MIA > Archive > Wilhelm Liebknecht
Written: As a speech in German, delivered July 14th, 1889.[1]
Published in English: July 2021.
Translated: By Graham Seaman for the Marxists Internet Archive.
Source: Graham Seaman's excellent first-time translation of the congress proceedings.
HTML Markup: By Graham Seaman. Excerpted for the Wilhelm Liebknecht archive by Bill Wright, January 2023.
It is the proudest moment of my life to stand here and see the fulfillment of the ideal announced by the words: Proletarians of all countries unite! And it gives me even more pleasure that I, a representative of German social democracy, stand here shoulder to shoulder with my friend Vaillant, a representative of French social democracy. After the terrible fratricidal war in which our two nations were torn to pieces, the two peoples so to speak shake hands in our persons: social-democratic Germany with social-democratic France. (The chairmen shake hands to the roaring cheers of the assembly.) The enmity of Germany and France has so far been the main obstacle to political and social progress in Europe. The fraternization of France and Germany is the triumph of peace, civilization, and socialism. And the fact that in this hall, in the mother city of the revolution, the representatives of the working people of all countries have come together — all animated by the one thought of the emancipation of the proletariat and the one feeling of solidarity gives this parliament of the worker the significance of a great work for peace, an epoch-making cultural deed. And while I formally offer my fraternal greeting to the non-German comrades present here in the name of the German social democracy, I now want to translate for my German comrades the enthusiastic words of the international greeting which have just been addressed to the Congress by our French friends Lafargue and Vaillant. (The speaker gives a summary of the two speeches and continues): I agree with the previous speaker. This congress is the starting point of international cooperation among the proletariat of the world. Whatever the resolutions it may take, the main importance of the Congress lies in the fact that it is meeting, in the fact that the worker-delegates of the different countries are meeting one another in person, recognizing the equality of their aspirations in spite of the difference of countries and tongues, and reaching out brotherly hands to the Pacte d'Union — to the sacred alliance treaty of the international proletariat.
Free from national prejudices, free from the selfish striving to dominate and exploit, the proletariat will realize the ideals which the heroes of the great revolution that is celebrating its centenary today had in mind — the ideals of liberty, equality and fraternity, which, however, contradicted the egoism of the bourgeoisie as it achieved domination, and so could not be realized until now.
This is not the first international workingmen’s congress that I have attended. In 1869 I was in Basel, and when we had finished with the work, and it was a matter of determining the time and place for the next congress, one of the French delegates invited us on behalf of the French comrades for next year in Paris — Paris would then be free from Bonaparte. And the invitation was accepted with jubilant unanimity, and with the cry: "Next year in Paris!" we parted.
That French delegate was Varlin.
The next year came — 1870 — and the war came — which unfortunately we could not prevent — Bonaparte fell — and the Commune came — and Varlin, like the other French congress delegates, did his duty in the council and on the battlefield — the Commune fell and Varlin, the noble, heroic Varlin, was captured by the inhuman victors and, under terrible abuse, to which he opposed stoic equanimity and defiant silence, was dragged for hours through streets turned red by the murder of his brothers, until those cruel enemies themselves grew tired and shot the hated man, whose last word was a curse against this vicious bourgeois society, against a wall.
The martyr’s blood of the Commune was the seed of revolution. The workers’ movement grew powerfully everywhere, especially in Germany, even though the bourgeoisie believed they had stifled it forever in blood and defamation.
And after twenty years we have now accepted Varlin’s invitation, and now more has come true than Varlin, than all of us dreamed back then — an international workingmen’s parliament, hundreds of representatives of the foreign proletariat, among them over eighty from Germany — besides the representatives of the workers of Paris and France.
The treaty of alliance does not need to be made — it has been made!
And before we proceed to the constitution of the Congress, I have only one thing left to say: this Congress is open to all honest fighters for the emancipation of the proletariat. Nobody is excluded who wants to cooperate on the work of liberation.
(Liebknecht had spoken partly in French — especially towards the end. The speech was followed by unanimous, sustained applause: Long live socialist Germany! Long live the International!)
1. The date of July 14th, 1889 as the founding date of the Second International is significant. It marks exactly 100 years since the storming of the Bastille fortress on July 14th, 1789, the armed uprising widely considered to mark the beginning of the Great French Revolution.
Last updated on 7 January 2023