Written on 21 March 1881.
From the manuscript.
From the English.

Citizen!

It is with great regret that we must inform you that we are unable to be present at your meeting.

When the Paris Commune succumbed to the terrible massacre organised by the defenders of “order”, the victors hardly suspected that not ten years would pass before an event would take place in far-off Petersburg which, even if perhaps after long and fierce struggles, must finally and with certainty lead to the establishment of a Russian Commune.

They also hardly suspected that the King of Prussia, who had prepared the Commune by besieging Paris and thus compelling the ruling bourgeoisie to arm the people, that this same King of Prussia, ten years later, besieged in his own capital by socialists, would only be able to maintain his throne by declaring a state of siege in his capital Berlin.

The governments of the Continent, which after the fall of the Commune forced the International Working Men’s Association, by their persecutions, to abandon its formal, external organisation—these governments, which believed they could destroy the great international working-class movement by decrees and special laws, on the other hand hardly suspected that this same international working-class movement ten years later would be more powerful than ever, and would embrace the working class not only of Europe but also of America, and that the common struggle for common interests against a common enemy would fuse it into a new and greater spontaneous International, which is more and more outgrowing all external forms of association.

Thus the Commune, which the powers of the old world believed they had exterminated, lives a more vigorous life than ever, and thus we can join with you in the cry: “Vive la Commune!”