Re: K vs. M

[Kenneth Campbell <kkc@xxxxxxxxxxxx>]

M/L wrote:

>Even earlier, Jim-- it's from a letter to Arnold Ruge
>(1843, I think), and yes--- there's a bit of the truth
>shall set thee free, there./m

Yeah, I agree. I have generally thought the principle is still
relevant... "the truth shall set you free"... but only of your own
preconceptions.

Karl had to clear his own hurdles... Did so. The "Manifesto Reality" of
48 (high energy)...

I liked the lower cap reality of 1863 more...

Karl's early letter to Ruge are classic stuff for those who "give a
shit" and are close to the reason they first gave a shit... But you have
to marry the "give a shit" emotion with a democratic base (like the
working class) or you are just another Benito guessing how to copy the
coup of the Russian Revolution... or just another shop steward wondering
when the Great Marxist will deliver a diminished work week.

Ken.

--
Laws are necessary only because there are persons in existence who own
nothing; and although this is directly expressed in but few laws, as,
for instance, those against vagabonds and tramps, in which the
proletariat as such is outlawed, yet enmity to the proletariat is so
emphatically the basis of the law that the judges and especially the
Justices of the Peace, who are bourgeois themselves, and with whom the
proletariat comes most into contact, find this meaning in the laws
without further consideration. If a rich man is brought up, or rather
summoned, to appear before the court, the judge regrets that he is
obliged to impose so much trouble, treats the matter as favourably as
possible, and, if he is forced to condemn the accused does so with
extreme regret, etc etc and the end of it all is a miserable fine, which
the bourgeois throws upon the table with contempt and then departs. But
if a poor devil gets into such a position as involves appearing before
the Justices of the Peace—he has almost always spent the night in the
stationhouse with a crowd of his peers—he is regarded from the beginning
as guilty; his defence is set aside with a contemptuous 'oh, we know the
excuse', and a fine imposed which he cannot pay and must work out with
several months on the treadmill.
          -- Frederick Engels, 1844
             The Condition Of The Working Class In England