18 - 3 - 2022

Long live the Paris Commune !

Long live the Kiev Commune !

Хай живе Паризька комуна! - 1871
Хай живе Київська комуна! - 2022

(Ukrainian language)

 

 

 

With the Paris Commune, a new period began in the liberation struggle of the proletariat, in which the focus was on building proletarian parties, which were guided by the principles of scientific communism by Marx and Engels and without which the proletarian revolution could not be successfully achieved. Today, according to the conditions of globalization, the revival of the Paris Commune is impossible without the proletarian world party which is guided by Stalinism-Hoxhaism.

We Stalinist-Hoxhaists cannot defend the Paris Commune without defending Stalinism-Hoxhaism. And vice versa, we cannot defend Stalinism-Hoxhaism without defending the Paris Commune.

Stalinism-Hoxhaism defines the general significance of the Paris Commune as follows:

The World Commune is in essence nothing but the further developed Paris Commune, namely the Paris Commune on a higher stage of its development, on its globalized stage.

The construction of the world commune requires the completion of the historical era of world socialism, while world socialism requires the complete destruction of world imperialism. And the reestablishment of the Paris Commune is not a matter of the inhabitants of Paris all alone, and even not a matter of France all alone. It is a global matter of the whole world population. The socialist revolution cannot triumph within the old framework of a single nation. The world proletariat will unite the workers of various nations in the struggle to overthrow the rule of the bourgeoisie of all nations. This is the most important lesson of the Paris Commune.

As Lenin teaches, hastening the downfall of world capitalism means utilising the war-created crisis of the imperialists (or the world imperialist crisis of today, caused by the Corona virus), according to the example provided by the Paris Commune. "The enemy can get into a weakened position of passivity or neutralization of his forces caused by inharent contradictions, which we exploit for our initiative, for our offensive." [General line of the Comintern (SH)].

If a crisis has matured and if the bourgeoisie has itself taken away the legality, we must not confine ourselves to legal forms of struggle. Such is the line of action that leads to civil war, and will bring about civil war at one moment or another. (Lenin; Volume 21, page 39).

Especially in the period between the Paris Commune and the October Revolution, namely with the beginning of a new period of armed class struggle, the opportunists of all hues constructed contradictions between the Paris Commune and the October revolution for the purpose of fishing in muddy waters. But one can neither seriously defend the Paris Commune against the October Revolution, nor defend the October Revolution against the people's revolution in Albania and against theworld socialist revolution to be prepared today, without sinking miserably into the swamp of opportunism.

All other revolutions do not meet this criterion of the dictatorship of the proletariat and therefore must not be leveled with them. In the same way, one cannot construct opposites between the military theory of Marx and Engels, Lenin, Stalin and Enver Hoxha, or exclude one or the other Classic. Historically, all Classics were the leaders of the world proletariat and the leaders of Marxist war science. And only all the Classics taken together give the complete picture of Stalinist-Hoxhaist military theory and class warfare, from which we have to learn for all time. On the basis of the knowledge of the Classics in the military field, we are now approaching the generalization of the current experiences of the international class struggle in order to constantly develop the Stalinist-Hoxhaist military theory and the world revolutionary art of class warfare for the benefit of the proletarian world revolution. We communist soldiers only fight on this theoretical and practical basis, on no other. We don't get involved in foreign (bourgeois) military theories, nor do we indulge in any ominous “revolutions” with all possible class interests. We take the rifle exclusively for the proletarian world revolution, which in essence and character corresponds perfectly to the Paris Commune, the October Revolution and the Albanian People's Revolution. We are neither revisionist nor sectarian soldiers, we are Stalinist-Hoxhaist soldiers !! A united front with troops that serve the enemy, even if they swear to stand on our side, is an absolute absurdity. A revolutionary force cannot avoid defeat if it allows the enemy to act in its own ranks.

To avoid this and other catastrophes, it is essential that every red soldier learns to master the combined usage of theoretical and practical weapons.

Let us fight in the spirit of the heroes of the Paris Communards !

Long live the 151st anniversary of the Paris Commune !

Long live the dictatorship of the world proletariat !

Long live the world socialist republic !

Long live the World Commune !

Comintern (SH)

18th of March, 2022

 

 

 

 

SPECIAL WEBSITE ON THE

150th ANNIVERSARY OF THE

PARIS COMMUNE

18th of March 2021

 

 

 

MLSH-SCHOOL

STUDY COURSES

OF THE COMINTERN (SH)

NEW:

Study Course No 4

The Paris Commune

 

 

click on the cover !

 

 

Marx and Engels

ON THE PARIS COMMUNE

 

alternative PDF

Part 1

Part 2

 

 

The Civil War in France

in 24 languages

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1891 Introduction by Frederick Engels

On the 20th Anniversary of the Paris Commune

 

 

 

Karl Marx - The Story of His Life

Chapter 14: The Decline of the International

 

4. The International and the Paris Commune

written by Franz Mehring

 

 

 

 

 

The First International and the Paris Commune

study course

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Paris Commune

Marx and Lenin in pictures (woodcuts)

1944

 

 

 

 

Marx, Lenin and the Commune

Alexander Trachtenberg

"The Communist"

No 7, March 1928, USA

 

 

 

 

 

Paris on the Barricades

 

 

1929

 

 

 

 

 

A story in pictures

 

1932

 

 

 

 

The Franco-German War and The Paris Commune

History of The First International (chapter XII)

by G. M. Stekloff

 

 

 

 

 

 

Louis Michel

Memories of the Commune

1886

 

 

Louise Michel wrote this poem in honor and memory of the Communard Théophile Ferré, Blanquist Delegate to the Police, who refused to recognize a military court’s right to judge him after the defeat of the Commune, and was sentenced to death and executed.

 

 

 

REPUBLICANS OF THE WORLD, ARISE !

REPUBLICANS OF THE WORLD, arise in the name of Liberty! In France, in Italy, in Spain, in Hungary, in Denmark, in Poland! And you, our German brothers, proletarians from the other side of the Rhine, will you wait for our victory and the Germanic disaster for the triumph of your freedoms?

Fooled by our common enemies, will you, at the same time as us, rise up to conquer them?

Arise, all who labor! Fight and suffer for justice, for all who are oppressed! For the hour has come for the great combat that will pass judgment on peoples and kings. A superhuman duel of the two principles, of force and of right, of the cannon that screams and kills and of reason that instructs, of the fatalism of Attila and the revolutionary idea.

Courage and the dedication are ours, individually and as a group. Ours are the volunteers, ours are the veterans of the fights for our demands who know how to fight for freedom!

TO ARMS CITIZENS!
TILL DEATH OR VICTORY!
LONG LIVE THE UNIVERSAL REPUBLIC!

The Central Committee of the Twenty Arrondissements of Paris to all the Defenders of the Revolution - 1871

 

 

some red carnations ...

If one day to the cold cemetery I were to go,
brothers, cast on your sister,
like a final hope,
some red carnations in bloom.

In the final days of the empire,
as the people awoke,
red carnation, it was your smile
that told us all was reborn.

And now, go blossom in the shade
of dark and drear prisons,
go blossom near the somber captive,
and tell him we love him.

Tell him that in these changing times
everything belongs to the future;
that the victor with his pallid brow
can die as easily as the vanquished.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Paul Lafargue

A Visit to Louise Michel

1885

 

 

 

Manifesto of the Paris Commune

April 19, 1871

 

 

 

International Working mens Association 1872

Resolutions of the Meeting held to celebrate the Anniversary of the Paris Commune

MECW, Volume 23, p. 128;
Written: by Marx between March 13 and 18, 1872;
First published: in La Liberté, March 24, 1872 and in The International Herald, March 30, 1872;

 

I

“That this meeting assembled to celebrate the anniversary of the 18th March last, declares, that it looks upon the glorious movement inaugurated upon the 18th March, 1871, as the dawn of the great social revolution which will for ever free the human race from class rule.”

II

“That the incapacity and the crimes of the middle classes, extended all over Europe by their hatred against the working classes, have doomed old society no matter under what form of government-Monarchical or Republican.”

III

“That the crusade of all governments against the International, and the terror of the murderers of Versailles as well as of their Prussian conquerors, attest the hollowness of their successes, and the presence of. the threatening army of the proletariat of the whole world gathering in the rear of its heroic vanguard crushed by the combined forces of Thiers and William of Prussia.”

 

 

 

 

The Paris Commune 1871

International Workingmen’s Association
Federal Council of Parisian Sections

 

WORKERS:

A long train of reverses, a catastrophe that would necessarily seem to bring about the complete ruin of our country; such is the balance sheet of the situation created for France by the governments that have dominated it.

Have we lost the qualities needed to raise us up from this degradation? Have we degenerated to the point that we resignedly submit to the hypocritical despotism of those who delivered us to the foreigner and that we only have no energy except that needed to render our ruin irremediable through civil war?

The recent events have demonstrated the might of the people of Paris; we are convinced that a fraternal accord will soon demonstrate their wisdom.

The principle of authority is powerless to reestablish order in the streets, to put the shop floors back to work, and this powerlessness is its negation.

The lack of solidarity has created general ruin and engendered social war. It is from freedom, equality and solidarity that we must ask for the assurance of order on new foundations and for the recognition of labor, which is its primordial condition.

 

WORKERS:

The Communal Revolution affirms its principles and casts aside all future causes of conflict. Can you hesitate to give it your definitive sanction?

The independence of the Commune is the guarantee of the contract whose clauses, freely debated, will bring an end to class antagonism and will assure social equality.

We have demanded the emancipation of the workers, and the Communal delegation is the guarantee of this, for it hall furnish each citizen with the means of defending his rights and effectively controlling the acts of its representatives charged with the managing of its interests and determining the progressive applications of social reforms.

The autonomy of each commune removes any oppressive character from its demands and affirms the republic in its highest expression.

 

WORKERS:

We have fought and we have learned to suffer for our egalitarian principles; we cannot retreat now that we can assist in laying the first stone of the social edifice.

What have we asked for?

The organization of credit, exchange, and association in order to assure the worker the full value of his labor;

Free, secular, and integral education;

The right to meet and to form associations; the absolute freedom of the press and of the citizen;

The municipal organization of police services, armed forces, hygiene, statistics, etc.;

We were the dupes of those who governed us; we allowed ourselves to be caught up in their game while they alternately caressed us and repressed the factions whose antagonisms assured their existence.

Today the people of Paris sees things clearly and refuses the role of a child guided by a preceptor, and at the municipal elections – the product of a movement of which it is itself the author – it will remember that the principle that presides over the organization of a group or an association is the same as that which should govern al of society, and just as it rejects any administrator or president imposed by an external power, it will also reject any mayor or prefect imposed by a government foreign to its aspirations.

It will affirm its superior right to a vote of the Assembly to remain master of its city and to constitute as it see fit its municipal representation, without imposing it on others.

We are convinced that on Sunday March 26 the people of Paris will vote for the Commune.

The Delegates present at the session of the night of March 23, 1871
Federal Council of Parisian Sections of the International Association:

 

Aubry (Rouen federation)
Boudet
Chaudesaigues
Coifé
V. Demay
A. Duchèe
B. Dupuis
Leo Frankel
H. Gollé
Laureau
Limousine
Martin Léo
Nostag
Ch. Rochat
Federal Chamber of Workers’ Societies
Camélinat
Descamps
Evette
Galand
Haan
Hamet
Jance
J. lalleman
Lazare Levy
Pindy
Eugène Pottier
Rouveyrolles
Spoetler
A. Theisz
B. Very

 

 

 

 

The Paris Commune 1871

Address of the 3rd Congress of the Romande Federation of the International Workingmen’s Association to the Paris Commune

 

Geneva, Temple Unique, May 17, 1871

The annual Congress of the Romande Federation cannot close its sessions without casting its gaze at you, BROTHERS OF PARIS, and without proclaiming its adherence to the great labor of political and social reorganization that you are carrying out.

This is the first time that adepts of the INTERNATIONAL have made triumph the political principles of our Association, which is that of National Federations united among themselves across artificial frontiers and having THE COMMUNE as its fundamental basis.

It is also the first time that the international idea of the representation of labor finds its faithful expression in you, our brothers, who are called upon by the people of Paris to the direction of affairs of the great Commune, once again in full possession of itself.

While Paris is blocked by the Chouans of Versailles, it is incumbent upon us to defend you by enlightening those populations still in the dark on the true meaning of the revolution of March 18, accomplished in the name of the economic aspirations of the working classes. Everywhere that human intelligence exists it’s up to us to make understood that there is no middle ground between the two irreconcilable parties: social revolution or monarchical reaction.

We can’t help but express our profound regret that in the ferocious struggle between these two parties the provinces have not yet understood either their obligations or their interests. They haven’t understood that their destiny is intimately tied to that of the Paris Commune, because if Paris were to succumb with it would fall republican freedom, and on the smoking ruins of the cosmopolitan city would once again be installed the “order” of bloody persecution, the transportation of republicans, and the massacre of workers every time they demand their right to live from their labor.

But let reaction know well that that we make the solemn commitment to ceaselessly pursue our labor, that of plucking up the courage of the people so that they rise against the reaction of Versailles in order to extend their hands to the combatants of Paris across the gendarmes of Bonaparte and the mercenaries of Thiers, Favre, and Picard.

May this commitment, contracted by the workers of all countries, prove to reaction that it can’t defeat the Commune.

And if reaction has until now prevented you from realizing all the social and political reorganization that the Commune carries within itself; if reaction has forced you to preoccupy yourself for the moment with the suppression of the shadowy attacks of treason and corruption, to consecrate yourselves completely to the fight to the end against the assassination of the republic, thus putting obstacles before the peaceful development of the new social life, the Commune nevertheless remains the only federative form which, through its application extended throughout France, is capable of assuring independence, well-being and equality for all. It alone can create true national unity, that is, the unity of the people through the harmony of all its interests.

It is for this that we proclaim that the principles of the Commune have already triumphed over the debris of the ancien régime and its definitive consolidation cannot be far off, for it is and will remain the object of all the efforts of the workers.

And when the workers are united by an organization as vast as that of the International, the triumph of their cause is assured.

Receive then, Parisian brothers, our warm wishes for your imminent success, and believe that the members of the International of the entire world will join with us to declare that the International should adopt the orphans and the widows of the defenders of the Paris Commune.

 

Long live the Paris Commune!

Long live the International Association!

 

 

 

MAY 17, 1871

The Central Committee of the Union of Women for the Defense of Paris and the Care of the Wounded, charged by the Commune’s Labor Commission with the organization of the labor of the women of Paris and with the constituting of federal and union chambers of united working women;

Given the identity of the union and federal chambers of workingmen, of the grouping of workingwomen in professional sections forming free and federated productive associations among themselves,

Consequently, it invites all workingwomen to meet today Wednesday, May 17 at the Bourse at 7:00 p.m. in order to name delegates from each corporation for the constituting of union chambers that will, in turn, each send two delegates for the formation of a federal chamber of workingwomen.

For all information contact the Committee of the Union of Women, instituted and functioning in all arrondisements.

Seat of the Central Committee of the Union: Rue du Faubourg-Saint-Martin, at the town hall of the Xth arrondisement.

Seen and approved

The Delegate for the Department of Labor and Exchange

Leo Frankel

The Executive Committee of the Central Committee

Nathalie le Mel

Aline Jacquier

Leloup

Blanche Lefevre

Collin

Jarry

Elisabeth Dmitrieff

 

 

 

 

A lesson in the military sphere

The first great but groping attempt of a proletariat to seize and maintain political power was the experiment of the Paris Commune. The military problem was not one of the least causes of its failure. In his historical work The Paris Commune, which appeared in 1880, Peter Lavrov depicted the inability of the Communards to put an efficient army into the field against the forces of the Versailles Assembly in the following words:

"Neither the socialists nor the democratic extremists, both of whom were drawn from the ranks of the peaceful working classes and clerks, could provide military specialists. The usual occupations and general trend of thought of these leaders of a people’s revolution made them strangers to military technique and unfitted them for the task of controlling the actions of military leaders. The government was incompetent to direct in affairs of war; consequently all military discipline was under mined, while the military leaders were deprived of the possibility of taking quick and energetic action at the very moment when the fate of the Commune depended on the speed and energy of their actions."

Lissagaray, who fought for the Commune, describes the state of the troops as follows:

"Most battalions had no leaders. The cadres of the National Guard were incomplete, while the generals who took the responsibility of leading 40,000 men had never taken even a single battalion into action. They neglected the most elementary arrangements; they failed to provide artillery, powder wagons and ambulances. One day they even forgot to issue any orders, and so left their men for hours without food in a cold, wet fog."

It was the experience of the Paris Commune that led Karl Kautsky to the opinion that “warfare is not the proletariat’s strong point.”

But meanwhile the proletariat had learnt much since 1871, even in the military sphere.

 

 

 

Timeline

of The Civil War

in France

 

1870

January 10: About 100,000 people demonstrate against Bonaparte's Second Empire after the death of Victor Noir, a republican journalist killed by the Emperor's cousin, Pierre Bonaparte.

 

May 8:

A national plebiscite votes confidence in the Empire with about 84% of votes in favour. On the eve of the plebiscite members of the Paris Federation were arrested on a charge of conspiring against Napoleon III. This pretext was further used by the government to launch a campaign of persecution of the members of the International throughout France.

 

July 19:

After a diplomatic struggle over the Prussian attempt for the Spanish throne, Louis Bonaparte declares war on Prussia.

July 23: Marx completes what will become known as his "First Address."

 

July 26: The "First Address" is approved and internationally distributed by the General Council of the International Working Men's Association.

 

August 4-6:

Crown Prince Frederick, commanding one of the three Prussian armies invading France, defeats French Marshal MacMahon at Worth and Weissenburg, pushes him out of Alsace (NorthEastern France), surrounds Strasbourg, and drives on towards Nancy. The other two Prussian armies isolate Marshal Bazaine's forces in Metz.

 

August 16-18:

French Commander Bazaine's efforts to break his soldiers through the German lines are bloodily defeated at Mars-la-Tour and Gravelotte. The Prussians advance on Chalons.

 

September 1: Battle of Sedan. MacMahon and Bonaparte, attempting to relieve Bazaine at Metz and finding the road closed, enters battle and is defeated at Sedan.

 

September 2:

Emperor Napoleon III and Marshal MacMahon capitulate at Sedan with over 83,000 soldiers.

 

September 4:

At news of Sedan, Paris workers invade the Palais Bourbon and force the Legislative Assembly to proclaim the fall of the Empire. By evening, the Third Republic is proclaimed at the Hotel de Ville (the City Hall) in Paris. The provisional Government of National Defence (GND) is established to continue the war effort to remove Germany from France.

 

September 5:

A series of meetings and demonstrations begin in London and other big cities, at which resolutions and petitions were passed demanding that the British Government immediately recognize the French Republic. The General Council of the First International took a direct part in the organization of this movement.

 

September 6:

GND issues statement: blames war on Imperial government, it now wants peace, but "not an inch of our soil, not a stone of our fortresses, will we cede." With Prussia occupying Alsace-Lorraine, the war does not stop.

 

September 19:

Two German armies begin the long siege of Paris. Bismarck figures the "soft and decadent" French workers will quickly surrender. The GND sends a delegation to Tours, soon to be joined by Gambetta (who escapes from Paris in a balloon), to organize resistance in the provinces.

 

October 27:

French army, led by Bazaine with 140,000-180,000 men at Metz, surrenders.

 

October 30:

French National Guard defeated at Le Bourget.

 

October 31: Upon the receipt of news that the Government of National Defense had decided to start negotiations with the Prussians, Paris workers and revolutionary sections of the National Guard rise up in revolt, led by Blanqui. They seize the Hôtel de Ville (City Hall) and set up their revolutionary government — the Committee of Public Safety, headed by Blanqui. On October 31, Flourens prevents any members of the Government of National Defense from being shot, as had been demanded by one of the insurrectionists.

 

November 1:

Under pressure from the workers the Government of National Defense promises to resign and schedule national elections to the Commune — promises it has no intention to deliver. With the workers pacified by their 'legal' charade, the government violently seizes the Hôtel de Ville and re-establishes its domination over the besieged city. Paris official Blanqui is arrested for treason.

 

1871

January 22:

The Paris proletariat and the National Guards hold a revolutionary demonstration, initiated by the Blanquists. They demand the overthrow of the government and the establishment of a Commune. By order of the Government of National Defense, the Breton Mobile Guard, which was defending the Hôtel de Ville, opens fire on the demonstrators. After massacring the unarmed workers, the government begins preparations to surrender Paris to the Germans.

 

January 28:

After four long months of workers struggle, Paris is surrendered to the Prussians. While all regular troops are disarmed, the National Guard is permitted to keep their arms — the populous of Paris remains armed and allows the occupying armies only a small section of the city.

 

Febuary 8:

Elections held in France, unknown to most of the nation's population.

 

Febuary 12:

New National Assembly opens at Bordeaux; two-thirds of members are conservatives and wish the war to end.

 

February 16:

The Assembly elects Adolphe Thiers chief executive.

 

February 26:

The preliminary peace treaty between France and Germany signed at Versailles by Thiers and Jules Favre, on the one hand, and Bismarck, on the other. France surrenders Alsace and East Lorraine to Germany and paid it indemnities to the sum of 5 billion francs. German army of occupation to slowly withdraw as indemnity payments made. The final peace treaty was signed in Frankfort-on-Main on May 10, 1871.

 

March 1-3:

After months of struggle and suffering, Paris workers react angrily to the entry of German troops in the city, and the ceaseless capitulation of the government. The National Guard defects and organizes a Central Committee.

 

March 10:

The National Assembly passes a law on the deferred payment of overdue bills; under this law the payment of debts on obligations concluded between August 13 and November 12, 1870 could be deferred. Thus, the law leads to the bankruptcy of many petty bourgeoisie.

 

March 11:

National Assembly adjourns. With trouble in Paris, it establishes its government at Versailles on March 20.

 

 

March 18:

Adolphe Thiers attempts to disarm Paris and sends French troops (regular army), but, through fraternization with Paris workers, they refuse to carry out thier orders. Generals Claude Martin Lecomte and Jacques Leonard Clement Thomas are killed by their own soldiers. Many troops peacefully withdraw, some remain in Paris. Thiers outraged, the Civil War begins.

 

March 26:

A municipal council — the Paris Commune — is elected by the citizens of Paris. Commune consists of workers, among them members of the First International and followers of Proudhon and Blanqui.

 

March 28:

The Central Committee of the National Guard, which up to then had carried on the government, resigns after it first decrees the permanent abolition of the "Morality Police".

 

March 30:

The Commune abolishes conscription and the standing army; the National Guard, in which all citizens capable of bearing arms were to be enrolled, was to be the sole armed force. The Commune remitts all payments of rent for dwelling houses from October 1870 until April 1871. On the same day the foreigners elected to the Commune were confirmed in office, because "the flag of the Commune is the flag of the World Republic".

 

April 1:

The Commune declares that the highest salary received by any member of the Commune does not exceed 6,000 francs

 

April 2:

In order to suppress the Paris Commune Thiers appeals to Bismarck for permission to supplement the Versailles Army with French prisoners of war, most of whom had been serving in the armies that surrendered at Sedan and Metz. In return for the 5 billion francs indemnity payment, Bismarck agrees. The French Army begins seige of Paris. Paris is continually bombarded and, moreover, by the very people who had stigmatized as a sacrilege the bombardment of the same city by the Prussians.

The Commune decrees the separation of the Church from the State, and the abolition of all state payments for religious purposes as well as the transformation of all Church property into national property. Religion is declared a purely private matter.

 

April 5:

Decree on hostages adopted by the Commune in an attempt to prevent Communards from being shot by the French Government. Under this decree, all persons found guilty of being in contact with the French Government were declared hostages. This was never carried out.

 

April 6:

The guillotine was brought out by the 137th battalion of the National guard, and publicly burnt, amid great popular rejoicing.

 

April 7:

On April 7, the French army captures the Seine crossing at Neuilly, on the western front of Paris.

Reacting to French government policy of shooting captured Communards, Commune issues an "eye-for-an-eye" policy statement, threatening retaliation. The bluff is quickly called; Paris workers execute no one.

 

April 8:

A decree excluding from the schools all religious symbols, pictures, dogmas, prayers — in a word, "all that belongs to the sphere of the individual's conscience" — is ordered to be excluded from the schools. The decree is gradually applied.

 

April 11:

In an attack on southern Paris the French army is repulsed with heavy losses by General Eudes.

 

April 12:

The Commune decides that the Victory Column on the Place Vendôme, which had been cast from guns captured by Napoleon after the war of 1809, should be demolished as a symbol of chauvinism and incitement to national hatred. This decree was carried out on May 16.

 

April 16:

Commune announces the postponement of all debt obligations for three years and abolition of interest on them.

The Commune orders a statistical tabulation of factories which had been closed down by the manufacturers, and the working out of plans for the carrying on of these factories by workers formerly employed in them, who were to be organized in co-operative societies, and also plans for the organization of these co-operatives in one great union.

 

April 20:

The Commune abolishes night work for bakers, and also the workers' registration cards, which since the Second Empire had been run as a monopoly by police nominees — exploiters of the first rank; the issuing of these registration cards was transferred to the mayors of the 20 arrondissements of Paris.

 

April 23:

Thiers breaks off the negotiations for the exchange, proposed by Commune, of the Archbishop of Paris [Georges Darboy] and a whole number of other priests held hostages in Paris, for only one man, Blanqui, who had twice been elected to the Commune but was a prisoner in Clairvaux.

 

April 27:

In sight of the impending municipal elections of April 30, Thiers enacted one of his great conciliation scenes. He exclaimed from the tribune of the Assembly: "There exists no conspiracy against the republic but that of Paris, which compels us to shed French blood. I repeat it again and again...". Out of 700,000 municipal councillors, the united Legitimists, Orleanists, and Bonapartists ( Party of Order ) did not carry 8,000.

 

April 30:

The Commune orders the closing of the pawnshops, on the ground that they were a private exploitation of labor, and were in contradiction with the right of the workers to their instruments of labor and to credit.

 

May 5:

On May 5 it ordered the demolition of the Chapel of Atonement, which had been built in expiation of the execution of Louis XVI.

 

May 9:

Fort Issy, which is completely reduced to ruins by gunfire and constant French bombardement, is captured by the French army.

 

May 10:

The peace treaty concluded in February now signed, known as Treaty of Frankfurt. (Endorsed by National Assembly May 18.)

 

May 16:

The Vendôme Column is pulled down. The Vendôme Column was erected between 1806 and 1810 in Paris in honor of the victories of Napoleonic France; it was made out of the bronze captured from enemy guns and was crowned by a statue of Napoleon.

 

May 21-28:

Versailles troops enter Paris on May 21.

The Prussians who held the northern and eastern forts allowed the Versailles troops to advance across the land north of the city, which was forbidden ground to them under the armistice — Paris workers held the flank with only weak forces. As a result of this, only a weak resistance was put up in the western half of Paris, in the luxury city; while it grew stronger and more tenacious the nearer the Versailles troops approached the eastern half, the working class city.

The French army spent eight days massacring workers, shooting civilians on sight. The operation was led by Marshal MacMahon, who would later become president of France.

 

Tens of thousands of Communards and workers are summarily executed (as many as 30,000); 38,000 others imprisoned and 7,000 are forcibly deported.

 

 

 

 

Eugene Pottier

 

1870

Wilhelm and Paris

Eugène Pottier, Chants Révolutionnaires (second edition), Paris, Bureau de Comité Pottier, [n.d.]

WILHELM

Paris, know your danger
I trapped your army;
Open, or I'll besiege you!

 

PARIS
Besiege!

 

WILHELM

You'll see consumed
The old, children, the women;
Open, or I'll starve you

 

PARIS
Starve!

 

WILHELM

A crater will flame,
Burning palaces and slums;
Open, or I'll bombard

 

PARIS
Bombard!

 

WILHELM

Everyone’s not so firm.
Who’s the ambassador we'll horse trade with
Who'll sign the peace?

 

PARIS
Cambronne! [1]

 

– November 1870

[1] Pierre Cambronne was a Napoleonic general who, when summoned to surrender at Waterloo was reported as saying “The Guard dies and doesn’t surrender.” The more common version of his response is that he simple replied “merde!” Since then “le mot de Cambronne” has signified “shit!”

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Commune of Paris - 1871

by Frank Jellinek

1937

 

 

 

 

The Rise of Paris

 

by Robert Ballanger

1945

 

 

 

 

The Paris Commune

1871-1919

 

"The Revolutionary Age"

Saturday, March 15, 1919

 

 

 

 

 

Marx's "Civil War in France"

N. Fedorovsky

1985 - Moscow

 

 

 

 

On Karl Marx

and the Paris Commune

Wolfgang Eggers

14. 3. 2021

 

* * *

 

18th of March

- 98th Anniversary of the political prisoner day 

 

The Day of the Political Prisoner in 2021 is devoted to the Paris Communards.

The International of Communist Solidarity (ICS) publishes the following website: 

 

"The Bloody Week"

 21st of May 1871 - 28th of May, 1871

 

 

 

 

March 1927

Paris Commune

Volume 2 - Issue 3

The last days of the Paris Commune.

Our tribute to the memory of the Paris Commune.

* * *

IN THE VERSAILLESE PRISON DES CHANTIERS

March 1926

Paris Commune

Max Shachtman

Volume 1 - Issue 3

 

 

72 Days of Working Class Power:

The Paris Commune of 1871

15 of March 1924