Letter to Hermann Ramm, January 25, 1877

Author(s) Friedrich Engels
Written 25 January 1877


First published, in Russian, in Marx-Engels Archives, Vol. I (VI), Moscow, 1929
Printed according to the original
Published in English for the first time in Marx-Engels Collected Works, Volume 45


ENGELS TO HERMANN RAMM

IN LEIPZIG

London, 25 January 1877

Dear Ramm,

Since I do not know whether Liebknecht is back from Offenbach,[1] I am writing to you.

[2] [3]

To begin with, it is nearly a fortnight now since I had any of the Dühring proof-sheets[4] (the last, sent back at once, being Art.VI) and I'm afraid that a consignment may have gone astray.

Next, I had requested Liebknecht[5] to send me the Nos. of the Neue Welt containing my biography of Wolff[6] ; I received the first 4 numbers, but since then it was only from the mutilated Neue Welts used for packing the Vorwärts that I saw that the subsequent part had also appeared. Needless to say, I neither kept a copy of the manuscript here, nor did anything about getting hold of the thing, having taken Liebknecht at his word; would you be so good as to see to this before all numbers have been torn to pieces and used up?

As to the by-elections, we over here are very much in the dark. All we know is that Rittinghausen is 'in', as the English say.[7] A pity that the Christian-Social chaplain, Laaf, was licked; in the first place, it would have been amusing to watch him steering a middle course through the Reichstag and, in the second, since he was evidently doomed to make an ass of himself, he would have stirred up dissension among the working men at Aachen, thus giving us a chance of introducing the thin end of the wedge.

What is most encouraging about the recent elections is the great progress made in the country, particularly in the big farming districts of Schleswig-Holstein and Mecklenburg. Thence it's an easy step to Pomerania and Brandenburg and, once inroads have been made into the schnapps country,[8] it will soon be all up with the Prussian monarchy.

Ever your friend,

F. Engels

  1. ↑ In January 1877, Wilhelm Liebknecht was in Offenbach where he was nominated for the second ballot to the German Reichstag (see also Note 237).
  2. ↑ M. Block, Les théoriciens du socialisme en Allemagne. Extrait du 'Journal des Économistes'.
  3. ↑ É. de Laveleye, 'Le socialisme contemporain en Allemagne. I. Les théoriciens', Revue des deux Mondes, Vol. 17, Paris, 1876.
  4. ↑ This is probably a reference to Dühring's Cursus der Philosophie als streng wissenschaftlicher Weltanschauung und Lebensgestaltung, Leipzig, 1875. Engels criticised the book in his Anti-Dühring (see present edition, Vol. 25, Part I, 'Philosophy').
  5. ↑ Engels' letter has not been found.
  6. ↑ Engels' work Wilhelm Wolff was printed in June-November 1876 in Die Neue Welt of which Wilhelm Liebknecht was the editor (see present edition, Vol. 24).
  7. ↑ After the elections to the German Reichstag held on 10 January 1877 (see Note 237), a second ballot took place in a number of constituencies. As a result, three more Social-Democratic deputies were elected (in addition to the nine who had been successful at the first ballot): August Bebel (later replaced by Wilhelm Bracke), August Kapell and Moritz Rittinghausen.
  8. ↑ See Engels' article 'Prussian Schnapps in the Reichstag'.