138 
THE SOCIALISM OF TO-DAY. 
rights of the country folk and to obtain a reduction of military 
service and of the taxes that burdened the land. Among the 
resolutions passed at the general assembly of the peasant 
clubs of Bavaria, held at Deggendorf, in October, 1871, may 
be found the following passage : “ We detest with all our soul 
the military system which is looked upon as the principal thing 
for which all else should be sacrificed. It absorbs the living 
forces of labour, even when they are most indispensable for 
production, as at harvest-time. Yet the army exists for the 
nation, and not the nation for the army, just in the same way 
as the government for the people, and not the people for the 
government." 
In the general assembly of Christian Social Associations, 
held at Essen, on the 29th June, 1870, Herr Witte, one of the 
delegates, thus enumerates the forces at their disposal : “ Fif 
teen thousand Catholic peasants are already federated in 
Bavaria. Fifteen thousand farms form a solid basis of opera 
tions from which to obtain possession of the country districts. 
We shall soon have as many, or even more, in Westphalia and 
in the Rhine country. A hundred thousand master-workmen 
range themselves under our flag, and eighty thousand gallant 
journeymen of the Kolpings-Vereine offer us their services. 
Our societies will soon count their members by hundreds of 
thousands. We have already a goodly army, and it is only the 
commencement. Thirty thousand German priests have just 
put their hands to the work. I foresee a brilliant future.” 
All this army, of w^hich the orator spoke, was sent forth to 
the ballot by the clergy, and at the elections by universal 
suffrage for the Imperial Parliament, in 1870, it gained more 
than one victory. Thus, at Elberfeld, it beat the Social 
Democrats, although the latter were on their own ground. In 
1871 a ministerial rescript pronounced the dissolution of the 
peasant clubs of Westphalia, as constituting illegal political 
associations. They were, however, immediately reconstituted 
under the name of “ Union of Westphalian Peasants " ( West 
falische Bauernverein), and, under the presidency of that mem 
ber of the Ultramontane Centre whom we have already men 
tioned, Baron von Schorlemer-Alst, the number of members