Graham R (Ed.) - Anarchism - A Documentary History of Libertarian Ideas Volume One - From Anarchy to Anarchism (300 CE to 1939)

Revolutionary Ideas And Action /51
the revolutionary heads, and the whole political period fo ams with constitutional
fights and constitutional questions, as the social talents too were uncommonly inventive
in societary arrangements (phalansteries, etc.). The insurgent strives to become
constitutionless ...
I am owner of my might, and I am so when I know myself as unique. In the unique
olle the owner himself returns into his creative nothing, of which he is born. Every
higher essence above me, be it God, be it man, weakens the feeling of my uniqueness,
and pales only before the sun of this consciousness. 1ft concern myselffor myself, the
unique one, then my concern rests on its transitory, mortal creator, who consumes
himself, and I may say:
All things are nothing to me.
12. Proudhon: The General Idea of the Revolution (1851)
In February 1848 there was a popular revolution in France, ovettlJrowing the monarchy and i11S1ituting
a republic. Although Proudhon lamented that they had "made a revolution without an
idea." he helped set up street barricades and became the editor of a series of mass-circulation
newspapers through which he did his best to impart some ideas to the revolution. Despite his opposition
to government, and his view of universal suffi'age as counter-revolution, he managed to
get himself elected to the National Assembly as a representative of working class districts in Paris.
He was shouted down in the Assembly as an advocate of class warfare when he proposed a general
"social liquidation, " with or without the help of the bOLIIgeoisie, fo llowing the brutal suppression
of the working class uprising ill june of 1848. Disillusioned by his isolation and powerlessness in
the Assembly, Proudhon advocated a "permanent revolution" by the direct action of the people.
However, he came to the support of the Republican Constitution in the fa ce of Louis Napoleon's
seemingly inexorable rise to power, all to no avail. and was subjected to repeated prosecuti011S
and the suppression of his newspapers. Eventually, he was stripped of his parliamentary immunity
and sentenced to three years in prison, ji"Om where he wrote the following selections taken from
his book, TIle General Idea of the Revolution in the Nineteenth Century (1851; translated by
john Beverley Robinson. Freedom Press, 1923; republished 1989. Pluto Press, with a new introductioll
by Robert Graham).
THE FORM UNDER WHICH MEN first conceived of Order in Society is the patriarchal
or hierarchical; that is to say, in principle, Authority; in action, Government. Justice,
which afterwards was divided into distributive and commutative justice, appeared at
first under the fo rmer heading only: a SUPERIOR granting to INFERIORS what is coming
to each one.