In the capitalist régime, that is, as long as the means of production and of existence are the exclusive property of a few who work less and less, all rights which the constitutions and the codes may grant to others, to those who concentrate within themselves more and more all muscular and cerebral work, will remain always and inevitably a dead letter. In multiplying reforms, one only multiplies shams (_trompe-l'oeil_).[60]
[60] Jules Guesde, _Le Socialisme au jour le jour_ (Paris, 1899), p. 268.
Inability to carry out real reforms was ascribed to both national legislative bodies and to the municipalities. Therefore,
if the party has entered into elections, it is not for the purpose of carving out seats of councillors or deputies, which it leaves to the hemorrhoids of bourgeois of every stamp, but because the electoral period brings under our educational influence that part of the masses which in ordinary times is most indifferent to our meetings.[61]
[61] Jules Guesde and Paul Lafargue, _Le Programme du Parti Ouvrier_, 4th edition (Paris, 1897), p. 32.
The municipalities conquered were to become just so many centres of recruiting and of struggle. The _Parti Ouvrier_ was to be a "kind of recruiting and instructing sergeant preparing the masses for the final assault upon the State which is the citadel of capitalist society."[62] For only a revolution would permit the productive class to seize the political power and to use it for the economic expropriation of capitalistic France and for the nationalization or socialization of the productive forces. Of course no man and no party can call forth a revolution, but when the revolution which the nineteenth century carried within itself arose as a result of national and international complication, the _Parti Ouvrier_ would be the party to assume the rôle of directing it.[63]
[62] _Le Programme du Parti Ouvrier_, p. 52.
[63] _Le Programme du Parti Ouvrier_, p. 30.
The _Parti Ouvrier_ adopted a centralized form of organization. It became in time the strongest and best organized socialist party of France. It was particularly strong in the _Department du Nord_ and among the textile workers. It was also known as the "Guesdist" party, after its leader Guesde.