In the 18th century the kings and potentates were in the habit 
of assembling at The Hague to discuss the interests of their 
dynasties. 

It is there that we decided to hold our workers’ congress despite 
the attempts to intimidate us. In the midst of the most reactionary 
population we wanted to affirm the existence, the spreading and 
hopes for the future of our great Association. 

When our decision became known, there was talk of emissaries 
we had sent to prepare the ground. Yes, we have emissaries 
everywhere, we do not deny it, but the majority of them are 
unknown to us. Our emissaries in The Hague were the workers, 
whose labour is so exhausting, just as in Amsterdam they are 
workers too, workers who toil for sixteen hours a day. Those are 
our emissaries, we have no others; and in all the countries in 
which we make an appearance we find them ready to welcome us, 
for they understand very quickly that the aim we pursue is the 
improvement of their lot. 

The Hague Congress has achieved three main things: 

It has proclaimed the necessity for the working classes to fight 
the old disintegrating society in the political as well as the social 
field; and we see with satisfaction that henceforth this resolution 
of the London Conference will be included in our Rules.’ 

A group has been formed in our midst which advocates that the 
workers should abstain from political activity. 

We regard it as our duty to stress how dangerous and fatal we 
considered those principles to be for our cause. 

a See this volume, p. 243.— Ed 

On the Hague Congress 255 

One day the worker will have to seize political supremacy to 
establish the new organisation of labour; he will have to overthrow 
the old policy which supports the old institutions if he wants to 
escape the fate of the early Christians who, neglecting and 
despising politics, never saw their kingdom on earth. 

But we by no means claimed that the means for achieving this 
goal were identical everywhere. 

We know that the institutions, customs and traditions in the 
different countries must be taken into account; and we do not 
deny the existence of countries like America, England, and if I 
knew your institutions better I might add Holland, where the 
workers may achieve their aims by peaceful means. That being 
true we must also admit that in most countries on the Continent it 
is force which must be the lever of our revolution; it is force which 
will have to be resorted to for a time in order to establish the rule 
of the workers.* 

The Hague Congress has endowed the General Council with 
new and greater powers. Indeed, at a time when the kings are 
assembling in Berlin and when from this meeting of powerful 
representatives of feudalism and the past there must result new 
and more severe measures of repression against us’; at a time 
when persecution is being organised, the Hague Congress rightly 
believed that it was wise and necessary to increase the powers of its 
General Council and to centralise, in view of the impending 
struggle, activity which isolation would render impotent. And, by 
the way, who but our enemies could take alarm at the authority of 
the General Council? Has it a bureaucracy and an armed police to 
ensure that it is obeyed? Is not its authority solely moral, and does 
it not submit its decisions to the Federations which have to carry 
them out? In these conditions, kings, with no army, no police, no 
magistracy, and reduced to having to maintain their power by 
moral influence and authority, would be feeble obstacles to the 
progress of the revolution. 

Finally, the Hague Congress transferred the seat of the General 
Council to New York. Many, even of our friends, seemed to be 
surprised at such a decision. Are they then forgetting that 
America is becoming the world of workers par excellence; that 
every year half a million men, workers, emigrate to that other 
continent, and that the International must vigorously take root in 
that soil where the worker predominates? Moreover, the decision 

a In place of this sentence Der Volksstaat has: “But this is not the case in all 
countries.” — Ed. 

taken by the Congress gives the General Council the right to 
co-opt those members whom it judges necessary and useful for the 
good of the common cause. Let us rely on its wisdom to choose 
men equal to the task and able to carry with a steady hand the 
banner of our Association in Europe. 

Citizens, let us bear in mind this fundamental principle of the 
International: solidarity! It is by establishing this life-giving 
principle on a reliable base among all the workers in all countries 
that we shall achieve the great aim which we pursue. The 
revolution must display solidarity, and we find a great example of 
this in the Paris Commune,’ which fell because there did not 
appear in all the centres, in Berlin, Madrid, etc., a great 
revolutionary movement corresponding to this supreme uprising 
of the Paris proletariat. 

For my part I will persist in my task and will constantly work to 
establish among the workers this solidarity which will bear fruit for 
the future. No, I am not withdrawing from the International, and 
the rest of my life will be devoted, like my efforts in the past, to 
the triumph of the social ideas which one day, be sure of it, will 
bring about the universal rule of the proletariat.