The year 1848 is turning out well. The Sicilian revolution with its 
long train of constitutions is hardly over before Paris experiences a 
victorious insurrection. 

The opposition deputies had publicly pledged themselves to 
defend the right of assembly against Guizot, Duchatel and Hébert by 
means of a courageous demonstration. 

All the preparations had been made. The hall was ready and 
awaited the banquet guests. Then suddenly, when the time had come 
to act, the poltroons of the Left, M. Odilon Barrot at their head, beat, 
as always, a cowardly retreat. 

The banquet was called off. But the people of Paris, stirred up by 
the loud-mouths in the Chamber, raging at the cowardice of these 
épiciers? and made discontented at the same time by protracted 
general unemployment, the people of Paris refused to be called off. 

At midday on Tuesday,° all Paris was on the streets. The masses 
were shouting: “Down with Guizot, long live the Reform!” They 
proceeded to Guizot’s residence, which was protected by the troops 
with difficulty; but the windows were nevertheless broken. 

The masses proceeded to Odilon Barrot’s house as well, shouted 
“Down with Barrot!” and broke his windows, too. M. Barrot, the 
cowardly originator of the whole outbreak, sent to the government 
and asked for a security guard! 

The troops stood by and quietly looked on. Only the Municipal 
Guard struck out, and that with the greatest brutality. The Municipal 
Guard is a corps consisting in the main of natives of Alsace and 

> February 22, 1848.—Ed. 

Lorraine, that is, men who are half German; they receive three and a 
half fr[ancs] a day and look very plump and well-nourished. The 
Municipal Guard is the basest body of soldiers in existence, worse 
than the Gendarmerie, worse than the old Swiss Guard; if the people 
win, things will go badly for it. 

Towards evening the people began to resist. Barricades were set 
up, guard posts stormed and set on fire. A police spy was cut down in 
the Place de la Bastille. Arms shops were looted. 

At five o’clock marching orders were sounded for the National 
Guard. But only a very few turned up, and those who did shouted 
“Down with Guizot!” 

During the night calm was restored. The last barricades were 
taken and the outbreak appeared to be over. 

On Wednesday morning, however, the revolt began again with 
renewed vigour. A large part of the centre of Paris lying to the east of 
the Rue Montmartre was strongly barricaded; after eleven o’clock 
the troops no longer dared venture in there. The National Guard 
gathered in large numbers, but only to hold the troops back from 
any attacks on the people and to shout “Down with Guizot, long live 
the Reform!” 

There were 50,000 soldiers in Paris, disposed according to 
Marshal Gérard’s defence plan*! and holding all strategic points. 
But these points were so numerous that all of the troops were kept 
busy with them and were thus already forced into inaction. Apart 
from the Municipal Guard there were almost no soldiers free for an 
offensive. Gérard’s excellent plan was of infinite help to the 
outbreak; it paralysed the troops and made it easier for them to 
maintain the passivity to which they were in any case inclined. The 
detached forts also proved to be anything but beneficial to the 
government. They had to be kept manned and thus also withdrew a 
considerable section of the troops from the battle area. No one 
thought of a bombardment. In general not a single person gave a 
thought to the fact that these bastilles even existed. One more proof 
how fruitless are all defence plans against a mass revolt in a great 
city! 

Towards noon the outcry against the Ministry in the ranks of the 
National Guard was so strong that several colonels sent word to the 
Tuileries that they would not hold themselves responsible for their 
regiments if the Ministry were to remain. 

At two o'clock the aged Louis Philippe was forced to drop Guizot 
and form a new Ministry. Hardly had this been made public when 
the National Guard went home in jubilation and illuminated their 
houses. 

But the people, the workers, the only ones who had erected the 
barricades, battled with the Municipal Guard and thrown themselves 
against the bullets, the bayonets and the horses’ hoofs, these workers 
had no desire to fight merely for M. Molé and M. Billault.*’* They 
continued the struggle. While the Boulevard des Italiens was full of 
joy and jubilation, there was heavy shooting in the Rue Sainte-Avoie 
and Rambuteau. The battle lasted long into the night and was 
continued on Thursday morning. Evidence of the general participa- 
tion of the workers in the battle was the tearing up of the rails on all 
the railways around Paris. 

The bourgeoisie has made its revolution, it has toppled Guizot and 
with him the exclusive rule of the Stock Exchange grandees. Now, 
however, in the second act of the struggle, it is no longer one section 
of the bourgeoisie confronting another, now the proletariat con- 
fronts the bourgeoisie. 

News has just arrived that the people have won and proclaimed 
the Republic. We confess that we had not dared hope for this 
brilliant success by the Paris proletariat. 

Three members of the provisional government belong to the 
definitely democratic party, whose organ is the Réforme. The fourth 
is a worker—for the first time in any country in the world. The others 
are Lamartine, Dupont de |’Eure and two men from the National.>° 

By this glorious revolution the French proletariat has again placed 
itself at the head of the European movement. All honour to the 
workers of Paris! They have given the world an impulse which will be 
felt by every country in turn; for the victory of the Republic in 
France means the victory of democracy in the whole of Europe. 

Our age, the age of democracy, is breaking. The flames of the 
Tuileries and the Palais Royal are the dawn of the proletariat. 
Everywhere the rule of the bourgeoisie will now. come crashing 
down, or be dashed to pieces. 

Germany, we hope, will follow. Nowor never will it raise itself from 
its degradation. If the Germans have any energy, any pride or any 
courage, then in a month’s time we too shall be able to shout: 

“Long live the German Republic!” 

Zeitung No. 17, February 27, 1848 time