Part 2 (2/2)

[31] P. Hubert-Valleroux, _La Co-operation_ (Paris, 1904), pp. 14-17.

In 1868 the co-operative movement, after several years of development, suffered a terrible blow. On November 2nd, the _Credit au Travail_ became bankrupt; it had immobilized its capital, and had given out loans for too long periods, while some of the other loans were not reimbursed.

The bank had to suspend payment and was closed. The disaster for the co-operative movement was complete. The _Credit au Travail_ seemed to incarnate the co-operative movement; ”and its failure made many think that the co-operative inst.i.tution had no future”.[32]

[32] P. Hubert-Valleroux, _op. cit._, p. 16.

The failure of the co-operative movement turned the efforts of the workingmen into other channels. They now began to join the ”International a.s.sociation of Workingmen” in increased numbers and to change their ideas and methods.

The ”International”, as is well known, was formed in 1864 by French and English workingmen. The French section, during the first years of its existence, was composed mainly of the followers of Proudhon, known as _mutuellistes_. The program of the _mutuellistes_ was a peaceful change in social relations by which the idea of justice--conceived as reciprocity or mutuality of services--would be realized. The means advocated were education and the organization of mutual aid societies, of mutual insurance companies, of syndicats, of co-operative societies and the like. Much importance was attached to the organization of mutual credit societies and of popular banks. It was hoped that with the help of cheap credit the means of production would be put at the disposal of all and that co-operative societies of production could then be organized in large numbers. The _Mutuellistes_ emphasized the idea that the social emanc.i.p.ation of the workingmen must be the work of the workingmen themselves. They were opposed to state intervention. Their ideal was a decentralized economic society based upon a new principle of right--the principle of mutuality--which was ”the idea of the working-cla.s.s”.[33] Their spokesman and master was Proudhon who formulated the ideas of _mutuellisme_ in his work, _De la Capacite Politique des Cla.s.ses Ouvrieres_.

[33] P. J. Proudhon, _De la Capacite Politique des Cla.s.ses Ouvrieres_ (Paris, 1865), p. 59.

Between 1864 and 1868, the ”International” met with little success in France. The largest number of adherents obtained by it during this period was from five to eight hundred. Persecuted by the government after 1867, it was practically dead in France in 1868.[34] But in 1869 it reappeared with renewed strength under the leaders.h.i.+p of men of collectivist and communist ideas, which were partly a revival and survival of the ideas of 1848, partly a new development in socialist thought.

[34] A. Thomas, _Le Second Empire_, p. 332.

One current of communist ideas was represented by the Blanquists.

Blanqui, a life-long conspirator and an ardent republican who had been the leader of the secret revolutionary societies under the Monarchy of July, took up his revolutionary activity again during the latter part of the Second Empire. A republican and revolutionary above everything else, he had, however, gradually come to formulate in a more precise way a communistic program, to be realized by his party when by a revolutionary upheaval it would be carried into power. The Blanquists denounced the ”co-operators” and the ”mutuellistes” and called upon the workingmen to organize into secret societies ready, at a favorable moment, to seize political power. Towards the end of the Second Empire, the Blanquists numbered about 2,500 members in Paris, mainly among the Republican youth.[35]

[35] A. Thomas, _op. cit._, p. 332.

The other current of communist ideas had its fountainhead in the ”International” which Caesar de-Paepe, Marx and Bakounine succeeded in winning over to their collectivist ideas. The congresses of the ”a.s.sociation” in Brussels in 1868 and in Bale in 1869 adopted resolutions of a collectivist character, and many members of the French section were won over to the new ideas.[36]

[36] E. E. Fribourg, _L'a.s.sociation Internationale des Travailleurs_ (Paris, 1871).

The success of the ”International” in France in 1869 was the sudden result of the strike-movement which swept the country during the last years of the Second Empire. The members of the ”International” succeeded in obtaining financial support for some strikers. This raised the prestige of the ”a.s.sociation”, and a number of syndicats sent in their collective adhesion. It is estimated that toward the end of 1869 the ”International” had a members.h.i.+p of about 250,000 in France.

These facts had their influence on the French leaders of the ”International”. They changed their att.i.tude toward the strike, declaring it ”the means _par excellence_ for the organization of the revolutionary forces of labor”.[37] The idea of the general strike suggested itself to others.[38] At the Congress of Bale in 1869, one of the French delegates advocated the necessity of organizing syndicats for two reasons: first, because ”they are the means of resisting the exploitation of capital in the present;” and second, because ”the grouping of different trades in the city will form the commune of the future” ... and then ... ”the government will be replaced by federated councils of syndicats and by a committee of their respective delegates regulating the relations of labor--this taking the place of politics.”[39]

[37] A. Thomas, _op. cit._, p. 363.

[38] _Ibid._, p. 358.

[39] James Guillaume, _L'Internationale, Doc.u.ments et Souvenirs_ (Paris, 1905), vol. i, p. 205.

Under the influence of the ”International” the syndicats of Paris--there were about 70 during the years 1868-1870--founded a local federation under the name of _Chambre Federale des societes ouvrieres de Paris_.

This federation formulated its aim in the following terms:

This agreement has for its object to put into operation the means recognized as just by the workingmen of all trades for the purpose of making them the possessors of all the instruments of production and to lend them money, in order that they may free themselves from the arbitrariness of the employer and from the exigencies of capital.... The federation has also the aim of a.s.suring to all adhering societies on strike the moral and material support of the other groups by means of loans at the risk of the loaning societies.[40]

[40] A. Thomas, _op. cit._, p. 352.

These organizations were entirely swept away by the events of 1870-71: the Franco-Prussian War, the Proclamation of the Republic, and especially the Commune. After 1871 the workingmen had to begin the work of organization all over again. But the conquests of the previous period were not lost. The right to strike was recognized. The policy of tolerating workingmen's organizations was continued, notwithstanding a few acts to the contrary. But, above all, the experience of the workingmen was preserved. The form of organization which they generally advocated after the Commune was the syndicat. The other forms (_i. e._, the _Compagnonnages_ and the secret _Societe de resistance_) either disappeared or developed independently along different lines, as the friendly societies.

In other respects, the continuity of the labor movement after the Commune with that of the preceding period was no less evident. As will be seen in the following chapter the problems raised and the solutions given to them by the French workingmen for some time after the Commune were directly related to the movement of the Second Empire. The idea of co-operation, the _mutuellisme_ of Proudhon, and the collectivism of the ”International” reappeared in the labor movement under the Third Republic.

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