Letter to Conrad Schmidt, January 11, 1889

Author(s) Friedrich Engels
Written 11 January 1889


First published, slightly abridged, in Sozialistische Monatshefte, Nos 15 and 16, 1920 and, in full, in: Marx and Engels, Works, First Russian Edition, Vol. XXVIII, Moscow, 1940
Printed according to the original
Published in English in full for the first time in Marx-Engels Collected Works, Volume 48


ENGELS TO CONRAD SCHMIDT

IN ZURICH

London, 11 January 1889

Dear Sir,

I am in receipt of your two letters of 5 November and 28/31 December and have followed with much interest the progress of your experimentation with German universities.[1] The domination of the Junkers in alliance with the bourgeois differs from the pre-'48 domination of the Junkers in alliance with the bureaucrats only in having a broader basis. In those days their treatment of Bruno Bauer[2] stirred up indignation throughout Philistia; today, when similar treatment is being meted out to Dühring,[3] and the doors of all the universities are being slammed in your face, that self-same Philistia considers it perfectly right and proper.

You will, in fact, have no other recourse than to take up writing, and for that purpose there is, of course, no better place in the Empire than Berlin. I am glad that you say no more (in your second letter) about your American plans, for you would have experienced a bitter disappointment over there. I can see that anyone subject to the Anti-Socialist Law[4] might think highly of the American-German socialist press, particularly from the viewpoint of a journalist. In actual fact it isn't up to much, either from the theoretical or from the local, American standpoint. The best paper is the Philadelphia Tageblatt; the St Louis Tageblatt is well-meaning but feeble; the New Yorker Volkszeitung is managed in a proper, businesslike way, but is first and foremost a business; the Sozialist (New York), the official organ of the German party, is very poor. Just now there is little place in America for theoretical thinkers. The Germans—at any rate in their official organisation—insist upon remaining a branch of the German metropolitan party, look down with a truly Lassallean arrogance upon the 'ignorant' Americans and expect them to join their German party, i.e. place themselves under German tutelage—in short, they behave with sectarian pettiness and bigotry. Further inland things are better, but the New Yorkers still retain the upper hand. I seldom see the Chicagoer Arbeiter-Zeitung (now edited by Christensen). In America, in short, the only possible openings are in the daily press, and you would have to be over there for at least a year in order to gain the necessary confidence and personal insights; in addition you would have to adapt yourself to the prevailing opinions, which are often all the more parochial for the persistence amongst the Germans there of that loutish mentality which, in Germany, has been eradicated by large-scale industry (one of the curious things about America is that what is most antiquated and out of date continues to vegetate happily alongside what is newest and most revolutionary). Things can and will, no doubt, improve within a year or two, but anyone who wishes to promote the scientific side will find a far better prepared public here in Europe.

Incidentally, you will also find that a career as a writer offers ample scope for worthwhile work. You will presumably have access to Braun's Archiv für soziale Gesetzgebung und Statistik, Conrad's Jahrbücher für Nationalökonomie und Statistik, and to Schmoller's collection of papers.[5] For instance, a work on the system of exploitation by middlemen (sweating system)—at least as prevalent in the Berlin garment trade as in that of London, etc.—would be very useful as providing a parallel to the English Report by the Select Committee of the House of Lords (First Report from the Select Committee of the House of Lords on the Sweating System...)—which I will gladly send you if you'd care to have it. Many other types of economic conditions would similarly reward investigation and description, quite aside from actual theoretical works, which might now and then provide relief from the common run of writing. We can discuss this further once you are in Berlin and have started work.

If your experiences (which might well be worth publishing) recall the time of Frederick William IV, those of Hoch hark back directly to the worst period of demagogue-hunting.[6] It must surely be the first time since 1835 that anyone has been refused matriculation because of his political views.

As regards Volume III (of Capital), Section I (of seven) is ready for the press, and I am busy with II and III, which I hope to finish shortly. The work is more time-consuming that I had thought, and I have to take great care of my eyes. The stupendous fogs in December caused a temporary setback, but now they are better again. On New Year's night we went to Pumps'—we being Schorlemmer, Sam Moore, Tussy and a few of the Sozialdemokrat people (Hermann and Anna Schlüter and Leonard Tauscher). She lives 2 miles away and, because of the fog, it took us over an hour to get there. Then it got so bad that no one could leave. So nolens volens the whole party of us had to go on tippling until day (or rather a pitch black morning) dawned, which we did with much merriment. Towards five o'clock some of us were able to leave for town by the first train; the rest lay down at seven on hastily improvised beds and slept until the first noon of the New Year. Voilà la vie de Londres!

With kindest regards,

Yours sincerely,

F. Engels

  1. ↑ In these letters Conrad Schmidt told Engels that his own attempts to obtain a position of senior lecturer at Leipzig University failed because of his socialist views.
  2. ↑ In the autumn of 1841 Bruno Bauer, one of the leaders of the Young Hegelians, was suspended from teaching at Bonn University by Eichhorn, the Prussian Minister of Religious Worship, Education and Medicine. In March 1842, he was dismissed from his post as lecturer in theology on account of his atheistic views and opposition speeches. Bauer's dismissal evoked sharp protests from radical and liberal intellectuals.
  3. ↑ As assistant professor at Berlin University, Eugen Duhring, beginning in 1872, criticised the university professors, Hermann Helmholtz in particular, and the University customs in general. Such criticism riled the reactionary faculty which started hounding Duhring. In July 1877 he was deprived of the right to teach at the University. His dismissal sparked vigorous protests from his supporters and was condemned by the public.
  4. ↑ The Anti-Socialist law (Gesetz gegen die gemeingefahrlichen 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).
  5. ↑ The reference is to the monographs on the history of Germany's national economy under the heading Staats- und socialwissenschaftliche Forschungen edited by Gustav Schmoller in 1878-1916, and in co-operation with Max Sering as of 1903. Containing a wealth of factual and historical evidence, these publications offered no theoretical analysis at all. This series mirrored the views of the 'young historical school' in Germany's political economy, a trend led by Schmoller. Its followers thought the chief task of political economy was to collect factual material on the history of the national economy, with theoretical analysis being left to the generations to come.
  6. ↑ 'Demagogues' was the name given to participants in the students' opposition movement in Germany after the country's liberation from Napoleonic rule. The name gained currency after the Karlsbad Conference of Ministers of the German States in August 1819, which adopted a special decision on the persecution of the Demagogues.