London, 23 May 1884 

Dear Ede, 

I trust your business trip was eventually crowned with success. All 
that is necessary to begin with, I think, is for the gentry to be thrown 
off the scent; once you have managed to do that, the old route, or 
parts of it, can again be made use of. The stupidity of the police will 
see to the rest. ??8 

I ordered Rodbertus’ Normal-Arbeitstag, but it was out of print. 
I should be grateful if you could let me have the thing — on loan, of 
course,— since it contains the only authentic version of his proposed 
labour reforms.—I am now returning the issues of the old Social- 
Demokrat by registered Malt, ??* having discovered that Lessner pos- 
sesses them. The translation to be agreed with Lafargue is still pen- 
ding, * which is why I had to have the original here; now, of course, 
it can be returned. 

2 See this volume, pp. 116-17. 

Singer has been over here and I informed him, amongst other 
things, of my views regarding the tactics to be adopted in the case of 
final ballots. For I consider it nonsensical to try and set up universally 
applicable rules for these which, when it actually comes to the point, 
are never adhered to. We have great potential power of which no use 
at all will be made if abstention from the polls is prescribed in all cases 
where none of our people are involved in the final ballot. As it hap- 
pens, in all such cases electoral pacts—e.g. with the Centre ??9 — 
invariably come into being automatically: We shall vote for you here 
if you vote for us there, and many a seat have we acquired thus. Blun- 
ders may result of course, but blunders will always be made, nor is 
this any reason for committing an even greater one. I therefore told 
him that, in places like Berlin, for instance, where the electoral cam- 
paign is virtually confined to ourselves and the men of Progress, °* 
pacts before the general election were not out of the question — you 
cede us that constituency and in return we cede you this one— but 
only, of course, if one can count on their being observed. What I con- 
sider inept is, in effect, the attempt by congresses to formulate in ad- 
vance universally valid rules for as yet non-existent tactical cases. 

Au fond,* | am glad that the Anti-Socialist Law has been renewed 
and not repealed forthwith. 7? The liberal philistine would have se- 
cured a tremendous electoral victory for the Conservatives 79°; in 
order to preserve the Anti-Socialist Law he would not only go 
through fire and water, but wade through the deepest of cess-pits. And 
it would only have resulted in another, more draconian law. As it 
now stands, it has probably been renewed for the last time and will, 
once old Wilm” succumbs to his nephritis, soon cease to exist in prac- 
tice. And the thorough discrediting of the German Free Thinkers ?3! 
and of the Centre Party in the course of the division 23? is also of some 
value, though not as much as Bismarck’s right to work. ?°3 Now that 
that addle-pate has taken this up there’s a chance of our ridding our- 
selves of the wailers '?° 4 Ja Geiser. Come to that, no one but a Bis- 
marck could perpetrate such a blunder in the face of a workers’ 
movement that cannot be kept down even by means of emergency laws. 
For the present our people are right to press for implementation and 
thus implicate him as deeply as possible; the moment the man has 
committed himself a bit more (though he is not likely to do so very 
soon), the whole imposture will resolve itself—into Prussian police 

@ On the whole-” William I 

chicanery. Qua electoral programme, the slogan by itself will do him 
damn’ all good. 

The right to work was Fourier’s idea but realised in his case only in 
the phalanstére,?°* and thus presupposes the adoption of the latter. 
The Fourierists— peace-loving philistines of Démocratie pacifigue, as 
their paper was called — disseminated the slogan precisely because it 
sounded safe. The Parisian workers of 1848 swallowed it whole— 
it being something theoretically utterly unclear— because it 
seemed so practical, so non-utopian, so readily realisable. The govern- 
ment realised it—1in the only way it could be realised in a capitalist 
society—in the form of preposterous national workshops. 235 
Similarly in this country, during the 1861-64 cotton crisis, the right 
to work was realised in Lancashire in the form of municipal work- 
shops. And in Germany it is likewise being realised in those hunger 
and cudgel workers’ colonies about which your philistine is now 
enthusing. Advanced as a separate demand, the right to work cannot be 
realised in any other form. The demand for its realisation by capital- 
ist society can only be met by the latter within the terms of its own 
existence, but if the demand for the right to work be made of that so- 
ciety, then it is made on these specific terms and hence is a demand for 
national workshops, workhouses and [workers’] colonies. But if the 
demand for the right to work is to comprise zndirectly the demand for 
the subversion of the capitalist mode of production, it is, in regard 
to the present state of the movement, a dastardly piece of tergiversa- 
tion, a concession to the Anti-Socialist Law, a slogan whose only pur- 
pose can be to bemuse and befuddle the workers as to the aims they 
ought to pursue and the only terms upon which they can attain 
them. 

In the Paris municipal elections, our people have in fact pursued 
the tactics recommended by you, only putting up Dereure against 
Joffrin because there was at first no Opportunist 2°° standing against 
him, so that in this instance opposition was pretty well obligatory. 
Simoneau did not come upon the scene until later, whereupon Guesde 
immediately demanded that Dereure withdraw; but at this point 
Dereure’s courage failed him and thus he suffered a resounding de- 
feat. Vaillant, on the other hand, triumphed over the Possibilists ?%7 
in his arrondissement, for Retiés was a tosspot (poivrard) of the worst 
repute and was deservedly defeated. And if Joffrin was defeated in the 
final ballot, it was not our people but his who were to blame. It will, 
by the way, be necessary to go on opposing the Possibilists until they 

deign to come to an agreement with our chaps at election time; so 
long as they simply go on making themselves out to be the parti ouvrier 
par excellence,* they will force our chaps into direct opposition. So 
either — or; it’s for those gentlemen to decide. 

As regards Joffrin in particular, his programme was so lousy and 
lukewarm that even the Radicals refrained from putting up a rival 
candidate, Joffrin’s programme being, in essence, their own! 

Over here Justice gets more wretched by the week. 

Your 
F.E. 

I shall also set to work on the Déhring. ? When roughly do you 
want to Start printing? Once I have begun, I shall be able to knock off 
some 6 to 8 sheets straight away, although it is precisely at the begin- 
ning that there is much revision to be done. 

The Peasant War will be completely rewritten save for the account 
of military events. ?!3 I have learned a great deal about the subject in 
recent years and shall be including quite a lot of German history. 
This as soon as Dühring is ready!