"Neue Rheinische Zeitung" — Berlin Debates on the Agreement

Programme of the Radical Democratic Party and of the Left at Frankfurt

Contents

Debates on the Agreement

Page numbers refer to: Karl Marx — Friedrich Engels — Werke, Vol. 5, pp. 44–47

Berlin Debates on the Agreement

["Neue Rheinische Zeitung" No. 7, June 7, 1848]

Cologne
, June 6. The
proceedings for the
agreement
etc. are making most gratifying progress in Berlin. Motions upon
motions are tabled, most of them even five or six times over, so that they do not go
astray on the long journey through the sections and commissions. Preliminary questions,
subsidiary questions, intermediate questions, supplementary questions and main questions are
raised on every occasion in the most abundant quantity. At each of these big and small
questions there regularly ensues an informal conversation “from the floor” with the President,
the ministers, etc., providing a welcome resting point between the strenuous labour of the
“great debates”. Those nameless conciliators whom the stenographer usually designates
as a “voice” are particularly fond of expressing their opinion in such cosy discussions.
These “voices” are, moreover, so proud of their right to vote that, as happened
on June 2, they sometimes
“vote for Aye and also for No”
. But alongside this idyll there rises, in all the sublimity
of tragedy, the struggle of the great debate, a struggle waged not only from the tribune
with words, but in which the chorus of conciliators participates
by drumming, murmuring, shouting in confusion, etc. The drama naturally ends each time with
the victory of the virtuous Right and is almost always decided by the call of the conservative
army for a vote.

In the sitting of June 2, Herr
Jung
addressed an interpellation to the Minister of
Foreign Affairs concerning the cartel treaty with Russia. It is known that as early as
1842 public opinion forced the abrogation of the cartel, but that this was
restored under the reaction of 1844. It is known how the Russian government has the
extradited persons flogged to death with the knout or sent to Siberia. It is known what
a welcome pretext the

stipulated extradition
of common criminals and vagabonds offers for delivering political refugees into the
hands of the Russians.

Herr
Arnim
, Minister of Foreign Affairs, replied:

“Surely no one will object to the extradition of
deserters, since it is entirely customary for friendly states to extradite
them to each other.”

We take note that, in the opinion of our minister, Russia and
Germany are “friendly states”. Indeed, the masses of troops which Russia
is concentrating on the Bug and the Niemen have no other intention than to
liberate “friendly” Germany from the horrors of the revolution as soon as
possible.

“The decision on the extradition of criminals
rests, moreover, in the hands of the courts, so that every guarantee is given
that the accused will not be extradited before the conclusion of the criminal
investigation.”

Herr Arnim seeks to make the Assembly believe that the Prussian
courts conduct the investigation into the facts of the offence charged against
the criminal. Quite the contrary. The Russian or Russo-Polish judicial
authorities send a resolution to the Prussian courts, by which they place the
fugitive under accusation. The Prussian court has merely to examine whether
this document is authentic, and if it answers this question in the affirmative, it
must order the extradition. “So that every guarantee is given” that the Russian
government need only give a hint to its judges in order to get any refugee,
as long as he has not yet been charged with political matters, into its hands
loaded with Prussian chains.

“That
our own subjects
are not extradited goes without
saying.”

“Our own subjects,” Herr Feudal Baron von Arnim, cannot be
extradited for the very reason that there are no longer any “subjects” in Germany,
since the people were free enough to emancipate themselves on the
barricades,

“Our own subjects!” We, who elect assemblies, who prescribe sovereign
laws to kings and emperors, we “subjects” of His Majesty the King of
Prussia?

“Our own subjects!” Had the Assembly even a spark of the revolutionary
pride to which it owes its existence, it would have thundered the servile
minister down from the tribune and from the ministerial bench with a single cry
of indignation. But it calmly let the stigmatising expression pass. Not the
slightest protest was heard.

Herr
Rehfeld
interpellated Herr Hansemann concerning
the renewed wool purchases of the Seehandlung and the advantages offered to English
buyers over German ones by discount offers. The wool industry, oppressed
by the general crisis, had the prospect of finding at least some small advantage
in making purchases at this year’s very low wool prices. Then the
Seehandlung comes along and, through enormous purchases, forces up prices. At the same
time it offers to facilitate purchases for English buyers considerably by discounting good bills
on London; a measure likewise well suited to drive up wool prices by attracting
new buyers, and which gives a significant advantage to foreign buyers over
domestic ones.

The Seehandlung is a legacy of the absolute monarchy, which it served for
diverse purposes. For twenty years it has rendered the law on state debts of 1820 illusory
and has interfered in trade and industry in a most unseemly
manner.

The question raised by Herr
Rehfeld
is basically of little interest for
democracy. The issue here is a few thousand thalers more or less for the
wool producers on the one hand, and for the wool manufacturers on the other
side.

The wool producers are almost exclusively great landowners, feudal lords of
the Mark, of Prussia, Silesia and Posen.

The wool manufacturers are mostly big capitalists, members of the high
bourgeoisie.

Thus the wool prices involve not general interests but class interests,
the question of whether the high landed aristocracy is to fleece the high bourgeoisie,
or the high bourgeoisie the high landed aristocracy.

Herr Hansemann, sent to Berlin as a representative of the high bourgeoisie, the
party now in power, betrays it to the landed aristocracy, to the defeated
party.

For us democrats the matter is only of interest insofar as Herr Hansemann
sides with the defeated party, that he supports not the merely conservative class, but
the

reactionary
class. We confess that from the bourgeois Hansemann
we had not expected this.

Herr
Hansemann
first assured them that he was no friend of the Seehandlung, and
then added: Neither the purchasing business of the Seehandlung nor its factories
can be discontinued all at once. As regards the wool purchases, there are
contracts under which the purchase of a certain lot of wool this year ... is an
obligation of the Seehandlung. I

believe that,
if such purchases do not, in any one year, harm private trade, this will be the
case precisely in this year (?) .. because otherwise prices might become too
low.

The whole speech shows that Herr Hansemann does not feel at ease while
speaking. He has allowed himself to be induced to do a favour for the Arnims,
Schaffgotschs and Itzenplitzes at the expense of the wool manufacturers, and now he
has to defend his ill-considered step with the arguments of modern
political economy, which is so merciless towards the nobility. He himself knows best
that he is making fools of the whole Assembly.

“Neither the purchasing business of the Seehandlung nor its factories can
be discontinued all at once.” The Seehandlung therefore buys wool and lets its factories
work at full steam. If the factories of the Seehandlung cannot be “discontinued” all
at once, it goes without saying that the sales cannot be discontinued either. The
Seehandlung will therefore put its woollen goods on the market, it will add further glut
to the already glutted market, and depress still further the depressed prices. In
a word, in order to procure money for their wool to the country squires of the
Mark, etc., it will further intensify the present commercial crisis and deprive the
wool manufacturers of the few remaining customers.

As for the English bills-of-exchange affair, Herr Hansemann delivers a
brilliant tirade on the enormous advantages that accrue to the entire country
when English guineas walk into the pockets of the country squires of the Mark. We
shall certainly be careful not to go into this seriously. We only fail to understand
how Herr Hansemann was able to keep a straight face while doing so.

In the same sitting there was also a debate on a commission to be appointed
for Posen. More on this tomorrow.