Mark and Lincoln: And Unfinished Revolution

administration. Th
 e freed people were left on their own, while 
Republican placemen forced to fl ee the South were found jobs in 
the Treasury Department in Washington.
161
But the real problem was that in each recession many banks failed 
and even in good times the service off ered to farmers was miserably 
inadequate. Th
  e modest resources available to the Federal govern-
ment were also a signifi cant factor in the failure of Reconstruction, 
as we have seen. Abraham Lincoln gave considerable latitude to 
his treasury secretaries, but by inclination he favored private sec-
tor solutions and was wary of giving too much scope to publicly 
controlled entities. If the US postbellum record was much weaker 
than it should have been, the decisions taken—and not taken—by 
his administration help to explain this. However, it was the retreat 
from Reconstruction, the granting of virtual autonomy to Southern 
Dixiecrats, and the blunting of Federal powers by the Supreme 
Court that gave free rein to robber baron capitalism.
Marx and Engels themselves were often scornful of Republican 
leaders, including Lincoln, and generally distrusted the machi-
nations of large states. But, with occasional misgivings, they had 
placed a wager that the Civil War would lead to slave emancipation, 
and that emancipation would in its turn pose the issue of votes for 
the freedmen. Th
  ey further predicted more and larger labor strug-
gles. Th
  eir predictions were borne out, although the new unions 
were eventually contained or defeated. Th
  e American Federation 
of Labor was founded, but it turned its back on the formation of a 
labor party. Th
  e example and watchwords of the Internationalists 
and of the Haymarket martyrs helped to encourage worker resist-
ance in Shanghai, Petrograd, Calcutta, Havana, Turin, Barcelona, 
Berlin, Vienna, and Glasgow. In the years before the outbreak of 
the great slaughter in 1914, socialists, anarchists, and syndicalists 
worked to oppose imperial war, and to foster internationalism and 
class solidarity. And though they underestimated the power of 
nationalism and militarism, they were right about imperialism.
161 Foner, 
Reconstruction, pp. 580–1; Josephson, Politicos, pp. 234–6.
introduction  97

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MARX IN THE US?
It remains only to address a fi nal problem. Karl Marx’s concep-
tion of history bequeathed a theoretical puzzle to later historical 
materialists, namely, what is the role of the individual in history? 
Such powerful writers and thinkers as Georgi Plekhanov, Isaac 
Deutscher, Jean-Paul Sartre, and Ernest Mandel debated the topic, 
often drawing attention to the fact that even deep-laid historical 
processes often depend on highly personal capacities and decisions. 
Considering the remarkable sequence of events I have surveyed here, 
it is clear that some individuals are so placed that they can infl u-
ence the course of history. Lincoln did so with the Emancipation 
Proclamation. He thereby started a revolution, but he did not live to 
fi nish it. Th
  e freed people, the former abolitionists of whatever race, 
sex, or class had to contend with the consequences—angry white 
men in the South and greedy businessmen in the North. Th
 rough 
New York City IWA parade to commemorate martyrs of the Paris Commune, 
December 17, 1871 (original woodcut from Frank Leslie’s Illustrated News-
paper, New York 1872).
98  an unfinished revolution

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the IWA, Karl Marx had an impact on a generation of American 
workers and radicals, but despite heroic battles to do so, the IWA 
proved unable to build a political workers’ movement to compare 
with those in Europe and the antipodes. 
Th
  is leads me to a fi nal thought. What would have happened 
if Marx or Engels had themselves sailed from England to make 
their home in New York or Chicago? It would have provoked a 
sensation. Marx would have earned good fees as a lecturer, and his 
family, including his daughters and sons-in-law, would very likely 
have fl ourished. Engels was hugely invigorated by the trip he did 
make to New York and Boston in 1887, but he declined to give 
public lectures there, and he did not return.
162
 
But the truly tantalizing issue is whether they would have been 
able to fi nd a more promising path for the American left. Obviously, 
there is no real way of knowing. But if their conduct in Germany in 
1848–9, or in the 1860s, is any guide, Marx and Engels would have 
162  Eleanor Marx and Edward Aveling also visited the US in 1887, and 
their combined lecture tour was very well received by the public. However, the 
visit was to be marred by controversies over the expenses claimed by Aveling. 
See Yvonne Kapp, Eleanor Marx, volume 2, London 1976, pp. 141–91.
introduction  99

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strongly opposed any policy of subordinating the real movement 
to some socialist shibboleth. Th
  ey might well have helped to con-
solidate the International’s achievements. Th
  ey would very likely 
have favored opening the unions to the generality of workers and 
they would surely have given exceptional importance to curbing the 
freelance violence of the Southern “rifl e clubs” and Northern com-
pany goons. Marx would have urged workers to develop their own 
organizations. But, just as he saw the importance of the slavery issue 
at the start of the Civil War, so he would surely have focused on 
“winning the battle of democracy,” securing the basic rights of the 
producers—including the freedmen—in all sections as preparation 
for an ensuing social revolution. Eschewing reactionary socialism 
or the counterfeit anti-imperialism of some Southern slaveholders, 
Marx and Engels would have insisted that only the socialization of 
the great cartels and fi nancial groups could enable the producers 
and their social allies to confront the challenges of modern society 
and to aspire to a society in which the free development of each is 
the precondition for the free development of all.
100  an unfinished revolution

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