Text of a short, powerful speech by Liebknecht given to the Prussian Diet, March 2, 1915.

‘The Class Struggle’ (1915) by Karl Liebknecht from Voices of Revolt No. 4. International Publishers, New York. 1927.

ONE of the most important direct causes of the outbreak of the war–whose fundamental causes are, of course, based on the conditions of international capital–is to be found in our conditions of semi-absolutism, of secret diplomacy, and of personal rule.

Gentlemen, if the imperialistic aspirations of big capitalism conjure up immense dangers to peace, it is the more necessary for the great masses of the people to control the foreign policy. Such a control is precluded by the present-day constitution and administration of Prussia and Germany. I know that the democratization of the internal policy leaves much to be desired even in other nations, where the democratization of this policy is comparatively advanced; and our friends in England, our friends in France, who are as much our friends to-day as ever, insofar as they are carrying on a Socialist policy, have voiced, and are still voicing, the demand for a consistent democratization of the foreign policy.

Gentlemen, the sacrifices of millions who are being slaughtered in this war are due at bottom to the disfranchisement of the masses of the population in the nations who are participating.

All of us–however great may be the differences of opinion in our inner circles today–are in agreement to the effect that the masses of the people did not desire the war in any of the participating nations.

Gentlemen, I welcome the destruction of the illusion that has existed in large sections of the population concerning the readiness of the ruling classes and the Government to grant a suffrage reform. Clarity, a clear view, is necessary above all things; the vapor is now dispelled. And this clarity should be preached not only to them–a task not to be neglected–who protect and support the “Fatherland” in their civilian clothes and feel the distress of these days, but also them who stand in the trenches and who hope to read other things in the newspapers they receive from home than news items concerning the transactions of the Budget Commission last Saturday and to-day, transactions which, I am firmly convinced, will make them clench their fists in their pockets and curse them who aroused hopes and illusions within them, deceiving them as to the truth, however, as to the fact that this war is being waged, not for the interests of the great masses of the German people, as to the truth that the masses of the people will remain as disfranchised after the war as they were before the war, unless they seize their rights with their own hands. Gentlemen, the sole salvation of the masses of the people is struggle; this condition has not changed. Not by yielding, not by adaptability, not by flexible concessions, but by struggle, will the people attain its rights. The class struggle alone is the salvation of the proletariat, and we hope that we shall soon once more be waging this class struggle in common and publicly, internationally, together with the proletarians of all other countries, including those now at war with us. In this international class struggle, not only is our sole hope the democratization, the political and economic liberation of the working class, but it is even the sole hope of the masses of the belligerent nations while the war is still in progress, their sole prospect and resource in the struggle for the termination of the awful slaughter of nations, in the struggle for peace in the Socialist sense. Away with the hypocrisy of domestic peace! On to the class struggle! On to the international class struggle for the liberation of the working class, and against war!

The fourth in the Voices of Revolt series begun by the Communist Party’s International Publishers under the direction of Alexander Trachtenberg in 1927.

PDF of original book: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/parties/cpusa/voices-of-revolt/04-Karl-Liebknecht-VOR-ocr.pdf