Letter to August Bebel, October 6, 1891

Author(s) Friedrich Engels
Written 6 October 1891


First published in: Marx and Engels, Works, First Russian Edition, Vol. XXVIII, Moscow, 1940
Printed according to the original
Published in English for the first time in Marx-Engels Collected Works, Volume 49


ENGELS TO AUGUST BEBEL

IN BERLIN

London, 6 October 1891

Dear August,

Herewidi what you need in regard to the Cuno-Leibfried case.[1]

But now I think you would be well-advised to stop bombarding poor Ede with letters about Lassalle 178; he is becoming tremendously irritable because of them and so confused over what you people, on the one hand, are demanding and what he, on the other, considers to be his duty, that this sort of thing can only make matters worse and he'll end up by producing nothing but contradictory material. You are as much to blame as Ede for the fact that the note[2] is in it at all, and to

[3]

condemn this excellent work in its entirety because of one wretched note is surely not right. I told him not to let this deflect him from his purpose, but to continue wearing the velvet glove over the iron fist and I also said that you would be grateful to him in the long run for having criticised Lassalle in this way. For it's clear to me that were you to re-read Lassalle's stuff now, you yourselves would be surprised at what it contains and at the faith in the false hero which, out of cour- tesy, you forced yourselves to profess when consorting with the Las- salleans at the time of the Anti-Socialist Law.[4] I'm positive that you, as also a whole lot of chaps who still cling to the Lassallean tradi- tion, no longer have any knowledge whatever of what the man said and wrote (indeed, said and wrote for the most part against his better judgment). And hence the new edition of Lassalle will have a tho- roughly beneficial effect on you people as well, provided only that you read the works of the prophet's critic.

Lafargue is not yet out of prison, but if the government doesn't re- lease him during election time, he will probably be elected in Lille.[5] The prospects are rosy; Delory would have got in all right at the last election had not the by now routed Boulangists collared a whole mass of working men's votes.

In Paris there could easily be a government crisis. Rouvier is a shady individual, more so than is tolerable and, now that Boulanger has met his end, Constans is no longer needed and is detested by Car- not because he wants to step into the latter's shoes. Freycinet & Co. also want to get rid of Rouvier and Constans arid so it may easily come to a split when the Chamber assembles on the 15th.

I'm glad to see that Dietz has paid you my fee. Louise asks me to tell you that the photographs have arrived; very many thanks from us all; she has taken one of the two identical ones and I the profile.

Warm regards to your wife[6] and yourself from Louise and

Your

F. E.

  1. ↑ This refers to the inheritance lawsuit involving Alphonse Cuno and the notary Leibfried in Luxembourg.
  2. ↑ An allusion to the fact that in his preface to Lassalle's works (see Note 178) Eduard Bernstein, speaking of Lassalle's chronic disease, appended a footnote reading, 'presumably syphilis'.
  3. ↑ See this volume, pp. 237 38, 248 49, 251.
  4. ↑ The Anti-Socialist Law, initiated by the Bismarck government and passed by the Reichstag on 21 October 1878, was directed against the socialist and working-class movement. The Social-Democratic Party of Germany was virtually driven into the underground. All party and mass working-class organisations and their press were banned, socialist literature was subject to confiscation, Social-Democrats made the object of reprisals. However, with the active help of Marx and Engels, the Social- Democratic Party succeeded in overcoming both the opportunist (Eduard Bern stein et al.) and 'ultra-Left' (J. Most et al.) tendencies within its ranks and was able, by combining underground activities with an efficient utilisation of legal means, to use the period of the operation of the law for considerably strengthening and ex panding its influence among the masses. Prolonged in 1881, 1884, 1886 and 1888, the Anti-Socialist Law was repealed on 1 October 1890. For Engels' assessment of it see his article 'Bismarck and the German Working Men's Party' (present edition, Vol. 24, pp. 407-09).
  5. ↑ In a letter of 23 September 1891 Laura Lafargue told Engels that the French Workers' Party had put up Paul Lafargue as its candidate for the Chamber of Dep uties in a by-election in Lille to replace the deceased deputy Werquin. This en abled Lafargue to get out of prison and conduct the election campaign in North France. He was elected to the Chamber on 8 November 1891 and did not have to go back to prison.
  6. ↑ Julie Bebel