Anarchist Beginnings

Anarchist Beginnings

Mikhail Bakunin, “I believe neither in constitutions, nor in laws” (1848)

September 4, 2016 Shawn P. Wilbur
[Max Nettlau has pointed to this letter as the first evidence of anarchist leanings in Bakunin’s writings.] [Early August, 1848] To Citizen George Herwegh. Paris. [Rue St. Augustins] 40 9 [r. sur Cirque] To George My dear friend, since the letter that I have written from Cologne, which I do not know if you have received, I have no longer written a single word. Many things have changed since then, but not our friendship, not the confidence that we have in one another. The thoughts that are essential to us, the aspirations that are essential to us non plus. I […]
Anarchist Beginnings

Ernest Coeurderoy, “Demolish Authority!” (1850)

September 4, 2016 Shawn P. Wilbur
[From Days of Exile, Vol. 1] To make the Revolution pass, like a red-hot iron, across this century, one thing alone must be done: Demolish authority. This proposition has no need of demonstration. Let each inquire within and let them say whether it is willingly or by force that they accept the fact that another proclaims themselves their master and acts as such. Let them say if they do not believe that they are worth as much as any other. Let them say if they are in the mood to maintain popes, emperors, kings, representatives, monopolists, doctors, teachers, judges, journalists, […]
Anarchist Beginnings

Josiah Warren, “Manifesto” (1841)

September 2, 2016 Shawn P. Wilbur
An impression has gone abroad that I am engaged in forming societies. This is a very great mistake, which I feel bound to correct. Those who have heard or read anything from me on the subject, know that one of the principal points insisted on is, the forming of societies or any other artificial combinations IS the first, greatest, and most fatal mistake ever committed by legislators and by reformers. That all these combinations require the surrender of the natural sovereignty of the INDIVIDUAL over her or his person, time, property and responsibilities, to the government of the combination. That […]
Anarchist Beginnings

P.-J. Proudhon, “The Third Form of Society” (1840)

September 2, 2016 Shawn P. Wilbur
[From Pierre-Joseph Proudhon, What is Property?] 3. Determination of the third social form. Conclusion Therefore, no government, no public economy, no administration is possible with property for a basis. Community seeks equality and law. Property, born of the autonomy of reason and the feeling of individual worth, wants, above all things, independence and proportionality. But community, taking uniformity for law, and leveling for equality, becomes tyrannical and unjust. Property, through its despotism and its invasions, soon shows itself oppressive and unsociable. What property and community seek is good; what both produce is bad. And why? Because both are exclusive, and […]
Anarchist Beginnings

Elisée Reclus, “The Development of Liberty in the World” (c. 1850)

September 2, 2016 Shawn P. Wilbur
The Development of Liberty in the World An Unpublished Study Elisée Reclus I. In past centuries, peoples only fought for their passions or their immediate interests; it was without remorse, it was even with gladness that, in order to satisfy their ambition or greed, they exterminated entire nations and dragged behind them multitudes of slaves. Without any link of solidarity between them, men stole their selfish well-being from the well-being of their neighbors, and the world, given over to chance, was sometimes the prey of the stronger, sometimes that of the most skillful. However, from the beginnings of humanity, some […]
Anarchist Beginnings

Elisée Reclus in the Era of Anarchy

September 1, 2016 Shawn P. Wilbur
I’ve been splitting the formative period of the anarchist tradition into two eras: an Era of Anarchy, running roughly from 1840 to 1880, and then an Era of Anarchism, running on to around 1920, with the emergence of anarchism as a common keyword marking the division between them. The scheme is not without its weaknesses, but one of the striking facts in support of it is the very limited number of figures who identified as anarchists in both periods. There is almost no one who called for anarchy before Proudhon’s death in 1865 who was both alive and still in […]
Anarchist Beginnings

Adin Ballou, “Non-Resistance in Relation to Human Governments” (1839)

August 30, 2016 Shawn P. Wilbur
Friend President—‘Where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty.’ I feel that the Spirit of the Lord is in this meeting, and that all who participate in its discussions are at liberty to express their convictions and peculiar views in their own way, without fear of offending each other. We are of various religious connexions, and have not only different opinions on many points, but different modes of thought and expression. Be it so; since we come together in love, for the consideration and promotion of that grand virtue of Christianity without which all others become practically unfruitful. […]
Anarchist Beginnings

Lucy Parsons, “I Am an Anarchist” (1913)

August 30, 2016 Shawn P. Wilbur
I am an anarchist. I suppose you came here, the most of you, to see what a real, live anarchist looked like. I suppose some of you expected to see me with a bomb in one hand and a flaming torch in the other, but are disappointed in seeing neither. If such has been your ideas regarding an anarchist, you deserved to be disappointed. Anarchists are peaceable, law abiding people. What do anarchists mean when they speak of anarchy? Webster gives the term two definitions chaos and the state of being without political rule. We cling to the latter definition. […]
Anarchist Beginnings

Victor Yarros, “Anarchism: What it Is and What it Is Not” (1893)

August 30, 2016 Shawn P. Wilbur
IT was an observation of John Stuart Mill’s that to know a thing it is necessary to realize, not only what it is, but also what it is not. Applying this definition or test to that passage of Mr. Thomas B. Preston’s paper on “Are We Socialists?” (ARENA, December) in which he states and criticises the principles of anarchism, we find ourselves entitled to affirm that Mr. Preston scarcely possesses such familiarity with, and comprehension of, the essential doctrines of anarchism as would justify confident criticism of that school. What is anarchism, and who are the anarchists? Loosely speaking, there […]