Letter to Wilhelm Liebknecht, May 7, 1872

Author(s) Friedrich Engels
Written 7 May 1872


First published, in Russian, in Marx-Engels Archives, Vol. I (VI), Moscow, 1932
Published in English for the first time in Marx-Engels Collected Works, Volume 44


ENGELS TO WILHELM LIEBKNECHT

IN LEIPZIG

London, 7 May 1872

Dear Liebknecht,

I see now where your mistrust of Cuno stems from: you thought he was an agent of Becker's[1] who had come on a mission to lead the German International back into the arms of its mother-section in Geneva.[2] This was quite unnecessary. When Cuno was in Chemnitz,[3] he could have been enrolled as a member there and then, if you had not treated the International so platonically. In Milan, since he did not have our address, he turned to the only one known to him, that of Becker, and Becker, having admitted him, directed him to us. So just because Becker had once experienced the desire to annex Germany for himself, and because he may still intrigue a little here and there, you have to suspect every honest fellow who has had to turn to Becker because you were unwilling to act! I shall not believe your allegations about his boastfulness until I see proof; I have far less confidence in your correspondents in Nuremberg and elsewhere than I have in Cuno, who has never tried to pull the wool over our eyes, but has always reported more truthfully than most other people. Cuno's father is a Prussian official in Düsseldorf who simply threw him out; now he is stuck without a penny to his name. His possessions and those of his father are two different things altogether.

Enclosed an article by Lafargue from the Emancipation; you will have someone or other who knows enough Spanish to translate it.[4] Lafargue is doing a terrific amount of work in Spain and very skilfully too. The report from the Liberté on the congress in Saragossa was also by him. Incidentally, do not forget to publish the second report, the one in the previous issue of the 'Liberté', in which he unmasks the secret intrigues of the Bakuninists and describes the spectacular victory gained over them by our supporters there.[5]

This was the decisive defeat for that pig-headed Bakunin. The Emancipation is now the best paper we have. These Bakuninists are jackasses. The Spaniards have a very good organisation, one which has stood the test with flying colours precisely in the last 6 months, and now these fools come along and imagine that they can seduce people with their phrases about autonomy and get them to dissolve their organisation to all intents and purposes.

You ought to make more use of The Eastern Post; the information we make available there is truly of greater interest than the dogmatic legalistic waffle of Mr Acollas about the best of all possible constitutions.[6]

I still believe that the conviction will be quashed. In the first place, too many formal errors have been made, and secondly, the trial has already caused far too much of a rumpus.[7] Bismarck must surely perceive that he has gone too far and that quashing the sentence will be more advantageous for him than confirming it.

To the best of my knowledge, Stefanoni has not published your letter. I have not received all the issues of the Libero Pensiero and unfortunately your letter arrived in Italy at the very moment when all our papers I had sent it to folded up simultaneously. As for Büchner, you only need glance at his last would-be socialist production to see the envy and hatred the little cripple feels for Marx, whom he plunders and distorts without ever mentioning him by name.[8] And I stick to my belief that it is he who has filled Stefanoni's head with all that junk. That he is on good terms with you is something he shares with Malon and many others who cherish a mortal hatred for us.

I am sending you today's Daily News with a delightful account of the behaviour of the German professors and students in Alsace and the reception given them by the Alsatians. A description of the German student is enclosed.[9] Both reports are by Major Forbes, the same man who was with the Saxons before Paris and was, at the time, beside himself with admiration for the German officers and soldiers, i.e. if anything he is prejudiced in favour of the Germans. You should make use of these descriptions of the representatives of 'German culture'; they are striking proof as to how threadbare that 'culture' of the bourgeoisie has become, and how ludicrous its official spokesmen.[10]

As soon as I have time I shall write you an article on the housing shortage and against the absurd Proudhonist stories that have appeared in a series of articles on the subject in the Volksstaat.[11]

Our reply to the Jurassians[12] is still in the press. The devil take all these co-operative printers.

There is nothing to tell you about the Congress. Where it will take place can only be decided at the last moment.[13] That it will take place, you know already.

The arrest of our people in Denmark will be of enormous advantage to us and will not do much harm to the victims.[14] Denmark is not Saxony. Unfortunately, I do not know who has been arrested and so am forced to interrupt the correspondence.

The Emancipation now regularly publishes extracts from the Volksstaat. Laura is looking after it, so make sure that the paper is sent there regularly.

In Belgium the Brussels Federal Council has let everything go to rack and ruin; the two decent people we have there do not have sufficient energy to intervene. The workers in the provinces are much superior, but Brussels is the rottenest soil of all and as long as the centre is there it is unlikely that anything decent can develop. Hins has gone off to Verviers and since then the Liberté is much more accessible, so that is a positive gain.

Give our best wishes to your wife[15] and Bebel. You will have heard that Jenny Marx is engaged to Longuet. The first instalments of the 2nd edition of Capital[16] are due in the next few days and so is the French edition.[17] We have already seen the proofs.

Your

F. E.

What Lafargue says about Büchner is rubbish, of course. He is not sufficiently well informed about such details.

  1. ↑ Johann Philipp Becker
  2. ↑ See this volume, pp. 370-72.
  3. ↑ Modern name: Karl-Marx-Stadt.
  4. ↑ In his letter, John Hales proposed the establishment of direct contacts between the British and the Belgian federation and accused the old General Council of 'authoritarianism'. This was in fact a declaration of support for the anarchists' campaign against the General Council.
  5. ↑ This is a reference to Lafargue's reports on the Saragossa Congress of the Spanish Federation which appeared in La Liberté, Brussels. The first report, dated 9 April, was printed in No. 17 of 28 April 1872, and also carried by Der Volksstaat, No. 36, 4 May 1872. The second report, 'Congrès de Saragosse', written on 12 April, contained revelations about the secret Alliance and was published in La Liberté, No. 18, 5 May, and reprinted, in part, by Der Volksstaat, No. 41, 22 May 1872. On Lafargue's exaggeration of the successes scored by the General Council supporters at the Saragossa congress, see Note 489.
  6. ↑ Der Volksstaat, Nos. 35 and 36, 1 and 4 May 1872, printed the first two instalments of the article by the French lawyer Emile Acollas translated as 'Die Republik und die Gegenrevolution' (first published in the Suisse Radicale, and later as a pamphlet).
  7. ↑ Following the arrest of Bebel, Liebknecht and Hepner (17 December 1870), Bismarck's government started preparations for a trial of the leaders of the Social-Democratic Workers' Party, who were charged with 'high treason' (see Note 134). The trial was held in Leipzig between 11 and 26 March 1872. Though the charges brought against them had not been proved, Bebel and Liebknecht were condemned to two-year imprisonment in a fortress (with the deduction of the two months they had spent in prison before the trial); Hepner was acquitted. Following the trial in Leipzig, early in July 1872 Bebel was again brought before the court 'for insulting His Majesty', which he had allegedly done when addressing workers in Leipzig. Bebel was sentenced to additional 9 months in prison and deprived of his seat in the Reichstag.
  8. ↑ This presumably refers to L. Büchner's book Die Stellung des Menschen in der Natur in Vergangenheit, Gegenwart und Zukunft.
  9. ↑ [A. Forbes,] 'The Opening of the Strasburg University. The Academical Excursion', The Daily News, No. 8120, 7 May 1872.
  10. ↑ Liebknecht used the materials received from Engels in the 'Politische Uebersicht' column of Der Volksstaat, No. 40, 18 May 1872.
  11. ↑ Der Volksstaat, Nos. 10-13, 15 and 19 of 3, 7, 10, 14 and 21 February and 6 March 1872, reprinted from the Austrian workers' newspaper Volkswille a series of anonymous articles under the heading 'Die Wohnungsfrage'. The author of the articles was a doctor of medicine, the Proudhonist Arthur Mülberger. On 22 May Engels sent Liebknecht his reply to Mülberger's articles, which formed Part I of his work The Housing Question (see present edition, Vol. 23, pp. 315-37).
  12. ↑ K. Marx and F. Engels, Fictitious Splits in the International.
  13. ↑ On 11 June 1872, on Marx's suggestion, the General Council resolved to convene a regular Congress in Holland on 2 September 1872 and decided on the principal item on the agenda, the consolidation of the International's organisation (revision of the General Rules and Administrative Regulations). At its next meeting on 18 June the Council decided on The Hague as the venue for the Congress and appointed a special commission (Engels, Edouard Vaillant, Joseph MacDonnel) to prepare an official announcement of the forthcoming Congress. The announcement was written by Engels and despatched to The International Herald, which published it on 29 June 1872 (see present edition, Vol. 23, pp. 170-73).—325, 366, 372, 374, 376, 392, 396, 398, 401, 404, 407, 409, 411-13, 415, 417, 418, 422, 425, 426
  14. ↑ A reference to the arrest of members of the Danish Federal Council of the International, including Louis Pio, editor of the Socialisten, Harald Brix and Paul Geleff, which took place in the night from 4 to 5 May 1872. They were charged with the propagation of socialist ideas 'threatening public order'. In March 1873 the Danish court sentenced the local leaders of the International to various terms of imprisonment.
  15. ↑ Natalie Liebknecht.
  16. ↑ In early February 1871, at Marx's request, Harney sent a written inquiry to the General Land Office in Washington (see The Harney Papers. Ed. by F. G. Black and R. M. Black, Van Gorcum and Co., Assen, 1969, pp. 267-69).
  17. ↑ The surviving manuscript copy of the letter does not bear the name of the addressee. However, its contents and Marx's correspondence on the subject indicate that it was addressed to the heads of the Lachâtre publishing house in Paris. On 13 February 1872 Marx received a reply from the manager Juste Vernouillet, who informed him about the despatch of copies of the agreement on the publication of the French translation of Volume I of Capital. The agreement was signed on 15 February by Marx on one side, and Maurice Lachâtre and Juste Vernouillet on the other. It stipulated that the French edition was to be published in 44 instalments, and sold five instalments at a time. The French authorised edition of Volume I of Capital was published between 17 September 1872 and November 1875. The translation was done by Joseph Roy, who began in February 1872 and completed work in late 1873. The quality of the translation largely failed to satisfy Marx; besides, he was convinced that the original needed to be revised to adapt it to French readers.