labor or how hard they toil, have no capital to back them--that is a
matter which you, Gentlemen, do not need to be told by me, but can
find often enough, unfortunately, in your daily life. Indeed, in many
respects, the capitalist class asserts the supremacy of its special
privilege with even stricter consistency than the nobility of the
Middle Ages did with its land ownership. The instruction of the
people--I mean here of the adult people--was in the Middle Ages the
work of the clergy. Since then the newspapers have assumed this
function; but through the securities a newspaper must give, and still
more through the stamp tax which is laid in our country, as in France
and elsewhere, on newspapers, a daily newspaper has become a very
expensive institution, which cannot be established without very
considerable capital, with the result that, for this very reason, even
the opportunity to mold public opinion, instruct it, and guide it has
become the privilege of the capitalist class.
Were this not the case, you would have much different and very much
better papers. It is interesting to see how early this attempt of the
_bourgeoisie_ to make the press a privilege of capital appears, and in
what frank and undisguised form. On July 24, 1789, a few days after
the capture of the Bastille, during the first days after the middle
class obtained political supremacy, the representatives of the city of
Paris passed a resolution by which they declared printers responsible
if they published pamphlets or sheets by writers _sans existence
connue_ (without visible means of support). The newly won freedom of
the press, then, was to exist only for writers who had visible means
of support. Property thus appears as the condition of the freedom
of the press, indeed of the morality of the writer. The
straightforwardness of the first days of citizen sovereignty only
expresses in a childishly frank manner what is today artfully obtained
by bonding and stamp taxes. With these main characteristic facts
corresponding to our consideration of the Middle Ages we shall have to
be satisfied here.
What we have seen so far are two historical periods, each of which
stands for the controlling idea of a distinct class, which impresses
its own principle upon all institutions of the time.
First, the idea of the nobility, or land ownership, which forms the
controlling principle of the Middle Ages, and permeates all the
institutions of that time.
This period closed with the French Revolution; though, of course,
especially in Germany, where this revolution came about, not through
the people, but in much slower and more complete reforms introduced by
the governments, numerous and important survivals of that first
historical period still exist, preventing to a large extent, even
today, complete control by the capitalist class.
We observed, second, the period beginning with the French Revolution
at the end of the last century, which has capitalism as its principle
and establishes this as the privilege which permeates all social
institutions and determines participation in the public policy. This
period is also, little as external appearances indicate, essentially
at an end.
On February 24, 1848, the first dawn of a new historical period became
visible, for on that day in France--that land in whose mighty internal
struggles the victories as well as the defeats of liberty indicate
victories and defeats for all mankind--a revolution broke out which
placed a workingman at the head of the provisional government, which
declared the principle of the State to be the improvement of the lot
of the working classes, and proclaimed the universal and direct
franchise, through which every citizen who had attained his
twenty-first year, without regard to property, should receive an equal
share in the control of the State and the determination of public
policy. You see, Gentlemen, if the Revolution of 1789 was the
revolution of the _tiers état_ (the third class), this time it is the
fourth class--which in 1789 was still undistinguished from the third
class and seemed to coincide with it--that now attempts to establish
its own principle as the controlling one of society and to make it
pervade all institutions.
But here, in the case of the supremacy of the fourth class, we find
the tremendous distinction that this class is the final and
all-inclusive disinherited class of humanity, which can set up no
further exclusive condition, either of legal or actual kind, neither
nobility, land ownership, nor capital, which it might establish as a
new privilege and carry through the institutions of society.
Workingmen we all are, so far as we have the desire to make ourselves
useful to human society in any way whatsoever.
This fourth class, in whose bosom therefore no possible germ of a new
order of privilege is concealed, is for that very reason synonymous
with the whole human race. Its class is, in truth, the class of all
humanity, its liberty is the liberty of humanity itself, its
sovereignty is the sovereignty of all. Whoever hails the principle of
the working class, in the sense in which I have developed it, as a
controlling principle of society, utters no cry which separates and
makes hostile to another the classes of society. He utters, rather, a
cry of reconciliation, a cry which includes all society, a cry for the
leveling of all hostilities among the social strata, a cry of accord,
in which all should join who do not wish privilege and the oppression
of the people by privileged classes, a cry of love, which, ever since
it spoke for the first time from the heart of the people, will always
remain the true voice of the people, and, on account of its meaning,
will still be a cry of love, even if it sounds the battle-cry of the
people.
The principle of the working class as a controlling principle of
society we have still to consider from three points of view--first, as
to the formal means of its realization; second, as to its moral
significance; third, as to its political conception of public policy.
The formal means for carrying out this principle is the universal and
direct franchise already discussed--I say the universal and direct
franchise, not merely the general franchise such as we had in 1848.
The introduction in elections of two steps--of voters and of
electors--is nothing but an artful means introduced purposely with the
intention of thwarting, so far as possible, the will of the people in
the elections. To be sure, the universal and direct franchise will
be no magic wand, Gentlemen, which can protect you from temporary
mistakes. We have seen in France, in the years 1848 and 1849, two
unfavorable elections in succession, but the universal and direct
franchise is the only means which automatically corrects, in course of
time, the mistakes and temporary wrong to which this may lead. It is
that legendary lance which itself heals the wounds it makes. In the
course of time it is impossible, with universal and direct franchise,
for chosen representatives not to be a completely faithful reflection
of the people who have elected them. The people, therefore, at every
time will consider universal and direct franchise as an indispensable
political weapon, and as the most fundamental and important of their
demands.
Let us now glance at the moral bearing of this social principle which
we are considering.
Perhaps the idea of the lowest classes of society as the controlling
principle of society and of the State may appear very dangerous and
immoral, one which threatens to expose morality and culture to the
danger of being overrun by a "modern barbarism."
And it would be no wonder if this thought should appear so at present.
For even public opinion--I have already indicated by what means,
namely, through the newspapers--receives today its imprint from the
coining-die of capital and from the hands of the privileged capitalist
class.
Nevertheless this fear is only a prejudice; and it can be proved, on
the contrary, that this thought would represent the highest moral
progress and triumph which the world's history has shown. That view is
a prejudice, I say, and it is the prejudice of the present time, which
is still controlled by privilege.
At another time--at the time of the first French Republic of 1793,
which was necessarily forced to fail from its own lack of
clearness--the opposite prejudice prevailed. At that time it was held
as a dogma that all the upper classes were immoral and only the
common people were good and moral. This view is due to Rousseau. In
the new Declaration of Human Rights which the French Convention, that
powerful constitutional assembly, published, it is even set forth in a
special article--Article 19--which reads "_Toute institution, qui ne
suppose le peuple bon et le magistrat corruptible, est vicieuse_."
(Every institution which does not assume that the people is good and
the magistracy corruptible is faulty.) You see that is exactly the
opposite of the confidence which is called for today, according to
which there is no greater crime than to doubt the good-will and the
virtue of the magistrates, while the people are considered on
principle a sort of dangerous beast and centre of corruption.
At that time the opposite dogma even went so far that almost anybody
whose coat was in good repair appeared for that very reason corrupt
and suspicious, and virtue and purity and patriotic morality were
believed to be found only in those who had no good coat. It was the
period of _sans-culottism._
This point of view had really a foundation of truth, which, however,
appears in a false and perverted form. Now there is nothing more
dangerous than a principle which appears in false and perverted form;
for, whatever attitude you take toward it, you are sure to fare badly.
If you adopt this truth in its false, perverted form, then, at certain
times, this will produce the most terrible devastation, as was the
case in the period of _sans-culottism._ If, on account of the false
form, you reject the whole proposition as false, you fare still worse,
for you have rejected a truth, and, in the case which we are
considering, a truth without whose recognition no wholesome progress
is possible in modern political affairs.
There is therefore no other procedure possible than to overcome the
false and perverted form of that proposition, and to try to establish
clearly its true meaning.
Current public opinion is, as I said, disposed to stamp the whole
proposition as entirely false and as a declamation of the French
Revolution and of Rousseau. However, if this unreceptive attitude
toward Rousseau and the French Revolution were still possible, it
would be entirely impossible with reference to one of the greatest
German philosophers (Fichte), the one hundredth anniversary of whose
birth this State will celebrate next month, one of the most powerful
thinkers of all nations and all times.
Fichte also declares expressly and literally that, with the rising
social scale, a constantly increasing moral deterioration is found,
and that "inferiority of character increases in proportion to the
higher social class."
The final reason of these propositions Fichte has nevertheless not
developed. He gives as the reason of this corruption the selfishness
of the upper classes; but then the question must immediately arise
whether selfishness is not also to be found in the lower classes, or
why less in these classes. Now it must immediately appear as a strong
contradiction that less selfishness should prevail in the lower
classes than in the upper, who have in large measure the advantage of
them in the well-recognized moral elements, culture and education.
The real reason, and the explanation of this contradiction, which
appears at first so strong, is the following:
For a long time, as we have seen, the development of nations, the
tendency of history, has been toward a constantly extending abolition
of the privileges which guarantee to the higher classes their position
as higher and ruling classes. The wish for perpetuation of these, or
personal interest, brings therefore every member of the upper classes
who has not once for all, by a wide outlook upon his whole personal
existence, raised himself above such considerations (and you will
understand, Gentlemen, that these can form only very unusual
exceptions) into a position which is from principle hostile to the
progress of the people, to the extension of education and science, to
the advance of culture, to all tendencies and victories of historical
life.
This opposition of the personal interest of the upper classes to the
progress of culture in the nation produces the great and inevitable
immorality of the upper classes. It is a life whose daily requirements
you only need picture to yourselves in order to feel the deep decline
of character to which it must lead. To be obliged daily to take an
attitude of opposition to everything great and good, to bewail its
success, to rejoice at its failures, to check its further progress, to
make futile or to curse the progress which has already been made, is
like a continual existence in the enemy's country; and this enemy is
the moral fellowship of the whole country in which you live, for which
all true morality urges support. It is a continual existence, I say,
in an enemy's country. This enemy is your own people, who must be
looked upon and treated as an enemy, and this hostility must, at least
in the long run, be craftily concealed and more or less artfully
veiled.
From this arises the necessity either of doing what is against the
voice of your own conscience, or of stifling this voice from the force
of custom in order not to be annoyed by it, or, finally, of never
knowing this voice, never knowing anything better or having anything
better than the religion of your own advantage.
This life, Gentlemen, therefore leads necessarily to a complete lack
of appreciation and a contempt for all ideal efforts, to a pitying
smile when the great word "ideal" is even mentioned; to a deep lack of
appreciation and of sympathy for everything beautiful and great; to a
complete transformation of all moral elements in us into the one
passion of selfish opportunism and the pursuit of pleasure.
This conflict between personal interest and the cultural development
of the nation is, fortunately, not to be found in the lower classes of
society.
In the lower classes, to be sure, there is, unfortunately, selfishness
enough, much more than there should be; but this selfishness, if it
exists, is the fault of individuals and not the inevitable fault of
the class.
Even a very slight instinct tells the members of the lower classes
that, so far as each one of them depends merely upon himself and
merely thinks of himself, he can hope for no considerable improvement
of his situation; but so far as the lower classes of society aim at
the improvement of their condition as a class, so far does this
personal interest, instead of opposing the course of history and
therefore of being condemned to the aforesaid immorality, coincide in
its tendency completely with the development of the people as a whole,
with the victory of the ideal, with the progress of culture, with the
vital principle of history itself--which is nothing else than the
development of liberty. Or, as we have already seen, their cause is
the cause of all humanity.
You are therefore in the fortunate position, Gentlemen, instead of
being compelled to be dead to the idea, of being destined rather,
through your own personal interests, to a greater receptiveness for
it. You are in the fortunate position that that which forms your own
true personal interest coincides with the throbbing heart-beat of
history--with the active, vital principle of moral development. You
can therefore devote yourself to historical development with personal
passion and be sure that the more fervent and consuming this passion
is, the more moral is your position, in the true sense which I have
explained to you.
These are the reasons why the control of the fourth class over the
State must produce a fullness of morality and culture and knowledge
such as never yet existed in history.
But still another reason points in the same direction, which again is
most intimately connected with all the considerations which we have
stated and forms their keystone.
The fourth class has not only a different formal political principle
from the capitalist class--namely, the universal direct franchise in
place of the property qualification of the capitalist class; it has,
further, not only through its social position a different relation to
moral forces than the upper classes, but also, and partly in
consequence of this, a conception of the moral purpose of the State
entirely different from that of the capitalist class. The moral idea
of the capitalist is this--that nothing whatsoever is to be guaranteed
to any individual but the unimpeded exercise of his faculties.
If we were all equally strong, equally wise, equally educated, and
equally rich, this idea might be regarded as a sufficient and a moral
one; but since we are not so, and cannot be so, this thought is not
sufficient, and therefore, in its consequences, leads necessarily to a
serious immorality; for its result is that the stronger, abler, richer
man exploits the weaker and becomes his master.
The moral idea of the working class, on the other hand, is that the
unimpeded and free exercise of individual faculties by the individual
is not sufficient, but that in a morally adjusted community there must
be added to it solidarity of interests, mutual consideration, and
mutual helpfulness in development.
In contrast to such a condition the capitalist class has this
conception of the moral purposes of the State--that it consists
exclusively and entirely in protecting the personal liberty of the
individual and his property.
This is a policeman's idea, Gentlemen--a policeman's idea because the
State can think of itself only in the guise of a policeman whose whole
office consists in preventing robbery and burglary. Unfortunately this
conception is to be found, in consequence of imperfect thinking, not
only among acknowledged liberals, but, often enough, even among many
supposed to be democrats. If the capitalist class were to carry their
thought to its logical extreme they would have to admit that,
according to their idea, if there were no thieves or robbers the State
would be entirely unnecessary.
The fourth class conceives of the purpose of the State in a quite
different manner, and its conception of it is the true one.
History is a struggle with nature--that is, with misery, with
ignorance, with poverty, with weakness, and, accordingly, with
restrictions of all kinds to which we were subject when the human race
appeared in the beginning of history. A constantly advancing victory
over this weakness--that is the development of liberty which history
portrays.
In this struggle we should never have taken a step forward, nor should
we ever take another, if we had carried it on, or tried to carry it
on, as individuals, each for himself alone.
It is the State which has the office of perfecting this development of
freedom, and of the human race to freedom. The State is this unity of
individuals in a moral composite--a unity which increases a
millionfold the powers of all individuals who are included in this
union, which multiplies a millionfold the powers which are at the
command of them all as individuals.
The purpose of the State, then, is not to protect merely the personal
liberty of the individual and the property which, according to the
idea of the capitalist, he must have before he can participate in the
State; the purpose of the State is, rather, through this union to put
individuals in a position to attain objects, to reach a condition of
existence which they could never reach as individuals, to empower them
to attain a standard of education, power, and liberty which would be
utterly impossible for them, one and all, merely as individuals. The
object of the State is, accordingly, to bring the human being to
positive and progressive development--in a word, to shape human
destiny, i.e., the culture of which mankind is capable, into actual
existence. It is the training and development of the human race for
freedom.
Such is the real moral nature of the State--its true and higher task.
This is so truly the case that for all time it has been carried out
through the force of circumstances, by the State, even without its
will, even without its knowledge, even against the will of its
leaders.
But the working class, the lower classes of society in general, have,
on account of the helpless position in which their members find
themselves as individuals, the sure instinct that just this must be
the function of the State--the aiding of the individual, by the union
of all, to such a development as would be unobtainable by him merely
as an individual.
The State then, brought under the control of the idea of the working
class, would no longer be driven on, as all states have been up to
this time, unconsciously and often reluctantly, by the nature of
things and the force of circumstances; but it would make this moral
nature of the State its task, with the greatest clearness and complete
consciousness. It would accomplish with ready willingness and the most
complete consistency that which, up to this time, has been forced only
in the dimmest outlines from the opposing will, and just for this
reason it would necessarily promote a nourishing of intellect, a
development of happiness, education, prosperity, and liberty, such as
would stand without example in the world's history, in comparison with
which the most lauded conditions in earlier times would drop into a
pale shadow.
It is this which must be called the political idea of the working
class, its conception of the purpose of the State, which, as you see,
is just as different, and in a perfectly corresponding manner, from
the conception of the purpose of the State in the capitalist class as
the principle of the working class--a share of all in the
determination of public policy, or universal suffrage--is from the
corresponding principle of the capitalist class--the property
qualification.
The line of thought here developed is therefore what must be
pronounced the idea of the working class. It is that which I had in
view when, at the beginning, I spoke of the connection between the
particular period of history in which we live and the idea of the
working class. It is this period, beginning with February, 1848, which
has the task of bringing such a political idea to realization, and we
may congratulate ourselves that we have been born in a time which is
destined to see the accomplishment of this most glorious work of
history, and in which we have the privilege of lending a helping hand.
But for all who belong to the working class there follows from what I
have said the duty of an entirely new attitude. Nothing is more
effective in impressing upon a class a dignified and deeply moral
stamp than the consciousness that it is destined to be the ruling
class; that it is called upon to elevate the principle of its class to
the principle of the whole historical period; to make its idea the
leading truth of the whole of society, and so, in turn, to shape
society into a reflection of its own character. The lofty historical
honor of this destiny must lay hold upon all your thoughts. It is no
longer becoming to you to indulge in the vices of the oppressed, or
the idle distractions of the thoughtless, or even the harmless
frivolity of the insignificant. You are the rock upon which the church
of the present is to be built.