mmunists 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 favor
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
labor, which property is alleged to be the ground work of all personal
freedom, activity and independence.

Hard-won, self-acquired, self-earned property! Do you mean the
property of the petty artisan and of the small peasant, a form of
property that preceded the bourgeois form? There is no need to abolish
that; the development of industry has to a great extent already
destroyed it, and is still destroying it daily.

Or do you mean modern bourgeois private property?

But does wage labor create any property for the laborer? Not a bit.
It creates capital, _i.e._, that kind of property which exploits
wage-labor, and which cannot increase except upon condition of
begetting a new supply of wage-labor for fresh exploitation. Property,
in its present form, is based on the antagonism of capital and wage
labor. Let us examine both sides of this antagonism.

To be a capitalist, is to have not only a purely personal, but a social
status in production. Capital is a collective product,