In less than one month’s time we shake hands with the Year 2008. This shall be the 160th anniversary of successful revolutions. Brazil, France, the German States, Greater Poland, Wallachia, Habsburg Empire & Hungary, the Italian States and Sicily to name just a few.
As if that were enough, let us run through the brief chronology of major events for 1848, they include the California Gold Rush, the end of the Mexican-American War, the Irish Potato Famine, a new Napoleon and a Presidential Election in America among others:
* January 3 - Joseph Jenkins Roberts is sworn in as the first president of the independent African Republic of Liberia.
* January 12 - The Palermo rising in Sicily, against the Bourbon kingdom of the Two Sicilies.
* January 24 - California Gold Rush: James W. Marshall finds gold at Sutter’s Mill, in Coloma, California.
* January 31 - The Washington Monument is established.
* February 2 - Mexican–American War: The Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo is signed, ending the war and ceding to the United States virtually all of what is today the southwest of that country.
* February 8 - Revolution in Rome leads to the foundation of the second Roman Republic, soon to be led by Giuseppe Mazzini, though it would last only four months.
* February 21 - Karl Marx publishes The Communist Manifesto.
* February 22 - In Paris, revolt erupts against the king Louis Philippe. Two days later he abdicates, leading to the Second Republic.
* March 4 - Carlo Alberto di Savoia signs the Statuto Albertino that will represent the first constitution of the Kingdom of Sardinia and later of unified Italy.
* March 7 - The Great Mahele (land division) is signed in Hawaii.
* March 10 - The Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, ending the Mexican-American War, is ratified by the United States Senate. (cf. February 2, above.)
* March 11 - Louis-Hippolyte Lafontaine and Robert Baldwin become the first Prime Ministers of the Province of Canada to be democratically elected under a system of responsible government.
* March 15 - Revolution breaks out in Hungary. The Habsburg rulers are compelled to meet the demands of the Reform Party.
* March 18-19, Marsoroligheterna, in Stockholm, Sweden. Demonstrations outside the Royal Castle, where revolutionaries demands reforms, among them that Sweden becomes a republic. The Swedish king, Oscar I gives the guards order to shoot at the demonstrators.
* March 20 - King Ludwig I of Bavaria abdicates.
* March 23 - Province of Otago in New Zealand is founded.
* May 15 - Radicals invade the French Chamber of deputies.
* May 18 - Opening of the first German National Assembly (Nationalversammlung) in Frankfurt, Germany.
* May 19 - The Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, ending the Mexican-American War, is ratified by the Mexican government. (cf. February 2, above.)
* May 29 - Wisconsin is admitted as the 30th U.S. state.
* July 19 - Women’s rights: Seneca Falls Convention - The two day Women’s Rights Convention opens in Seneca Falls, New York and the “Bloomers” are introduced at the feminist convention.
* July 26 - Matale Rebellion against British rule in Sri Lanka.
* July 29 - Irish Potato Famine: Tipperary Revolt - In Tipperary, an unsuccessful nationalist revolt against British rule is put-down by a government police force.
* August 17 - Yucatán officially united with Mexico.
* August 19 - California Gold Rush: The New York Herald breaks the news to the East Coast of the United States that there is a gold rush in California (although the rush started in January).
* August 28 - Mathieu Luis becomes the first black member to join the French parliament as a representative of Guadeloupe.
* September 12 - One of the successes of the Revolutions of 1848, the Swiss Federal Constitution, patterned on the US Constitution, enters into force, creating a federal republic and one of the first modern democratic states in Europe.
* November 3 - Greatly revised Dutch constitution proclaimed.
* November 7 - U.S. presidential election, 1848: Whig Zachary Taylor of Louisiana defeats Democrat Lewis Cass of Michigan in the first US presidential election held in every state on the same day.
* December 10 - Prince Louis-Napoleon Bonaparte elected first president of the French Second Republic.
* December 20 - President Bonaparte takes his Oath of Office in front of the French National Assembly.
The World changed considerably that Year in 1848. Karl Marx’s Communist Manifesto, another product of from that Year, according to many permeates to this very day. A popular and prevailing theory within the underbelly of the patriot movement is the belief that the Soviet Union in fact won the Cold War. Although, the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics never achieved pure Communism as defined by Karl Marx. Many of the planks in the Marxist Communist Manifesto were implemented. Unfortunately, the introduction of such policies was not limited to the confines of the Kremlin but its tentacles are found in the modern United States of America.
First, let us examine the actual text of Karl Marx:
1. Abolition of property in land and application of all rents of land to public purposes.
2. A heavy progressive or graduated income tax.
3. Abolition of all rights of inheritance.
4. Confiscation of the property of all emigrants and rebels.
5. Centralisation of credit in the banks of the state, by means of a national bank with State capital and an exclusive monopoly.
6. Centralisation of the means of communication and transport in the hands of the State.
7. Extension of factories and instruments of production owned by the State; the bringing into cultivation of waste-lands, and the improvement of the soil generally in accordance with a common plan.
8. Equal liability of all to work. Establishment of industrial armies, especially for agriculture.
9. Combination of agriculture with manufacturing industries; gradual abolition of all the distinction between town and country by a more equable distribution of the populace over the country.
10. Free education for all children in public schools. Abolition of children’s factory labour in its present form. Combination of education with industrial production, &c, &c.
It is unreasonable to surmise that Karl Marx himself created the Internal Revenue Service or the Federal Reserve. We do not know if he would have supported the way in which such entities were constructed. But we can infer agencies such as the IRS and the Fed appear to be right out of the Manifesto’s pages. However, these are sadly not the only “coincidences” or “parallels” or outright injection of Communism in America Today. See the following to very biased websites http://www.garymcleod.org/communis.htm and http://www.geocities.com/Heartland/7006/com-man.html.
Even as biased as the above websites may be, it is difficult to dispel the Marxist nature of many so called “institutions” that exist in the United States or elsewhere. A few points to ponder:
Could it be some grandiose conspiracy?
Did Communism actually win?
Were some of the “good ideas” of Communism simply adopted and melted into the general fabric of civilization?
Is any of this analogous?
Does any of this matter at all?
My personal hunch is a little of each flavor. While I personally dispute the merits of the Marxist Manifesto and it’s planks. Obviously, many disagree and not all are truly foaming at the mouth, Molotov cocktail throwing Marxist thugs. Just because one is okay with the Federal Reserve doesn’t automatically make one a Communist. Or does it? But as a Police Helicopter circles my neighborhood at nearly 2:15AM, with thoughts of Big Brother dancing in my head, one wants to desperately believe in organized efforts. The unexplained thus has an explanation. Your neighbor, your uncle, the union boss, your friend’s boss, the cat, the dog, or the man sitting on a bench. All of which take away from the debate of ideas. Will 2008 be like 1848, or will it be more talk and more distraction?
Hungry for more?
