Part 2 / Book 2 — CHAPTER V.

POLITICAL CRIMES.

The origin of the state, and the possibility of political crimes, are bound up with a certain phase of the development of the economic life, that is to say with the origin of marked contrasts of fortune. Those who had monopolized the power in the state defended their position by laws whose infraction was threatened with severe penalties. Economic conditions, however, undergo considerable changes, and when these have reached a certain degree, the oppressed class, having become the more powerful, breaks the political power of the ruling class and seizes it for itself. If the dominant class does all that it can to maintain its position unimpaired to the last moment, it will necessarily happen that this development will lead to political crimes. This kind of political crime may be called great political criminality. In western Europe the last great struggle of this nature was that of the feudal classes and the bourgeoisie. The former, once necessary, had become superfluous and harmful; the bourgeoisie on the other hand, from an insignificant class had become the most important. It overturned the whole political system which embarrassed it, seized the power, and transformed the state according to the exigencies of the economic system. A repetition of the same process in eastern Europe we are now witnessing in the changes going on in Russia. The economic development no longer corresponds to the political system, which sooner or later will inevitably be replaced by the modern system.

We must put in the same class the political criminals who aim to deliver a subjugated people from their oppressors. The authors of these crimes also have nothing in common with ordinary criminals.

Besides these two kinds of political crimes, which are plainly collective in their nature, there are cases of crimes committed by individuals which for the most part are attempts upon the life of the monarch or of one of his representatives. The more absolute a government, the more liberty is restricted, and the less chance there is, consequently, of seeing the situation changed by legal means, the greater will become the danger that one of those oppressed will kill the autocrat, either to better the situation or to take revenge for what he and his have suffered. Anyone who wants to follow the genesis of this kind of crime has only to turn to Russia. There all the factors meet which lead to political homicide; the repression of all freedom, a corrupt bureaucracy, and the impossibility of obtaining the least change by legal means.

Finally there remains a third kind of political crimes, analogous to ordinary crime, the assassination of the monarch by individuals who thus attempt to place themselves in power. These are actuated by the same vile motives that inspire the robber-murderer—cupidity, desire to dominate, etc.

Now what are the political crimes committed in our days? Leaving aside the case of Russia, which is still living in an epoch that western Europe has left behind, there are only the political crimes of socialists and anarchists. There is little to be said about those committed by socialists. The international social democracy attempts to reach its end by legal means. Since the fall of absolutism it has been possible to exercise an influence on the state in this way, an influence which varies with the country. It is this possibility that the social democracy makes use of. In conformity with its fundamental principles it rejects all violence against the head of the state. Accordingly its partisans have never committed such acts. The more democratic the constitution of a country, the less justification the social democracy will have for political crimes, as in Switzerland, for example, a country where the penal code, moreover, mentions but few political crimes. In other countries, where the democratic institutions are weak, where the constitutional monarchy has still an absolutist character, and where social democracy has become powerful, as in Germany, political crimes are inevitable. Their number, however, is insignificant in comparison with ordinary crimes. From a criminological point of view they have little importance, though often punished severely, and they are generally limited to the crime of leze majesty. Social democrats are, then, sometimes guilty of minor political offenses, and in some countries only. Whether this party will not in the future be guilty of crime of the great political type, or, in other words, whether it will not come to political revolution, is another question and one that no one can answer with certainty. Like all the bourgeoisie when the contest with the feudal classes was still going on, the social democrats are a revolutionary class; they wish to place society upon a basis different from the present one. It is possible that in democratic countries they will attain this by legal means, and consequently without there being any reason for political crime. However, it may also happen that at a given moment when the proletariat forms the majority of the legislative body, the ruling class may have recourse to a “coup d’état”, to a political crime, in order to prevent the proletariat from governing. This possibility is even a probability in some countries, where the opposition of classes is very marked. In Germany, for example, where the social democracy is very powerful, it is very likely that the government will attempt some day to suppress universal suffrage by a “coup d’état.” It is only in such a case that the social democracy will in its turn abandon the legal way and be forced to have recourse to other methods.

Another characteristic of nearly all active anarchists, and one intimately connected with the preceding, is great vanity. Lucheni, for instance, in speaking of his crime said, “I wanted to kill a person of note, because that would get into print.” Vaillant had himself photographed before making his attack, distributed his portraits right and left, and when arrested asked whether the journals had printed his picture, etc.

There are authors who claim that poverty is not to be considered as one of the principal causes of anarchy, and in support of their assertion cite the case of Henry and some others, who while not living in easy circumstances, yet did not know the blackest poverty. Those who reason thus have a false notion of the motives that impel anarchists. It is not only the poverty that they have themselves experienced that moves them, but also, and chiefly, the poverty of others. Those who remain insensible to the sufferings of their neighbors never become anarchists; for not being able to draw any personal profit from anarchism, they consider it madness. Placed in unfavorable conditions such persons become ordinary criminals, or commit suicide. They never sacrifice themselves for an ideal.

Is it astonishing that such individuals come to attempt homicide? No; to be sure all persons of this kind do not go so far; for that it would be necessary that other conditions should be complied with. It is plain that persons with a great aversion to violence would run little risk of attempting an assassination; with others it is courage that is lacking; others still attach too high a price to life and liberty to be willing to risk them; etc. We must note this last point especially. Generally active anarchists are persons who care nothing for a life in which they have nothing further to lose. Their conduct in court and their indifference in the face of death are proof of this; knowing beforehand that they will almost certainly not go unpunished their act is often an indirect suicide.

As in the case of all other crimes, I find for anarchism only social causes, and in the last analysis, only economic causes. To be sure, the individuals who commit these crimes are already predisposed in that direction, but this is true of other crimes also. Only the predisposition in these latter is simple, while that which leads to anarchistic crimes is much more complex. However, this predisposition alone explains nothing. I would ask those who think that only individual factors play any part, whether fanatical persons with all the characteristics of the anarchists of our time have not been found in all ages and countries. Everyone, I think, will answer in the affirmative. Well then, anarchistic crimes have occurred only during a certain period and in certain countries. No one can deny that there are as many persons predisposed to anarchistic crimes in a country like Germany, as there are in Italy, for example. Yet anarchistic crimes do not occur in Germany, for the good reason that the material conditions of the proletariat there are so much better than in Italy, and the degree of intellectual development in the working people is so much higher; the German working-man derides the “naïveté” of the anarchists, and detests their futile crimes. It is in the environment alone then that we find the causes of active anarchism, the poverty and ignorance in which the lower classes live.