Engels in Neue Rheinische Zeitung November 1848

New Institutions -- Progress in Switzerland

by Frederick Engels

Neue Rheinische Zeitung No. 143
Translated by the Marx-Engels Institute
1994

Berne, November 9. The new legislative Federal Assembly, consisting
of the Swiss National Council and the Council of States, has been meeting
here since the day before yesterday. The city of Berne has gone out of
its way to give them brilliant and fascinating reception. There has been
music, festive processions, illuminations, the boom of cannon and the peal
of bells -- nothing has been forgotten. The sessions began the day before
yesterday. In the National Council, which is elected by universal suffrage
and according to the number of inhabitants (Berne has returned 20 deputies,
Zurich 12, the smallest cantons two or three), the great majority of deputies
are liberals of a radical hue. The decidedly radical party is strongly
represented, and the conservatives have only six or seven seats out of
over a hundred. The Council of States, which is made up of two deputies
from each canton and one deputy from each demicanton, on the whole resembles
the last Diet as regards composition and character. The old cantons have
once again returned several true separatists, [89] and as a result of the
indirect elections, the reactionary element, though definitely in a minority,
is nevertheless more strongly represented in this Council than it is in
the National Council. As a matter of fact, by abolishing binding mandates
[90] and invalidating half votes, the Council of States has been turned
into a rejuvenated version of the Diet and has been pushed into the background
by the creation of the National Council. It plays the thankless role of
a senate or a chamber of peers, the role of heir to the mature wisdom and
sober judgment of the forefathers, acting as a drag on the National Council
which is assumed to be excessively fond of innovation. This dignified and
sedate institution already shares the fate of similar bodies in England
and America, and the now defunct one in France. Even before it has shown
any signs of life it is looked down upon by the press and overshadowed
by the National Council. Practically no one talks about the Council of
States, and if it did make itself talked about it would be still worse
for it.

Although the National Council is supposed to represent the entire
Swiss "nation", it has already at its first session given proof of typically
Swiss discord and hair-splitting, even if not of petty cantonal spirit.
Three votes had to be taken to elect a president, although there were only
three candidates with any serious chances, and all three of them from Berne.
The three gentlemen in question were Ochsenbein, Funk and Neuhaus; the
first two represent the moderate radical party of Berne, the third the
moderate liberal, semi- conservative party. In the end Ochsenbein was elected
by 50 votes out of 93, that is, with a very narrow majority. One can understand
the Zurich and other Moderados [91] preferring the wise and very experienced
Herr Neuhaus to Herr Ochsenbein, but the fact that Herr Funk, who represents
exactly the same political coloring as Herr Ochsenbein, should have been
put forward as a competing candidate and received support in two votings,
shows how unorganized and undisciplined the parties still are. At any rate
the election of Ochsenbein means that the Radicals gained a victory in
the first contest of the parties. In the subsequent election of a vice-president,
five votes had to be taken to produce an absolute majority. On the other
hand, the staid and experienced Council of States almost unanimously elected
the Moderado Furrer from Zurich as its president in the first round of
voting. These two elections amply illustrate how different a spirit obtains
in the two Chambers and that they will soon move in different directions
and enter into conflict with each other.

The choice of a federal capital will be the next interesting issue
to be debated. It will be interesting for the Swiss because the financial
interests of many of them are involved, and interesting for people abroad
because this debate will reveal most clearly to what extent the old parochial
patriotism, the petty cantonal narrow-mindedness has been finished with.
The competition is most intense between Berne, Zurich and Lucerne. Berne
would like to see Zurich satisfied with the federal university, and Lucerne
with the federal court of law, but in vain. Berne at any rate is the only
suitable city, being the point where German and French Switzerland merge,
the capital of the largest canton and the rising centre of the whole Swiss
movement. But in order to become a real centre, Berne must also possess
the university and the federal court. But try and explain that to the Swiss,
whose fanaticism for their cantonal town has been roused! It is quite possible
that the more radical National Council will vote for radical Berne, the
sedate Council of States for the sedate, wise and prudent Zurich. An extremely
difficult situation will then arise.

There has been considerable unrest in Geneva during the last three
weeks. The reactionary patricians and bourgeois, who, from their villas,
keep the villages around Geneva in almost feudal dependence, managed with
the help of their peasants to push through all their three candidates in
the elections to the National Council. But the (local] authorities declared
the elections invalid, as more ballot-papers were returned than had been
issued. Only this measure was able to pacify the revolutionary workers
of Saint- Gervais, groups of whom were already marching through the streets
and shouting "Aux armes!" The attitude of the workers in the course of
the week that followed was so menacing that the bourgeois preferred not
to vote at all rather than provoke a revolution with the inevitable scenes
of horror; especially since the government threatened to resign if the
reactionary candidates were once more elected. The Radicals meanwhile altered
their list of candidates, to which they added some more moderate names,
made up for lost canvassing time, and obtained 5,000 to 5,500 votes in
the new elections, that is, almost a thousand more than the reactionaries
had received in the previous round. The three reactionary candidates got
hardly any votes; General Dufour, who received the highest number, managed
to poll 1,500 votes. Elections to the Great Council were held a week later.
The city elected 44 Radicals, and the countryside, which had to return
46 councilors, elected almost exclusively reactionaries. The Revue de Geneve
[92] is still arguing with the bourgeois papers as to whether all 46 are
reactionary or half a dozen of them will vote for the Radical government.
We shall soon know. Still greater confusion may reign in Geneva; for if
the government, which is here elected directly by the people, is forced
to resign, then a situation similar to that obtaining during the second
elections to the National Council might easily result, and a Radical government
would be confronted by a reactionary majority in the Great Council. It
is moreover certain that the workers of Geneva are only waiting for an
opportunity to secure the threatened gains of 184793 by a new revolution.

On the whole, compared with the early forties, Switzerland has
made considerable progress. This is nowhere so striking as among the workingclass. Whereas this old spirit of parochial narrow-mindedness and pedantry
still holds almost undivided sway among the bourgeoisie and especially
in the old patrician families, or has, at best, assumed more modern forms,
the Swiss workers have developed to a remarkable degree. Formerly, they
kept aloof from the Germans and displayed the most absurd "free Swiss"
national arrogance, complained about the "foreign rogues" and showed no
interest whatever in the contemporary movement. Now this has changed. Ever
since working conditions have deteriorated, ever since Switzerland has
been democratized, and especially since the minor riots have given place
to European revolutions and battles such as those waged in Paris in June
and in Vienna in October-ever since then the Swiss workers have been drawn
more and more into the political and socialist movements, have fraternized
with foreign workers, especially German workers, and have abandoned their
"free Swiss attitude". In the French part of Switzerland and in many of
her German districts, Germans and German Swiss are members of the same
workers' association on an equal footing, and associations consisting mainly
of Swiss workers have decided to join the proposed Organization of German
Democratic Associations which has partially been set up. Whereas the extreme
Radicals of official Switzerland dream at best of the one and indivisible
Helvetian republic, Swiss workers often express the view that the whole
of little Switzerland's independence will go to the dogs in the impending
European storm. And this is said quite calmly and indifferently, without
a word of regret, by these proletarian traitors! All the Swiss I have met
expressed great sympathy for the Viennese, but among the workers it amounted
to real fanaticism. No one speaks about the National Council, the Council
of States, the riot of the priests in Fribourg, [94] -- but Vienna is on
everybody's lips all day long. One would think that Vienna were again the
capital of Switzerland as it was in the days before Wilhelm Tell, that
Switzerland belonged again to Austria. Hundreds of rumors were bruited
about, dilated upon, called in question, believed, refuted, and all possible
aspects were thoroughly discussed. And when, at last, the news of the defeat
of the heroic Viennese workers and students and of Windischgratz's superior
strength and barbarity was definitely confirmed, the effect on these Swiss
workers was as great as though their own fate had been decided in Vienna
and their own country had succumbed. Though this feeling is not yet a universal
one, it is steadily gaining ground among the Swiss proletariat, and the
fact that it already exists in many localities is, for a country like Switzerland,
a great advance.

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