* Cologne, January 25. Seldom, yet from time to time, one has the
No. 205, January 26, 1849
Neue Rheinische Zeitung.
pleasure of seeing, from the sediment left behind by the double deluge of revolution and counter-revolution, a signpost from the good old pre-March days still towering up. Mountains have been moved,
valleys filled in, forests levelled to the ground, but the signpost still
stands in its old place, painted with the old colours, and
still bears the old inscription: “To Schilda!”
Such a signpost stretches its wooden arm out to us from No. 21 of the Berliner Nationalzeitung with the inscription: “ To the Urwähler. To Schilda!”
The well-meant advice of the Nationalzeitung to the Urwähler declares
to them first: “The hour has come when the Prussian people proceeds for the second time to exercise the hard-won universal suffrage,” (as if the octroyed so-called universal suffrage, with
its interpretation differing in every village, were still the same suffrage as that of 8 April!) “from which the men are to emerge who are to pronounce for the second time what the sense (!), the
opinion (!!), and the will (!!!) is, not of individual estates and classes,
but of the whole people.”
Let us pass over in silence the paunchy-clumsy style of this sentence, which wheezes laboriously from one word to the next. Universal
suffrage, it is said, is to reveal to us what the will is, not of individual
estates and classes, but of the whole people.
Fine! And of what does “the whole people” consist?
Of “individual estates and classes”.
And of what does “the will of the whole people” consist?
Of the individual, mutually contradictory “wills” of the “individual
estates and classes”, hence precisely of the will which the Nationalzeitung presents as the direct opposite of the “will of the whole people”.

Great logician of the Nationalzeitung!
But for the Nationalzeitung there exists a will of the whole people which
is no sum of contradictory wills, but a single, determinate will. How so?
That is – the will of the majority.
And what is the will of the majority?
It is the will that arises from the interests, the social position, the existential conditions of the majority.
Hence, in order to have one and the same will, the members of the
majority must have the same interests, the same social position, the same existential conditions, or must for the time being still be linked together in their interests, their social position,
their existential conditions.
In plain German: the will of the people, the will of the majority, is the
will not of individual estates and classes, but of one single class
and of those other classes and subdivisions of classes that are subordinated to this one
ruling class socially, i.e., industrially and commercially.
“But what are we to say to this?” The will of the whole people is the
will of a ruling class?
Certainly, and it is precisely universal suffrage that is the magnetic needle which, albeit only after various oscillations,
nevertheless points in the end to this class called to rule.
And this good National-Zeitung still drivels on, as it did anno
1847, about an imaginary “will of the whole people”!
Further. After this uplifting exordium, it astounds us
with the pregnant remark:
“In January 1849 the state of things is different from that in the days of May 1848, so rich in hope and exaltation (why not also in devotion?).”
At that time everything stood in the adornment of blossoms,
And the sunlight laughed,
And the little birds sang so hopefully,
And the people hoped and thought,
They thought:
“At that time all seemed unanimous that the great reforms which ought long since to have been undertaken in Prussia, if building had been continued on the foundations laid in the years
1807–14, in the spirit of that time and in accordance with the education and insight that have risen since then – must now be carried out fully and without delay.”

“At that time all seemed unanimous”! Great, divine naivety of the National-Zeitung!
At that time, when the guards withdrew from Berlin gnashing their teeth with rage, when the Prince of Prussia had to flee hastily in a postilion’s jacket, when the high nobility and the high bourgeoisie choked on their wrath at the ignominy inflicted upon the King in the palace courtyard, when
the people compelled him to doff his cap before the March corpses – “at that time
all seemed unanimous”!
Heaven knows, it is already a tall order to have imagined such a thing, but now, after one must acknowledge oneself as duped, still to trumpet one’s duped credulity from the rooftops –
truly, c’est par trop bonhomme!
And about what “did all seem unanimous”?
About the fact “that the great reforms which ... ought to have been
undertaken, if ... building had been continued, must now ... be carried out.”
About that, all were – no, seemed unanimous.
Great achievement of March, expressed in worthy language!
And what “reforms” were these?
The development of the “foundations of 1807–14, in the spirit of that time
and in accordance with the education and insight that have since risen.”
I.e., in the spirit of 1807–14 and at the same time in a completely different
spirit.
The “spirit of that time” consisted quite simply in the highly material
pressure of the French of that time upon the Prussian Junker monarchy of that time, as well as in the financial deficit of the Kingdom of Prussia, which was likewise little favourable at that time. In order to make the burgher and peasant capable of paying taxes, in order at least for appearance's sake to introduce some of the reforms among the royal Prussian subjects, with which the French showered the conquered parts of Germany;
in short, in order to patch up again somewhat the Hohenzollern monarchy, which was cracking in all its joints and rotten, some miserly so-called municipal ordinances, redemption ordinances, military institutions, etc., were made. All these reforms were distinguished by
nothing except that they lagged a full hundred years behind the French Revolution of 1789, nay behind the English one of 1640. And
these are supposed to be the foundations for revolutionised Prussia?
But old-Prussian imagination always sees Prussia at the centre of world history, whereas the state of intelligence has in reality always been dragged by it through the mire. This old-Prussian imagination must naturally ignore that Prussia, so long as it
received no kicks from the French, remained quietly squatting on the undeveloped

foundations of 1807–1814 and stirred not a limb. It must
ignore that these foundations had long been forgotten when, last February, the glorious bureaucratic-Junkerish royal Prussian monarchy received from the French a new, so violent jolt that it
tumbled down most gloriously from its “foundations of 1807–1814”. It
must ignore that for the royal Prussian monarchy it was not at all a question of
these foundations, but merely of averting the further consequences
of the impulse received from France. But all this the Prussian imagination ignores, and when it suddenly receives the jolt,
it screams, like a child for its nurse, for the rotten foundations of 1807–1814!
As if the Prussia of 1848, in territory, industry, trade,
means of communication, education and class relations, were not a completely different country from the Prussia of the “foundations of 1807–1814”!
As if since that time two entirely new classes, the industrial
proletariat and the free peasant class, had not intervened in its history, as if the Prussian bourgeoisie of 1848 were not entirely different from the timid, humble and grateful petty bourgeoisie of
the time of the “foundations”!
But all this is of no avail. A good Prussian must know nothing but
his “foundations of 1807 to 1814”. Those are the foundations once and for all,
building is continued on them, and basta.
The beginning of one of the most colossal historical upheavals is
shrivelled up into the end of one of the tiniest sham-reform swindles – thus does one understand the revolution in Old Prussia!
And in this self-complacently narrow-minded enthusiasm from the patriotic
history, “all seemed unanimous” – to be sure, thank God, only in Berlin!
Further.
“Those estates and classes which had privileges and prerogatives to give up ... whose part it was in future to stand only on an equal footing with
all their fellow citizens, ... seemed prepared to do so – filled with the
conviction that the old state of affairs had become untenable, that it lay in
their own well-understood interest ...”
Look at the meek and from his heart humble burgher, how
he once again conjures away the revolution! The nobility, the priests, the bureaucrats, the officers “seemed prepared” to give up their privileges,
not because the armed people compelled them to do so, because the demoralisation and disorganisation which, in the first terror at the European revolution, had irresistibly broken out in their own ranks rendered them unresisting – no! The peaceful, benevolent and, for both
parties, advantageous “transactions”, to speak with Herr Camphausen, of

24 February and 18 March, had filled them with the “conviction” that this “lay in their own well-understood interest”!
The March revolution and above all the 24th of February in the well-understood interest of the lords of the cabbage Junkers, consistorial councillors, government councillors and guards lieutenants – that is truly a pyramidal fancy!
But alas! “Today it is no longer so. The beneficiaries and adherents
of the old state of affairs, far from helping themselves, in accordance with their duty (!), to clear away the old rubble and build the new house, only want to prop up the old ruins, under which the ground has so alarmingly
quaked, and to decorate them with a few forms that seem to fit the new age.”
“Today it is no longer so” – as it seemed to be in May, i.e., it is
not so as it was not in May, or it is exactly so as it was in
May.
Such German is written in the Berliner National-Zeitung, and they are
proud of it into the bargain.
In a word: May 1848 and January 1849 differ
only in semblance. Previously the counter-revolutionaries seemed to recognise their duty, today they really and openly fail to recognise it,
and the tranquil burgher laments over this. After all, it is the duty of the
counter-revolutionaries to give up their interests in their own well-understood interest! It is their duty to cut open their own life-veins – and yet they do not do it – so laments the man of
well-understood interest!
And why do your enemies not now do what, as you say, is after all
their duty?
Because you yourselves did not do your “duty” in spring, – because
at that time, when you were strong, you behaved like poltroons and trembled before the revolution which was to make you great and powerful; because
you yourselves left the old rubble lying and complacently
admired yourselves in the aureole of a half-success! And now, when the
counter-revolution has grown strong overnight and sets its foot on your
necks, now, when the ground quakes alarmingly beneath your feet,
now you demand that the counter-revolution become your servant, that it
clear away the rubble you were too weak and too cowardly
to clear away, that it, the mighty, sacrifice itself for you, the weak?
Childish fools you are! But wait a short while, and the people will
rise up and with one mighty blow stretch you on the ground together with the counter-revolution, against which you now bark so impotently!
(Conclusion follows.)

Neue Rheinische Zeitung.
No. 207, January 28, 1849.
Second Edition.
* Cologne, January 27. (The Berlin National-Zeitung to the Electors. –
Conclusion.)

We have in our first article not taken into consideration a circumstance which might indeed serve the National-Zeitung as an apparent excuse: The National-Zeitung does not write freely, it stands under the state of siege. And under the state of siege it must indeed sing:
Bid me not speak, bid me be silent,
For my secret is my duty;
I would reveal my inmost heart to you,
But fate will not permit it!!!
However, newspapers do not appear, not even under the state of siege, in order to say the contrary of what they think, and then the state of siege does not apply to the first half of the article in question, which we have hitherto considered.
The state of siege is not to blame for the bombastic, unclear style of the National-Zeitung.
The state of siege is not to blame for the fact that after March the National-Zeitung harboured all sorts of philistine illusions.
The state of siege by no means compels the National-Zeitung to make the revolution of 1848 the train-bearer of the reforms of 1807 to 1814.
The state of siege, in a word, by no means compels the National-Zeitung to have such absurd notions about the course of development of the revolution and counter-revolution of 1848 as we demonstrated it had two days ago. It is not the past, only the present that falls prey to the state of siege.
Therefore, in criticising the first half of the article in question, we took no account of the state of siege, and precisely for that reason we shall take account of it today.
After finishing its historical introduction, the National-Zeitung now turns to the electors in the following manner:
“The thing is to secure the progress that has been initiated, to hold fast to the achievements.”
What “progress”? What “achievements”? The “progress” that “today it is no longer as it ‘seemed’ in May”? The “achievement” that “the beneficiaries of the old state of things are far from helping themselves in accordance with their duty, that the old rubble be cleared away”? Or the imposed “achievements” that “prop up the old ruins and dress them up with a few forms that seemingly adapt themselves to the new era”?
The state of siege, gentlemen of the National-Zeitung, is no excuse for thoughtlessness and confusion.
The “progress” which for the time being is best “initiated” is the retrogression to the old system, and on this road of progress we stride further every day.
The only “achievement” that has remained to us – and that is no specifically Prussian, no “March” achievement, but the result of the European revolution of 1848 – is the most general, most decisive, bloodiest, most violent counter-revolution, which is itself, however, only a phase of the European revolution and therefore only the mother of a new, general and victorious revolutionary counter-blow.
But the National-Zeitung perhaps knows that just as well as we do, and is merely not permitted to say it because of the state of siege? Listen:
“We do not want a continuation of the revolution; we are enemies of all anarchy, of every act of violence and arbitrary act; we want law, peace and order.”
The state of siege, gentlemen, compels you at most to silence, never to speak. We therefore place this last-quoted sentence on record: if it speaks out of you, so much the better; if the state of siege speaks from it, you had no need to make yourselves its mouthpiece. Either you are revolutionary, or you are not. If you are not, we are opponents from the very outset; if you are, you had to be silent.
But you speak with such conviction, you have such honourable antecedents, that we can calmly assume: the state of siege is entirely alien to this protestation.
“We do not want a continuation of the revolution.” That means: we want the continuation of the counter-revolution. For out of the violent counter-revolution, that is a historical fact, one either never gets out at all, or only through revolution.
“We do not want a continuation of the revolution,” that means: we recognise the revolution as closed, as having attained its goal. And the goal which the revolution had attained on January 21, 1849, when the article in question was written, this goal was precisely – the counter-revolution.
“We are enemies of all anarchy, of every act of violence and arbitrary act.”
Thus also enemies of the “anarchy” which sets in after every revolution until the consolidation of the new relations, enemies of the “acts of violence” of February 24 and March 18, enemies of the “arbitrary act” which ruthlessly demolishes a rotten state of things and its decayed legal support-pillars!
“We want law, peace and order”!
Indeed, the moment is well chosen, to kneel down before “law, peace and order”, to protest against the revolution and to join in the trivial clamour against anarchy, acts of violence and arbitrary act!
Well chosen, precisely at the moment when the revolution, under the protection of bayonets and cannons, is officially stigmatised as a common crime, when “anarchy, acts of violence and arbitrary act” are applied in practice without disguise by royal countersigned ordinances, when the “law” which the camarilla imposes upon us is always used against us, never for us, when “peace and order” consist in leaving the counter-revolution in “peace” so that it can restore its old Prussian “order” of things!
No, gentlemen, it is not the state of siege that speaks out of you, it is the most unadulterated Odilon Barrot, translated into the Berlin idiom, that speaks out of you, with all his narrow-mindedness, all his impotence, all his pious wishes.
No revolutionary is so tactless, so childish, so cowardly as to disown the revolution just when the counter-revolution is celebrating its most brilliant triumphs. If he cannot speak, he acts, and if he cannot act, he would rather keep completely silent.
But do the gentlemen of the National-Zeitung not perhaps pursue a cunning policy? Do they perhaps come forward so tamely in order to win over a section of the so-called moderates on the eve of the elections for the opposition?
We have said it, from the very first day when the counter-revolution broke over us, from now on there are only two parties: the “revolutionaries” and the “counter-revolutionaries”; only two watchwords: “the democratic republic” or “the absolute monarchy”. Everything that lies between them is no longer a party, it is a mere faction. The counter-revolution has done everything to make our dictum come true. The elections are its most brilliant confirmation.
And at such a time, when the parties confront each other so sharply, when the struggle is being waged with the greatest embitterment, when only the overwhelming superior force of organised soldiery prevents the struggle from being fought out with weapons in hand – at such a time all mediation politics ceases. One must be an Odilon Barrot oneself to be able to play the Odilon Barrot then.
But our Berlin Barrots have their reservations, their conditions, their interpretations. Whimperers they are, but by no means whimperers pure and simple; they are whimperers with a “that is to say”, whimperers of the mild opposition:
“But we want new laws, such as the awakened free spirit of the people and the principle of equal rights demand; we want a truly democratic-constitutional order” (i.e. a veritable absurdity); “we want peace that rests on something more than bayonets and states of siege; that is a politically and morally (!) founded calming of minds, evoked by the conviction, guaranteed through deeds and institutions, that every class of the people gets its right” etc., etc.
We can save ourselves the labour of writing out this state-of-siege-like sentence to the end. Enough, the gentlemen do not “want” the revolution, but only a little bouquet from the results of the revolution; a little democracy, but also a little constitutionalism, a few new laws, removal of the feudal institutions, bourgeois equality, etc., etc.
In other words, the gentlemen of the National-Zeitung and those of the Berlin ex-Left, whose organ it is, want to obtain from the counter-revolution exactly the same things for which the counter-revolution dispersed them.
They have learnt nothing and forgotten nothing!
The gentlemen “want” nothing but things which they will never obtain except through a new revolution. And a new revolution they do not want.
A new revolution would, however, bring them quite different things from the modest bourgeois demands set out above. And therefore the gentlemen are quite right not to want a revolution.
But the best of it is that historical development cares little what the Barrots “want” or do not “want”. On February 24, the original Paris Barrot also “wanted” nothing but very modest reforms and in particular to push through a portfolio for himself; and scarcely had he snatched both, than the waves closed over his head and he disappeared with his entire virtuous, petty-bourgeois following in the revolutionary deluge. Even now that he has finally snatched a ministry again, he again “wants” all sorts of things; but nothing of what he wants happens. That has always been the fate of the Barrots. And so it will also go with the Berlin Barrots.
They will, with or without a state of siege, continue to bore the public with their pious wishes, they will at most push through a few of these wishes on paper, and in the end will be pensioned off either by the crown or by the people. But pensioned off they will be in any case.