Untitled

THE FIGHT FOR EXISTENCE 225
made upon them seemed to increase their power, while
even the great reforms he was instituting seemed somehow
to be credited to the agitation of the socialists. Instead
of proving the good will of the ruling class, these
reforms seemed only to prove its weakness; and they
were looked upon generally as belated efforts to remedy
old and grievous wrongs which, in fact, made necessary
the protests of the socialists. The result was that tens
of thousands of workingmen were flocking each year into
the camp of the socialists, and at each election the socialist
votes increased in a most dreadful and menacing man-
When the anti-socialist law was put into effect, the
ner.
party polled under 450,000 votes. After twelve years of
underground work as outlaws, the party polled 1,427,000
votes Despite
all the efforts of Bismarck and all the immense
power of the Government, socialism, instead of being
crushed, was 1,000,000 souls stronger after twelve
years of suffering under tyranny than it was in the beginning.
This of course would not do at all, and everyone
saw it
clearly enough except the Iron Chancellor. Infuriated
by his own failure and unwilling to confess defeat,
he pleaded once more, in 1890, for the reenactment
of the anti-socialist law and, indeed, that it should be
made a permanent part of the penal code of the Empire.
He even sought further powers and asked the Reichstag
to give him a law that would enable him to expel not only
from districts proclaimed to be in a state of siege, but
from Germany altogether, those who were known to
hold socialist views. The Reichstag, however, refused
to grant him either request, and on September 30, 1890,
just twelve years after its birth, the anti-socialist law
was repealed.
That night was a glorious one for the socialists, as
w T ell as a very dreadful one for Bismarck and those