Manifesto of Union of Women for the Defense of Paris and Care of the wounded

Below is a Commune manfesto included in the record of the trial of Louse Michel, one of the leaders of the Paris Commune.

From Louise Michels, My Trials (http://communeeditions.com/2013/10/08/my-trials-by-louise-michel/)

A copy of the manifesto found at the town hall of the 10th arrondissement reveals the role played by her in the aforementioned committees during the final days of the conflict. We reproduce verbatim this written work:

“In the name of the social revolution that we hail, in the name of the demand of the rights of work, equality, and justice, the Union of Women for the Defense of Paris and Care of the Wounded opposes with all its might the outrageous proclamation to the citizens, made public the day before yesterday by a group of reactionaries.

“Said proclamation holds that the women of Paris call on the generosity of Versailles and demand peace at all costs.

“No, it is not peace, but war to the death that the working women of Paris demand.

“Today conciliation would be treason. It would be to renounce all the working women’s aspirations demanding absolute social renewal, the annihilation of all currently existing legal and social relations, the abolition of all privilege, every exploitation, the substitution of the reign of work for that of capital, in a word, the emancipation of the worker by the worker!

“Six months of suffering and betrayal during the siege, six weeks of immense struggles against the allied exploiters, the waves of blood poured out for the cause of liberty, these are our titles of glory and vengeance!

“The current struggle can only have as its outcome the triumph of the people’s cause ... Paris will not shrink back, for it carries the flag of the future. The final hour has come! Make way for the workers! To the back with their torturers! Action! Energy!

“The tree of liberty grows, watered with the blood of its enemies!

“All united and unwavering, raised and enlightened by the suffering that the social crises carried in their wake, deeply convinced that the Commune, representing the international and revolutionary principles of the people, carries within it the seeds of social revolution, the women of Paris will prove to France and to the world that they too will know, at the moment of utmost danger, at the barricades, on the ramparts of Paris, if the reaction would force the gates, how to give, like their brothers, their blood and their life for the defense and the triumph of the Commune, that is to say of the people! Thus victorious, even unto uniting themselves and understanding each other’s common interests, working men and working women, all in solidarity by a last effort...” (This final sentence remained incomplete).

“Long live the universal Republic! Long live the Commune!