The Charleston daily news. [volume] (Charleston, S.C.) 1865-1873, 1871-06-08
Is Communism Dead

Written in letters of fire and blood, and o.
proportions 80 huge that all the world will
read them with horror for a~.century to come
the principles of the Commune seem scarce
ly to need an interpreter. But they are
given 30 tersey by one Of their sympathizers
DR.. Robinet, that we cannot refrain from
publishing them.
'tTheir philosophy" says Dr.. R., "is
''atheism, materialism, the negatlon of Cd
"religion.
s'Their political programme is absolute in
"dividualliberty, by means ofthe% suppression
sof government and the division Of nation
ssalities into Communes more or less iede'
Grated.
''Their political economy consists essen.
'tiauy in the dispossession, without compen-
~''sation, of the present holders o fcapital, and
sin assigning the coin, instruments of labor
''and land to associations OF workmep.
'Their historical theory is that the no
"bility and bourgeoisie have each their
''reign, and that the time OF the p~roletariate
''has now come.
'They exclude all that is outside the
working class from society, considering it
"as socially aud even ph~ysiologically e6ste.".
Such is the doctrine OF the Central Com
mittee OF the National Guard and the Com
munal Council at the Hotel de Vile, which
FOR more than two months were absolute
masters of Paris. So then tits not aa out
burst of blind fury on the part OF the sans
culoNes, hut a philosophy put in practice
the first fruits OF armed Fourierism, an after
birth OF the Revolution Of '98. II it be o ne
cation of all religion, it is, nevertheless, a
faith. Sixty thousand corpses, now rotting
in Paris, attest the devotion of the believers
in this no.religion. The hplks, the prisons
are crowded ten courts martial are busy
day and night and the workof vengeance
goes on.
Will Communism be thus stamped out, no
more to raise its head? If we recall the
universal execration heaped upon the first
revolution and its authors, and remember
the applause which Carlyle and others have
bestowed upon that bloody protest against
ages Of oppression, we shall hesitate to
answer in the affirmative. No! Communism
is not dead. 1t cannot die until the grand
problem of civilization is finally solved.
There was a system which %reconciled labor
snd capital as no other system in human
history ever-succeeded in doing. That sys-
tenn has been destroyed forever. The distri-
button of intelligence and refinement through
every portion Of o State, as accomplished
by this system, will be substituted the world.
over by the concentration into mighty cities
OF all the wealth, power and intellect which
the State possesses. The few immensely
rich will be surrounded by the many exceed
ingly poor Ten thousand ''savages OF civ
silization," as the English historian APPLY
calls them, will stand hungry and impatient
at the door of every Cresus. The bayonets
hired to repress those sayages may he
to think a little too much. Hunger
and steel and myriads OF bare, brawny
and mad radical philosophers" ever
at work-what hope is there OF peace for
In o night the earth will begin to
quake. No! Communism is not dead. Lon
don, Berlin, Vienna and New York may
learn a lesson by the lurid flames OF Paris.
Will they?