This is what I have seen in the way of concerted, organised agitation on the part of the social democracy of our locality. I do not say and I do not believe that this was the whole of its activity, but I can only describe what actually came under my observation. Its head and front was the not very numerous group of élite social democrats, the fanatical partisans who form the phalanx of the movement everywhere, who are the pole of crystallization for the thousands attracted about them. From this group arise the candidates for social-democratic votes, the subordinate leaders in individual districts, the chiefs of campaign clubs and trade unions, the members of committees appointed for agitation during elections. They were all more or less acquainted with the plans of the general central management, whose executive organs they were, and from which alone they took their instructions. They directed the festivals, led the debates in public assemblies and discussions, acted as travelling orators in the outlying districts, were untiring lecturers in the regular meetings of campaign clubs and trade unions, and even dictated the course of the most influential men in industries where not one of themselves was represented. By the other workmen they were recognized – outwardly at least – as leaders, without opposition, and treated with an extraordinary and interesting mixture of assured good-fellowship and reverential respect, to which, on their side, they responded with a kind of studied bonhomie and conscious reserve. Yet they were not all honoured and respected equally; one was better liked than another, this one more popular than that one, according to tact of manner or address, or the whole disposition of the man. There were the two brothers N., for example, who stood at that time at the head of the agitation in Chemnitz, and who – particularly one of them – were very prominent speakers at the meetings of our club, as well as at the Sunday festivals; now, however, as I hear, one of them has been expelled from the party, and the other has withdrawn from it. These brothers were unpopular on account of their blustering and arrogant manners, while others were commended for their mild, firm, serious bearing. I have often heard this kind of perfectly independent criticism of their leaders from the older workmen in the factory, yet nevertheless the men acknowledged them as the guiding spirits, listened to their words of authority, and accepted the instructions which were resolved upon for furtherance of the agitation, which was exceedingly well planned, and systematically organised and conducted. [ . . . ]
The wage-earners among whom I lived are not, therefore, to be imagined, in regard to their political and social ideals, as a uniform, symmetrical and homogeneous body, but rather – to use a metaphor – as a mighty pyramid, consolidated by the strong cement of social-democratic agitation. Its apes are the “élite” social democrats I have described; from these, the leaders, and the small band of their most trusty followers, the vast structure gradually descends in ever-widening strata, to the chaotic multitude of all those who are social democrats only – nor can they be blamed for this to-day – because they give their votes to “one of their own sort,” a labour candidate and a social democrat.
Source of English translation: Paul Göhre, Three Months in a Workshop. A Practical Study (orig. 1891). New York: Arno Press, 1972, pp. 90-99, 104-06, 143.
Source of original German text: Paul Göhre, Drei Monate Fabrikarbeiter und Handwerksbursche. Eine praktische Studie. Leipzig: Grunow, 1891, pp. 88-97, 102-03, 142.
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