us about the issue of signatures, tell us that there are people in their groups who, for family or employment reasons, cannot give their names openly without compromising themselves. We would not like to be misunderstood. We have argued for the benefits of and need for speaking out publicly, but that does not mean that we should give up the precautions commended by sheer common sense. Exposing oneself to the blows of the enemy to no useful purpose would amount to naivety and foolishness!
It is natural for those who cannot or who simply do not wish to commit themselves to be on their guard. But if, as happens in every group, there are some comrades not bothered about hiding their identity and who may already be known as anarchists on account of their propaganda among the public, why should we miss out on the prestige earned by a party that bravely asserts its ideas? And why play into the hands of the police who, from time to time, take it into their heads to uncover that which it never occurred to anybody to conceal?
[Followed by a list of fresh endorsements for the manifesto]
Point of Honor: To the Comrades
Translated from “Obbligo d’onore: Ai compagni,”
L’Agitazione (Ancona) 1, no. 4 (April 4, 1897).
The elections are over.
We—by which we mean all the comrades—have done all we could to alert the people to the deceitfulness and harm implicit in the electoral contest—and we did well. But now another more important duty is incumbent on us: demonstrating—with facts and with results—that our tactics are better than those of the parliamentarists, that we mean to be and are already, not merely a negative force, but an active, functioning, effective force in the fight for the emancipation of the proletariat.
We oppose the parliamentary socialists, and are right to do so, since in their program and in their tactics lurk the seeds of a fresh oppression; and, should they succeed, the government principle that they cling to and bolster would destroy the principle of social equality and usher in a fresh age of class struggles. However, in order to be entitled to oppose them, we must do better than them.
Being right in theory, cherishing loftier ideals, criticizing others, foreseeing the harmful consequences from incomplete and contradictory programs, is not enough. In fact, if everything is confined to theory and criticism and does not offer a jumping-off point for an activity that seeks out and creates the conditions for the implementation of a better program, then our action turns out to be harmful, in practice, because it hobbles the efforts of others, to the benefit of our common foes.
Preventing, through our propaganda, the people from sending socialists and republicans into parliament (since those who are the most accessible to our propaganda are the very people who, but for us, would cast their votes for anti-monarchy candidates) is an excellent outcome as long we manage to turn whomever we lure away from the fetishism of the ballot box into a conscious and active fighter for genuine, complete emancipation.
Otherwise, we would have served and would serve the interests of the monarchy and the conservatives!
Let us all ponder this point. What is at stake is the interest of our cause and our honor as men and as a party.
The isolated, casual propaganda that is often mounted as a concession to one’s conscience, or as merely an outlet for a desire to argue, is of little or no use. Given the unconscious, impoverished conditions in which the masses find themselves, and all the forces lined up against us, this propaganda is forgotten and evaporates before it can build up any impact and make any headway. The terrain is too hard for seeds scattered randomly to germinate and put down roots.
We are after unrelenting, patient, coordinated effort tailored to a range of settings and a variety of circumstances. Each of us must be able to depend on the cooperation of all the rest; and wherever a seed has been thrown out, there must follow solicitous attention from the grower in the tending and protection of it until such time as it blossoms as a plant capable of surviving on its own and bringing forth further fertile seeds.
In Italy, there are millions of proletarians who are still blind instruments in the hands of the priests. There are millions who, while hating the master intensely, are persuaded that one cannot live without masters, and they are incapable of imagining and yearning for any other emancipation than their becoming masters in their turn and exploiting their fellow wretches.
There are vast stretches—actually most of the landmass of Italy—where our message has never been heard or, if perchance it has made it there, it has left no discernible trace behind.
Though only a few, there are workers’ organizations and we are alien to them.
Strikes occur and, caught unprepared, we are neither able to help the workers in their struggle nor profit from the mental unrest to spread our ideas.
Popular upheavals and near-insurrections happen and nobody gives us a thought.
Then comes the persecution, and we are imprisoned, deported in our hundreds or thousands, and we find ourselves powerless to even draw the public’s attention to the infamies visited upon us, let alone to do anything else.
To work, comrades! The task is a big one! To work, everyone!147
147 This article was impounded by the censor.
The Judicial Crime in Barcelona
Translated from “Il crimine giudiziario di Barcellona,”
L’Agitazione (Ancona) 1, no. 4 (April 4, 1897).
A telegram from Barcelona reports that the “Superior Court Martial has requested the death penalty for nine perpetrators of a dynamite outrage, lower sentences for others, and the acquittal of thirty accused.”
This is the penultimate act of a ghastly tragedy, of one of the most horrific crimes that a so-called civilized government has ever committed.
Here are the facts.
In the Calle Cambios Nuevos in Barcelona, on June 7 last year, a bomb was thrown into the middle of the Corpus Domini procession and exploded, claiming many victims.
Was it the work of a madman? Or was it the work of thugs hired to give the reaction a pretext for snuffing out the last remnant of freedom in much-feared Catalonia and for exterminating the known enemies of the priests and the monarchy by the garrotte and the firing squad, or by the slower but almost equally sure penalty of deportation to Fernando Po? Or was it one of those ineffectual and ill-targeted acts of vengeance, like in Barcelona or elsewhere in the past, when anarchists, irked and driven almost mad by persecution, thought to stand up for justice and mount propaganda?
One has no way of knowing. Some crackpots, attempting to plead the case for that act, said and put in print that the bomb was aimed at the believers following the procession. But the most likely thing, assuming that the thrower had some revolutionary purpose in mind, no matter how well or poorly grasped, is that the bomb was aimed at General Despujol who was at the head of the procession, surrounded by his general staff, and that it was only by misadventure that it exploded in the midst of the crowd.
Be that as it may, it is known that deeds of this sort are always the handiwork of isolated individuals and nothing came to light that might have led to the perpetrator.
Though quick to throw people in prison, even the police were
