THE FREE TRADE CONGRESS AT BRUSSELS
On the 16th, 17th, and 18th of September, there was held here 
(Brussels) a congress of political economists, manufacturers, tradesmen, etc., to discuss the question of Free Trade. There were present 
about 150 members of all nations. There assisted, on the part of the 
English Free Traders, Dr. Bowring, M. P., Col. Thompson, M. P., 
Mr. Ewart, M. P., Mr. Brown, M. P., James Wilson, Esq., editor of the 
Economist, etc.; from France had arrived M. Wolowski, professor of 
jurisprudence; M. Blanqui, deputy, professor of political economy, 
author of a history of that science,3 and other works; M. Horace Say, 
son of the celebrated economist15; M. Ch. Dunoyer, member of the 
Privy Council, author of several works upon politics and economy, 
and others. From Germany there was no Free Trader present, but 
Holland, Denmark, Italy, etc., had sent representatives. Señor 
Ramon de la Sagra, of Madrid, intended to come, but came too late. 
The assistance of a whole host of Belgian Free Traders need hardly 
be mentioned, it being a matter of course.
Thus the celebrities of the science had met to discuss the important 
question—whether Free Trade would benefit the world? You will 
think the discussions of such a splendid assembly—discussions 
carried on by economical stars of the first magnitude—must have 
been interesting in the highest degree. You will say that men like Dr. 
Bowring, Colonel Thompson, Blanqui and Dunoyer, must have 
pronounced speeches the most striking, must have produced 
arguments the most convincing, must have represented all questions 
under a light the most novel and surprising imaginable. Alas! Sir, if 
you had been present, you would have been piteously undeceived.
a A. Blanqui, Histoire de l’économie politique m Europe.—Ed.
b Jean Baptiste Say.— Ed.

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Your glorious expectations, your fond illusions would have vanished 
within less than an hour. I have assisted at innumerable public 
meetings and discussions. I heard the League pour forth their 
Anti-Corn-Law117 arguments more than a hundred times, while I was 
in England, but never, I can assure you, never did I hear such dull, 
tedious, trivial stuff, brought forward with such a degree of 
self-complacency. I was never before so disappointed. What was 
carried on did not merit the name of a discussion—it was mere 
pot-house talk. The great scientific luminaries never ventured 
themselves upon the field of political economy, in the strict sense of 
the word. I shall not repeat to you all the worn-out stuff which was 
brought forward on the first two days. Read two or three numbers of 
the League or the Manchester Guardian, and you will find all that was 
said, except, perhaps, a few specious sentences brought forward by 
M. Wolowski, which he, however, had stolen from M. Bastiat’s (chief 
of the French Free Traders) pamphlet of Sophismes économiques. Free 
Traders did not expect to meet with any other opposition, but that of 
M. Rittinghausen, a German Protectionist, and generally an insipid 
fellow. But up got M. Duchateau, a French manufacturer and 
Protectionist—a man who spoke for his purse, just as Mr. Ewart or 
Mr. Brown spoke for theirs, and gave them such a terrible 
opposition, that on the second day of the discussion, a great number, 
even of Free Traders, avowed that they had been beaten in 
argument. They took, however, their revenge at the vote—the 
resolutions passed, of course, almost unanimously.
On the third day, a question was discussed which interests your 
readers. It was this: “Will the carrying out of universal Free Trade 
benefit the working classes?” The affirmative was supported by Mr. 
Brown, the South Lancashire Free Trader, in a lengthy speech, in 
English; he and Mr. Wilson were the only ones who spoke that 
language, the remainder all spoke French—Dr. Bowring, very 
well—Colonel Thompson, tolerably—Mr. Ewart, dreadfully. He 
repeated a part of the old League documents, in a whining tone, very 
much like a Church-of-England parson.
After him got up Mr. Weerth, of Rhenish Prussia. You know, I 
believe, this gentleman—a young tradesman whose poetry is well 
known and very much liked throughout Germany, and who, during 
several years’ stay in Yorkshire, was an eye-witness of the condition 
of the working people. He has a great many friends amongst them 
there, who will be glad to see that he has not forgotten them. As his 
speech will be to your readers the most interesting feature of the 
whole Congress, I shall report it at some length. He spoke as 
follows118:

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“Gendemen—You are discussing the influence of Free Trade upon the condition 
of the working classes. You profess the greatest possible sympathy for those classes. I 
am very glad of it, but yet I am astonished not to see a representative of the working 
classes amongst you! The monied classes of France are represented by a peer—those 
of England by several M.P.s.—those of Belgium by an ex-minister—and even those of 
Germany by a gentleman who gave us a faithful description of the state of that 
country. But where, I ask you, are the representatives of the working men? I see them 
nowhere; and, therefore, gentlemen, allow me to take up the defence of their 
interests. I beg to speak to you on behalf of the working people, and principally on 
behalf of those five millions of English working men, amongst whom I spent several of 
the most pleasant years of my life, whom I know and whom I cherish. (Cheers.) 
Indeed, gentlemen, the working people stand in need of some generosity. Hitherto 
they have not been treated like men, but like beasts of burden, nay—like merchandise, 
like machines; the English manufacturers know this so well, that they never say, we 
employ so many workmen, but so many hands. The monied classes, acting upon this 
principle, have never hesitated a moment to profit by their services as long as they 
require them, and then turn them out upon the streets, as soon as there is no longer 
any profit to be squeezed out of them. Thus the condition of these outcasts of modern 
society has become such, that it cannot be made worse. Look wherever you like; to the 
banks of the Rhone; into the dirty and pestilential lanes of Manchester, Leeds, and 
Birmingham; on the hills of Saxony and Silesia, or the plains of Westphalia; 
everywhere you will meet with the same pale starvation, the same gloomy despair, in 
the eyes of men who in vain claim their rights and their position in civilised society.” 
(Great sensation.)
Mr. Weerth then declared his opinion to be, that the protective 
system in reality did not protect the working people, but that Free 
Trade—and he told it them plainly and distinctly, although he 
himself was a Free Trader—that Free Trade would never change 
their miserable condition. He did not at all join in the delusions of 
the Free Traders, as to the beneficial effects of the carrying out of 
their system upon the working classes. On the contrary, Free Trade, 
the full realisation of free competition, would force the working 
people as much into a keener competition amongst themselves as it 
would make capitalists compete more selfishly against each other. 
The perfect freedom of competition would inevitably give an 
enormous impulse to the invention of new machinery, and thus 
supersede more workmen than even now were daily superseded. It 
would stimulate production in every way, but for this very reason it 
would stimulate overproduction, overstocking of markets, and 
commercial revulsions, just in the same measure. The Free Traders 
pretended that those terrible revulsions would cease under a system 
of commercial freedom; why, just the contrary would be the case, 
they would increase and multiply more than ever. Possible, nay 
certain it was, that at first the greater cheapness of provisions would 
benefit the workpeople,—that a lessened cost of production would 
increase consumption and the demand for labour, but that

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advantage very soon would be turned into misery, the competition of 
the working people amongst themselves would soon reduce them to 
the former level of misery and starvation. After these and other 
arguments (which appeared to be quite novel to the meeting, for 
they were listened to with the greatest attention, although The Times 
reporter deigns to rid himself of them with the impudent but 
significant sneer—“Chartist commonplace”3), Mr. Weerth concluded 
as follows:
“And do not think, gentlemen, that these are but my individual opinions; they are 
the opinions, too, of the English working men, a class whom I cherish and respect, 
because they are intelligent and energetic men, indeed, (cheers, “by courtesy”) I shall 
prove that by a few facts. During full six years, the gentlemen of the League, whom we 
see here, courted the support of the working people, but in vain. The working men 
never forgot that the capitalists were their natural enemies; they recollected the 
League riots of 1842,119 and the masters’ opposition against the Ten Hours Bill. It was 
only towards the end of 1845, that the Chartists, the élite of the working classes, 
associated for a moment with the League, in order to crush their common enemy, the 
landed aristocracy. But it was for a moment only, and never were they deceived by the 
delusive promises of Cobden, Bright and Co., nor did they hope the fulfilment of 
cheap bread, high wages, and plenty to do. No, not for a moment did they cease to 
trust in their own exertions only; to form a distinct party, led on by distinct chiefs, by 
the indefatigable Duncombe, and by Feargus O’Connor, who, in spite of all 
calumnies,—(here Mr. Weerth looked at Dr. Bowring, who made a quick, convulsive 
movement)—who, in spite of all calumnies, within a few weeks will sit upon the same 
bench with you in the House of Commons.120 In the name, then, of those millions who 
do not believe that Free Trade will do wonders for them, I call upon you to seek for 
some other means to effectively better their condition. Gentlemen, I call upon you for 
your own interests. You have no longer to fear the Emperor of all the Russias; you 
dread not an invasion of Cossacks, but if you do not take care you will have to fear the 
irruption of your own workmen, and they will be more terrible to you than all the 
Cossacks in the world. Gentlemen, the workpeople want no more words from you, 
they want deeds. And you have no reason to be astonished at that. They recollect very 
well, that in 1830 and 31, when they conquered the Reform Bill for you in London, 
when they fought for you in the streets of Paris and Brussels,121 that then they were 
courted, shaken hands with, and highly praised; but that when a few years after they 
demanded bread, then they were received with grape shot and the bayonet. (“Oh! no, 
no! yes, yes! Buzançais, Lyons.”)122 I repeat, therefore, to you, carry your Free Trade, 
it will be well; but think, at the same time, about other measures for the working 
classes, or you will repent it.” (Loud cheers.)
Immediately after Mr. Weerth, up got Dr. Bowring to reply.
“Gentlemen,” said he, “I can tell you that the hon. member who has just sat down 
has not been elected by the English working people to represent them in this 
Congress. On the contrary, the English people generally have given us their suffrages 
for this purpose, and, therefore, we claim our places as their true representatives.”
He then went on to show the beneficial effects of Free Trade, as 
proved by the increased importation of articles of food into England
3 “Free Trade Congress in Brussels” in The Times, September 20, 1847.— Ed.

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Frederick Engels
since the introduction of last year’s tariff.3 So many eggs, so many 
cwt. of butter, cheese, ham, bacon, so many heads of cattle, etc., etc.; 
who could have eaten all that if not the working people of England? 
He quite forgot, however, telling us what quantities of the same 
articles have been produced less in England since foreign competition has been admitted. He took it for granted that increased 
importation was a decisive proof of increased consumption. He 
never mentioned wherefrom the working people of Manchester, 
Bradford, and Leeds, who now walk the streets and cannot get work, 
wherefrom these men got the money to pay for this supposed 
increase of consumption and Free Trade comforts, for we never 
heard of the masters making them presents of eggs, butter, cheese, 
ham, and meat, for not working at all. He never said a word about 
the present depressed state of the trade, which in every public paper 
is represented as really unexampled. He seemed not to know that all 
the predictions of the Free Traders since the carrying of the 
measures have proved just the reverse of reality. He had not a word 
of sympathy for the sufferings of the working classes, but, on the 
contrary, represented their present gloomy condition as the brightest, happiest, and most comfortable they could reasonably desire.
The English working people, now, may choose betwixt their two 
representatives. A host of others followed, who spoke about every 
imaginable subject upon earth, except upon the one under 
discussion. Mr. M’Adam, M. P. for Belfast (?), spun an eternally long 
yarn upon flax-spinning in Ireland, and almost killed the meeting 
with statistics. Mr. Ackersdijk, a Dutch professor, spoke about Old 
Holland and Young Holland, the university of Liège, Walpole, and 
De Witt. M. Van de Casteele spoke about France, Belgium, and the 
ministry. M. Asher, of Berlin, about German patriotism and some 
new article he called spiritual manufacture. M. Den Tex, a 
Dutchman, about God knows what. At last, the whole meeting being 
half asleep, was awakened by M. Wolowski, who returned to the 
question and replied to Mr. Weerth. His speech, like all speeches 
delivered by Frenchmen, proved how much the French capitalists 
dread the fulfilment of Mr. Weerth’s prophecies; they speak with 
such pretended sympathy, such canting and whining of the 
sufferings of the working classes, that one might take it all for good 
earnest, were it not too flagrantly contradicted by the roundness of 
their bellies, by the stamp of hypocrisy deeply imprinted on their 
faces, by the pitiful remedies they propose and by the unmistakeably 
striking contrast between their words and their deeds. Nor have they
3 i.e., the lifting of heavy duties on imported corn in 1846.— Ed.

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ever succeeded in deceiving one single working man. Then, up got 
the Due d’Harcourt, peer of France, and claimed, too, for the French 
capitalists, deputies, etc., present the right of representing the 
French working people. They do so in the same way as Dr. Bowring 
represents the English Chartists. Then spoke Mr. James Wilson, 
repeating most brazen-facedly the most worn-out League arguments, in the drowsy tone of a Philadelphia quaker.
You see from this, what a nice discussion it was. Dr. Marx, of 
Brussels, whom you know as by far the most talented representative 
of German Democracy, had also claimed his turn to speak. He had 
prepared a speech, which, if it had been delivered, would have made 
it impossible for the congressional “gents” to vote upon the question. 
But Mr. Weerth’s opposition had made them shy. They resolved to 
let none speak, of whose orthodoxy they were not quite sure. Thus, 
Messrs Wolowski, Wilson, and the whole precious lot spoke against 
time, and when it was four o’clock, there were still six or seven 
gentlemen who wanted to speak, but the chairman3 closed the 
discussion abruptly, and the whole set of fools, ignorants, and knaves 
called a congress of political economists, voted all votes against one 
(the poor German fool of a Protectionist aforesaid)—the Democrats 
did not vote at all—that Free Trade is extremely beneficial to the 
working people, and will free them from all misery and distress.
As Mr. Marx’s speech, although not delivered, contains the very 
best and most striking refutation of this barefaced lie, which can be 
imagined, and as its contents, in spite of so many hundred pages 
having been written pro and con upon the subject, will yet read quite 
novel in England, I enclose you some extracts from it.
SPEECH OF DR. MARX ON PROTECTION, FREE TRADE,
AND THE WORKING CLASSES
There are two sects of protectionists. The first sect, represented in 
Germany by Dr. List, who never intended to protect manual labour, 
on the contrary, they demanded protective duties in order to crush 
manual labour by machinery, to supersede patriarchal manufacture 
by modern manufacture. They always intended to prepare the reign 
of the monied classes (the bourgeoisie), and more particularly that of 
the large manufacturing capitalists. They openly proclaimed the 
ruin of petty manufacturers, of small tradesmen, and small farmers, 
as an event to be regretted, indeed, but quite inevitable, at the same 
time. The second school of protectionists, required not only
Charles de Brouckere.— Ed.

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Frederick Engels
protection, but absolute prohibition. They proposed to protect 
manual labour against the invasion of machinery, as well as against 
foreign competition. They proposed to protect by high duties, not 
only home manufactures, but also home agriculture, and the 
production of raw materials at home. And where did this school 
arrive at? At the prohibition, not only of the importation of foreign 
manufactured produce, but of the progress of the home manufacture itself. Thus the whole protective system inevitably got upon the 
horns of this dilemma. Either it protected the progress of home 
manufactures, and then it sacrificed manual labour, or it protected 
manual labour, and then it sacrificed home manufactures. Protectionists of the first sect, those who conceived the progress of 
machinery, of division of labour, and of competition, to be 
irresistible, told the working classes, “At any rate if you are to be 
squeezed out, you had better be squeezed by your own countrymen, 
than by foreigners.” Will the working classes for ever bear with this? 
I think not. Those who produce all the wealth and comforts of the 
rich, will not be satisfied with that poor consolation. They will 
require more substantial comforts in exchange for substantial 
produce. But the protectionists say, “After all, we keep up the state 
of society as it is at present. We ensure to the working man, somehow 
or other, the employment he wants. We take care that he shall not be 
turned out of work in consequence of foreign competition.” So be it. 
Thus, in the best case, the protectionists avow that they are unable to 
arrive at anything better than the continuation of the status quo. 
Now the working classes want not the continuation of their actual 
condition, but a change for the better. A last refuge yet stands open 
to the protectionist. He will say that he is not at all adverse to social 
reform in the interior of a country, but that the first thing to ensure 
their success will be to shut out any derangement which might be 
caused by foreign competition. “My system,” he says, “is no system 
of social reform, but if we are to reform society, had we not better do 
so within our own country, before we talk about reforms in our 
relations with other countries?” Very specious, indeed, but under 
this plausible appearance, there is hid a very strange contradiction. 
The protectionist system, while it gives arms to the capital of a 
country against the capital of foreign countries, while it strengthens 
capital against foreigners, believes that this capital, thus armed, thus 
strengthened, will be weak, impotent, and feeble, when opposed to 
labour. Why, that would be appealing to the mercy of capital, as if 
capital, considered as such, could ever be merciful. Why, social 
reforms are never carried by the weakness of the strong, but always 
by the strength of the weak. But it is not at all necessary to insist on

The Free Trade Congress at Brussels
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this point. From the moment the protectionists agree that social 
reforms do not necessarily follow from, and that they are not part 
and parcel of their system, but form quite a distinct question, from 
that moment they abandon the question, which we discuss. We may, 
therefore, leave them in order to review the effects of Free Trade 
upon the condition of the working classes. The problem: What will 
be the influence of the perfect unfettering of trade upon the 
situation of the working classes, is very easy to be resolved. It is not 
even a problem. If there is anything clearly exposed in political 
economy, it is the fate attending the working classes under the reign 
of Free Trade. All those laws developed in the classical works on 
political economy, are strictly true under the supposition only, that 
trade be delivered from all fetters, that competition be perfectly free, 
not only within a single country, but upon the whole face of the 
earth. These laws, which A. Smith, Say, and Ricardo have developed, 
the laws under which wealth is produced and distributed—these laws 
grow more true, more exact, then cease to be mere abstractions, in 
the same measure in which Free Trade is carried out. And the 
master of the science, when treating of any economical subject, tells 
us every moment that all their reasonings are founded upon the 
supposition that all fetters, yet existing, are to be removed from 
trade. They are quite right in following this method. For they make 
no arbitrary abstractions, they only remove from their reasoning a 
series of accidental circumstances. Thus it can justly be said, that the 
economists—Ricardo and others—know more about society as it will 
be, than about society as it is. They know more about the future than 
about the present. If you wish to read in the book of the future, open 
Smith, Say, Ricardo. There you will find described, as clearly as 
possible, the condition which awaits the working man under the 
reign of perfect Free Trade. Take, for instance, the authority of 
Ricardo, authority than which there is no better. What is the natural 
normal price of the labour of, economically speaking, a working 
man? Ricardo replies, “Wages reduced to their minimum—their 
lowest level.” Labour is a commodity as well as any other 
commodity.123 Now the price of a commodity is determined by the 
time necessary to produce it. What then is necessary to produce the 
commodity of labour? Exactly that which is necessary to produce 
the sum of commodities indispensable to the sustenance and the 
repairing of the wear and tear of the labourer, to enable him to live 
and to propagate, somehow or other, his race. We are, however, not 
to believe that the working man will never be elevated above this 
lowest level, nor that he never will be depressed below it. No, 
according to this law, the working classes will be for a time more

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happy, they will have for a time more than the minimum^ but this 
surplus will be the supplement only for what they will have less than 
the minimum at another time, the time of industrial stagnation. That 
is to say, that during a certain space of time, which is always 
periodical, in which trade passes through the circle of prosperity, 
overproduction, stagnation, crisis—that, taking the average of what 
the labourer received more, and what he received less, than the 
minimum, we shall find that on the whole he will have received 
neither more or less than the minimum; or, in other words, that the 
working class, as a class, will have conserved itself, after many 
miseries, many sufferings, and many corpses left upon the industrial 
battle field. But what matters that? The class exists, and not only it 
exists, but it will have increased. This law, that the lowest level of 
wages is the natural price of the commodity of labour, will realise 
itself in the same measure with Ricardo’s supposition that Free 
Trade will become a reality. We accept every thing that has been said 
of the advantages of Free Trade. The powers of production will 
increase, the tax imposed upon the country by protective duties will 
disappear, all commodities will be sold at a cheaper price. And what, 
again, says Ricardo? “That labour being equally a commodity, will 
equally sell at a cheaper price”—that you will have it for very little 
money indeed, just as you will have pepper and salt. And then, in the 
same way as all other laws of political economy will receive an 
increased force, a surplus of truth, by the realisation of Free 
Trade—in the same way the law of population, as exposed by 
Malthus, will under the reign of Free Trade develop itself in as fine 
dimensions as can possibly be desired. Thus you have to choose: 
Either you must disavow the whole of political economy as it exists at 
present, or you must allow that under the freedom of trade the 
whole severity of the laws of political economy will be applied to the 
working classes. Is that to say that we are against Free Trade? No, we 
are for Free Trade, because by Free Trade all economical laws, with 
their most astounding contradictions, will act upon a larger scale, 
upon a greater extent of territory, upon the territory of the whole 
earth; and because from the uniting of all these contradictions into a 
single group, where they stand face to face, will result the struggle 
which will itself eventuate in the emancipation of the proletarians.