Remembering The Paris Commune
May Day Special
In honor of May Day, I wanted to take a few moments to discuss an event that often gets overlooked in the history of workers’ struggles against tyranny and oppression. Given the pandemic we’re currently going through, I believe we can find inspiration from a time period where there was no worldwide workers’ solidarity and the continent of Europe was still dominated by monarchies and late-stage empires. There was an event that sparked concern not just amongst the capitalist elites of that country but other regimes throughout Europe, and it’s the Paris Commune of 1871.
The Paris Commune was a radical, socialist and revolutionary government that controlled Paris from March 18 to May 28, 1871. Yes, it was short-lived but its effects were wide reaching and are often referenced in Marxist and socialist literary works to this day. The untold history of the Paris Commune is devastating to those want to understand history and the struggle for more egalitarian societies. It was a radical experiment that produced a central government but a long term philosophy that would help future revolutionaries inspire and lead their comrades to power.
The Commune was a direct result of the power vacuum that was created in the immediate aftermath of the Franco-Prussian War. This was a war that saw the collapse of the Second French Republic under Napoleon III, who would be captured in 1870 and then exiled to London where he would die in 1873. The Germans under Bismarck defeated the French in what was a brutal war. It not only ended the Second French Republic but France lost a ton of land, that they would never get back. The devastating results from this war, would haunt the French for decades and lead them into not one but two world wars. First, with the German Empire in WW1, and then the Third Reich in WW2. This collapse of the Second French Republic would usher in the Third French Republic which became imperialistic due to the fact that they lost so much land and GDP in the war. They would battle with the British Empire, the German Empire and the Belgians for the carving up of African colonies that would proceed for the next thirty years or so.
Paris was under siege for four months by the Germans. The siege lasted from September 19, 1870 to January 28, 1871 and was held in place by what was called the North German Confederation (remember Prussia wasn’t unified and consolidated into the German Empire yet). This brutal siege of a historic city like Paris, was embarrassing for the French workers and the aristocracy alike. They had to move their capital to Tours for a short time because of it. Paris was a growing hotbed for insurrection and working-class radical thought. The war only exacerbated local workers’ organizing efforts. Many of these laborers had lasting memories of the European Revolutions of 1848 and the Marxist thought the emerged out of The Communist League. During the siege, the city was primarily defended by regiments of the National Guard, which was a gendarmerie and reserve force. The actual French army fled the city beforehand. They would surrender the city in January 1871 and Adolphe Thiers would become the chief executive of the new French government after negotiations with the Germans. A key part of this agreement with Bismarck required, the French to disband the army, leaving only the National Guard troops. This would prove to be a problem for the new French government because it created an opportunity for the Communards to seize Paris. They would do just this on March 18 by killing two French army generals and refusing to accept the new French government. Now, they had power and wanted to capitalize on what Marx called, the “dictatorship of the proletariat.”
What made this short-lived revolutionary government even more interesting, were the demographics and class structure of France at the time. In 1871, France was very much divided between the large, Catholic conservative population of the countryside and the republican, radical and Bonapartist elements that existed in the large cities of Paris, Lyon and Marseilles. To put in in comparison to current demographics, it’s similar to America today. Religious and conservative in the rural areas, liberal and radical in the cities. Obviously this is overly simplified, but a picture needs to be painted for illustrative purposes. Due to the 1869 French parliamentary elections, we have an accurate census of who populated Paris at the time. In 1869 there were 2 million people in Paris, 500,000 of whom were industrial workers (by 1871 this was likely higher). This made up about 15% of all industrial workers in France at the time. The high concentration of workers made the Paris Commune that much easier pull off. The radicalization of the Paris workers most likely began with the Canut silk workers’ revolts in Paris and Lyon in the 1830’s. Even though this was over thirty years prior, that along with the Revolutions of 1848, left a lasting memory in Parisian residents. They used The First international as a template for a workingman’s alliance and it grew in influence across France, radicalizing even more workers by the time the Franco-Prussian War came. Copper and bronze workers attempted to unionize in 1868 but were eventually de-unionized by their Parisian employers. By this point, the French aristocracy could begin seeing the fraying of their beloved Second French Republic. There were too many industrial workers concentrated in one city and they all seemed to be attempting unionization one way or another. They had their own memories of the July Revolution of 1830 and the June uprisings of 1848. They knew that Paris itself had always been a radical city and would only become more so, once occupied by any foreign force.
What is often misunderstood about the Commune is that it wasn’t highly centralized and lacked one central leadership group. There was a spectrum of factions within the revolutionaries of Paris, similar to the Jacobin-Bourbon split in the French Revolution of 1789. The more conservative wing of the Commune included the “Republicans” as they were called. They were led by Georges Clemenceau who was leader of the national assembly and tried to negotiate a compromise between the Commune and the government. This would prove fruitless. The more extreme revolutionaries on the further left of the Commune spectrum, were led by Louis Auguste Blanqui who was not only a charismatic leader but spent much of his life in prison. Because he was in jail for most of the entire four month life of the Commune, he organized cells of revolutionaries who corresponded in code. He wrote the pamphlet Insurrections for an Armed Uprising to provide guidance. Ironically, his followers would prove to make up the majority of the Commune leadership and were considered the most professional and disciplined soldiers at a time when there were rampant human rights abuses committed by the Prussians and the new French government. “Blanquists”, as they would later be called, believed that once power was consolidated, they could take the country from a capitalist state to a post-capitalist state and introduce elements of socialism along the way. They would set up councils and govern the city of Paris in a fairer manner. This never came to fruition though, as French army elements began to surround the city and start a process of uprooting the Commune.
As word spread about the 160,000 French troops that surrendered to the Germans in Metz, revolutionaries and workers began barricading streets in Paris. On October 31, 1870 Blanqui, Louis Charles Delescluze and Felix Pyat called for new demonstrations and it became clear that by the early months of 1871, they would control all of Paris proper. Negotiations between them and the Germans would continue throughout October, November and December of that year. The siege became worse for the Parisians during those winter months as the Seine froze over and temperatures regularly dropped into the single digits. Food was scare and the Commune officials were holding on for dear life. By January 11, the French army was facing defeat on four different fronts, let alone the revolutionaries began to control their biggest city. Naturally as Paris started to suffer from starvation, this only agitated more workers to rally to the side of the revolutionaries and engage in radical behavior such as boarding up shops and creating more strategic barricades. Bread lines were formed but the revolutionaries had the support of the residents, despite the hard times. Later, the Armistice of Versailles would be signed January 28, 1871 and effectively end the active phase of the Franco-Prussian War.
This treaty and the end of the war created the atmosphere for the Commune to come into effect by March. On March 18, the National Guard took power after regular army units began to leave the city. The Paris Commune was officially initiated on that day. Blanqui’s followers captured the gunpowder silos and the telegraph lines. They also took the Pantheon and other historical landmarks. The Communards would not stop there. They would then take the Ministry of Justice building, the Hotel de Ville and gain control of both sides of the Seine. Hostilities though between Clemenceau and the National Guard would ensue. Clemenceau believed he was the legitimate leaders of Paris, instead of the Central Committee of the National Guard. However on March 22, the day before the elections, the Central Committee (The Commune) declared that they were the legitimate government of Paris and Clemenceau would leave for Versailles or face death. He would later remark “We are caught between two bands of crazy people, those sitting in Versailles and those in Paris.” In any event, the path was now clear for the Commune to set up a governing structure.
They held their first meeting on March 28 and put forward some policy proposals. They included making Blanqui an honorary president, the abolition of military conscription and the abolition of the death penalty. All of these were very radical for the time period. Even though honorary title was given to Blanqui a key feature of the Commune was that there would be no mayor, president or commander in chief. They established nine commissions to bring order to Paris and organized them by arrondissement. Their programme went even further. They didn’t meet for that many days and were not able to implement 80% of what they wanted but the programme had some forward-thinking policy proposals. These included a separation of church and state, remission of rents during the siege, the abolition of child labor and night work, free return of pawn shops, a postponement of commercial debts and a granting of pensions to unmarried men. What was even more radical was that there wouldn’t just be a separation of church and state, all church property was to be appropriated into public property. There was also an entire section of the programme dedicated to feminist initiatives. As for the press relations, the pro-commune papers expanded rapidly but they did close down the pro-Versailles aristocracy newspapers of Le Figaro and Le Gaulois. They did allow some pro-Republican newspapers to remain operating, bu there was a clear bias against the elites in Versailles.
As the councils tried their best to govern the city, French forces remained outside the city but far enough to where the Commune could operate with impunity. Just south of the city, Fort Issy was captured in April and other army units began to take some surrounding villages. It became clear that the revolutionary government would not last much longer. The final offensive that would topple the Commune was initiated on May 21. National Guard Commune soldiers abandoned the eastern part of the city and the barricades were proving ineffective. Once sporadic fighting began inside Paris, neighborhood loyalties to the Commune began to work against them. Instead of a unified force, the citizens of Paris began to defend their neighborhoods in cell-like formation. There was no central coordination and the city would eventually fall as French forces began to outflank the Communard’s barricades. Delescluze would issue a proclamation calling the city to arms but it was too late. The army of McMahon outnumbered the Communards by five-to-one, creating a massive disadvantage. At 2 in the morning on May 24, Delescluze and his forces along with other Communards retreated to the Hotel de Ville where they had hoped to be able to treat the wounded. Hospitals were not nearby and they needed some time to gather the wounded. They would choose to set the hotel on fire and retreat even further. Summary executions of Communards began as the army forces got deeper into the city. Delescluze, who would be the last surviving Communard leader that day, would be shot dead atop a barricade while apparently unarmed. Fighting would continue the following few days into June but the Paris Commune experiment was all but over. All told 43,000 prisoners were captured in what became known as “The Bloody Week.” The official army count of Communards killed was 877, but many historians fear it was much higher. Exiles were rounded up sent to villages outside of Paris where they would either work manual labor or be put on trial and killed. Mass graves were dug and the history books would be written in favor of the victors, as is always the case.
So as we reflect on the short-lived history of the Paris Commune, let us understand the radical perspectives that allowed progressive policy proposals to take place amongst a war-weary populace. While they were not able to carry out many of the tenants of their programme, the communal success over a large population of workers proved to be a landmark moment in history that would be an early model on how to seize power away from capitalist elites. Now obviously, the power vacuum left the Communards with the ability to consolidate power quickly and without much violence, but there are many lessons that can be learned. Cities like Turin in the early 20th century would use organizing models similar to the Communards because Turin, like Paris in the 1870’s had a massive industrial workforce that was often abused and de-unionized. It’s my hope that on this May Day in 2020, we can take some programatic elements of the Paris Commune and apply them to today’s labor struggles.