But, even assuming that it would be possible to smuggle in some great truth into the “Reichstag” which could not be spoken anywhere else – what would be the good of this accomplishment? The law, to be sure, does permit an unhindered printing of the speech in question, but the law makes the press responsible for every word of any speech printed by any newspaper either in full or in part, or if the newspaper print only one speech instead of the entire debate, or only a section of a single speech. And even the largest newspapers could not afford to print the entire debate – which they are allowed to print only from the officially approved stenographic report, because they have not space enough, which is a condition far more unfavorable from this point of view to the small Social-Democratic sheets.
Accordingly, even if we had so cleverly smuggled important truths into the “Reichstag”, we should still be left with no other means for smuggling them out of the “Reichstag” among the people again, except the official stenographic report, which is entirely inaccessible to the masses, however, because of its volume and its price.
All that the workers learn of the debates concerning the social question is given them through the labor papers, and all that these papers print in the form of parliamentary reports could be far better published – and in much more careful elaboration – in the form of independent articles and essays.
[ . . . ]
I do not mean to say in this statement that the parliamentary struggle must always and under all circumstances be rejected. In periods of chronic enervation, in which the blood flows sluggishly through the channels of the body politic, in which the downcast spirit of the nation can perceive no salvation ahead for decades to come, in such periods it may be of value to keep alive a little lamp of liberty in some parliament or other, which may shed its bright little light in the midst of the surrounding darkness.
And when the people, when the “battalions of workers” stand armed and accoutred at the gates of parliament, perhaps on such occasions a word flung from the speaker’s platform may have a kindling effect, may give the signal for the liberating deed like an electric spark.
But – thank God! – we are now no longer in a period of chronic passivity and, I regret to say, we are not yet at the eve of a revolutionary act about to issue forth from the inmost heart of the people.
I do not underestimate the value of the spoken word. But at moments of crisis, at moments when one world is in the moribund state and another about to be born, the representatives of the people must go among the people. For my part, I consider it not only more honorable but even more profitable to address a meeting of honest workers, than to speak in that motley company, assembled at the beck and call of a statesman who despises justice and despises men, a band of junkers, apostates and nonentities, which is known as the North German Reichstag.
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