Letter to August Bebel, January 5, 1889

Author(s) Friedrich Engels
Written 5 January 1889


First published in: Marx and Engels, Works, First Russian Edition, Vol. XXVIII, Moscow, 1940
Published in English for the first time in Marx-Engels Collected Works, Volume 48


ENGELS TO AUGUST BEBEL

IN BERLIN

London, 5 January 1889

Dear Bebel,

First of all let me heartily reciprocate your kind New Year's wishes. Today, fog permitting, I must write to you by request concerning two delicate matters. Both have to do with the fear that Liebknecht might commit the party to a not altogether desirable course when, as has been announced, he visits London and Paris[1] (if he comes on his own, that is), nor, in view of his dependence on passing moods (which again is often due to self-deception), can I altogether disagree with the chaps.

In Paris it is a question of the congress or rather two congresses—the Possibilists' and our own, in other words the international congress decided upon at the Trades Unions Congress in Bordeaux in November[2]

and again at the Socialist Congress in Troyes.[3] Lafargue is afraid that Liebknecht has had dealings with the Possibilists and that you might perhaps send delegates to their congress. I have written and told Lafargue[4] that in my view you cannot possibly do this. The Possibilists, having joined

in mortal combat with our people, the so-called Marxists, have now set themselves up as the one true church which absolutely prohibits any intercourse, any cooperation with the others—Marxists no less than Blanquists—and have formed an alliance with the one true church over here (the Social Democratic Federation[5] ), an alliance not the least of whose aims is to oppose the German Party everywhere so long as it refuses to join this unsavoury league and cease associating with other Frenchmen and Englishmen. Moreover, the Possibilists have sold themselves to the present government, their fares, congress expenses and periodicals are paid for out of secret funds, and all this on the pretext of combating Boulanger and defending the republic, hence also France's Opportunist exploiters, the Ferrys, etc., their present allies.[6] And they defend the present Radical government which, in order to remain in office, must do all the Opportunists' dirty work for them, a government which ordered an assault on the people on the occasion of Eudes' funeral[7] and in Bordeaux and Troyes, just as in Paris, is more rabid in its opposition to the red flag than any government before it. To go along with this gang would be a denial of your entire foreign policy to date. Two years ago in Paris the same lot made common cause with the venal English trades unions against the socialist demands[8] and if they took a different stand over here in November,[9] it was because they had no alternative. Moreover, it is only in Paris that they are strong; in the provinces they're a negligible quantity, proof of this being that they cannot hold a congress in Paris because the provinces would either stay away or prove hostile. Nor are they able to hold one in the provinces. Two years ago they went to a little place tucked away in the Ardennes[10] ; this year they expected to find accommodation in Troyes, where several of the labour town councillors, having betrayed their class after the election, had joined them. But they were not re-elected and the comité—their own comité—extended an invitation to all French Socialists. Thereupon, dismay in the Paris camp; an attempt to rescind this—in vain. And so they didn't go to their own congress, which was taken over and brilliantly run by our Marxists. What the provincial trades unions think of them can be seen from the enclosed resolution passed at the Bordeaux Trades Unions Congress in November. On the Paris Municipal Council they have 9 men, whose main purpose it is to oppose, on no matter what pretext, Vaillant's socialist activities, to betray the workers and in return to secure not only grants of money for themselves and their supporters but also sole control of the labour exchanges.

The Marxists, who control the provinces, are the only anti-chauvinist party in France; the stand they have taken on behalf of the German labour movement has made them unpopular in Paris, and to send delegates to a congress there that is hostile to these people would be to cut off your nose to spite your own face. They also know how best to combat Boulanger,[11] who stands for the general feeling of dissatisfaction in France. When Boulanger wanted to hold a banquet in Montluçon, our people took 300 tickets so as to put to him through Dormoy—a most able little chap—some highly categorical questions about his attitude to the labour movement, etc. When the worthy general learned of this, he cancelled the whole banquet.

The fog precludes any further writing today. More in a day or two.

Your

F. E.

  1. ↑ On 29 December 1888 Wilhelm Liebknecht told Engels he intended to visit Paris and London to hold preliminary negotiations with local socialists about the forthcoming International Socialist Congress in Paris.
  2. ↑ The National Congress of the French Trade Unions took place on 23 October-4 November 1888. It represented 272 labour unions - the workers' syndical chambers and industrial groups. Most of the delegates belonged to the revolutionary wing of the French workers' movement. The congress had been opened in Bordeaux, but its sessions had to be transferred to Le Bouscat after the police declared the congress disbanded because of a red banner over its rostrum. The congress passed a decision to convene an International Socialist Working Men's Congress in Paris in 1889 to commemorate the centennial of the French Revolution Also discussed was a general strike, considered to be the only revolutionary way.
  3. ↑ The convention of the French Workers' Party held in Troyes in December 1888 (see note 322) passed a decision on nominating a socialist as an independent candidacy for the by-election of 27 January 1889. The candidature of Boule, a labourer and stonemason, was nominated accordingly. This convention also decided to hold an International Socialist Working Men's Congress in Paris in 1889, thus confirming the decision of the National Congress of the French trade unions (see note 331).
  4. ↑ See this volume, p.239
  5. ↑ The reference is to the rapprochement of the leadership of the Social Democratic Federation (see note 62) and the Possibilists (see note 19). Starting in 1884, the Federation, acting through its organ Justice, conducted broad campaign in support of the Possibilists; it recognised them as the principal organisation of French Socialists and maintained no relations with the French Workers' Party (see note 33). The Social Democratic Federation was the only socialist organisation to support the Possibilist International Congress in Paris in 1889 (see note 478). An allusion to the Parliamentary Committee, an executive body of The Trades Union Congress of Great Britain formed in 1868 and uniting the British trade unions. As of 1871 the Parliamentary Committee was annually elected by Trades Union Congresses as a steering body of the trade unions in between the congresses. It was designed to nominate trade union MPs, support draft bills tabled in the interests of the trade unions, and prepare regular union congresses. Henry Broadhurst was the parliamentary Committee's Secretary from 1875 to 1890. In 1921 the Parliamentary Committee was replaced with the Trades Union Congress General Council.
  6. ↑ Opportunists was the name given in France to the party of moderate bourgeois republicans upon its split in 1881 and the formation of a left-wing party of radicals under Georges Clemenceau. The name was first used in 1877 by Henri Rochefort, a journalist, after the leader of the party, L. Gambetta, had said that reforms were to be implemented at 'an opportune time' ('un temps opportun').
  7. ↑ The funeral of the Paris Commune general Émiles Eudes on 8 August 1888, developed into a mammoth demonstration of the Paris proletariat; its participants carried red flags and posters urging a new commune. This demonstration was dispersed by the police.
  8. ↑ Engels refers to the Paris International Conference convened by the French Possibilists in 1886 (see note 319). The conference discussed issues related to international labour legislation. Its resolutions denied the need for working-class political struggle.
  9. ↑ The reference is to the London International Congress of Trades Unions held on 6-10 November 1888 at the initiative of the British trade unions. The congress involved trade union representatives of Britain, Belgium, Holland, Denmark, Italy as well as French syndicates aligned with the Possibilists. Stipulating that delegates to this congress should be officially elected by respective trade unions, its organisers thereby deprived the German and Austrian Social Democrats, as well as representatives of the French Workers' Party (the Guesdists), see note 33, of an opportunity to attend. Yet the leaders of the British trade unions failed in their attempts to foist reformist decisions on the congress and isolate it from the Socialists. The congress adopted a number of positive decisions. Thus, the workers were not to confine themselves to forming purely professional organisations - they were to unite into an independent political party as well. One of the resolutions stressed the need to press for legislative regulation of the working day and working conditions. In its most significant decision, the congress resolved to convene an International Working Men's Congress in Paris in 1889; organisation of this congress was entrusted to the Possibilists.
  10. ↑ Engels alludes to the Ninth Congress of the Party of the Possibilists at Charleville on 2-8 October 1887. The main issue on the agenda was participation in electoral campaigns.
  11. ↑ In her letter to Engels of 27 December 1888 Laura Lafargue wrote that the anti-Boulangism of the Possibilists was similar to their other deception. They used to good advantage the pronouncements of the Guesdists in support of the international and, specifically, the German working-class movement and, as a result, the latter lost its popularity in Paris. For the Guesdists' attitude to Boulangism see note 277.