Socialism and Democracy in Europe Part 6

"5. Centralization of credit in the hands of the state, by means of a national bank with state capital and an exclusive monopoly.

"6. Centralization of the means of communication and transport in the hands of the state.

"7. Extension of factories and the instruments of production owned by the state: the bringing into cultivation of waste lands, and the improvement of the soil generally, in accordance with a common plan.

"8. Equal liability of all labor. Establishment of industrial armies, especially for agriculture.

"9. Combination of agriculture with manufacturing industries; gradual abolition between town and country, by a more equable distribution of population over the country.

"10. Free education for all children in public schools, combination of education with industrial production," _etc._

Though the "Manifesto" was written in 1848, neither Marx, who lived until 1882, nor Engels, who died in 1895, made any alteration in it, on the ground that it had become "a historical doc.u.ment which we have no longer any right to alter."[3]

"However much the state of things may have altered during the last twenty-five years, the general principles laid down in this manifesto are, on the whole, as correct to-day as ever."[4]

On one very important point, however, they could not refrain from further comment. The revolutionary language in the original draft would be radically mollified if written at the time of the joint preface in 1872. The example of the Paris Commune was disheartening.

It demonstrated that "the working cla.s.s cannot simply lay hold of the ready-made state machinery and wield it for its own purposes."[5]

These, then, were the principles of the international movement of which the "Manifesto" was the supreme expression. When labor had revived from its first stupor, after the hard blows it received in the years of revolution, the "Manifesto" was translated into several Continental languages. With the revival of internationalism, it has been translated into every language of the industrial world, and I am told a j.a.panese and a Turkish edition have been issued. This is a gauge of the spread of international Socialism.

In 1862 a number of French workingmen, visiting the International Exhibition in London, were entertained by the Socialist exiles, and the question of reviving an international movement was discussed. Two years later, in St. Martin's Hall, London, workingmen from various countries organized a meeting and selected Mazzini, the Italian patriot, to draw up a const.i.tution. But the South European view of cla.s.s war was out of accord with the German and French views, and Mazzini's proposals were rejected. Marx then undertook the writing of the address. He succeeded remarkably well in avoiding the giving of offense to the four different elements present, namely, the trade unionists of England, who, being Englishmen, were averse to revolutions; the followers of Proudhon in France, who were then establishing free co-operative societies; the followers of La.s.salle in Germany and Louis Blanc in France, who glorified state aid in co-operation; and the less easily satisfied contingent of Mazzini from Spain and Italy.

Marx's diplomacy and his international vocabulary stood him in good stead. He began the "Address" by a clever rhetorical parallelism.

Gladstone, whose splendor then filled the political heavens, had just delivered a great speech in which he had gloried in the wonderful increase in Britain's trade and wealth. Marx contrasted this growth in riches with the misery and poverty and wretchedness of the English working cla.s.ses. Gladstone's small army of rich bourgeois were adroitly compared with Marx's large army of miserably poor. The growth of wealth, he said, brought no amelioration to the needy. But in this picture of gloom were two points of hope: first, the ten-hour working day had been achieved through great struggles, and it showed what the proletarian can do if he persists in fighting for his rights. Second, Marx alluded to the co-operative achievements of France and Germany as a proof that the laboring man could organize and carry on great industries without the intervention of capitalists. With these two elements of hope before them, the laborers should be of good cheer.

Marx admonished them that they had _numbers_ on their side, and all that is necessary for complete victory is organization. In closing he repeats the battle-cry of '48: "Workingmen of all lands, unite!"

The "statutes," or by-laws[6] were also drawn by Marx. The preamble is a second "Manifesto," in which he reiterates the necessity for international co-operation among workingmen, and concludes: "The First International Labor Congress declares that the International Workingmen's a.s.sociation, and all societies and individuals belonging to it, recognize truth, right, and morality as the basis of their conduct towards one another and their fellowmen, without respect to color, creed, or nationality. This congress regards it as the duty of man to demand the rights of a man and citizen, not only for himself, but for every one who does his duty. No rights without duties, no duties without rights."

The "Address" and the "Statutes" were adopted by the a.s.sociation at its first congress, held in Geneva in September, 1866, where sixty delegates represented the new movement. With the vicissitudes of Marx's International we are not especially concerned here. It met annually in various cities until 1873, when its last meeting was held at Geneva.

Marx had successfully avoided offense to the various elements in his masterly address and preamble. But the organization contained irreconcilable elements more or less jealous of one another. The two extremes were the Anarchists, led by the Russian Bakunin, and the English labor unions. The Anarchists believed in overthrowing everything, the English laborists abhorred violence. Between these two extremes stood Marx's doctrine of evolutionary revolution, as distasteful to the English as it was despised by the Anarchists.

When the congress met at The Hague, in September, 1872, Marx was one of the sixty-five delegates. He had hitherto held himself aloof from the meetings. But here even his magnetic presence could not prevent the breach with Bakunin.[7] There were stormy scenes. The Anarchists were expelled, and the seat of the general council was transferred to New York, where it could die an un.o.bserved death.

Before the final adjournment a meeting was held in Amsterdam. Here Marx delivered a powerful speech characterized by all the arts of expression of which he was master. He compared these humble "a.s.sizes of labor" with the royal conferences of "kings and potentates" who in centuries past had been wont to meet at The Hague "to discuss the interests of their dynasties." He admitted that in England, the United States, and maybe in Holland, "the workmen might attain their goal by peaceful means. But in most European countries force must be the lever of revolution, and to force they must appeal when the time comes."

These were his last personal words to his International, the crystallization of his lifelong endeavor to lead the workingmen's cause. There was one more meeting at Geneva, in 1873; then it perished.

Bakunin's following, renamed the International Alliance of Social Democracy, meanwhile went the way of all violent revolutionists. They took part in the uprisings in Spain in 1873; the rebellion was promptly suppressed, and the alliance came to an end.

During its brief existence the International was the red bogey-man of European courts. The most violent and bloodthirsty ambitions were ascribed to it. Such conservative and careful newspapers as the London _Times_ indulged in the most extreme editorials and news items about the sinister organization that was soon to "bathe the thrones of Europe in blood" and "despoil property of its rights" and "human society of its blessings."

In the light of history, these fears appear ridiculous. The poor, struggling organization that could summon scarcely one hundred members to an international convention was powerful only in the possession of an idea, the conviction of international solidarity. Its plotting handful of Anarchists were a great hindrance to it, and the events of the Commune put the stamp of veracity on the dire things the public press had foretold of its ambitions.

The programs discussed at the various meetings are of more importance to us because they reveal whatever was practical in Marx's organization. For the second meeting, 1866, the following outline was sent out by the general council from London. It was unquestionably prepared by Marx himself.

"1. Organization of the International a.s.sociation; its ends; its means of action.

"2. Workingmen's societies--their past, present, and future: stoppage, strikes--means of remedying them; primary and professional instruction.

"3. Work of women and children in factories, from a moral and sanitary point of view.

"4. Reduction of working hours--its end, bearing, and moral consequences; obligation of labor for all.

"5. a.s.sociation--its principle, its application; co-operation as distinguished from a.s.sociation proper.

"6. Relation of capital and labor; foreign compet.i.tion; commercial treaties.

"7. Direct and indirect taxes.

"8. International inst.i.tutions--mutual credit, paper money, weights, measures, coins, and language.

"9. Necessity of abolishing the Russian influence in Europe by the application of the principle of the right of the people to govern themselves; and the reconst.i.tution of Poland upon a democratic and social basis.

"10. Standing armies and their relation to production.

"11. Religious ideas--their influence upon the social, political, and intellectual movements.

"12. Establishment of a society for mutual help; aid, moral and material, given to the orphans of the a.s.sociation."

This reads more like the agenda of a soph.o.m.ore debating society than the outline of work for an international congress of workingmen. The discussions of the congress were desultory, quite impractical, and often tinged with the factional spirit that ultimately ruptured the a.s.sociation. At its first meeting the discussion of the eight-hour day, the limitation of work for women and children, and the establishing of better free schools took a modern turn. But the French delegates brought forward a proposal to confine the membership in the a.s.sociation to "hand workers." This was to get rid of Marx and Engels, who were "brain workers." Socialism was evidently no more clearly defined then than it is to-day.

Occasionally practical subjects were debated, as the acquiring by the state of all the means of transportation, of mines, forests, and land. But their time was largely taken up in the discussion of general principles, such as "Labor must have its full rights and entire rewards." Or they resolved, as at Brussels in 1868, that producers could gain control of machines and factories only through an indefinite extension of co-operative societies and a system of mutual credit; or, as at Basle the following year, that society had a right to abolish private property in land.

It is apparent to any one who reads the reports of their meetings that very little practical advance had been made since the "Manifesto."

Socialism was still in the vapor of speculation. It had absorbed some practical aspects from the English unions. These were at first interested in the International, and at their national conference in Sheffield, 1868, they even urged the local unions to join it. This interest waned rapidly as they saw the Continental contingent veer towards the Commune.

However, the beginnings of a new movement, a "new Socialism," were distinctly seen in the questions that the English element introduced: the length of the working day, factory legislation, work of women and children. These had been the subject of rigid governmental inquiry.

Marx was thoroughly familiar with these parliamentary findings. They are no small part of the fortifications he built around his theory of social development. But his German training inclined him to the Continental, not the Anglo-Saxon, view of social progress and of politics.

The "Old International," then, was an attempt to spread Marxian doctrines into all lands. As such an attempt it is noteworthy. The Marxian _modus_, however, did not fit the world. Some Socialist writers attribute its failure to the fact that the time was not ripe for Marx's methods. The time will never be ripe for the Marxian method. Marx tried to move everything from one center. He was a German dogmatist. His council was a centralized autocracy, issuing mandates like a general to an army. This is an impossible method of international organization. The center must be supported by the periphery, not the periphery by the center. There could be no proletarian internationalism until there was an organized proletarian nationalism.

Its conceptions of its detailed duties were even cruder than its machinery. The discussions were a blending of pedantic declamation and phosphoric denunciation. Its programs were a mixture of English trade-union realities and Continental vagaries. Such a movement had neither wings nor legs.

But it had an influence, nevertheless, and a very important one. It was the means of bringing the new generation of leaders together, the men who were to make Socialism a practical political force. Even the fact that an international laboring men's society could meet was important. It realized the central idea of Marx, that the labor problem is international. That is the important point. Human solidarity is not ethnic, but inter-ethnic. The "Old International"

was a faltering step toward that solidarity of humanity that has been advanced so rapidly by inventions, by international arbitrations, by treaties of commerce, and every other movement that makes international hostilities every year more difficult.

On Socialism the "International" had at least one beneficial effect.

It cleared its atmosphere of the anarchistic thunder clouds and prepared the way for the present more practical movement. This was largely due to the influence of the English trade unions. They were not inclined toward philosophical dissertations like the Germans, nor brilliant speculative vagaries like the French. Their stolid forms were always on the earth. That Marx was anxious for their support is apparent, and he drove them out of the movement by his indiscreet utterances on the Parisian Commune of 1871.

The "Old International" was a revival of the "Society of the Just,"

tempered with English trade-unionism and tinged with Anarchism; it was also a connecting link between the old and the new Socialism.

The characteristics of the "New Socialism" cropped out at the first meeting of the "New International," as it is called. In the first place, the co-operative movement and the trade-union movement were both amply represented at the Paris meetings, where the "New International" was formed in 1889. This is indicative of the new direction that the economic phase of Socialism has since taken. In the second place, the Socialist congress split into two parties, ostensibly over the question of the credentials of certain delegates, but really over the question that divides Socialists in all countries to-day: Shall Socialists co-operate with other political parties or remain isolated? The Marxian dogmatists believed in isolation; the opportunists or Possibilists believed in co-operating with other parties. There were two congresses. The Marxian congress had 221 French delegates and about 175 from other countries. The Possibilist convention was composed of 91 foreign and 521 French delegates. It was virtually a labor union convention, for over 225 unions were represented. It is of great significance that these two meetings, which divided on a question of political policy, discussed virtually the same questions. They were against war, believed in collectivism, demanded international labor legislation, the eight-hour day, the "day of rest," etc.[8]

Liebknecht, the distinguished German Socialist, who was one of the chairmen of the Marxian convention, wrote in his preface to the German edition of the _Proceedings_ that the Paris meeting began a new era, "and indicated a break with the past." He told the delegates at the convention, "the Old International lives in us to-day." There was a continuity of proletarian ambition. In this respect the old movement was resurrected in the new. But in every other respect the old movement was dead. The abstractions about property and the rights of individuals did not interest the new generation. They were more concerned with wages than wage theories, and in the purchasing power of their wages than in a theory of values. Even the spirit of the cla.s.s consciousness had changed. Marx's organization was the source of the old; national consciousness was the source of the new. The present internationalism is the result of nationalism. The delegates at Paris were representatives; they represented nationalities. One of the rules of the Marxian congress was that votes should be counted "by the head," unless a delegation from any country should unanimously demand "voting by nationalities."

In the twenty years that had elapsed since Bakunin and his conspiracy-loving following had disrupted the "Old International" by their preaching of violence against nationalism, labor had increased with the rapid strides of the increasing industry and commerce of the world. This labor had organized itself into unions and all manner of co-operative and protective a.s.sociations. It had done this by natural compulsion from within, not by a superimposed force from without. They had thereby found their national h.o.m.ogeneity, and were ready to go forward into a great and universal international h.o.m.ogeneity.