第42章

Annihilation of universal suffrage -- such is the last word of the party of Order, of the bourgeois dictatorship.

On May 4, 1848, on December 20, 1848, on May 13, 1849, and on July 8, 1849, universal suffrage admitted that they were right.On March 10, 1850, universal suffrage admitted that it had itself been wrong.Bourgeois rule as the outcome and result of universal suffrage, as the express act of the sovereign will of the people -- that is the meaning of the bourgeois constitution.But has the constitution any further meaning from the moment that the content of this suffrage, of this sovereign will, is no longer bourgeois rule? Is it not the duty of the bourgeoisie so to regulate the suffrage that it wills the reasonable, its rule? By ever and anon putting an end to the existing state power and creating it anew out of itself, does not universal suffrage put an end to all stability, does it not every moment question all the powers that be, does it not annihilate authority, does it not threaten to elevate anarchy itself to the position of authority?

After March 10, 1850, who would still doubt it?

By repudiating universal suffrage, with which it hitherto draped itself and from which it sucked its omnipotence, the bourgeoisie openly confesses, "Our dictatorship has hitherto existed by the will of the people;it must now be consolidated against the will of the people." And, consistently, it seeks its props no longer within France, but without, in foreign countries, in invasion.

With the invasion, this second Coblenz [13] , its seat established in France itself, rouses all the national passions against itself.With the attack on universal suffrage it provides a general pretext for the new revolution, and the revolution requires such a pretext.

Every special pretext would divide the factions of the revolutionary league, and give prominence to their differences.The general pretext stuns the semirevolutionary classes; it permits them to deceive themselves concerning the definite character of the coming revolution, concerning the consequences of their own act.Every revolution requires a question for discussion at banquets.Universal suffrage is the banquet question of the new revolution.

The bourgeois factions in coalition, however, are already condemned, since they take flight from the only possible form of their united power, from the most potent and complete form of their class rule, the constitutional republic, back to the subordinate, incomplete, weaker form of monarchy.

They resemble the old man who in order to regain his youthful strength fetched out his boyhood garments and suffered torment trying to get his withered limbs into them.Their republic had the sole merit of being the hothouse of the revolution.

March 10, 1850, bears the inscription: Apres moi le deluge !

part IV

THE ABOLITION OF UNIVERSAL SUFFRAGE IN 1850 [14]

T he same symptoms have shown themselves in France since 1849, and particularly since the beginning of 1850.The Parisian industries are abundantly employed and the cotton factories of Rouen and Mulhouse are also doing pretty well, although here, as in England, the high prices of the raw material have exercised a retarding influence.The development of prosperity in France was, in addition, especially promoted by the comprehensive tariff reform in Spain and by the reduction of the duties on various luxury articles in Mexico; the export of French commodities to both markets has considerably increased.The growth of capital in France led to a series of speculations, for which the exploitation of the California gold mines on a large scale served as a pretext.A swarm of companies have sprung up; the low denomination of their shares and their socialist-colored prospectuses appeal directly to the purses of the petty bourgeois and the workers, but all and sundry result in that sheer swindling which is characteristic of the French and Chinese alone.One of these companies is even patronized directly by the government.The import duties in France during the first nine months of 1848 amounted to 63,000,000 francs, of 1849 to 95,000,000francs, and of 1850 to 93,000,000 francs.Moreover, in the month of September, 1850, they again rose by more than a million compared with the same month of 1849.Exports also rose in 1849, and still more in 1850.