Letter to Friedrich Adolph Sorge, December 21, 1872

Author(s) Karl Marx
Written 21 December 1872


First published in Briefe und Auszüge aus Briefen von ]oh. Phil. Becker, Jos. Dietzgen, Friedrich Engels, Karl Marx u. A. an F. A. Sorge und Andere, Stuttgart, 1906
Published in English in Marx-Engels Collected Works, Volume 44


MARX TO FRIEDRICH ADOLPH SORGE[1]

IN HOBOKEN

[London,] 21 December 1872

Dear Sorge,

Just a few words in great haste. The ostensible majority on the British Federal Council (consist- ing to a very large extent of SHAM SECTIONS numbering a few individuals and founded by that scoundrel Hales merely for the purpose of sending delegates) has SECEDED from the minority (which alone represents the large English sections in London, as well as in Manchester, Birkenhead, etc.).[2] The fellows secretly put together a circular to the Federation[3] (will be sent to you), (dated the 10th of this month), in which they summon the sections to a congress in London to make common cause with the Jurassians, with whom Hales has kept up contact ever since The Hague.

Our people—who now constitute
the only legal
Federal Council—at once sent out printed postcards to all the sections, advising them to delay any decision until they had received their counter-manifesto, to consult about which they all assembled in my house yesterday (to draw up the main points). You will get it

without delay.3 It will be printed at the beginning of next week. They will also adopt a formal resolution to recognise the Hague Congress[4] and the General Council.

At the same time Engels, at the request of one of the Manchester sections, has prepared for them a reply[5] to the circular of the scoundrels (who include among their number that vain idiot Jung, who has been unable to stomach the removal of the General Council from London and who has for a long time now been Hales' TOOL). They will receive it in their meeting today and will print it without delay.

My view is that you should confine yourselves to the role of observers as much as possible for the time being, and leave the battle to the sections on the spot. In the meantime of course circulars like the one to Spain that I found in the Emancipaciân'[6]

i 644 are very good.

Apropos. On my advice
The
International
Herald
and its proprietor, Riley (a member of the Federal Council), have gone independent.[7] We shall probably agree a contract whereby we shall publish our own international supplement to it once a week. I am sending you a copy today in which Engels and I open a polemic against Hales et Co.[8]

As for Poland, your letter cannot be sent there. The old General Council was only able to obtain Poland's accession on the condition (essential, given the situation in the country) that it dealt exclusively with Wroblewski, who lets us know what he thinks would be appropriate or necessary.

In this situation you have no choice. You must grant Wröblewski the same unlimited authority as we did, or else renounce Poland's membership.[9]

Because of the French translation,[10] which makes me more work than if I had to do it without the translator, I am so overworked that I have not been able to write to you, as I have wanted for such a long time.

Cuno has promised to provide details of the meeting of the Committee of Enquiry in The Hague.[11] Tell him that if he does not do so immediately, we cannot wait for him any longer and that his personal honour is at stake in the matter.

With best wishes from the whole family.

Your

Karl Marx

  1. ↑ On 19 December 1870 The Times published Gladstone's letter, dated 15 December, which announced an amnesty of the condemned Fenians (on the Fenians see Note 6). However, this amnesty was hedged round with numerous reservations, which caused Engels to compare it with the shabby amnesty of political prisoners announced in Prussia in January 1861 on the occasion of William Fs accession to the throne.
  2. ↑ After the Hague Congress the reformist wing of the British Federal Council refused to recognise the Congress resolutions. To counter the reformists' actions, the revolutionary wing of the Council (Samuel Vickery, William Riley, George Milner, Frederick Lessner, Eugène Dupont and others) vigorously supported Marx and Engels. In early December 1872 a split occurred; the wing of the Council that remained loyal to the Hague Congress resolutions was established as the British Federal Council in late December 1872.
    The British Federal Council existed until early 1874.
  3. ↑ 'To the Branches, Sections and Members of the British Federation of the International Working Men's Association'.
  4. ↑ On 19 July 1872 at the meeting of the General Council Executive Committee (Sub-Committee; see Note 435), Engels was instructed to prepare the financial report for the Hague Congress covering the period since the London Conference in September 1871. The report was read out by Engels at the Hague Congress sitting of 7 September 1872, and unanimously approved.
    Marx and Engels arrived at The Hague to take part in the Congress on 1 September 1872. On 8 September they travelled to Amsterdam, where they took part in the meeting marking the closure of the Congress. Engels returned to London on 12 September, and Marx around 17 September 1872.
    The Fifth Congress of the International Working Men's Association was held on 2-7 September 1872 in The Hague and attended by 65 delegates from 15 national organisations. Its decision to include in the General Rules (as Article 7a) the major tenet on the conquest of political power by the proletariat, and its resolutions relating to Administrative Regulations signified a victory for Marxism. The Congress took stock of the struggle Marx, Engels and their followers had waged for years against petty-bourgeois sectarianism in the workers' movement, in whatever guise it appeared, most notably against Bakuninism; Mikhail Bakunin and James Guillaume, the anarchist leaders, were expelled from the International. The resolutions of the Hague Congress laid the groundwork for the future formation of independent political parties of the working class on a national level.
  5. ↑ F. Engels, 'The Manchester Foreign Section to All Sections and Members of the British Federation'.
  6. ↑ 'Consejo General. A los miembros de la Asociacion en Espana', La Emancipation, No. 78, 14 December 1872.
  7. ↑ In conformity with the agreement signed by the publisher and proprietor of n The International Herald William Riley and the British Federal Council, from 11 May 1872 (No. 6) the paper functioned as the Council's official organ. It was at Marx's suggestion that Riley broke the agreement on 30 November 1872 and refused to give the reformist majority of the British Council an opportunity to use the newspaper against the General Council. After the revolutionary wing of the British Federal Council formed a new Council in late December 1872 (see Note 643), the paper resumed its functions as the Council's mouthpiece.
    The Hague Congress resolutions were published in The International Herald, No. 37, 14 December 1872. Reports on the International's activities on the Continent written by Engels were published between mid-January and mid-February 1873 (see present edition, Vol. 23, pp. 409-13).
  8. ↑ K. Marx and F. Engels, 'To the Editor of The International Herald'.
  9. ↑ By a decision of 2 February 1872, Walery Wröblewski, who from October 1871 and throughout 1872 had been Corresponding Secretary for Poland of the London General Council, was appointed representative for Poland by the New York General Council.
  10. ↑ 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 agree ment 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 edi tion 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.
  11. ↑ At the very first sittings of the Hague Congress a question was raised on the Bakuninist Alliance of Socialist Democracy as a secret sectarian organisation within the International. On the proposal put by Marx and other delegates, the sitting of 5 September appointed a special committee to inquire into the secret activities of the Alliance. Its members were Theodor Cuno, Roch Splingard, Lucain (Frédéric Potel), Paul Vichard and Walter (L. Van Heddeghem). On 5 and 6 September the Congress heard the evidence given by Marx, Wroblewski, Dupont, Serraillier, Guillaume, Zhukovsky, Morago Gonzalez, Marselau, Alerini, and Farga Pellicer. Engels submitted to the committee a report on the Alliance (see present edition, Vol. 23, pp. 228-38).
    Due to the torrent of incoming documents and a large volume of evidence, the committee could not complete the investigation but, on the basis of the material it had managed to examine, arrived at the conclusion that the Alliance was incompatible with the International, and on 7 September submitted a proposal to the Congress that Bakunin, Guillaume, Schwitzguébel, Malon, Marchand, and Bousquet be expelled from the International Working Men's Association. (The committee's report was later published in La Liberte, No. 42, 20 October 1872.) The Congress adopted the proposal on the expulsion of Bakunin and Guillaume, and passed a decision to make public the documents on the Alliance the committee had at its disposal. The committee, however, was unable to carry through this decision. The documents were sent to Marx and Engels in London and formed the basis for the pamphlet The Alliance of Socialist Democracy and the International Working Men's Association (see Note 623).