Letter to August Bebel, December 1, 1891

Author(s) Friedrich Engels
Written 1 December 1891


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 49


ENGELS TO AUGUST BEBEL

IN BERLIN

London, 1 December 1891

Dear August,

At last, after three exuberant days, my birthday mood may perhaps have subsided sufficiently for me to write a moderately rational letter again. First, then, the Lafargue affair has been settled. I have today heard from Laura—Lafargue has gone to Lyons,[1] having only been in Paris for a couple of hours on Saturday to attend to his scrutiny—who says:

'Paul authorises me to say, 1. that he confirms his letter to you' (see below); 2. 'that the meeting at which he spoke in Bordeaux was private,—a closed meeting for members of the Workers' Party—'that no reporters had been admitted and no official record exists; 3. the incriminating statements are the invention of a reporter brodant sur le texte d'un article publié par Ranc[2] (embroidering on the text of an article by Ranc); 4. 'the words used by Paul were as follows: "If I insisted upon the war being continued, this was because the information at my disposal led me to believe that Germany was not in a position to hold out for very much longer." '

She adds:

There was no question of plans obtained by Germans or through their agency; in general Paul declares that, throughout the war, he received no communications of any kind from Germany. And Paul also says that he subscribes to your demands, and not only subscribes to them but challenges any refutation of his above statement.

(Le Perreux, 28 November; only reached me today.)

In his letter to me (Lyons, 26 November), Lafargue says that the purport of his speech had been such and such, that in 1870 the International in all countries had considered it its duty to prevent the crushing of the French Republic by Bismarck's troops, and that while the other Internationals had fought under Garibaldi, the Germans had protested against the continuation of the war and the rape of Alsace-Lorraine.

My demands to which he subscribes were for the repudiation, without reservation or qualification, of the statements ascribed to him and of their purport. These you now have and may use as you think fit.

So that's one weight off my mind, I'm glad to say. Thanks to the colossal stupidity of our enemies, they have lost this opportunity for a scandal, and now it is gone for ever. Should anything be brought up now, you will be forearmed and your assailants will look foolish in the extreme. But while the uncertainty lasted we over here were in a muck sweat, I can tell you, for fear that some reptile[3] or other should get his fangs into the thing before we knew what answer to make and how to give him the lie. But what idiots they are! As Tussy said only last Sunday, if we had got hold of some information like that about our enemies, what wouldn't we have done with it!

I missed the incident at Potsdam involving William II; what was it? The affair would certainly seem to be assuming a growing pace, and every such straw in the wind is of interest. According to the papers over here, your Emperor intends to relinquish all the honorary colonelships he holds in the Russian army because of the impolite way in which Alexander travelled across his domains.[4] I should say that the Russians are trying to inveigle him into untimely escapades so that he may appear to be a disturber of the peace whilst they, who are pretty well unassailable, can afford to play for the highest stakes and allow him to purchase peace at the price of further concessions. That they really intend war seems to me impossible. The failure of the French loan—instead of £20 million a bare £12; famine of unprecedented dimensions and intensity; the winter crops virtually destroyed by lack of seed and unfavourable weather; the wholesale death or slaughter of cattle and horses in the most fertile regions for lack of fodder, so that agriculture will be paralysed for years to come—all these are things which, in a semi-barbarous country like Russia, will deprive the army of any prospect of successful action. But despite all this, the Russians are not deterred from behaving politically as though they were deliberately heading for war; this they can permit themselves because of their strategic position and their expertise in betraying their friends. Of course, their little plan may always go awry—hence mobilisation and troop concentrations on a massive scale which, if things go off peacefully, can also serve as an instrument of diplomatic pressure.

Wonderful. France and Russia are confronting the Triple Alliance,[5] based 'on the existing status quo', with a Dual Alliance which has 'a far loftier principle, namely the maintenance of the treaties!' Or so the papers say. Thus France, wishing to break the Treaty of Frankfurt, declares itself desirous of supporting it with the help of Russia, while Russia, which customarily breaks all treaties, enters into alliance with this self-same France because of the latter's steadfast demeanour. How stupid men such as these must consider the public to whom they address themselves.

Your budget speech was brilliant[6] —to judge by the Vorwärts. Do let us have the stenographic report. The allusion to our soldiers could not have been more apt. Why keep one's mouth shut about things our enemies know as well as we do?

The fact that Carl Hirsch isn't coming is not, to my mind, a disaster.[7] I didn't like to say anything once matters had been settled, but over here I at once remarked that it wouldn't work out. Hirsch is not only pig-headed but also embittered without reason, believing as he does that he was unfairly excluded from the editorship of the Sozialdemokrat; in fact, I believe that his resentment was directed more against Marx and myself than against you people.[8] For, as you will remember, what he wanted was that we should press him to accept, which had never ever crossed our minds. At all events he thereupon ceased to play any active role and has since accumulated such a mass of grievances and crotchets that, if for no other reason, it might, I think, be better were he to void his costiveness elsewhere, after which he will gradually return to a more normal frame of mind and thus again become capable of doing something worthwhile. But I feel sure that Liebknecht and he would not have endured six weeks of each other's company without falling out. Schoenlank, too, has certain bees in his bonnet; so far as I can judge he hasn't nearly enough guts to put up the necessary resistance and will soon chalk up so many sins of omission as to make his chief editor his chief in real earnest. Well, we shall have to wait and see how things go—they can't get very much worse.

You are always comparing the situation in Germany with that of 1787-88; it is far more like that of 1847 in France and the scandals which brought about the downfall of Louis Philippe: Teste, the venal minister, the duc de Praslin, who murdered his wife, an equerry to the king who was caught cheating at cards in the Tuileries, or Fould who paid bribes in high places to get into the Légion D'Honneur, etc., etc. What's odd is the way people in Germany carry on about a bank crisis; for the few tin-pot firms that have gone to the wall are quite outside international trade as such—money brokers to civil servants, officers, landed aristocracy, petty bourgeoisie—to everyone in fact except wholesalers. If Anhalt & Wagener, Diskonto-Kommandit, Deutsche Bank, etc., were to put up their shutters, then it might be permissible to speak of a bank crisis. But even so, things aren't so dusty and, if the cloak falls, the Duke will soon come tumbling after.[9]

What you tell me about the kind of 'comrades' who are now presenting themselves is most interesting and also significant so far as the situation is concerned.[10] They have noticed that we are, to use a reptilian expression, becoming a 'factor' in the state and, since the Jews have more intelligence than the other bourgeois, they are the first to notice this—especially under the impulsion of anti-Semitism—and the first to come over to us. We can only be glad of the fact but, precisely because these chaps are brighter and have, as it were, been thrown back on and schooled in careerism by centuries of oppression, one has to be rather more on the qui vive.

Please will you convey my best thanks to the parliamentary group for their kind telegram of the 28th.[11] As soon as I get the photographs I shall endeavour to pay back in kind all the testimonies of friendship I have received.

Ede tells me you had suggested that he should spend more time at the Society.[12] I am firmly convinced that every minute he spends there would not only be completely wasted but would also discredit the party. He would have to consort with Gilles there and that is completely out of the question. But what he ought to do is frequent the English, get to know the chaps personally and enlighten them about things in Germany by conversing with them; as it is, he sits at home and forms an opinion of local affairs from the accounts he reads in one or at most two newspapers, there being no coffee houses or reading-rooms in his district.

Finally, let me assure you—as expressly requested—that Louise has executed her commission with a dignity worthy of a president of the Reichstag—at the very least; she had no opportunity for making bad jokes since I invariably forestalled her with some of my own. In other respects we were, however, exceedingly merry during the time in question, not least on account of your ostensible admirer[13] who, on the last page, revealed himself to be a 'Junger'[14] desirous of placing you on the shelf. The fellow is really priceless, with his ultra-High German.

Warm regards to Mrs Julie[15] and yourself from Louise and

Your

F.E.

  1. ↑ In Lyons, the ninth congress of the French Workers' Party was held from 26 to 28 November 1891. It adopted a municipal programme and determined the party's tactics for the municipal elections due on 1 May 1892. It also endorsed the composition of the Secretariat of Labour formed in October 1891 (see Note 320).
  2. ↑ Arthur-Auguste Ranc
  3. ↑ The reference is to the 'reptile press', the press dependent on the Bismarck government. The name derives from the 'Reptile Fund', the assets provided to the Elector of Hesse, ex-King George V of Hanover, in compensation for the incorporation of Hanover (an ally of Austria) into Prussia after the Austro-Prussian war. The fund was sequestered after it had become known that the Hesse Elector engaged in anti-Prussian activities in France. In his speech to the Prussian Landtag on 30 January 1869 Bismarck maintained that the fund would be used to combat the intrigues of the former Hanover King and his agents, whom he called 'reptiles'. Actually, a considerable part of the means was used by Bismarck to bribe certain periodicals and individual journalists. The words 'reptile' and 'reptile press' became synonyms of a government-bribed press.
  4. ↑ In the course of a diplomatic tour of Europe in the autumn of 1891, the Russian Foreign Minister N. K. Giers visited Milan, where he had talks with King Umberto I and Prime Minister Rudini on 12 and 13 October. In the opinion of the European press, he tried to persuade Italy to quit the Triple Alliance (see Note 303). On his way back from Denmark in late October 1891 Tsar Alexander III visited the German port of Danzig and Berlin, but evaded a meeting with William II. The pointed omission of a visit to the German Emperor (though a meeting had already been announced in the press) was interpreted by European newspapers, in particular English ones, as evidence of tension between Russia and Germany.
  5. ↑ The Triple Alliance, embracing Germany, Austria-Hungary and Italy, was a military-political bloc directed against France and Russia. It finally took shape in 1882 when Italy joined the Austro-German military alliance, formed in 1879. The Triple Alliance treaty, concluded for five years, was renewed in 1887 and 1891 and automatically extended in 1902 and 1912. The establishment of the Triple Alliance marked the first step towards the division of Europe into two large military camps and ultimately led to the first imperialist world war (1914-18). Italy withdrew from the Alliance at the outbreak of the war and in 1915 joined the powers fighting against Germany and Austria-Hungary.
  6. ↑ Engels means Bebel's speech on the military budget delivered at the Reichstag on 28 November 1891. The speech was reported in Supplement I to Vorwärts, No. 280, 29 November. Taking issue with those deputies who advocated a more numerous army and larger military appropriations on the plea that internal riots army, Bebel said: 'Things are developing to our advantage of themselves, and if you have to raise millions of men, up to the Landsturm (home reserve) of the second call, needless to say there will be hundreds of thousands of Social-Democrats among them.'
  7. ↑ See this volume, p. 299.
  8. ↑ See K. Marx and F. Engels, 'Circular Letter to August Bebel, Wilhelm Liebknecht, Wilhelm Bracke and Others' (present edition, Vol. 24, pp. 253-69).
  9. ↑ Paraphrased from Schiller's Die Verschwörung des Fiesco zu Genua.
  10. ↑ In his letter of 15 November 1891 Bebel named some intellectuals and bourgeois who had declared themselves members of the Social-Democratic Party.
  11. ↑ On 28 November 1891, on the occasion of Engels' birthday, the Reichstag Social-Democratic deputies sent Engels the following message: 'The Social-Democratic group of the German Reichstag wishes its staunch and indefatigable champion many happy returns of the day.'
  12. ↑ Engels means the German Workers' Educational Society in London, which was founded by Karl Schapper, Joseph Moll, Heinrich Bauer and other members of the League of the Just in 1840. After the establishment of the Communist League, its local branches played the leading role in the Society. In 1847 and 1849-50, Marx and Engels took an active part in its work. On 17 September 1850, they and a number of their followers retired from the Society because most of its members had sided with the adventurist sectarian minority (the Willich-Schapper faction) which was challenging the Marx- and Engels-led majority in the Central Authority of the Communist League. Marx and Engels resumed their work in the Society in the late 1850s. When the First International Working Men's Association was founded, the Society—then led, among others, by Friedrich Lessner—became its member. The London Educational Society was closed by the British government in 1918.
  13. ↑ An allusion to an anonymous anti-Socialist pamphlet, August Bebel der Arbeiter-Bismarck. Von einem Socialisten, Berlin, 1890.
  14. ↑ The Erfurt Congress of the Social-Democratic Party of Germany met from 14 to 21 October 1891. It was attended by 258 delegates. The congress was preceded by a sharp ideological struggle between the party's revolutionary hard core and the Right- and Left-wing opportunists, who had stepped up their activities and created the atmosphere of a party crisis in German Social-Democracy. There had been sharp debates at meetings and in the press on the party's programme and tactics, set off by the public pronouncements of Georg von Vollmar, leader of the Bavarian Social-Democrats, who sought to impose an opportunist reformist tactics and lead the party away from class proletarian positions (see Note 270). Vollmar's campaign provided a pretext for fresh attacks on the party (summer and autumn 1891) by the Jungen, a petty-bourgeois semi-anarchist opposition group within German Social-Democracy formed in 1890. Their stronghold being the Social-Democratic organisation of Berlin, they were also known as the Berlin opposition. The group's specific character was determined by students and young literati claiming the role of the party's theoreticians and leaders. Foremost among them were Paul Ernst, Hans Müller, Paul Kampffmeyer, Bruno Wille, Karl Wilderberger and Wilhelm Werner. The Jungen ignored the fact that the repeal of the Anti-Socialist Law had changed the conditions the party was operating in. They denied the need to employ legal forms of struggle, opposed Social-Democracy's participation in parliamentary elections and use of the parliamentary platform and demagogically accused the party and its Executive of protecting the interests of the petty bourgeoisie, of opportunism and of violating party democracy. The leaders of the Berlin opposition levelled especially fierce attacks at the party's leaders—Bebel and Liebknecht. The sectarian anarchist activities of the Jungen held a grave danger to the party's unity. The paramount task facing the Erfurt Congress was to overcome the crisis in the party and consolidate its ranks. The congress discussed the report of the party Executive, the activities of Social-Democratic deputies in the Reichstag, the party's tactics, the draft of its new programme, and various organisational questions. The ideological struggle continued at the congress too, especially over party tactics. A report on this issue was presented by Bebel. He—in his report and speeches—as well as other speakers (above all Singer, Liebknecht and Fischer) gave a resolute rebuff both to the Left and to the Right opportunist elements. By a majority vote the congress endorsed Bebel's draft resolution on tactics. It pointed out that the main objective of the working-class movement was the conquest of political power by the proletariat and that this end would be attained not through a chance concatenation of circumstances but through persevering work with the masses and skillful employment of every form and method of proletarian class struggle. The resolution emphasised that the German Social-Democratic Party was a fighting party employing the traditional revolutionary tactics. Vollmar and his supporters, finding themselves in isolation, were forced to retreat. The congress expelled two leaders of the Jungen—Werner and Wilderberger—from the party for their splitting activities and slander; a number of other Jungen leaders announced their resignation from the party and walked out of the congress. The main achievement of the congress was the adoption of a new programme for German Social-Democracy. A report on it was presented by Liebknecht. The Erfurt Programme being essentially Marxist, was an important step forward compared with the Gotha Programme. The Lassallean reformist dogmas had been dropped. The new programme scientifically substantiated the inevitability of the collapse of capitalism and its replacement with socialism, and pointed out that, in order to be able to restructure society along socialist lines, the proletariat must win political power. At the same time, the programme had serious shortcomings, the principal one being its failure to state that the dictatorship of the proletariat was the instrument of the socialist transformation of society. Also missing were propositions concerning the overthrow of the monarchy and the establishment of a democratic republic, the remoulding of Germany's political system and other important matters. In this respect, the criticisms made by Engels in A Critique of the Draft Social-Democratic Programme of 1891 (see present edition, Vol. 27, pp. 217-34) also apply to the version of the programme adopted in Erfurt. The resolutions of the Erfurt congress showed that Marxism had firmly taken root in Germany's working-class movement.
  15. ↑ Julie Bebel