Page:Wilhelm Liebknecht - Socialism; What It Is and What It Seeks to Accomplish - tr. Mary Wood Simons (1899).djvu/50

 then classes will cease; there will remain only society, a society of equals—true human society, mankind and humanity.

For that reason it has been stated in the plainest manner that we should not substitute one class rule for another. Only malice and thoughtlessness could incidentally put such a wrong construction on our meaning, for in order to rule, in order to he able to exercise rule, I must have possession in the means of production. My private property in the means of production is the preliminary condition for rule, and socialism removes personal private property in the means of production. Rule and exploitation in every form must he done away with, man become free and equal, not master and servant, but comrades, brothers and sisters!

Next to these general remarks we will speak of the international character of the party. Since the International Workingmen's Association was established, in the middle of the '60s, the international character of the labor movement has been acknowledged and given practical proof of by the German workers on every occasion. In the new platform we have plainly given expression to the two phases of this thought; first on the economic side, since industrial development has in its nature an international character, and then on the political side, since out of the international character of economic evolution arises the impossibility of solving the social question in one country, and from whence arises the necessity for international united effort on the part of the laboring class.

And, further, because of misunderstandings and perverted conclusions and occurrences in other lands, that lead to these conclusions, it was doubly our duty, to state with particular emphasis and in words that leave no room for doubt that we feel and declare ourselves one