FREDERICK ENGELS
THE POSITION OF ENGLAND
THE BRITISH CONSTITUTION
In the preceding article we
developed the principles according to which the British
Empire’s present position in the history of civilisation should
be judged, and also gave the necessary data on  the development  of the English nation, since they are indispensable for
the purpose  but  are less known  on  the Continent; thus, having
substantiated our  premises, we  may pass on  to our  subject
without  more  ado.
England’s position has up  to now  seemed enviable to all
other European peoples, and so  it is to anybody who  scans
the surface alone and sees only  with the eyes of a politician.
England is a world power  in the sense in which such powers
can exist today, and in which, essentially, all other world
powers  existed; for Alexander’s and Caesar’s empires, like
the English, were also a dominion  of civilised nations over
barbarians and colonies. No  other country  in the world can
vie with England in power  and riches, and this power  and
these riches are not  in the hands of a single despot, as they
were in Rome,  but  belong  to the educated part of the nation.
For  a hundred years already, England has known  no  fear of
despotism, no  struggle against the power  of the Crown;
England is undoubtedly the freest, that is, the least unfree
country  in the world, North  America not  excepted, and as a
result the educated Englishman has a measure of inborn  independence of which no  Frenchman, let alone a German, can

boast. Political activity, the free press, the command of the
seas, and England’s gigantic industry have so  fully developed
in almost every individual the energy and determination
which go  hand in hand in the national character with the
coolest prudence that in this respect, too, the continental
peoples are infinitely far behind the English. The history
of the British Army  and Navy  is a series of splendid victories,
while England has for the past eight hundred years hardly
seen an enemy  near her shores. Only  German literature and
that of ancient Greece can vie with the English for precedence: in philosophy  England has at least two  great
names— Bacon and Locke; in the empirical sciences the great
names are beyond  counting; and if it is a question  of what
people has done the most,  no  one will deny that the English
are that people.
These are the things of which England may be proud,
things in which she has the advantage over the Germans and
the French and which I have enumerated here in advance, so
that all good  Germans may convince themselves of my  “impartiality” from the very start; for I am well aware that in
Germany one may speak without  ceremony much  rather of
the Germans than of any other nation. And  these things just
enumerated form more  or less the subject of the entire voluminous,  yet utterly fruitless and superfluous, literature that
has been written on  the Continent  about England. Nobody
has ever taken it into his head to make a thorough  study of
the nature of English history and the English national
character, and just how  miserable the whole literature on
England is can be seen from the simple fact that Herr  von
Raumer ’s miserable book 7 is, as far as I know,  still considered
in Germany  the best book  on  that subject.
Let us  begin with the political aspect, since England has
up  to now  been viewed only  from that angle. Let us  weigh
the British Constitution,  this, in Tory  parlance, “most  perfect
product of the British mind” and, as yet another favour to
the politicians, let us  proceed for the present on  purely
empirical lines.
The juste-milieu values the British Constitution  particularly for having developed “historically” , which in plain
German means that the old basis created by  the 1688  revolu-

tion was preserved and that on  this foundation, as they call
it, building was continued. Later on  we  shall see the character
the British Constitution  has acquired because of this; for the
time being a simple comparison of the Englishman of 1688
with the Englishman of 1844 is enough  to prove  that an
identical constitutional foundation for both  is an absurdity,
an impossibility. Even disregarding the general advance of
civilisation, the political character of the nation is quite
different from what it was then. The Test-Act, the Habeas
Corpus  Act, and the Bill of Rights 8 were measures which the
Whigs  were able to put  into effect owing  to the weakness of
the Tories at that time and their victory over the Tories, and
which were directed against these Tories, that is, against the
absolute monarchy and against overt or covert Catholicism.
But  within the next fifty years the old Tories disappeared,
and their descendants adopted the principles which had until
then been those of the Whigs; with  the coronation of George I
the monarchic-Catholic Tories became an aristocratic-High-
Church  party, and since the French Revolution,  which
brought  the first glimmer of light into their minds, the
positive principles of Toryism  have tended more  and more
towards the abstraction of “Conservatism ” , the naked,
thoughtless defence of the existing order of things, but  even
this stage has already been left behind. In the person  of Sir
Robert  Peel Toryism  has decided to recognise progress, has
realised that the British Constitution  is untenable, and is
making concessions merely in order to preserve this derelict
structure as long  as possible. The Whigs  have also gone
through  an equally important development, a new  democratic
party has emerged, and yet the foundation of 1688 is to be
broad enough  for 1844! The necessary consequence of this
“historical development” is that the internal contradictions,
which make up  the essence of constitutional monarchy, and
which were sufficiently revealed at the time when  modem
German philosophy  still maintained a republican standpoint,
have reached their peak in the modern English monarchy.
Indeed, the English constitutional monarchy is the consum mation of constitutional monarchy in general, is the only  state
in which, insofar as this is still possible today, a genuine
aristocratic nobility has been able to maintain its place next

to a relatively highly developed public consciousness, and
where there actually exists that trinity of legislative power
which has been artificially reconstructed and is preserved
with difficulty on  the Continent.
If the essence of the state, as of religion, lies in mankind’s
fear of itself, this fear reaches its culminating point  in the
constitutional, and particularly in the English, monarchy.
The experience of three millennia has not  made people any
cleverer; on  the contrary, it has made them more  confused,
more  prejudiced, has driven them mad, and the result of this
madness is the political state of present-day Europe. The
pure monarchy inspires fear— it suggests  the idea of Oriental
and Roman  despotism. Pure aristocracy is no  less terrifying—
the Roman  patricians and medieval feudalism, the Venetian
and Genoan Nobili  did not  exist for nothing. Democracy is
more  frightful than either; Marius and Sulla, Cromwell  and
Robespierre, the bleeding heads of two  kings, the proscription lists and the dictatorship proclaim loudly enough  the
“horrors ” of democracy. Moreover,  it is well known  that not
one  of these forms has ever lasted any length of time. What
then was to be done? Instead of moving  on  directly, instead
of concluding from the imperfection, or, rather, from the
cruelty of all state forms, that the state itself is the cause of
this cruelty, and is cruel itself, instead of that one simply
reassured oneself by  adopting the view  that this immorality
is inherent only  in the forms of the state, inferred from the
above premises that three immoral factors taken together
could be transformed into a moral product, and created the
constitutional monarchy.
The first principle of constitutional monarchy is the
balance of power,  and this principle is the most  perfect
expression of mankind’s fear of itself. It is not  my  intention
to discuss the absurdity, the total impracticability of this
Principle, I merely want to see if it has been sustained in the
British Constitution,  and shall, as I promised, conduct this
investigation in a purely empirical way, so  empirically, in
fact, that it may be too  much  even for our  political empiricists. I therefore take the British Constitution  not  as it is
described in Blackstone’s Commentaries, in de Lolme ’s fantasies,9  or in the long  series of Constitutional Statutes, from
3’

the Magna Charta10 to the Reform  Bill, but  as it exists in
reality.
Let us  begin with  the monarchic element. Everybody  knows
what the sovereign counts for in England, whether male
or female. In practice, the power  of the Crown  has been
reduced to naught, and if this circumstance, notorious
throughout  the world, needs further proof, this is furnished
by  the fact that all struggle against the Crown  ceased more
than a hundred years ago, that even the radical-democratic
Chartists know  how  to use their time to better purpose  than
to waste it on  such struggle. Where, in that case, is the third
of legislative power  allotted to the Crown  in theory? Yet—
and herein the fear reaches its peak— the British Constitution
cannot exist without  the monarchy. Remove  the Crown,  the
“subjective apex” , and the entire artificial structure collapses.
The British Constitution  is an inverted pyramid, the apex is
at the same time the base. And the less significant the
monarchic element has become in reality, the more  significance
has it acquired for the Englishman. Nowhere,  as is well
known,  is this non-ruling personification worshipped  more
than in England. The English journals surpass the German
by  far in slavish servility. This disgusting cult of the king
as such, the worship  of a completely emasculated and meaningless notion,  not  even a notion,  but  the mere word “king” ,
is the consummation  of monarchy, just as the worship  of the
mere word “god” is the consummation  of religion. The
word  “king” is the essence of the state, just as the word  “god”
is the essence of religion, even if both  words  are meaningless. In both  cases, the main thing is to see to it that the main
thing, namely, man, who  is at the back of both  these words,
should not  come under discussion.
Next,  the aristocratic element. It is, at least in the sphere
allotted to it by  the Constitution,  not  much  better off than
the Crown.  If the mockery being constantly heaped on  the
House  of Lords for over a hundred years now  has gradually
become so  much  part of public opinion  that this branch of the
legislative power  is generally regarded as an asylum for
pensioned-off statesmen, and that the offer of a peerage is
considered an insult by  any as yet not  fully spent member  of
the Commons,  one can easily imagine what respect is com 
manded by  the second of the state powers  established by  the
Constitution. Indeed, the activity of the Lords in the Upper
House  has been reduced to a mere, insignificant formality and
only  on  rare occasions does this activity rise to a sort of vis
inertias, as happened during the rule of the Whigs  between
1830 and 1840— but  even then the Lords are not  strong  by
themselves, but  only  thanks to the Tory  party, whose  purest
representatives they are. The House  of Lords, the main
advantage of which, according to the theory of the Consti tution, is supposed  to be that it is equally independent of the
Crown  and of the people, in reality depends on  a party, and
hence on  public opinion,  and because of the right of the
Crown  to create peers, also on  the Crown.  But  the feebler
the House  of Lords has become, the more  strongly  is it sup ported by  public opinion. The constitutional parties, the
Tories, Whigs  and Radicals, equally dread an abolition of
this empty  formality, and the most  the Radicals will say is
that the House  of Lords, as the only  constitutional power
without  responsibility, is an anomaly, and that the hereditary
peerage should therefore be replaced by  an elected one. It is
once again man’s fear of himself that preserves this empty
form, and the Radicals, who  demand a purely democratic
basis for the House  of Commons,  are driven by  this fear even
further than the other two  parties in that they, in order to
prevent the decline of that threadbare, outmoded Upper
House,  seek to breathe some  vitality into it by  an infusion
of popular blood. The Chartists know  better what they have
to do: they know  that under pressure from a democratic
House  of Commons  the entire rotten structure— Crown  and
Lords and all— must  collapse by  itself and therefore they
do not, as the Radicals do, bother with a reform of the
peerage.
And  just as the adoration of the Crown  has grown  in the
same measure in which the power  of the Crown  has waned,
so  has the people’s respect for the aristocracy increased in the
measure in which the political influence of the House  of
Lords has dwindled. The point  is that not  only  have the most
humiliating formalities of feudal times been preserved, that
the Members  of the House  of Commons,  when  they appear in
an official capacity before the Lords, have to stand hat in

hand in front of the seated and hatted Lords, that the official
address to a member  of the aristocracy is: “May  it please
your  lordship” , etc., the worst  of it is that all these formalities
are really the expression of public opinion  that regards a lord
as a being of a superior kind and has a respect for the
lineage, full-sounding titles, old family heirlooms, etc., which
is as repugnant and disgusting to us  continentals as is the
worship  of the Crown.  In this trait of the English character,
too, we  once again see the adoration of an empty,  senseless
word,  the completely insane, fixed idea that a great nation,
that humanity and the universe cannot exist without  the word
aristocracy. For  all that, the aristocracy has in reality still
considerable influence; but  just as the power  of the Crown  is
the power  of the Ministers, that is, the representatives of the
majority in the House  of Commons — thereby taking an utterly different direction from that envisaged by  the Constitu tion— so, too, does the power  of the aristocracy consist of
something  entirely different from its right to a hereditary
seat in the legislature. The aristocracy is strong  by  its
enormous  estate, by  its wealth in general, and hence shares
this power  with all the other, untitled rich; so  the power  of
the Lords resides not  in the Upper  House,  but  in the House
of Commons,  and this leads us  to that component  of the
legislature that, according to the Constitution,  should
represent the democratic element.
If the Crown  and the House  of Lords are powerless, the
House  of Commons  must  of necessity wield all power,  and
this is the case. The House  of Commons  does, in fact, pass
the laws and administer them through  the Ministers, who  are
but  its committee. Hence, with this omnipotence of the House
of Commons — though  the two  other branches of legislature
would  nominally continue to exist— England should be a
pure democracy, if only  the democratic element itself were
really democratic. But  this is not  so. When  the Constitution
was established after the revolution of 1688 the composition
of the constituencies remained quite unchanged; the towns,
villages and boroughs,  which formerly had the right to return
a member,  kept this right; and this right was by  no  means a
democratic one, not  a “universal human  right” , but  a purely
feudal privilege, which had long ago, in the time of

Elizabeth, been granted by  the Crown  quite arbitrarily and
by  grace to many towns  that had until then not  been
represented. Even the character of representation which the
elections to the Lower  House  had possessed at least initially
was soon  lost as a result of “historical development” . The
composition  of the old House  of Commons  is known.  In the
towns  the returning of a member  was either in the hands of
one person  or of a closed and self-recruiting corporation;
only  a few towns  were open,  that is, had quite a large number
of electors, and in them the most  shameless bribery did away
with the last remnants of true representation. The closed
towns  were mainly under the influence of an individual, generally a lord; and in the rural constituencies the omnipotence
of the big landowners suppressed any more  or less free and
independent movement  among  the people, who  were otherwise politically inert. The old House  of Commons  was
nothing  but  a closed, medieval corporation independent of
the people, a culmination of the “historical” right, a corporation that was unable to advance a single truly or seemingly
rational argument in defence of its existence, that existed
contrary to reason and therefore denied in 1794, through  its
committee, that it was a meeting of representatives and that
England was a country  with a representative government/'"
As  compared with such a Constitution,  the theory of a state
with a representative government,  even of an ordinary
constitutional monarchy with a Chamber  of Representatives,
was bound  to appear highly revolutionary and objectionable,
and the Tories were therefore quite right when  they called
the Reform  Bill a measure diametrically opposed  to the spirit
and the letter of the Constitution  and undermining  it. Never theless, the Reform  Bill was passed, and we  now  have to
consider what it has made of the British Constitution  and
especially the House  of Commons.  Above  all, the conditions
for the election of representatives in rural areas have remained unchanged. The voters there are almost exclusively
tenants and, as such, are heavily dependent on  their landlord
*  Second Report  of the Committee  of Secrecy, to whom  the Papers
referred to in His  Majesty’s Message on  the 12th May 1794  were
delivered (Report on  the London  revolutionary societies, London,  1794).
P. 68 ff.

because the latter may at any moment  terminate the lease,
there being no  contractual relations between him and his
tenants. The representatives of the counties (as opposed  to
the towns)  are, as before, representatives of the landlords,
for only  in the most  tumultuous  times, as in 1831, 11  dare the
tenants vote against the landlords. Moreover,  the Reform
Bill12 has only  aggravated these evils by  increasing the
number  of representatives from the counties. Of the 252
county  members  the Tories can therefore always count on  at
least 200, unless any general disturbance which would  make
an intervention by  the landlords unwise  should break out
among  the tenants. In the towns  representation has been introduced at least formally, and everyone who  rents a house
at no  less than ten pounds  a year and pays direct taxes (the
Poor  Tax, etc.) has the right to vote. This excludes the vast
majority of the working  classes; for, first of all, naturally,
only  the married live in houses  and even if a considerable
number  of these houses  are rented at ten pounds  a year, most
of their tenants evade the payment of direct taxes and are
therefore not  entitled to vote. Under the Chartist, universal
suffrage the electorate would  increase at least threefold. The
towns  are thus in the hands of the middle class, but  in the
smaller towns  the latter frequently depends, directly or indirectly, on  the landlords through  the tenants, who  are the
small shopkeepers’ and craftsmen’s main customers. Only  in
the big towns  does the middle class really come to power,  and
in the small factory towns,  particularly in Lancashire, where
the middle class is insignificant on  account of its small
number  and the rural population has little influence, and
where even a minority  of the working  class carries great
weight, this semblance of representation approaches to
some  degree a real one. These towns,  for example, Ashton,
Oldham, Rochdale, Bolton,  etc., therefore send almost
exclusively Radical members  to Parliament. An  extension
of the voting  rights according to the Chartist principles
would  here too, as in all factory towns  in general, give the
latter party a majority of voters. In addition to these different
and, in practical respects, very complicated influences, a
telling effect is exerted by  various local interests and, last
but  not  least, by  a very important factor— bribery. In the first

article in this series I mentioned that the House  of Commons
had declared through  its committee set up  to investigate
corrupt practices that it had been elected through  bribery,
and Thomas Duncombe,  the only  confirmed Chartist member,
has long  since frankly told the House  of Commons  that not
a single person  in the whole  assembly, himself included, could
say that he had obtained his seat through  the free ballot of
his constituents, without  bribery. Last summer,  Richard
Cobden,  member  for Stockport and leader of the Anti-Corn
Law League,13 declared at a public meeting in Manchester
that bribery had at the time become more  widespread than
ever, that in the Tory  Carlton Club  and the Liberal Reform
Club  in London  town  seats were being blatantly auctioned off
to the highest bidder, and that these clubs acted as entrepreneurs— for so  and so  many  pounds  we  guarantee you  such
and such a seat, etc. And  on  top  of all this, there is the
“honourable” way in which these elections are carried out:
the general drunkenness in which the voting  takes place, the
public houses  in which the voters get drunk at the expense of
the candidates, the disorder, the brawls and the howling  of
the crowd at the election boxes,  put  the final touches to the
worthlessness of the representation elected for a term of
seven years.
We  have seen that the Crown  and the House  of Lords
have lost their significance; we  have seen in what manner
the omnipotent  House  of Commons  is recruited; the question
now  is: who  really rules England? Property  rules. Property
enables the aristocracy to dominate the election of representatives from the rural areas and the small towns; property
enables the merchants and factory owners  to pick the representatives for the big and partly also for the small towns;
property  enables both  to increase their influence through
bribery. The rule of property  is expressly recognised in the
Reform  Bill through  the establishment of property  qualifications. And  since property  and influence through  property  are
the essence of the middle class, since the aristocracy takes
advantage of its property  in any election, and therefore acts
not  as an aristocracy, but  puts  itself on  a par with the middle
class, and since the influence of the middle class proper  is
much  stronger than that of the aristocracy, it is, of course,

the middle class that really rules. But  how  and why  does it
rule? Because the people have not  yet any clear idea of the
nature of property,  because they are generally— at least in
rural areas— still spiritually dead and therefore put  up  with
this tyranny of property. England is indeed a democracy, but
in the way Russia is a democracy; for, without  being aware
of it, the people rule everywhere, and in all states the govern ment  is only  a different expression for the people’s level of
education.
It will be difficult for us  to return from the way the British
Constitution  is practised to its theory. Practice is in glaring
contradiction with theory; the two  are so  far apart that there
is no  longer any resemblance between them. Here a trinity of
legislation, there a tyranny of the middle class; here a two-
chamber system,  there an all-powerful House  of Commons;
here a royal prerogative, there a cabinet chosen by  the
Commons;  here an independent House  of Lords with hereditary law-givers, there an asylum for pensioned-off members
of the Lower  House.  Each of the three components  of the
legislative power  has had to hand over its power  to a
different element: the Crown  to the Ministers, that is, to the
majority of the House  of Commons,  the lords to the Tory
party, that is, to a popular element, and to the peer-creating
Ministers, that is, essentially also to a popular element, and
the Commons  to the middle class or, which is the same, to
the political immaturity of the people. Actually, the British
Constitution  no  longer exists; the whole  tedious process of
legislation is a mere farce; the contradiction between theory
and practice has become so  glaring that it cannot be preserved
for long, and even if the Catholic Emancipation, of which
we  shall have more  to say further on,  and the parliamentary
and municipal reform may seem to have instilled some  life
into this feeble Constitution,  these measures are themselves
a confession that all hope  for the preservation of the Consti tution has been lost. These measures introduce elements into
the Constitution  which decisively contradict its basic principles, and therefore only  further aggravate the conflict by
bringing  theory into contradiction with itself.
We  have seen that the power  structure designed by  the
British Constitution  rests on  fear alone. This fear is revealed

even more  starkly in the rules according to which legislation
is implemented, in the so-called Standing Orders. Every Bill
must  be read in each of the two  Houses  three times at
definite intervals; after the second reading it is passed on  to
a committee, which examines it in detail; in more  important
cases “the House  becomes a committee of the whole  House ”
for the examination of the Bill and appoints a chairman, who
after the debates are over reports with a great deal of pomp
on  the debates to the same House  that debated the Bill. Incidentally, is this not  as beautiful an example of “transcendence within immanence and of immanence within transcendence” as any Hegelian could wish  for? “The knowledge
of the Lower  House  about the committee is the knowledge of
the committee about itself” , and the chairman is the “absolute
personality of the mediator in which both  are identical” .
Thus,  every Bill is discussed eight times before it may receive
royal assent. Naturally, this whole ridiculous procedure is
once again due to the man’s fear of himself. It is realised that
progress  is the essence of humanity but  the courage is lacking
to proclaim this progress  openly; laws are issued which are
to have absolute validity, which, therefore, set limits to prog ress, and then through  the right reserved to amend laws the
progress  just denied is let in again through  the back door.
Only  not  too  quickly, only  not  too  rashly! Progress  is revolutionary, dangerous and, therefore, a strong  bar must  at least
be created; before it is decided to recognise it the matter must
be thought  over eight times. But  this fear, which is contemptible in itself and only  proves  that those experiencing it
are not  yet really free people, must  of necessity lead to
blunders also in the measures which they undertake. Instead
of ensuring  a fuller consideration of the Bills, their repeated
reading becomes superfluous in practice and a pure formality.
Generally, the main debates are concentrated on  the first or
second reading, at times also on  the debates in the com mittee, depending on  what is more  convenient for the op position. The complete senselessness of these repeated debates
becomes particularly clear if one considers that the fate of
every Bill is decided from the outset, and if it is not decided,
the subject of the debates is not  some  particular bill, but  the
existence of a particular government. Thus, the result of this

whole farce, which is repeated eight times over, is not  the
holding of a calmer debate in the House  itself, but  something
entirely different, something  that did not  enter the plans of
those who  introduced this farce. The tediousness of the
debates gives the public time to form an opinion  about the
proposed  measure and in case of need to oppose  it by  means
of meetings and petitions, and often— as last year in the case
of Sir James Graham’s Education Bill— with success. But
this, as we  said above, is not  the original aim and could be
achieved in a much  simpler way.
Since we  are dealing with the Standing Orders, we  can
mention  a few more  points  in which the fear that permeates
the British Constitution  and the originally corporative
character of the House  of Commons  are revealed. The debates
in the House  of Commons  are not  public; admittance is a
privilege and is generally granted only  by  written order of
some  member. During  the voting  the galleries are cleared;
despite this ridiculous mystery-making, to the abolition of
which the House  has always strongly  objected, the names of
the Members  voting  for or against appear on  the next day in
all the newspapers. The Radical members  have never been
able to achieve a printing of the authentic minutes — only  a
fortnight ago such a motion  was defeated— and as a result
the publisher of parliamentary reports appearing in the
newspapers bears the sole responsibility for their content, and
legal proceedings can be instituted against him for the
publication of slander by  anyone who  feels offended by  anything a Member  of Parliament may have said— and according to law also by  the government — while the author of the
slander is protected by  his parliamentary privileges against
all persecution. This and a great number  of other items in
the Standing Orders show  the exclusively anti-popular
character of the reformed Parliament; and the tenacity, with
which the House  of Commons  clings to these customs,  shows
clearly enough  that it has no  wish  to change from a privileged
corporation into an assembly of people’s representatives.
A  further proof of this is the parliamentary privilege, the
exceptional position  of the members  with respect to the courts
and the right of the House  of Commons  to have anyone it
wishes arrested. Originally directed against encroachments

by  the Crown,  which has since been deprived of all power,
this privilege has in recent times turned directly against the
people. In 1771 the House  grew  angry about the audacity of
the newspapers that had published its debates— which only
the House  itself is entitled to do— and attempted to put  an
end to this audacity by  arresting first the publishers and then
the officials who  had released them. This attempt naturally
failed, but  it shows  how  things stand in the matter of parliamentary privilege, and the failure proves  that the House  of
Commons,  despite its elevated position over the people, is
nevertheless dependent on  them, that is to say, even the
House  of Commons  does not  rule.
In a country  where “Christianity is part and parcel of the
laws of the land” the Established Church is of necessity part
of the Constitution. According to her Constitution,  England
is essentially a Christian state, and what is more,  a fully
developed one, a strong  Christian state; state and church are
perfectly fused and indissoluble. But  this unity  of church and
state can exist only  in one Christian creed, to the exception
of all others, and these excommunicated sects are therefore
naturally designated as heretics and subjected to religious
and political persecution. This applies also to England. These
sects had for long  been lumped together in one  class, as non conformists or dissenters,14  barred from all participation in
the state, prevented from worshipping  and persecuted by
penal laws. The more  zealously they opposed  the unity  of
church and state, the more  zealously did the ruling party
defend this unity  and raise it to one of the maxims of the
state. When  the Christian state in England was still in full
bloom,  the persecution of dissenters, and especially of
Catholics, was the order of the day, and this persecution,
though  less violent, was more  universal and enduring than
that of the Middle Ages. The acute disease became a chronic
one, the sudden bloodthirsty fits of rage of Catholicism turned
into a cold, political cunning, which sought  to eradicate the
heterodoxy by  milder but  persistent pressure. The persecution was transferred to the secular field and thus made
unbearable. Refusal to believe the Thirty-nine Articles,15
though  no  longer considered blasphemy, became instead a
political crime.

But  the progress  of history could not  be arrested; the
difference between the legislation of 1688 and the public
opinion  of 1828 was so  great that in that year even the House
of Commons  found itself obliged to abolish the most  op pressive laws against the dissenters. The Test-Act16  and the
religious paragraphs of the Corporation  Act17 were repealed;
in the following year, despite violent Tory  opposition,  came
the Catholic Emancipation.18 The Tories, the champions
of the Constitution,  were quite right in their opposition,  since
none  of the liberal parties, including the Radicals, attacked
the Constitution  as such. For  them, too, the Constitution  was
to remain the basis, and, on  a constitutional basis, only  the
Tories were consistent. They realised, and said, that the
above-mentioned measures would  lead to the downfall of the
High  Church  and hence inevitably to the downfall of the
Constitution  as well; that the granting of active civil rights
to the dissenters would  de facto mean destroying the High
Church,  sanctioning attacks against the High  Church; that it
would  be a major inconsistency towards the state in general
if the Catholic, who  places the authority of the Pope  above
the authority of the state, were allowed to participate in
government  and legislation. Their arguments could not  be
refuted by  the Liberals; nevertheless Emancipation was
passed, and the prophecies of the Tories are already
beginning  to come true.
The High  Church  has thus become a name without  meaning and differs from other creeds only  in that it receives three
million pounds  a year and has several minor  privileges
which are just enough  to sustain the struggle against it. This
includes the ecclesiastical courts, in which the Anglican
bishop  has the exclusive but  quite meaningless right of
jurisdiction, and which are a burden due mainly to the
exaction of law costs; then comes the local church tax, which
is used to preserve the buildings placed at the disposal of the
Established Church; the dissenters are under the jurisdiction
of those courts and must  also pay the tax.
However,  not  only  the legislation against the church, but
also the legislation for it, has contributed to making the
Established Church  a name without  meaning. The Irish
Church  has always been nothing  but  a meaningless name,

a perfect Established or Government  Church,  a complete
hierarchy, from the archbishop down  to the vicar, one that
has everything except a congregation, and whose  mission  it
is to preach, to pray and to chant the litanies to the empty
walls. The Church  of England, it is true, has a public, though
it, too, has been largely pushed aside by  the dissenters,
especially in Wales and the industrial districts, but  the well-
paid pastors of the soul do not  worry  particularly about the
flock. “If you  want to pour  contempt on  a caste of priests and
to overthrow  it, then pay it well,” says Bentham, and the
English and Irish churches testify to the truth of this maxim.
In the country  and in the towns  of England the people hate
nothing  more, hold nothing  in greater contempt than a
Church-of-England parson. And  with so  religious a people
as the English this means something.
Obviously,  the more  negligible and lamentable the reputation of the High  Church  becomes, the more  strongly  does
the conservative and generally strictly constitutional party
cling to it— even Lord John  Russell would  be reduced to
tears by  the separation of the church from state; obviously
also, the more  its reputation declines, the worse  and the
more  perceptible becomes the burden it imposes. The Irish
Church  especially, being the least significant, is the best
hated; it serves no  other purpose  than to embitter the people,
than to remind them that they are an enslaved people
on  whom  the conqueror  imposes  his religion and his institutions.
Thus, England is now  in a state of transition from a
definite to an indefinite Christian state, to a state in which
there is no  definite creed, but  only  a blend of all existing
creeds, which has made indefinite Christianity its basis. The
old, definite Christian state naturally took  steps against this
unbelief, and the Apostate Act of 1699  punishes  unbelief with
the loss of even passive civil rights and with imprisonment;
though  the Act has never been repealed, it is never applied.
Another  law dating back to Elizabeth’s times prescribes that
anyone who  without  good  reason stays away from church on
Sundays (if I am not  mistaken, it even prescribes the Episcopal Church,  for Elizabeth did not  recognise the dissenting
churches), is to be punished by  a fine or imprisonment. This

law is still often enforced in rural areas, and even here, in
civilised Lancashire, a few hours  from Manchester, there
are a few bigoted justices of the peace who — as M. Gibson,
Member  for Manchester, said in the Commons — have
sentenced a great many people to as much  as six weeks’ imprisonment  for failing to attend church. The main laws
against unbelief, however,  are those which disbar people who
do not  believe in a God or in a reward or punishment  in
the hereafter from taking an oath, and punish  them for
blasphemy. Blasphemy is everything that seeks to throw
contempt on  the Bible or the Christian religion, and also
the outright denial of the existence of God; the punish ment  for it is imprisonment,  generally for a year, and a
fine.
But  the indefinite Christian state is also steadily declining,
even before it has been given official recognition by  legislation. The Apostate Act is, as we  said above, completely
obsolete, and the law on  attending church is also quite antiquated and is enacted only  in exceptional cases. Thanks to
the fearlessness of the English socialists, and especially of
Richard Carlile, the law against blasphemy is also obsoles cent and is applied only  here and there, in particularly
bigoted localities such as Edinburgh, for example, and even
the denial of the oath is avoided wherever possible. The
Christian party has become so  weak that it sees itself that a
strict enforcement of these laws would  result in their prompt
repeal, and therefore prefers to keep quiet so that the
Damocles’ sword  of Christian legislation may at least continue to hang above the heads of the unbelievers and perhaps
continue to act as a warning and deterrent.
In addition to the positive political institutions reviewed
above, a few other things should be considered in connection
with the Constitution. Up  to now  hardly any mention  has
been made of the Rights  of Man; within the framework of
the Constitution  proper, the individual has no  rights in
England. These rights are founded either on  usage or on  the
power  of separate statutes which are in no  way connected
with the Constitution. We  shall see how  this peculiar division  emerged, but  in the meantime pass over to the criticism
of those rights.

First there is the right of everyone to express his opinion
without  hindrance and without  preliminary permission  from
the government — the freedom of the press. In general, it is
true to say that nowhere  is there a more  extensive freedom
of the press than in England, and yet this freedom is still
very limited here. The libel law, the treason law and the
blasphemy law weigh  heavily on  the press, and even if press
persecution is seldom, this is not because of the law, but
because of the government ’s fear of the inevitable unpopular ity that measures against the press would  entail. Every day
the English newspapers of all parties commit offences both
against the government  and against individuals, but  they are
silently tolerated, no  action is taken until the opportunity  of
starting a political trial arises, whereupon  this opportunity
is used to institute proceedings against the press as well. This
was the case with the Chartists in 1842 and recently with the
Irish repealers.19  The English freedom of the press has lived
for the past hundred years by  grace of the government,  just
as the Prussian freedom of the press has done since 1842.
The second “birthright” of the Englishman is the right
of assembly, a right no  other people in Europe  as yet enjoys.
This right, although age-old, has later been proclaimed in a
statute as “the right of the people to assemble to discuss its
grievances and to petition the legislation for their relief” .
This formula itself contains a certain restriction. If no  petition results from a meeting, the latter assumes because of it
if not  a directly illegal, then at least a very doubtful
character. In O ’Connell ’s trial it was particularly stressed by
the Crown  that the meetings, which were qualified as illegal,
had not  been called to discuss petitions. The main restriction,
however,  is of a police nature; the central or local govern ment  can prohibit any meeting in advance or interrupt and
disperse it, and this has been done not  only  at Clontarf but
frequently even in England with Chartist and socialist
meetings. But  this is not  considered an encroachment on  the
Englishman’s birthrights, because the Chartists and socialists are poor  devils and, as such, outside the pale of the law;
nobody  takes any notice of it except the Northern Star and
the New Moral World,21 and the Continent  therefore does
not  get to know  about it.

Next  the right of association. All associations pursuing
lawful aims with lawful means are permitted, but  they are
allowed every time to form only  one large society, but  not  to
include branch associations. The setting up  of societies, which
divide into local branches with a special organisation, is
allowed only  for philanthropic and generally pecuniary
purposes,  and can be undertaken here only  if a license from
the official appointed for that purpose  is obtained. The
socialists obtained such a license for their association by
declaring such an aim; the Chartists were refused a license
even though  they copied the rules of the socialist society
word  for word  in their Charter. They are now  compelled to
circumvent the law and are thereby placed in a position
where a single slip of the pen of a single member  of the
Chartist Association can entangle the whole society in the
snares of the law. But  even apart from that, the right of
association, in its full scope, is a privilege of the rich; for an
association needs money  above all, and it is easier for the
rich Anti-Corn  Law League to raise hundreds of thousands
than it is for the poor  Chartist society or  the British Miners ’
Union  to defray the costs of association alone. And an
association that has no  funds at its disposal has little impor tance and cannot engage in agitation.
The Habeas Corpus,  that is, the right of every accused
(excepted in the case of high treason) to be released on  bail
before trial, this much-praised right is also a privilege of the
rich. The poor  cannot procure bail and must  therefore go
to gaol.
The last of these Rights  of Man  is the right of every one  to
be judged only  by  his peers, and this, too, is a privilege of
the rich. The poor  man is not  judged by  his peers, he is in all
cases judged by  his sworn  enemies, for in England the rich
and the poor  are in a state of open  war. The jurors  must
possess  certain qualifications, and what these are like, can be
seen from the fact that the jury  list of Dublin,  a town  of
250,000 inhabitants, contains only  800 who  qualify. In the
last Chartist trials in Lancaster, Warwick and Stafford
workers  were judged by  big landowners and tenants, who
were mostly  Tories, and by  factory owners  or  merchants, who
were mostly  Whigs,  but  in both  cases enemies of the

Chartists and the workers. And  that is not  all. An  “impartial
jury ” is generally an absurdity. When  four weeks ago
O ’Connell  was tried in Dublin  every juryman  was, as a
Protestant and Tory,  his enemy. Catholics and repealers
would  have been “his peers’’, and even they were not  so,
for they were his friends. A  Catholic in the jury  would
have made this verdict, any verdict except acquittal, impossible. We  have here a particularly vivid case, but  essentially the same applies to any case. By  its nature a jury  is a
political and not  a legal institution, but  since the whole
judicial system  is originally of a political nature, the jury
reflects the true essence of that system,  and the English jury,
because it is the most  developed, is the culmination of judicial
deception and immorality. It begins with the fiction of the
“impartial juror ” ; it is impressed upon  the jurors  that they
should forget everything they have heard about the given
case before the trial, that they should judge only  according
to the evidence presented here in court— as if this were pos sible! A  second fiction is created, that of the “impartial
judge” , who  is to explain the law and to weigh  the evidence
submitted by  both  sides impartially, completely “objectively”
— as if this were possible! It is even demanded of the judge
that he particularly and in spite of everything should not
exercise any influence on  the verdict of the jurors,  should
not  suggest  the verdict to them— that is, should interpret the
premises as they should be interpreted to draw the conclusion; but  he should not  draw the conclusion itself, he is not
allowed to draw it even for himself for that would  influence
his statement of the premises— all these and a hundred other
things that are impossible, inhuman and stupid are demanded
of him only  in order to lend a mask of decency to the
original stupidity and inhumanity. But  you  cannot bamboozle
practice, in practice no  one takes any notice of all this stuff;
the judge clearly intimates to the jury  what verdict it should
bring  in and the obedient jury  regularly delivers that
verdict.
Further! The accused must  be protected in every way, the
accused is, just as the king, sacred and inviolable and can do
no  wrong,  that is, he may do nothing,  and if he does do some thing, it is considered invalid. The accused may confess his
4*

& 52 F- ENGELS
crime, but  that does him no  good  at all. The law decides that
he is not  to be believed. I think it was in 1819  that a man
accused his wife of adultery when  she, during his illness,
which she believed to be fatal, confessed to him that she had
committed adultery— but  the wife’s advocate argued that a
confession of the accused may not  be taken in evidence and
the complaint was rejected.*  The sacredness of the accused
is also reflected in the judicial procedure which is applied
in the English trial by  jury  and which opens  such a profitable
field for the pettifogging tricks of the advocates. It seems incredible what ridiculous mistakes in procedure can upset
the whole  trial. In 1800 a man was found guilty of forgery
but  was released because his advocate discovered before the
verdict had been handed in that in the counterfeit bank-note
the name was abbreviated to Bartw, whereas in the indictment  it was written Bartholomew, in full. The judge, as we
said, sustained the objection and released the exposed
forger.**  In 1827 a woman  was accused in Winchester of
infanticide, but  was acquitted because in its verdict the inquest jury  had “upon  their oath” (The jurors  of our  Lord the
I j King  upon  their oath present that, etc.) declared that this and
*  Wade, British History, London,  1838.
**  Ibid.
***  Ibid.
that had happened, but  this jury  was made up  of thirteen
men  and had taken not  one  but  thirteen oaths and the verdict
should therefore have read: “Upon  their oaths.” ***  A  year ago
in Liverpool a boy  was caught on  a Sunday evening in the
act of stealing a handkerchief out  of somebody ’s pocket and
was arrested. His  father objected that the police had arrested him unlawfully, because the law lays it down  that no
one  is allowed to do on  Sunday the work  by  which he earns
his living, and that the police were therefore not  allowed to
arrest anybody on  a Sunday. The judge agreed to this, but
continued to question  the youngster,  who  admitted to being
a professional pickpocket. He  was fined 5 shillings because he
had pursued his trade on  a Sunday. I could give hundreds
of such examples, but  those given are eloquent enough.
■>  English law justifies the accused but  acts against society, for

the protection of which it actually exists. As  in Sparta it is
not  the crime but  the stupidity with which it was committed
that is punished. All protection is turned against those whom
it seeks to protect; the law seeks to protect society and attacks it; it seeks to protect the accused and does him nothing
but  harm— for it is clear that anybody too  poor  to oppose  the
official pettifoggery by  an equally pettifogging advocate
has against him the whole  procedure that was created for his
protection. Anyone  who  is too  poor  to put  up  an advocate
or the requisite number  of witnesses is lost in every some what doubtful case. He  receives for preliminary perusal only
the indictment and the sworn  testimony  initially given to the
justice of the peace, and hence does not  know  in detail what
will be brought  in evidence against him (and this is particularly dangerous to an innocent person); he must  reply as
soon  as the prosecution has presented its case, but  is allowed
to speak only  once, and if he does not  dispose of all doubts,
if a witness whom  he did not  consider necessary to call is
missing — he is lost.
The climax of the whole thing, however,  is the rule that
the twelve jurors  must  be unanimous  in their verdict.
They are locked up  in a room  and are not  allowed to leave
it until they reach a common  decision or the judge realises
that they cannot be made to agree. This is quite inhuman and
so  much  against human  nature that it makes it ridiculous to
demand of twelve people that they should have an identical
opinion  on  some  point. But  it is consistent. The inquisitional
system  inflicts bodily or  mental torture on  the accused, while
trial by  jury  sanctifies the accused and tortures the witnesses
by  a cross-examination that is no  less exacting than the court
of the inquisition. It even tortures the jurors,  for it must
obtain a verdict even if the world should go  to ruin; the jury
is locked up  until it hands in a verdict, and if the jurors
should really take it into their heads to act in accordance
with their oaths, a new  jury  is appointed and the trial is repeated, and this continues until either the prosecution or the
lurors tire of the struggle and surrender unconditionally.
This is proof enough  that the judiciary cannot exist without
torture and is in all cases barbarism. It could not  be otherwise; if one wants to achieve mathematical certainty about

things which do not  admit of such certainty, one cannot but
arrive at nonsense  or barbarism. Practice once again reveals
what is at the back of all this; in practice the jury  takes it
easy and, if there is no  other way, breaks its oath without  a
twinge  of conscience. In Oxford in 1824 a jury  was unable
to agree. One  said guilty; eleven said not  guilty. Finally they
came to terms; the one dissenter wrote  on  the indictment:
guilty, and withdrew; then came the aiderman and the
others, took  the document and wrote  a “not ” in front of the
“guilty” (Wade, British History}. Another  case is related
by  Fonblanque, the editor of the Examiner, in his England
Under Seven Administrations. Here, too, the jury  could not
reach agreement and finally resorted to drawing lots; they
took  two  straws and began to draw, and the opinion  of the
party drawing the longer straw was adopted.
Since we  are discussing legal institutions let us  look at the
matter in somewhat greater detail in order to get a fuller
view  of the state of the law in England. The English penal
code is known  to be the strictest in Europe. As  late as 1810
it still yielded nothing  to the Carolina22 in barbarism; burn ing at the stake, breaking on  the wheel, quartering, tearing
intestines from the live body,  etc., were very popular categories of punishment. Since then the most  revolting atrocities
have been abolished, but  a great many brutalities and infamies remain unamended in the statutes. Capital punishment
is prescribed for seven felonies (murder, treason, rape,
sodomy,  burglary, robbery  with violence and arson with
intent to murder); formerly much  more  widespread, it was
limited to this number  only  in 1837; besides it, the English
penal code contains two  other exquisitely barbaric kinds of
punishment — transportation, or  the turning  of man into beast
through  society, and solitary confinement, or the turning  of
man into beast through  solitude. Nothing  more  cruel and vile
can be devised than these two  punishments  to corrupt
systematically the victims of the law bodily, intellectually
and morally, and to make them worse  than beasts. The transported criminal falls into such an abyss of demoralisation,
of disgusting bestiality, that the best must  succumb  to it in
six months; anyone who  cares to read the eye-witnesses’
reports about New  South  Wales and the Norfolk Island will

agree with me when  I say that all the above said is still far
from reflecting the reality. The person  in solitary confinement  is driven insane; the model prison  in London  has after
three months  of its existence had to deliver three madmen to
Bedlam, not  to mention  religious madness, which still usually
passes for sanity.
The penal laws against political crimes are drawn up  in
almost the same terms as the Prussian ones; especially the
“exciting discontent” and “seditious language” are given in
the same indefinite wording  that leaves the judge and the
jury  so  much  elbow-room. The punishments  are also stricter
here than anywhere; transportation is the main punish ment.
If these strict punishments  and the vaguely defined political crimes do not  have the practical results one  might  expect
considering the law, this is on  the one side a shortcoming
of the law itself, which is so  confused and unclear that a
skilful advocate can always use these difficulties in favour
of the accused. The English law is either common  law, that
is, unwritten  law, as it existed at the time when  the collection
of the statutes began, and later when  it was compounded by
legal authorities; this law is naturally uncertain and doubtful
on  the main points; or the statute law, which consists of an
endless series of individual parliamentary acts, collected over
five hundred years, which contradict each other and create
instead of a “state of law” a completely lawless state. The
advocate is everything here; he who  has been really thorough
in wasting his time on  this legal jumble, on  this chaos of
contradictions, is all-powerful in an English court. The un certainty of the law naturally leads to faith in the authority
of the decisions of former judges in similar cases, and is thus
made only  worse,  for these decisions also contradict one
another, and the result of the trial depends again on  the
extensive reading and presence of mind of the advocate. On
the other hand, the meaninglessness of the English penal
code is again only  a grace, etc., an act of consideration for
public opinion,  which the law does not  oblige the government
to make; and that the legislature does not  intend to change
these conditions can be seen from the violent opposition  to
all law reforms. But  one should not  forget that property  rules

and that this grace is conferred only  on  “respectable”
criminals; the whole  burden of this legalised barbarism falls
on  the poor,  the pariah, the proletarian, and that is nobody ’s
concern.
Again, this patronage of the rich is explicitly expressed
in the law. While all serious crimes are punished with the
heaviest punishments,  almost all minor  offences incur fines,
which are naturally identical for the poor  and the rich, and
do no  or little harm to the rich, whereas the poor  man in
nine cases out  of ten is unable to pay and is then, without
further ado, sent in default of payment for a few months  to
the treadmill. One  has but  to read the police reports in the
first English daily paper one comes across to convince one self of the truth of this assertion. The maltreatment of the
poor  and the patronage of the rich in all courts is so  com monplace, is practised so openly  and is so shamelessly
reported by  the newspapers that one can scarcely read a
newspaper without  burning  with moral indignation. Thus  a
rich man is always treated with extraordinary politeness,
and no  matter how  brutal his offence may have been, “the
judges always very much  regret” that they have to sentence
him to a fine, usually a miserably small one. The administration of the law is in this respect much  less humane than
the law itself; “law grinds the poor,  and rich men  rule the
law” and “there is one law for the poor  and another for the
rich” are absolutely true expressions that have long  since
become proverbial. But  how  could it be otherwise? The
justices of the peace as well as the jurors  are themselves
rich men,  they are enlisted from the middle class and are
therefore biased in favour of their own,  and are born
enemies of the poor. And  if the social influence of property,
which cannot be considered here, is taken into account, then
nobody  can really feel surprised at this barbarian state of
affairs.
The subject of direct social legislation, in which baseness
reaches its climax, will be discussed later. At  this point  it
could not  be described in its full significance.
Let us  now  sum  up  this criticism of the state of the law in
England. What can be said against it from the viewpoint  of
the “legal state” is a matter of complete indifference. That

England is not  an official democracy cannot prejudice us
against her institutions. To  us  only  one thing matters, the
thing we  have observed everywhere, namely, that theory and
practice are in glaring contradiction. All the power  of the
Constitution — the Crown,  the Lords and the Commons —
have dissolved before our  very eyes; we  have seen that the
Established Church  and all the so-called birthrights of the
English are empty  words,  that even the jury  is in reality
only  an illusion, that the law has no  existence, in short, that
a state which has placed itself on  an accurately defined, legal
basis, has denied this basis and violated it. The Englishman
is not  free because of the law, but  despite the law, if he can
be considered free at all.
We  have also seen what a mass of lies and immorality
result from this state of affairs; people prostrate themselves
before meaningless names and deny reality, they do not  want
to know  anything about it, refuse to recognise what actually
exists, what they have themselves created; they deceive
themselves and introduce a conventional language with
artificial categories, each of which is a travesty, and cling
fearfully to these meaningless abstractions, all this in order
not  to have to admit that in life, in practice, quite different
things are at stake. The whole  British Constitution  and with
it all of constitutional public opinion  is nothing  but  one big
lie, which is perpetually being propped  up  and concealed by
a number  of small lies, when  its true nature is here or there
revealed somewhat  too  openly. And  even when  they realise
that all this edifice is nothing  but  falsehood and fiction, even
then they cling to it more  strongly  than before, so  that the
meaningless words,  the few senselessly compiled letters
should not  fall apart, for these words  are precisely the main
pillars of the world and with them the world and humanity
would  have to sink into the darkness of chaos! One  cannot
but  turn  away with deep disgust from this tissue of open
and hidden lies, hypocrisy and self-deceit.
Can such a state continue for long?  That is out  of the
question. The struggle of practice against theory, of reality
against abstraction, of life against empty,  meaningless words,
in short, of man against inhumanity, must  be resolved, and
there is no  doubt  which side will achieve victory.

The struggle has already started. The basis of the Consti tution has been shaken. How  things will turn  out  in the near
future can be seen from what has been said above. The new,
alien elements in the Constitution  are of a democratic
nature; public opinion,  too, as time will show,  moves  towards
democracy. In the near future England will become a
democracy.
But  what a democracy! Not  that of the French Revolution,
whose  antithesis were the monarchy and feudalism, but  that
democracy whose  antithesis is the middle class and property.
This is evident from the entire preceding development. The
middle class and property  rule; the poor  man has no  rights,
is oppressed and flayed, the Constitution  disowns  him and
the law maltreats him. The struggle of democracy against
the aristocracy in England is the struggle of the poor  against
the rich. The democracy towards which England is heading
is a social democracy.
But  mere democracy is unable to remedy social ills.
Democratic equality is a chimera, the struggle of the poor
against the rich cannot be fought out  on  the ground  of
democracy or politics in general. Hence this stage too  is
only  a transition, the last purely political measure that
still has to be tried and from which a new  element must
immediately develop, a principle transcending everything
political.
That principle is the principle of socialism.
in March 1844
Published in Vorwdrts! Translated from the German
(Paris), Nos.  75, 76, 77, 78, 80, 83
and 84; September 18, 21, 25 and 28,
and October 5, 16  and 19,  1844