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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 16 December 2008
If in the 1890s any one aspect of economic development under capitalism confounded the prognostications of German Marxists it was the agricultural. The peasants had not obliged the pundits of German Social Democracy by permitting themselves to be ruined and liquidated as a class. The realization, based on a plethora of statistical evidence, that the peasant would be for years to come a hardy perennial disposed many leaders of the German Social Democratic Party (Sozialdemokratische Partei Deutschlands, SPD) to coquette with reformist approaches to the agrarian problem. This provoked the great debate of 1893–95 in the course of which traditional lines between orthodoxy and reformism became blurred. Some of the party's best men were compromised, and the “whole conception of the movement as that of a class which harbors goals of the broadest revolutionary compass” was put into question. The erosion of principle was such that not only men of the standing of Georg von Vollmar and Bruno Schoenlank in South Germany but also August Bebel, who was the generalissimo of the SPD, Ignaz Auer, and Wolfgang Heine in North Germany were to be labelled by Otto Wels, the later Social Democratic Reichstag leader, shining examples of opportunism. The problem of the small farmer was to be a major factor in the subsequent rise of revisionism, for Eduard Bernstein, that brilliant wandering star in many constellations, was to stress the indispensable auxiliary role of the peasantry in engineering the gradualist transformation of society along Social Democratic lines.
1. The phrase is from a letter by August Bebel to Ignaz Auer, Jan. 4, 1882, in the archives of the International Institute of Social History, Amsterdam (hereafter cited as IISH), Nachlass Bebel (hereafter cited as NB), A, Folio 2/260–2.
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4. Die Geschichte der deutschen Arbeiterbewegung, by an Autorenkollektiv, vol. 1: Von den Anfängen der deutschen Arbeiterbewegung bis zum Ausgang des 19. Jahrhunderts (Berlin-East, 1966), pp. 166–67.Google Scholar
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17. Severing, Carl, Mein Leben (Cologne, 1950), 1: 34.Google Scholar
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19. See Kautsky, Die Agrarfrage, p. vi; and Eichenrode, Dieter Hertz, “Karl Marx über das Bauerntum und die Bündnisfrage,” International Review of Social History 11, no. 3 (1966): 383 and 389.Google Scholar
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22. Ibid., p. 294.
23. Ibid., p. 301. In this article Engels, who had always devoted more attention to the Junkers than to the peasants, was merely repeating what he had said a generation earlier. See Mayer, Gustav, Friedrich Engels: Eine Biographie, 2 vols. (The Hague, 1934)CrossRefGoogle Scholar, 1: Engels in seiner Frühzeit, p. 366; and 2: Engels und der Aufstieg der Arbeiterbewegung in Europa, p. 491. See also the letters of Wilhelm Liebknecht to Engels, Apr. 15 and 27, 1870, published by Kampffmeyer, Paul in the Hamburger Echo, 03 29, 1926.Google Scholar
24. Bebel, , Unsere Ziele: Ein Streitschrift gegen die “Demokratische Korrespondenz” (Leipzig, 1871). Citations are from the 11th ed. (Berlin, 1903), pp. 22, 40–43.Google Scholar
25. Ibid., p. 44.
26. Ibid., pp. 22 and 40.
27. Ibid., p. 44.
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29. Zur Grund- und Bodenfrage, p. 190
30. Ibid., pp. 80 and 187. See also Leipziger Hochverratsprozess: Ausführlicher Bericht über die Verhandlungen zu Leipzig in dem Prozess gegen Liebknecht, Bebel und Hepner wegen Vorbereitung zum Hochverrat vom 1.–26. März 1872: Bearbeitet von den Angeklagten (Leipzig, 1874)Google Scholar. Edition used is that of Berlin-East, 1960, pp. 196–97, 286.
31. Protokoll über den ersten Congress der socialdetnokratischen Arbeiterpartei: Abgehalten zu Stuttgart am. 4., 5., 6. und 7. Juni 1870 (Leipzig, 1870), pp. 15–16.Google Scholar
32. Ibid., p. 15.
33. Ibid., p. 16.
34. Ibid.
35. Most in Protokoll über den zweiten Kongress der socialdemokratischen Arbeiterpartei: Abgehalten zu Dresden am 12., 13., 14. und 15. August 1871 (Leipzig, 1872), pp. 22–25.Google Scholar
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37. Bebel's words in his Der deutsche Bauernkrieg: Mit Berücksichtigung der hauptsächlichsten sozialen Bewegungen des Mittelalters (Brunswick, 1876), p. iv.Google Scholar
38. Schaaf, p. 242.
39. Bebel's remarks, in Verhandlungen des Reichstags: Stenographische Berichte (hereafter cited as VR), 6th leg. per., 1st sess. (Feb. 11, 1885), pp. 1206–7, 1211.
40. Ibid., p. 1208.
41. Ibid., p. 1209. From an array of government statistics—the first to have been published on land ownership in Germany since 1879—Bebel cited figures to show that in 1884 whereas 1.24% of all grain-growing farmers in the Reich owned an aggregate of 9,636,249 hectares of arable (1 hectare = 2.471 acres), 98.76% owned only 3,747,000 hectares, i.e., only a third of that which was owned by the richest 1¼% of landed proprietors. Of 5,276,344 holdings, 4,597,433 could definitely be regarded as peasant and could be classified as follows: 44% with less than 1 hectare of land; 14% with from 1 to 2 hectares; 19% with from 2 to 5 hectares; and 10.05% with from 5 to 10 hectares. In other words, said Bebel, 87.05% of the farmers owned fewer than 25 acres of arable. An even more inequitable distribution of arable for the early 1880s is reflected in figures cited by Born, Karl Erich (“Structural Changes in German Social and Economic Development at the End of the Nineteenth Century,” in Imperial Germany, ed. Sheehan, James J. [New York, 1976] pp. 29–30)Google Scholar: “In 1882 76.6% of the German farmers had small farms with up to 5 hectares of arable land,” and only 15.7% of the total arable belonged to this great majority of the farmers; another 17.6% were “middle class,” with farms of between 5 and 20 hectares, and 29.8% of the total arable belonged to them. After the mid-1880s the total arable in large-scale operations dropped somewhat, while the number of farms of less than 20 hectares appreciably increased through the turn of the century (ibid., p. 30; Kautsky, Die Agrarfrage, p. 174; David, Sozialismus und Landwirtschaft, pp. 33–35).
42. VR, Feb. 11, 1885, pp. 1211–12.
43. Ibid., p. 1212.
44. The classic statement of the Kladderadatsch theory was given by Bebel in VR, 6th leg. per., 1st sess., 1 (Nov. 28, 1884): 81. Some years later Engels was still harping on the impending catastrophe: “The SPD, which overthrew Bismarck, … stands today at a point where the time can be determined with almost mathematical accuracy when it will come to power” (Engels, , “Der Sozialismus in Deutschland,” NZ 9, no. 2 [1891–1892]: 582).Google Scholar
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47. That this was the temper of party members in Bavaria was corroborated by a national foreign office agent in Munich who in 1892 reported to Chancellor von Caprivi: “The disposition to revolutionary action is utterly alien to most Socialist workers” (Auswärtiges Amt, Abt. A, Akten betreffend die Sozialdemokratie in Deutschland, vol. 12, no. 86, July 17, 1892, p. 3).
48. Jansen, Vollmar, pp. 32–33.
49. See Hertz, pp. 80–81; Nossig, 2: 415; Kautsky, Die Agrarfrage, pp. 110–14, and David, Sozialismus und Landwirtschaft, p. 35.
50. See Hesselbarth, Revolutionäre Sozialdemokraten, pp. 24–25.
51. The contrary is affirmed by Steinberg in his Sozialismus und deutsche Sozialdemokratie, pp. 18 and 28.
52. Blos in Protokoll über die Verhandlungen der Sozialdemokratischen Partei Deutschlands: Abgehalten zu Halle a. S. vom 12. bis 18. Oktober 1890 (Berlin, 1890), p. 185.Google Scholar
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55. Thus, virtually all of Bebel's Reichstag activity in the month of April 1891 was aimed at persuading the house to make concessions to the principle of urban workers' protection that went beyond those eventually incorporated in the Industrial Relations Act of 1891. See his remarks in VR, 8th leg. per., 1st sess., 4 (Apr. 13, 1891): 2248–49; ibid., Apr. 14, pp. 2282–83; ibid., Apr. 15, pp. 2324–25; ibid., Apr. 18, pp. 2420–23; and ibid., Apr. 21, pp. 2489–91.
56. The El Dorado speeches are in von Vollmar, Georg, Über die nächsten Aufgaben der deutschen Sozialdemokratie (Munich, 1891).Google Scholar
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58. Vollmar could not but have been impressed when at Halle in 1890 he heard Bebel declare: “The workers recognize in our party their political advocate. They see that we are, insofar as possible, toiling within the framework of existing bourgeois society to raise and improve the condition of the workers” (Halle Protokoll, p. 102).
59. Bebel to Engels, July 12, 1891, BBE, no. 160, p. 425; and Engels to Kautsky, Sept. 28, 1891, in Engels Briefwechsel mit Kautsky, vol. 1, ed. Kautsky, Benedikt, 2nd ed. (Vienna, 1955), no. 108, p. 309.Google Scholar
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62. Bebel to Engels, Sept. 29, 1891, BBE, no. 163, p. 433.
63. While Gerhard A. Ritter (op. cit., p. 93) speaks of Bebel's conciliatory attitude, Bebel himself maintained that it was Vollmar who had “backtracked” and “declared himself unreservedly” for the old party tactic (Bebel to Engels, Oct. 19, 1891, BBE, no. 172, p. 456). Engels, however, called Vollmar and his “clique” “insects,” who were now “harmless” (Engels to Bebel, Oct. 24, 1891, in Karl Marx-Friedrich Engels Werke, here after cited as MEW, ed. Institut für Marxismus-Leninismus beim ZK der SED, vol. 38 [Berlin-East, 1968], no. 83, p. 185).Google Scholar
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68. Ibid., pp. 158, 172, 175.
69. Ibid., p. 271.
70. Ibid., p. 176.
71. Ibid., p. 163.
72. See Bebel, “Über das Sozialdemokratische Parteiprogramm,” Vorwārts, Dec. 3, 1891.
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78. Revolutionāre Sozialdemokraten, p. 79.
79. Bebel to Engels, Apr. 24, 1894, BBE, no. 298, pp. 759–60.
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86. The vote on the treaty was 200 to 146. On its genesis and the debate it provoked see Human, Arthur, Der deutsch-russische Handels- und Schiffahrtsvertrag vom 20. Mārz 1894 (Leipzig, 1900).Google Scholar
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89. The viewpoint of the committee was expressed by Bebel in his “Die Bauernfreundlichkeit der Konservativen und Liberalen,” Hamburger Echo, June 3, 1894.
90. Cf. David, Sozialismus und Landwirtschaft, pp. 40–41; and Cohnstaedt, p. 152.
91. Bebel, in Protokoll über die Verhandlungen des Parteitages der Sozialdemokratischen Partei Deutschlands: Abgehalten zu Köln a. Rh. vom 22. bis 28. Oktober 1893 (Berlin, 1893), p. 231.Google Scholar
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93. Ibid., p. 57; Schoenlank to Vollmar, Oct. 12, 1897, Nachlass Vollmar, IISH.
94. See Kautsky and Schoenlank, Grundsātze und Forderungen, p. 28.
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97. See “Die Ausbreitung der Sozialdemokratie auf dem Lande,” Vorwärts, Sept. 4, 1894.
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104. See Hesselbarth, Revolutionäre Sozialdemokraten, p. 185.
105. Schoenlank's words here belie Reinhard Jansen's allegation (Vollmar, p. 58) that he (Schoenlank) only hoped to neutralize the peasants.
106. Schoenlank, in Protokoll über die Verhandlungen des Parteitages der Sozialdemokratischen Partei Deutschlands: Abgehalten zu Frankfurt a. M. vom 21. bis 27. Oktober 1894 (Berlin, 1894), p. 140.Google Scholar
107. Ibid., pp. 140 and 144.
108. Vollmar, ibid., pp. 145–48.
109. Bebel, ibid., p. 116.
110. Ibid., pp. 114–15.
111. Ibid., p. 118. On Bebel's campaign against the practice of the Bavarian SPD approving the state budget in the Landtag see Hennig, Günter, August Bebel: Todfeind des preussisch-deutschen Militärstaats 1891–1899 (Berlin-East, 1963), pp. 91–105.Google Scholar
112. Frankfurt Protokoll, p. 118.
113. Ibid., p. 118.
114. Ibid., p. 114.
115. Bebel to Victor, Adler, , in Victor Adler: Briefwechsel mit August Bebel, KarlKautsky u. A. (hereafter cited as Adlers Briefwechsel), collected by Friedrich, Adler (Vienna, 1954), no. B 34, p. 166.Google Scholar
116. Frankfurt Protokoll, pp. 132–34.
117. David had just written a major essay in which he displayed pronounced sympathy for Vollmar's agrarian views: (Hessian) Sozialdemokrat, Aug. 9, 16, 23, 30, and Sept. 6, 13, 20, and 27, 1894. See, further, idem, “Zur Frage der Konkurrenzfähigheit des land wirtschaftlichen Kleinbetriebs,” NZ 13, no. 1 (1894–1895): 678–90.Google Scholar
118. Frankfurt Protokoll, p. 135.
119. Ibid., pp. 135–36; David, Sozialismus und Landwirtschaft, pp. 19–20; and “Eine sozialdemokratische Agrarkommission?” Vorwärts, Oct. 21 and 24, 1894.
120. Bebel's speech was reported in Vorwārts, Nov. 16, 1894. See also Bebel's article in the Frānkische Tagespost, Nov. 29 and Dec. 5, 1894.
121. Liebknecht to Engels, Nov. 16, 1894, in Wilhelm Liebknecht: Briefwechsel mit Karl Marx und Friedrich Engels (hereafter cited as LBME), ed. Eckert, Georg (The Hague, 1963), no. 230, p. 394.Google Scholar
122. Ibid., p. 395.
123. Engels consented to admonish Bebel against his vehemence and tactlessness but nevertheless insisted that he had been “decidedly correct” at Frankfurt. See Engels to Liebknecht, Nov. 24, 1894, ibid., no. 231, p. 395; and MEW, vol. 39, no. 175, p. 330. Engels's admonitory letter has never been found.
124. See Grillenberger's Fränkische Tagespost article, reprinted in “Zur Diskussion über den Frankfurter Parteitag,” Vorwārts, Nov. 20, 1894.
125. Engels to Liebknecht, Nov. 24, 1894, LBME, no. 231, p. 397.
126. Liebknecht to Engels, Nov. 16, 1894, ibid., no. 230, p. 394.
128. Vollmar, “Bebels Fahnenerhebung,” from the Münchener Post, reprinted in Vorwärts, Nov. 23, 24, 27, 1894. See also the report of Vollmar's speech of Nov. 7 to a Munich assembly of 2,000 persons, in “Parteinachrichten,” ibid., Nov. 28, 1894.
129. For example, among their polemical articles see Ledebour's, Georg remarks in “Zur Diskussion…,”Google Scholaribid., Nov 21, 1894; Kautsky, , “Das Erfurter Program und die Landagitation,” NZ 13, no. 1 (1894–1895): 278–81Google Scholar; David, “Zur Frage der Konkurrenz fähigkeit…,” ibid., pp. 678–90; and Engels, “Die Bauernfrage…,” ibid., pp. 292–306.
130. “Zur Entgegnung,” in “Zur Diskussion…,” ibid., Nov. 28, 29, 30, and Dec. 1, 1894.
131. On the extent of Bebel's support in the party see Mayer, , Engels, 2: 495Google Scholar; Paul Singer to Viktor Adler, Nov. 26, 1894, Adlers Briefwechsel, pp. 163–64; and Hesselbarth, Revolutionäre Sozialdemokraten, p. 201.
132. Bebel, “Zur Diskussion…,” Vorwärts, Nov. 30, 1894. Bebel's arguments were rebutted by David in “Übersicht über die wichtigsten Ereignisse 1894,” ibid., Jan. 4, 5, 6, 1895.
133. Ibid., Feb. 12, 1895.
134. Ibid., Apr. 23, 24, 26, May 16, June 6 and 16, 1895.
135. Nettl, “German Social Democratic Party,” p. 69.
136. In this connection see Bebel's strong plea for universal suffrage and its import, in Die Sozialdemokratie und das allgemeine Stimmrecht: Mit besondere Berücksichtigung des Frauen-Stimmrechts und das Proportional-Wahlsystem (Berlin, 1895), in Bundesarchiv Koblenz, Z. Sg. 1, F. 90/115.Google Scholar
137. See David, , “Zur Frage der Konkurrenzfähigkeit…,” NZ 13: 690.Google Scholar
138. Ibid., p. 680.
139. Bebel to Engels, Feb. 18, 1895, BBE, no. 313, p. 794.
140. For the proposals of the Agrarian Committee, which were published on June 15, 1895, see Protokoll über die Verhandlungen der Sozialdemokratischen Partei Deutschlands abgehalten zu Breslau vom 6. bis 12. Oktober 1895 (Berlin, 1895), pp. 212–13.Google Scholar
141. See Bebel's remarks in Vorwärts, July 21 and 23, 1893. The peasants, who were as a rule rude, uneducated toilers who retained their instruments of production and eked out a living from farming, in 1895 owned, depending upon varying sets of statistics, anywhere from less than one hectare to between 5 and 10 hectares of land. The peasantry embraced from 76% to 87% of all German farmers, again depending upon the criteria used by the analyst. See Born, loc. cit., p. 29; and Cohnstaedt, p. 185.
142. Thus, Miller, S., Das Problem der Freiheit, p. 220.Google Scholar
143. Bebel admitted that David and Katzenstein had contributed significantly to evoking opposition in the party to the pallid agrarian features of the Erfurt Program (Bebel to Kautsky, Sept. 27, 1895, in August Bebels Briefwechsel mit Karl Kautsky [hereafter cited as BBK], ed. Kautsky, Karl Jr,. [Assen, Netherlands, 1971], no. 51, pp. 94–95).Google Scholar
144. Bernstein expatiated on these difficulties in his Die Voraussetzungen des Sozialismus. See Harvey's, Edith C. translation: Evolutionary Socialism (New York, 1961), p. 100.Google Scholar
145. Bebel to Engels, July 17, 1895, BBE, no. 318, p. 803.
146. Vollmar blamed Schippel for the ambiguities in the draft agrarian program and doubted that it would be the Breslau convention that handed down the final, probably favorable, decision. Vollmar to Schoenlank, Aug. 26, 1895. Nachlass Bruno Schoenlank, ASD, Bonn, Tr. 8–3, F. 7.
147. See David, , Sozialismus und Landwirtschaft, 1: 46.Google Scholar
148. Bebel to Engels, July 17, 1895, BBE, no. 318, p. 803; Grillenberger to Schoenlank, Aug. 4, 1895. Nachlass Schoenlank, ASD Bonn, Tr. 8–3, F. 2/1–4.
149. Bebel to Kautsky, July 11, 1895, BBK, no. 48, p. 91.
150. David, , “Ökonomische Verschiedenheiten zwischen Landwirtschaft und Industrie,” NZ 13, no. 2 (1894–1895): 449–55.Google Scholar
151. Kautsky, , “Die Konkurrenzfähigkeit des Kleinbetriebs in der Landwirtschaft,” NZ 13, no. 2 (1894–1895): 481–91Google Scholar; “Unser neuestes Program,” ibid., pp. 557–65, 586–94, 610–24; and “Noch einige Bemerkungen zum Agrarprogramm,” ibid., pp. 806–14.
152. Bebel, “Das Agrarprogram,” Vorwärts, July 21 and 23, 1895.
153. Reported ibid., July 28, 1895. On June 14, 1895, the German government released census statistics on vocations and professions in the Reich. David contended later that had these statistics been known to the delegates to the Breslau convention the tide would have been turned in favor of the agrarians. The new statistics showed that the number of small farmers owning from 2 to 20 hectares of land, as well as the acreage they possessed, had markedly increased between 1882 and 1895 (viz. by 107,111 farmers and 659,259 hectares respectively). See David, Sozialismus und Agrarfrage, p. 28.
154. Their article, appearing in the Leipziger Volkszeitung, was summarized in Vorwārts, July 25, 1895.
155. Reported in Der Sozialdemokrat, July 18 and 25, 1895.
156. Hesselbarth, Revolutionāre Sozialdemokraten, p. 186.
157. What made prospects of acceptance of any reformist program at Breslau still slimmer was the circumstance that the Hohenlohe government had undertaken to proceed draconically against the SPD by introducing an antisubversion (Umsturz) bill in the Reichstag. The measure, in the form of amendments to the military and civil penal codes, is in VR, 1894–1895, 1. Anlageband, p. 228.
158. Quarck in Breslau Protokoll, pp. 100–103, 158–60, 176–77.
159. All of their speeches are given in Vorwärts, Oct. 9, 10, 11, 1895, 1. Beilage: “Der Parteitag.”
160. Schoenlank in Breslau Parteitag, p. 152.
161. Schippel made this charge at the convention (ibid., p. 143).
162. Bebel's speech, ibid., pp. 112–24.
163. Ibid., p. 113. Kautsky's resolution rejected the notion that there was a close analogy between artisan and peasant and that agricultural and industrial developments must be judged by the same criteria. The resolution hypothecated that the draft proposal for an agrarian program would strengthen private property and the state, improve the condition of the peasantry, and dim prospects of revolution. See Kautsky, , “Und nochmals die Breslauer Resolution,” NZ 14, no. 1 (1895–1896): 209–13Google Scholar; and “Die Resolution des Parteitages zum Agrarprogram,” Vorwärts, Nov. 3, 1895.
164. Breslau Parteitag, p. 115.
165. Ibid., pp. 116–17.
166. Ibid., p. 122.
167. Ibid., pp. 116–18 and 122.
168. Ibid., p. 121.
169. Kautsky, ibid., pp. 124 and 126.
170. Ibid., p. 126.
171. Kautsky to Louise Kautsky, Oct. 7, 1895, BBK, p. 95, n. 3.
172. Zetkin in Breslau Protokoll, p. 143, Lenin, too, was disillusioned with Bebel. See Jansen, p. 61, n. 2.
173. Matthias, “Kautsky und der Kautskyanismus,” p. 178.
174. As corroboration Bebel in 1891 gave generous recognition to the fact that the Center had till then led all other bourgeois parties in supporting social legislation (“Die Gewerbeordnungs-Novelle,” NZ 9, no. 2 [1891]: 327).Google Scholar
175. VR, 8th leg. per., 2nd sess., 2 (Feb. 6, 1893), 874.
176. Bebel to Kautsky, Sept. 27, 1895, BBK, no. 51, p. 95.
177. Cohnstaedt, p. 221.
178. Roth, p. 275.
179. Breslau Protokoll, pp. 101–101, 104–5, 176–77 and 204. See also Steenson, p. 109, citing a letter of Kautsky to Louise Kautsky, Oct. 9, 1895, Nachlass Familie Kautsky, 35, IISH.
180. Cohnstaedt, p. 231, calculates that “in the party in Germany as a whole possibly 93% of the comrades were decisively opposed to the new program.”
181. Bebel to Adler, Oct. 20, 1895, Adlers Briefwechsel, B 39, p. 193. S. Miller, p. 221, puts more credence in Bebel's explanation than I am inclined to do.
182. Bebel to Adler, Oct. 20, 1895, Adlers Briefwechsel, p. 194.
183. Revolutionäre Sozialdemokraten, p. 238.
184. Cf. Mitrany, Marxismus und Bauerntum, pp. 31–33.
185. Winnig, August, Das Reich als Republik, 1918–1928 (Stuttgart and Berlin, 1928), pp. 97–98.Google Scholar
