KARL MARX

185 KARL MARX: A BIOGRAPHY
most dangerous enemy who, as the backbone of the Holy Alliance, would
eventually crush any revolutionary movement unless crushed by it. Such a
war would also achieve the otherwise impossible task of uniting Germany's
democratic forces. A secondary consequence of a war against Russia would
be the liberation of Poland which was at that time partitioned between
Prussia, Russia and Austria. On the occasion of a debate in the Frankfurt
Assembly on the situation in Poland, Engels published the longest series
of articles ever to appear in the paper. Their message was: 'The division
that the three powers have effected in Poland is the band that holds them
together; their common plunder has created their common solidarity. ..
the creation of a democratic Poland is the first condition for the creation
of a democratic Germany.' 37
The remaining important issue of Prussian foreign policy was the
notoriously complicated question of Schleswig-Holstein, two duchies
whose loyalties were divided between Prussia and Denmark. The Danish
King, largely supported by the bourgeoisie of Schleswig-Holstein, was
making strenuous efforts to imbue them with a Scandinavian spirit, while
the nobles felt more sympathetic to Germany. The Prussian military
forces were, of course, vastly superior, but Denmark was supported diplomatically
by Britain and Russia, and Prussia was forced to sign the armistice
of Malmo at the end of August. The Neue Rheinische Zeitung, through
the pen of Engels, was quite clear about the issue. Scandinavianism was
merely 'enthusiasm for a brutal, dirty, piratical Old-Nordic nationality
which is incapable of expressing its profound thoughts and feelings in
words, but certainly can in deeds, namely, in brutality towards women,
perpetual drunkenness and alternate tear-sodden sentimentality and berserk
fury'. 38
In addition to editing the newspaper, Marx also found time to be active
in local politics. In mid-June a large congress with delegates from almost
a hundred democratic organisations met in Frankfurt; it urged a national
organisation of democratic unions and created a central committee in
Berlin, of which Kriege, Ruge and Weitling were members. The national
organisation never got off the ground, but the congress bore fruit in the
Rhineland where the three main Cologne organisations - the Workers'
Association, the Democratic Society and the Union of Employees and
F.mployers - decided to co-operate. The delegate of the Workers' Association
at the Frankfurt Congress had been Gottschalk who had created
the impression of a man 'made to be dictator, with an energy of iron and
an intelligence as sharp as any guillotine: a living portrait of Robespierre'.
39 Gottschalk wanted a fusion of the three bodies which would
have made his Workers' Association dominant; the Democratic Society
suggested a steering committee. But before anything was decided the