2. F. Engels. Resolution of the General Council Expelling Gustave Durand from the International Working Men's Association
2. F. Engels. Resolution of the General Council Expelling Gustave Durand from the International Working Men's Association[7]
The General Council having received full evidence that Gustave Durand, working jeweller of Paris, ex-delegate of the jewellers to the Federal Chamber of Paris Working Men,[8] ex-chief of Battalion of the National Guards, ex-chief cashier at the Delegation of Finance under the Commune, passing as a refugee in London, has served, and is now serving, as a spy for the French police upon the Communal refugees and especially upon the General Council of the International Working Men's Association, and has already received 725 francs for his services.
The said Gustave Durand is therefore branded as infamous[3]
and expelled from the International Association.
This resolution to be published in all the organs of the International.
Adopted by the General Council on October 7, 1871
Reproduced from the Minute Book of the General Council checked with the newspapers LI PLEBE hill kkllL
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Endnotes
[7] The question of Gustave Durand was considered at a special meeting of the General Council on October 7, 1871, at which Durand's correspondence with the French police officers was produced. Durand was instructed to participate in the London Conference of the International with espionage as an ulterior motive and also to become a member of the General Council. The resolution on Durand's expulsion was drawn up and submitted to the meeting by Engels. He also translated it into French and Italian.
[8] The Federal Chamber of Working Men's Societies—an association of trade unions and other workers' societies in Paris — was formed on the International's initiative in 1869. The Chamber organised aid for workers on strike and maintained close ties with the International.
[3] Jules Gottraux, a Swiss-born subject of Great Britain and a member of the International, was detained by the French police on the French-Swiss frontier on September 30, 1866, when he was returning to London from Switzerland. The police confiscated letters, printed matter, and other material entrusted to him by the International's leaders in Geneva for delivery to the General Council. The seized documents included the preliminary report on the work of the Geneva Congress which had been drawn up by Council member Joseph Card and published in French in Geneva as a pamphlet. (Later, this gave rise to rumours that the French authorities had confiscated the Congress minutes, which in fact had bv that time been brought to London by Hermann Jung.) The General Council decided to lodge a complaint about this wanton act and to use the fact publicly to expose the regime of the Second Empire. At the beginning of December, the Council addressed the British Foreign Secretary, requesting him to make a corresponding démarche to the French government, which forced the French authorities to return, on December 21, the materials taken from Gottraux.