The immediate aim of the Communist is the same as that of all
the other proletarian parties: formation of the proletariat into
a class, overthrow of the bourgeois supremacy, conquest of
political power by the proletariat.
The theoretical conclusions of the Communists are in no way
based on ideas or principles that have been invented, or
discovered, by this or that would-be universal reformer. They
merely express, in general terms, actual relations springing from
an existing class struggle, from a historical movement going on
under our very eyes. The abolition of existing property
relations is not at all a distinctive feature of Communism.
All property relations in the past have continually been subject
to
historical change consequent upon the change in historical
conditions.
The French Revolution, for example, abolished feudal property in
favour of bourgeois property.
The distinguishing feature of Communism is not the abolition of
property generally, but the abolition of bourgeois property. But
modern bourgeois private property is the final and most complete
expression of the system of producing and appropriating products,
that is based on class antagonisms, on the exploitation of the
many by the few.
In this sense, the theory of the Communists may be summed up in
the single sentence: Abolition of private property.
We Communists have been reproached with the desire of abolishing
the right of personally acquiring property as the fruit of a
man's own labour, which property is alleged to be the groundwork
of all personal freedom, activity and independence.
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