Brief analysis of Marx's early important work 'Debate on the Law of Tree Theft'

[烽火Flame]

Recently, in order to once again carefully study the early ideological transformation of Marx and Engels, I read Marx’s early political treatise “Debate on the Forest Theft Law” and checked Marx’s background from the Marx-Engels Collected Works, browsing his university graduation certificate, and his doctoral degree certificate. Afterwards, I investigated the historical background of another political treatise, “Defense of the Moselle Reporter.” I also read Engels’ early political writings, including the “Upe River Valley Letters” I previously discussed with everyone, and then looked through the preface and introduction on the condition of the British working class.
I found that Marx’s class background was actually quite noble; his father, Heinrich Marx, was a legal advisor to the Trier city council. Marx studied law at the University of Bonn in his early years, then transferred to the University of Berlin to study law and philosophy, and later obtained a PhD in philosophy from the University of Jena. On Marx’s graduation certificates from Bonn and Berlin, all the teachers’ comments praised Marx as diligent or extremely diligent. The vice-chancellor of Jena University personally issued Marx his doctoral degree in philosophy, calling Marx a knowledgeable and talented scholar from Trier.
In fact, all of Marx’s achievements at university were gained through his own practice and research, not learned from his university teachers. Marx had already gradually transformed into a materialist during university and mastered dialectics. His first published political article, “Debate on the Forest Theft Law,” was very powerful, logically rigorous, full of dialectical ideas, and initially reflected his class analysis method, boldly criticizing the exploiting classes.
“Debate on the Forest Theft Law” reflects Marx’s process of transforming from a revolutionary democrat to a communist.
In this article, Marx passionately criticizes the forest owners, the landlord class, for twisting the law for their own benefit and imposing severe punishments on poor farmers that do not conform to legal standards. Marx used brilliant dialectical thinking to demonstrate that punishments must correspond to the fault; otherwise, the law itself becomes useless. Marx also explained that for formal equality created by written law, aristocratic customary law is itself illegal. He further pointed out that the social system causes the poor to break the law. From this article, we can see Marx’s image as a revolutionary nationalist approaching the people’s stance and learn dialectics, as well as observe his increasingly clear class analysis method. The greatest practical significance of this article is to clarify how revolutionary democrats transform into Marxists, and what this transformation process looks like. Here, I will publish an excerpt from this article along with my analysis and comments as a new post for everyone to study.

First, quoting annotations from the Marx-Engels Collected Works, to introduce the important early political article “Debate on the Forest Theft Law”:

“The Debate of the Sixth Rhine Province Parliament (Third Paper). On the Forest Theft Law” is the third of several papers Marx wrote in response to the debate of the Sixth Rhine Province Parliament.
In the 1840s in Prussia, small farmers, day laborers, and urban residents, due to poverty and bankruptcy, continually collected and cut down trees, which was traditionally considered their “habitual right.” The Prussian government wanted to formulate new laws and take strict measures to punish what the forest owners regarded as “theft.” The Rhine Province Parliament debated the draft law on forest theft from June 15 to 17, 1841. The representatives from various classes expressed amendments during the debate, tending to increase penalties to benefit the forest owners more. In this paper, Marx conducted an in-depth analysis and study of the legal issues in history and in the Prussian state, as well as the existing semi-feudal legal relations and viewpoints, attacking the feudal hierarchy’s perspectives and publicly siding with the poor masses to defend their material interests for the first time. This paper marked Marx’s initial step into political economy research.
The exact time when this article began writing is uncertain, but it was probably completed around October 24, and it is not ruled out that the later parts were still being written after the article was published.

[typhoon]

@Fenghuo Flame

Marx studied law at the University of Bonn in his early years, then transferred to the University of Berlin to study law and philosophy, and later obtained a Ph.D. in philosophy from the University of Jena. On Marx’s graduation certificates from Bonn University and Berlin University, all the teachers’ comments on all subjects described Marx as diligent or extremely diligent. The vice-president of Jena University also personally wrote the Ph.D. diploma for Marx, calling Marx a scholar with extensive knowledge and a talented thinker from Trier.

Seeing this, I thought of Marx’s doctoral thesis “The Difference Between Democritus’ Natural Philosophy and Epicurus’ Natural Philosophy.” What actually amazes me the most is that most of Epicurus’ works have been lost, leaving only fragments of a few letters, yet Marx relied on these few materials and extensively read many works from history to describe Epicurus’ writings and thoughts (including attacks on Epicurus by reactionary idealist philosophers) and wrote this thesis. The effort involved is simply unimaginable. It is precisely because of this diligent study and rigorous scholarly spirit that Marx was able to possess such profound knowledge and establish Marxist theory. This spirit is indeed worth learning from.

[fxyc]

Marx also explained that, for written laws that establish formal equality, the customary law of the nobility itself is an illegal act.
How should this sentence be understood?

[烽火Flame]

The customary law of the nobility, in terms of its content, is opposed to the formal legality of ordinary laws. They cannot have the form of law because they ignore the form of law. These customary laws, in terms of their content, contradict the form of law, namely universality and necessity, which also proves that they are unlawful customs. Therefore, they should never be recognized as laws, but rather abolished as opposed to laws. In fact, actions based on these customs should even be punished depending on the circumstances. It should be understood that a person’s manner of conduct is not lawful simply because it has become a habit, just as a robber’s theft cannot be forgiven because of his family tradition. If a person deliberately commits a crime, he should be punished for his intentional wrongdoing; if he commits a crime out of habit, he should be punished for that bad habit. When implementing ordinary laws, reasonable customary laws are merely those customs recognized by legislation, because law does not cease to be a habit simply because it has been recognized as law. However, it is no longer just a habit. For a law-abiding person, the law has become his own habit; whereas law-breaking individuals are forced to obey the law, even if it is not their habit. Law no longer depends on contingency, that is, it no longer depends on whether the habit is reasonable; on the contrary, a habit becomes reasonable because the law has become law, and the habit has become the habit of the state.

The customary practices of feudal nobles are essentially the exploitation of the people through extralegal coercion and oppression. These customs reflect the class relations of feudal society. Such extralegal coercion is incompatible with the principle of formal equality in capitalist society. Capitalist society, based on the principle of equivalent exchange demanded by its own value law, aims to maximize the ruling class’s dominance by ensuring that everyone is equal before money. However, feudal nobles use political privileges to oppress others, which violates the principle of equality before the law (in fact, before money). Therefore, “the customary law of the nobility is an unlawful custom.”

[ame]

Combining the original text of Marx below from Fenghuo, the analysis, and our reality, it’s actually easier to understand. Take wage collection as an example. Every time we go to demand wages, the inevitable problem we encounter is that capitalists will not settle the wages immediately. If they don’t call the police and gather the crowd to exert pressure, they won’t agree. Whenever we say “According to the ‘Interim Regulations on Wage Payment,’ wages should be settled immediately on the day of termination of employment,” the capitalists will say “We can’t settle now, the company规定 (regulation) requires wages to be paid on the xth of each month, and there is a process to follow.” We are referring to written law, while the capitalists refer to customary law, the latter being a kind of illegal privilege, and this privilege is actually protected by violent agencies in the Chinese revision. Whenever we encounter such a situation, we then ask, “Is the law greater or the company’s rules?” At this point, the capitalist will either repeat “These are the company’s rules,” or divert the topic, or directly say “You can go to labor arbitration,” using lengthy and complicated administrative procedures to kill the workers’ resolve. This creates a conflict between written law and customary law. The reason such conflicts still exist today is precisely because of the struggles of the working class—killing capitalists, burning factories, strikes, etc.—which force the bourgeoisie to recognize that the customs of the majority of the population, the laboring people, are reasonable customs, and to formally acknowledge them by incorporating them into written law.