The more immediate theoretical founder of social democracy, and for many years its leading representative, was Karl Marx, born in 1818 in Treves (Trier). The social position of his family in Germany was excellent. His father, a converted Jew, occupied a high position in the civil service. Marx studied law at the universities of Bonn and Berlin. In the latter place he became so much interested in philosophy that he abandoned law. The philosophy which he adopted was the Hegelian. He intended to become a professor, but was led into politics and journalism by the apparent dawn of freedom accompanying the succession of Frederick William IV. to the Prussian throne in 1840. He soon became editor-in-chief of the Rhenish Gazette (Rheinische Zeitung), which had been founded by leading liberals, and began to criticise the government with what was then called unheard-of boldness. But he was so skilful in his expressions that the special censor of the press, who was sent from Berlin to Cologne to watch the paper, could find no cause for legal proceedings against him. Finally, government becoming weary of such attacks, and having then the power to do so, simply decreed that at the expiration of the first quarter-year of 1843 the paper should[171] cease to appear.[171] The interest which Marx had begun to take in matters of government showed him the necessity of informing himself more fully on subjects of political economy. He went to Paris, accordingly, after the suppression of the Rheinische Zeitung, to study that science, thinking that France then afforded better advantages for that purpose. He was, no doubt, right in this, as the Germans have only lately become great in political economy. In Paris he continued to wage war with the pen on the Prussian government, and was banished from France in 1844 by Guizot, to please Prussia. Going to Brussels, he continued his economic studies, interested himself in the cause of the laborers, and in his writings at this time expressed views similar to those which he held at the time of his death. In 1847, in company with Friedrich Engels, he composed and published a manifesto of the communistic party, which closed with these words: “The communists scorn to conceal their views and purposes. They declare openly that their aims can be attained only by a violent overthrow of the existing social order. Let the ruling classes tremble before a communistic revolution. The proletarians have nothing to lose except their chains. They have a world to gain. Proletarians of all lands, unite!” The events of 1848 brought Marx to Germany again, where, with his friends, Engels, Wolff, and the poet Freiligrath, he founded the New Rhenish Gazette (Neue Rheinische Zeitung). For one year this paper was an able advocate of the cause of the laborers. German democracy and reaction were alike rejected,[172] and the interest of the laborers was represented as irreconcilably opposed to that of all other classes. The paper was suppressed in 1849, and its founders banished from Germany. Marx lived thereafter in London.
The last issue of the paper contained a spirited farewell poem, by Freiligrath, promising the reappearance of the journal when its undying spirit should have triumphed over all its foes. The following is a good translation:[172]
“FAREWELL OF THE NEW RHENISH GAZETTE.
“Farewell, but not forever farewell!
They cannot kill the spirit, my brother;
In thunder I’ll rise on the field where I fell,
More boldly to fight out another.
When the last of crowns like glass shall break
On the scenes our sorrows have haunted,
And the people its last dread ‘guilty’ shall speak,
By your side you shall find me undaunted.
On Rhine or on Danube, in war and deed,
You shall witness, true to his vow,
On the wrecks of thrones, in the midst of the field,
The rebel who greets you now.”
In London, Marx continued his agitation and literary work uninterruptedly—the former reaching its climax in the foundation of the International, in 1864; the latter in the appearance of his most important work, “Das Kapital” (“Capital”), in 1867.[173] It is a development and continuation of his “Zur Kritik der politischen Oekonomie”—“A Critique of Political[173] Economy”—published in 1859. Marx intended, in “Das Kapital,” to present a complete system of political economy in three volumes, but had published only the first, “On the Process of Capital Production,” at the time of his death, March 14, 1883. The delay was due, it is said, to the extraordinary thoroughness with which he worked. He had, however, practically completed the second volume and had the third volume well under way before his decease. These two volumes, treating of the “Circulation of Capital” and “The Forms of the Entire Process and the History of the Theory,” will be brought out by his friend, Friedrich Engels. It is further stated that Marx had prepared a third and improved edition of the first volume, which is now in press.
Marx’s book, “Capital,” has been called the Bible of the social democrats, and it deserves the name. It defends their doctrines with acuteness of understanding and profundity of learning, and certainly ranks among the ablest politico-economic treatises ever written. I should place it on a par with Ricardo’s “Principles of Political Economy and Taxation.” Much has been said against its style. I think it, at least, equal to Ricardo’s. It is difficult reading, not because it is poorly written, but because it is deep. Any one, however, who has had some training in political economy, and is ordinarily bright, ought not to find its difficulty insurmountable.
Marx lived a quiet life in London, directing from that point the movements of the International, corresponding for the New York Tribune for a time, besides writing his books and pamphlets, and enjoying the society of his friends. His family life was a happy one. His wife was Jenni von Westphalen,[174] daughter of the Prussian minister of the same name, who belonged to the celebrated reactionary ministry of which Von Manteuffel was president. He had four children, of whom two have already been mentioned as wives of well-known French socialists. The death of a son in early life was a severe blow to him, and he never recovered from the death of his wife, in 1881.
About the ability of Marx there is unanimity of opinion. The philosopher Professor Friedrich A. Lange regarded him as one of the ablest political economists that ever lived. So conservative a man as Professor Knies, of Heidelberg, has often spoken in high terms of his talents and acquisitions; and the well-known Cologne Gazette used these words in an obituary notice:[174] “He exercised, perhaps, a more lasting influence on the inner politics of civilized states than any one of his contemporaries. Political economy, especially in Germany, knows no writer who has influenced both masses and scholars in a more decided, thoroughgoing manner than Karl Marx.... He was one of the sharpest thinkers and readiest dialecticians ever possessed by economic science.... His ‘Capital’ is classical and indispensable for every one who wishes to concern himself earnestly with social and economic science.”
Immediately after the death of Marx, meetings were held in all parts of the United States and elsewhere, as far as the laws would allow it, to do honor to his memory. One characteristic feature of these meetings was the vow which was taken in all to spread the works and to disseminate the ideas of their departed leader. At the mass-meeting in the Cooper[175] Institute, in New York city, undoubtedly the largest one held, the following resolutions were read and adopted:
“In common with the workers and the disinherited, with the true friends of liberty of all countries, we deplore the death of our great thinker and champion, Karl Marx, as a grievous and irreparable loss to the cause of labor and freedom.
“We pledge ourselves to keep his name and his works ever in remembrance, and to do our utmost for the dissemination of the ideas given by him to the world.
“We promise, in honor of the memory of our great departed, to dedicate our lives to the cause of which he was a pioneer—the struggle in which he left so noble a record—and never, at any moment, to forget his great appeal, ‘Workmen of the world, unite!’”
Similar resolutions were adopted at the other meetings, in Baltimore, Chicago, Cleveland, etc.
Marx’s followers boast particularly of two discoveries which he made—viz., the correct theory of the development of history and his doctrine of value. While it is not true that these were, by any means, entirely original with him, no one would dispute that his presentation is worked out in an original and remarkable manner.
His theory of history is that it is a development, and is shaped at each period by the economic life of the people, by the manner in which goods are produced and distributed. He takes, as his starting-point, the fact that men must eat, drink, wear clothes, and find shelter from rain, snow, and cold. Art, religion, and science come after the satisfaction of these elementary wants. The production of wealth by slaves gave form to the history of the classical world, while that of the Middle Ages is dominated by serfdom and its accessories. The governing idea of the present age is capitalistic production—that is to say, concentration[176] of large masses in factories, running a race with immense machines, and systematically robbed by their employers. When we take the view that history is a growth governed by the necessities of production, past ages do not seem so inhuman as they otherwise do. It has hitherto been necessary that the vast majority should toil incessantly, while only few devoted themselves to the pursuit of the higher goods. The processes of production were so primitive and imperfect that it was physically impossible for the many to enjoy leisure for cultivating their minds and bodies. Hence it was that the ancients regarded slavery as necessary and natural. Plato and Aristotle both considered it a law of nature, just the same as it has hitherto been supposed that private property in land and capital was a law of nature; whereas, as already shown by Rodbertus, they are all only institutions of positive and changeable law. Private property in the instruments of production can be abolished, a............