Page:The Paris Commune - Karl Marx - ed. Lucien Sanial (1902).djvu/26

Rh No, no! But in the social-revolutionary spirit of undying opposition and fearless defiance. To take strategic positions in view of the final battle, and from there ceaselessly bombard the citadel of oppression; to thus and otherwise, by constant agitation from every point of vantage that may be gained, educate the proletarian masses, enlighten their blind discontent and transform it into a clear-minded resolve; to so organize them that every conflict in which they may be engaged, every victory they may win, and every reverse they may suffer, shall alike serve as object lessons to intensify their class- consciousness and class-solidarity; to do, in short, all that can be done along the straight line of the class struggle and do it quickly, then challenge the enemy to undo it; such is the great work, and the sole mission, of a social-revolutionary party.

We now come to the second part of the Kautsky resolution. It reads as follows:

"The entrance of an isolated socialist in a bourgeois government cannot be considered as the normal beginning of the conquest of the political power, but only as a necessary expedient (expédient forcé), transitory and exceptional.

"Whether, in a particular case, the political situation necessitates this dangerous experiment, is a question of tactics and not of principle; the International Congress has not to pronounce itself upon that point; but, in any case, the entrance of a socialist in a bourgeois government affords no hope of good results for the militant proletariat, unless the Socialist Party, in its great majority, approves of such an act, and the socialist minister remains the mandatary of his party.

"In the contrary case, of this minister becoming independent of this party, or representing only a portion of it, his intervention in a bourgeois government threatens the militant proletariat with disorganization and