local government bodies, and the promotion of the trade union and co-operative movement. In the League's early years its leaders took an active part in the working-class movement. However, in 1887 the League split into three factions (Anarchist elements, 'parliamentarists and 'anti-parliamentarists'). With sectarian tendencies growing stronger, the League gradually distanced itself from the day-to-day struggle of the British workers and finally disintegrated in 1889-90.
  12. ↑ On 29 May 1887 the third annual conference of the Socialist League (see note 21) was held in London. Delegates from 24 sections attended. The anarchists gained the upper hand; a resolution was adopted saying: 'This conference endorses the policy of abstention from parliamentary action, hitherto pursued by the League, and sees no sufficient reason for altering it.
  13. ↑ Aveling's answer to the second circular of the Executive of the Socialist Labor Party (see note 98) was printed in the form of a pamphlet, containing Aveling's statement of 27 May 1887 (a detailed reply to the charges levelled at him); a statement by Eleanor Marx-Aveling of 24 May, confirming her husband's arguments and adding certain details; a statement by Wilhelm Liebknecht in defence of Aveling of 16 May.
  14. ↑ Kelley-Wischnewetzky had suggested that Engels's article, 'Die Arbeiterbewegung in America' ('The Labour Movement in America'), written as a preface to the US edition of The Condition of the Working Class in England, should be issued in the form of separate German and English pamphlets. This was also suggested by Sorge in his letter of 26 April 1887. Engels translated the preface into German himself. The pamphlets appeared in New York in July 1887. Engels's German translation was also published in the Sozialdemokrat, Nos 24 and 25; 10 and 17 June 1887.
  15. ↑ 1 June