Cit. Marx was of opinion that Milner had not quite understood 
the nature of the controversy. There was no opposition to the 
mines and woods being made common property. The injury 
caused by the accumulation of land in the hands of the few was 
granted; it was only with regard to arable land that there was any 
dispute, the opposition came from the partisans of small farming; 
small property was the point in dispute. 

The plea of social necessity was superior to the claim of abstract 
right. Every thing, every possible form of oppression had been 
justified by abstract right; it was high time to abandon this mode 
of agitation. The question was, under what form this right should 
be realised: There was a social necessity to transform feudal 
property into peasant property. In England the proprietor has 
ceased to be a necessity in agriculture. 

As for natural right, the animal had a natural right to the soil 
since it cannot live without it. To push this natural right to its 
logical consequences would land us at the assertion of every 
individual to cultivate his own share. 

Social right and social necessity determined in what manner the 
means of subsistence must be procured. Social necessity enforced 
itself in the course of which factory had arrived, where co- 
operation was compulsory. The fact that no one could produce 
anything by himself gave the social necessity for co-operation. 

He was not against giving a more emphatic form to the 
resolutions. 


Appendices 393 


[If] 


The small peasantry is not at the Congresses, but their idealistic 
representatives are there. The Proudhonists are very strong upon 
the point and they were at Brussels. The Council is responsible for 
the resolutions; they were shaped by the Brussels Committee,** by 
men who well knew the opposition they had to deal with. I am not 
against recasting them. Cit. Weston has only spoken of social 
necessity. We see that both forms of private property in land have 
led to bad results. The small man is only a nominal proprietor, but 
he is the more dangerous because he still fancies that he is a 
proprietor. In England the land could be transformed into 
common property by act of Parliament in the course of a 
fortnight. In France it must be accomplished by means of the 
proprietors’ indebtedness and liability to taxation. |