Page:Karl Liebknecht - Militarism (1917).djvu/20

x tag after the outbreak of the war. At the second session in December Liebknecht was the only man who dared to stand up in the Reichstag against the decision of all parties and vote against the budget.

He not only cast his vote, but he also dared to state in an open meeting of the Reichstag to a Germany then apparently victorious, that the Germans were the aggressors in the war, and that it was an imperialistic war provoked by his country and Austria. He protested against the violation of Belgium and Luxembourg; against the military dictatorship; against Prussian and German autocracy. Whether one agrees or disagrees with his position, one cannot but admit the courageous character of the act, which is bound to be recorded as one of the most heroic of the world drama.

On May 1, 1916, Liebknecht participated in a May Day Peace demonstration in Berlin. It was on this occasion that he delivered the peace address which brought to him an imprisonment of four years and one month of hard labor.

"We Germans in Prussia," he declared, "have