Socialism: Its Growth and Outcome

CHAPTER XVI

THE PARIS COMMUNE OF 1871, AND THE CONTINENTAL MOVEMENT FOLLOWING IT

IN dealing with the great event of the 196 Paris Commune, we must take for granted a knowledge of the facts, which are to be found in Lissagaray’s work, now translated into English by Mrs. Aveling.

As we have stated before, the International was founded in 1864, under the leadership of Beesly, Marx, and Odger. In 1869, at the Congress of Basel, Marx drew it into the compass of Socialism; and though in England it still remained an indefinite labour body, on the Continent it became at once decidedly Socialistic and revolutionary, 197 and its influence was very considerable.

The progress of Socialism and the spreading feeling of the solidarity of labour was very clearly shown by the noble protest made by the German Socialists161 against the war with France, in the teeth of a “patriotic” feeling so strong in appearance that it might have been expected to silence any objectors from the first. The result of the war seemed to offer at least a chance for action to the rapidly increasing Socialist party, if they could manage to take advantage of it, and get into their hands the political power; accordingly under guidance of the International, the French Socialists determined to take action if an immediate opportunity offered. Neither did the opportunity fail. The final defeat of the French army at Sedan brought on the fall of the Empire, when Republican France might perhaps have made terms with the invaders, whom the men of the Empire had challenged. But a resistance was organised by Gambetta, at 198 the head of a stock-jobbing clique, whose interests, both commercial and political, forbade them to let the war die out, lest they should find themselves face to face with a people determined to be fleeced no longer. In saying the above we do not deny that this sham patriotism was backed up by a wave of genuine patriotic enthusiasm common to the whole people. The resistance, however, was always quite hopeless from a military point of view,and brought the country to the verge of ruin. It also necessarily involved the German siege of Paris, the result of which was to throw a great deal of power into the hands of the city proletariat, since they at least were in earnest in their opposition to the foreign enemy, and the theatrical resistance necessary to the ambition of the political adventurers who posed as their leaders could not have had a decent face to put upon it without their enthusiasm. In October, while the siege was still at its height, a rising headed by Blanqui nearly succeeded in overthrowing the bourgeois domination; and after the siege the possession of arms, especially cannon, by the proletariat, in the face 199 of the disarmed and disorganised army under the bourgeois, afforded the opportunity desired by the Socialists. On the failure of Thiers’ attempt to disarm Paris─whether he expected it to succeed, or only designed it as a trap to enable him to fall with force of arms on the city we will not decide—on this failure the insurrection took place, and the Central Committee, largely composed of members of the International, got into their own hands the executive power, a great deal of which they retained during the whole existence of the Commune. Their position was strengthened by the fact that, apart from their aims towards the economical freedom of the proletariat, they were, in their aspirations towards genuine federalisation, in appearance at least, in accord with the Radicals who wished to see an advanced municipalism brought about.

As the movement progressed, it became more and more obvious that if the resistance to Thiers and the attempt to establish municipal independence for Paris was to succeed, it must be through the exercise of Socialist influence on the proletariat: the Radicals, therefore, were 200 forced by the march of events into alliance with the Socialists. The Socialist element therefore came to the front, and enactments of a distinctly Socialistic nature were passed, involving the suspension of contract, abolition of rents, and confiscation of means of production; and both in these matters and in the decentralisation which was almost the watchword of the Commune, the advance from the proceedings of the earlier revolutionists is clearly marked. Also, although the opportunity for the establishment of the Commune was given by the struggle against foreigners, the international character of its aspirations was shown by the presence of foreigners in its Council, in its offices, and in command of its troops. And though in itself the destruction of the Vendome Column may seem but a small matter, yet considering the importance attached generally, and in France particularly, to such symbols, the dismounting of that base piece of Napoleonic upholstery was another mark of the determination to hold no parley with the old jingo legends.

It should be noted that the risings 201 that took place in other towns in France were not so much vanquished by the strength of the bourgeoisie, which at first found itself powerless before the people, but rather fell through owing to a want of a fuller development of Socialism and a more vigorous proclamation of its principles.

The whole revolt was at last drowned in the blood of the workers of Paris. Certainly the immediate result was to crush Socialism for the time by the destruction of a whole generation of its most determined recruits. Nevertheless the very violence and excess of the bourgeois revenge have, as we can now see, tended to strengthen the progress of Socialism, as they have set the seal of tragedy and heroism on the mixed events of the Commune, and made its memory a rallying-point for all future revolutionists.

The fall of the Commune naturally involved that of the International. The immediate failure of its action was obvious, and blinded people to its indestructible principles. Besides, a period of great commercial prosperity visited the 202 countries of Europe at this time. The French milliards which Germany had won as the prize of war were being turned over and over by the German bourgeois in their merry game of "beggar-my-neighbour.” It was a time now called by the German middle classes themselves the “swindle period.” England was at the height of her era of “leaps and bounds.” Even France, in spite of her being the plundered country, recovered from the condition into which the war had thrown her with a speed that made the plunderer envy her. In short, it was one of those periods which prove to the bourgeois exploiter that he is positively right, in which the bettermost workman grows quite unconscious of the chain that binds him, and is contemptuously regardless of that which lies heavy on the labourer below him, to whom the prosperity or adversity of the rest of the world makes little or no difference.

Internal dissensions, also, were at work within the International, and at the Congress of the Hague in 1872 it was broken up; for though it still 203 existed as a name for the next year or two, the remaining fragments of it did nothing worth speaking of.

In Vienna, in 1871, the movement in sympathy with the Commune became threatening, but was repressed by the authorities, and several of the prominent members of the party were imprisoned for the part they had taken in a Socialist demonstration—amongst others, Johann Most and Andreas Scheu.

For a while after the fall of the Commune the interest in the active side of the movement turns to Germany and Russia. In 1878 Nobiling and Hodel shot at the Emperor William; which event gave the occasion for the attack by Bismarck on the rapidly increasing Socialist party in October 1878, when the repressive laws were enacted which were maintained up to 1890.

The remarkable organisation of the German Socialist party calls here for some notice. Socialism owes its origin in Germany to the Workman's Party founded by Ferdinand Lasalle in 1862. Lasalle was one of those semitic geniuses of huge learning and untiring 204 energy who occasionally spring up to astonish the world. He started the party on a basis of State Socialism involving the resumption by the people of their rights in the land, and there was generally a strong infusion of nationalism in his scheme. Although in the beginning his party excited great enthusiasm, at his death in 1864 it only numbered about five thousand avowed adherents. Four years afterwards the body came under the influence of the International and of Marx, owing to the zeal of Bebel and Liebnecht. Up to the Congress of Eisenach in 1869 the Lasalle party and that of Marx were at daggers drawn. At Gotha in 1875 by a fusion of the two parties the present Social Democratic Party was founded. Since then that party has steadily grown, till it now numbers more than a million and a half of adherents. Owing to this rapid progress and its practical organisation the German party must be said to have taken the lead in Socialism since the time of the Commune.

In Russia the Socialist movement was, on the face of it, mixed up with nationalist and political agitation, which was 205 natural in a country in the bonds of the crudest form of absolutism. Nevertheless the ultimate aim of the party is unmistakable, and the propaganda has been carried on with a revolutionary fervour and purity of devotion which have never been surpassed, if they have ever been equalled. The slaying of the Czar on 13th March 1881, with the tragic scenes that followed it, has been the most dramatic event that the Russian movement has given to the world. The courage and devotion that went to the accomplishment of this lightning stroke, and the fact that it was directed against the acknowledged representative of reactionary oppression, has had great effect on progressively-minded persons by the mere force of sympathy, and has directed men’s thoughts very much to the struggles of the Russians against the tyranny which throttles them.

Footnotes

161. They also protested, at the end of the war, against the annexation of Alsace and Lorraine.Back