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The celebrations and public meetings organized on March 18 in all the towns where there are socialist groups deserve all our attention, not merely because they are a demonstration of the army of the proletariat, but more as an expression of the feelings which inspire the socialists of both hemispheres.
They are 'polled' in this way better than by all imaginable methods of voting, and they formulate their aspirations in full freedom, without letting themselves be influenced by electoral tactics.
Indeed the proletarians meeting on this day no longer confine themselves to praising the heroism of the Paris proletariat, or to calling for vengeance for the May massacres.
While refreshing themselves with the memory of the heroic struggle in Paris, they have gone further.
They are discussing what lessons for the next revolution must be drawn from the Commune of 1871; they are asking what the mistakes of the Commune were, not to criticize the men who made them, but to bring out how the prejudices about property and authority, which were at that time prevalent in the workers' organizations, prevented the revolutionary idea from coming to light, being developed, and illuminating the whole world with its life-giving light.
The lesson of 1871 has benefited the proletariat of the whole world, and, breaking with their old prejudices, the proletarians have said clearly and simply what they understand their revolution to be.
It is certain from now on that the next rising of communes will not be merely a communalist movement.
Those who still think that it is necessary to establish the independent commune and then within this commune attempt to carry out economic reforms are being left behind by the development of the popular mind.
It is through revolutionary socialist actions, abolishing individual property, that the communes of the next revolution will assert and establish their independence.
On the day when, as a result of the development of the revolutionary situation, governments are swept away by the people, and the camp of the bourgeoisie, which is maintained only by the protection of the state, is thrown into disorder--on that day (and it is not far off), the insurgent people will not wait until some government decrees in its amazing wisdom some economic reforms.
They will themselves abolish individual property by a violent expropriation, taking possession in the name of the whole people of all the social wealth accumulated by the labour of previous generations.
They will not confine themselves to expropriating the holders of social capital by a decree which would remain a dead letter; they will take possession of it on the spot and will establish their rights by making use of it without delay.
They will organize themselves in the factories to keep them working; they will exchange their hovels for salubrious dwellings in the houses of the bourgeoisie; they will organize themselves to make immediate use of all the wealth stored up in the towns; they will take possession of it as if it had never been stolen from them by the bourgeoisie.
Once the industrial baron who deducts profits from the worker has been evicted, production will continue, shaking off the restraints which obstruct it, abolishing the speculations which kill it and the muddle which disorganizes it, and transforming itself according to the needs of the moment under the impulse which will be given to it by free labour.
'People never worked in France as they did in 1793, after the land was snatched from the hands of the nobles,' says Michelet.
People have never worked as they will on the day when work has become free, when every advance by the worker will be a source of well-being for the whole commune.
On the subject of social wealth, an attempt has been made to establish a distinction between two kinds, and has even managed to divide the socialist party over this distinction.
The school which today is called collectivist, substituting for the collectivism of the old International (which was only anti-authoritarian communism) a sort of doctrinaire collectivism, has tried to establish a distinction between capital which is used for production and wealth which is used to supply the necessities of life.
Machinery, factories, raw materials, means of communication, and land on one side; and homes, manufactured goods, clothing, foodstuffs on the other.
The former becoming collective property; the latter intended, according to the learned representatives of this school, to remain individual property.
An attempt has been made to establish this distinction.
But the good sense of the people has quickly got the better of it.
They have realized that this distinction is illusory and impossible to establish. Unsound in theory, it fails before the reality of life.
The workers have realized that the house which shelters us, the coal and gas which we burn, the nourishment which the human machine burns to maintain life, the clothing which man covers himself with to protect his existence, the book which he reads for instruction, even the pleasure which he gets, are so many integral parts of his existence, are just as necessary for the success of production and for the progressive development of mankind as machines, factories, raw materials and other media of production.
They have realized that to maintain individual property for this kind of wealth would be to maintain inequality, oppression, exploitation, to paralyse in advance the results of partial expropriation.
Leaping the hurdles put in their way by theoretical collectivism, they are going straight for the simplest and most practical form of anti-authoritarian communism.
in fact in their meetings the proletarians are clearly asserting their right to all social wealth and the necessity of abolishing individual property as much in consumer goods as in those for further production.
'On the day of the revolution, we shall seize all wealth, all goods stored up in the towns, and we shall put them in common,' say the spokesmen of the working masses, and the audiences confirm this by their unanimous approval.
'Let each person take from the store what he needs, and we may be sure that in the warehouses of our towns there will be enough food to feed everyone until the day when free production makes a new start.
In the shops of our towns there are enough clothes to clothe everyone, stored there unsold, next to general poverty.
There are even enough luxury goods for everyone to choose according to taste.'
That--judging by what is said at the meetings--is how the proletarian mass imagines the revolution: the immediate introduction of anarchist communism, and the free organization of production.
These two points are settled, and in this respect the communes of the revolution which is knocking on the door will no longer repeat the errors of their forerunners which by shedding their blood so generously have cleared the way for the future.
The same agreement has not yet been reached--though it is not far away--on another point, no less important, on the question of government.
It is known that there are two schools of thought face to face, completely divided on this question.
'It is necessary,' says one, 'on the very day of the revolution to set up a government to take power.
This strong, powerful and resolute government will make the revolution by decreeing this and that and by imposing obedience to its decrees.'
'A sad delusion!' says the other.
'Every central government, taking it on itself to rule a nation, being formed inevitably from disparate elements and being conservative by virtue of its governmental essence, would be only a hindrance to the revolution.
It would only obstruct the revolution in the communes ready to go ahead, without being able to inspire backward communes with the spirit of revolution.
The same within a commune in revolt.
Either the commune government will only sanction things already done, and then it will be a useless and dangerous mechanism; or else it will want to take the lead: it will make rules for what has still to be worked out freely by the people themselves if it is to be viable; it will apply theories where the whole of society must work out new forms of common life with that creative force which arises in the social organism when it breaks its chains and sees new and wider horizons opening up in front of it.
The men in power will obstruct this enthusiasm, without carrying out any of the things which they would have been capable of themselves if they had remained within the people, working out the new organization with them instead of shutting themselves up in government ministries and wearing themselves out in idle debates.
A government will be a hindrance and a danger; powerless to do good, full of strength to do evil; so what is the point of it?'
However natural and correct this argument is, it nevertheless runs up against age-old prejudices stored up and given credit by those who have had an interest in maintaining the religion of government side by side with the religion of property and the religion of god.
This prejudice--the last of the series, God, Property, Government--still exists and is a danger to the next revolution.
But it can already be stated that it is in decline.
'We shall manage our business ourselves, without waiting for orders from a government, and we shall take no notice of those who try to force themselves on us as priests, proprietors, or government,' the proletarians are already saying.
So it is to be hoped that if the anarchist party continues to struggle vigorously against the religion of governmentalism, and if it does not itself stray from the path by letting itself be drawn into struggles for power--it is to be hoped, we say, that in the few years which still remain to us before the revolution the governmental prejudice will be shaken sufficiently not to be able any more to draw the proletarian masses into a false road.
There is however a regrettable omission in the popular meetings which we want to point out.
This is that nothing, or almost nothing, is done about the countryside.
Everything is confined to the towns.
The countryside might not exist for the workers in the towns.
Even the speakers who talk about the character of the next revolution avoid mentioning the countryside and the land.
They do not know the peasant or his desires, and they don't venture to speak in his name.
Is it necessary to insist at length on the danger arising from this?
The emancipation of the proletariat will not be even possible so long as the revolutionary movement does not include the villages.
The insurgent communes will not be able to hold out for even a Year if the insurrection is not at the same time spread in the villages.
When taxes, mortgages, and rents are abolished, when the institutions which levy them are scattered to the four winds, it is certain that the villages will understand the advantages of this revolution.
But in any case it would be unwise to count on the diffusion of the revolutionary idea from the towns into the countryside without preparing ideas in advance.
It is necessary to know here and now what the peasant wants, how the revolution in the villages is to be understood, how the thorny question of property in land is to be resolved.
It is necessary to say to the peasant in advance what the town proletarian and his allies propose to do, that he has nothing to fear from the measures which will be harmful to the landowner.
It is necessary that on his side the town worker gets used to respecting the peasant and to working in agreement with him.
But for this the workers must take on the task of spreading propaganda in the villages.
It is important that in each town there should be a small special organization, a branch of the Land League, for propaganda among the peasants.
It is necessary that this kind of propaganda should be considered as a duty under the same heading as propaganda in the industrial centres.
The beginning will be difficult; but let us remember that the success of the revolution is at stake.
It will only be victorious on the day when the factory worker and the field labourer proceed hand in hand to the conquest of equality for all, bringing happiness to the country cottage as well as to the buildings of the large industrial areas.
Editor's NOTE
This essay consists of three separate articles which were first published in Kropotkin's paper Le Revolte for the anniversaries of the Paris Commune in March 1880, March 1881, and March 1882.
They were put together to form a single chapter of Kropotkin's first political book ('La Commune de Paris', Paroles d'un Revolte, Paris 1885).
The first English translation was published eighty years ago as the second Freedom Pamphlet (The Commune of Paris, London 1891), and was reprinted five years later in the American Liberty Library (The Commune of Paris, Columbus Junction 1896); it has recently been included in an abridged and inaccurate version in Martin A. Miller's edition of Kropotkin's Selected Writings on Anarchism and Revolution (reviewed in FREEDOM on June 26).
The translation has now been revised by Nicolas Walter to make the original version of the essay available in English for the first time.
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