December 1952 marked the 100th anniversary of the death of Nicolae Balcescu, a progressive thinker of the 19th century, one of the most prominent fighters for national justice, who led the struggle of the Romanian people for freedom and independence in the middle of the last century. Nicolae Balcescu died at the age of 33, leaving a rich legacy of works on history, sociology and philosophy.

Romanian noble-bourgeois historiography in every possible way falsified and distorted the revolutionary statements of Balcescu, gave a false idea of his revolutionary activities. Only today, when the people of Romania, under the leadership of the Romanian Workers ' Party, took power into their own hands and created a people's democratic state, did it become possible to present the real face of this outstanding Romanian revolutionary democrat.

Nicolae Balcescu was born in Bucharest in 1819. At that time, the Romanian people languished under a double yoke - feudal and national: Wallachia (Muntenia) and Moldova were provinces enslaved by the Turkish Empire, separated from each other; Ardal (Transylvania) was under the yoke of the Habsburg Empire; all the land belonged to the boyars-landlords; serfdom prevailed.

It was an era of great revolutionary upheavals, culminating in the revolution of 1848.

Nicolae Balcescu's revolutionary worldview began to take shape in college. Even then, Balcescu's ardent desire to study the history of his homeland, which was tormented by Turkish enslavers, and the history of the Romanian people's struggle for freedom and independence was evident.

Young Balcescu was deeply impressed by the stories about the events of 1821, when the major boyars called up Turkish troops to suppress the popular uprising led by Tudor Vladimirescu.

At the age of 21, Balcescu, along with a group of other young revolutionaries, formed a revolutionary committee whose goal was to fight for the liberation of the peasants from serfdom and the establishment of a democratic government.

EDITOR'S NOTE: This report is based on an article by a member of the Romanian Academy of Sciences, Academician Constantinescu-Yas, and other materials received by the editorial office in connection with the centenary of the death of Nicolae Balcescu.

In 1840, the committee was discovered by the Romanian authorities and its leaders were arrested. Balcescu was imprisoned for three years. In 1843, after his release from prison, he founded the secret revolutionary organization Brotherhood in Wallachia, whose members included leading intellectuals, military personnel, peasants, artisans, and workers. The program of this organization, developed by Balcescu, reflected the interests of the broad masses. It included demands for the elimination of corvee and the omnipotence of large landlords, the allocation of land to peasants, ensuring equality of all citizens before the law, and the creation of a national army to fight against the Turkish yoke.

Balcescu's practical revolutionary activity was closely intertwined with his theoretical activity. In those years, he published such works as" Military power and military art from the foundation of the Principality of Wallachia to the present day"," Preface to sources on the history of Romania"," On the social situation of farmers in the Romanian principalities at various times " and others. Balcescu also wrote such important works as" Economic Issues in the Danubian Principalities"," Past and Present","History of Romania under Mihai the Brave".

In his writings, Balcescu emphasized that the people play the main role in history. The real history, he pointed out, is the history of the people and those of their representatives who have fought and are fighting to defend their rights. Even at school, at St. Sava's College, Balcescu had a firm conviction that his homeland should belong not to the ruling group, but to the whole people. From the proclamation of Tudor Vladimirescu, written during the uprising of 1821, Balcescu deeply learned exactly the part where it was pointed out that the homeland is the people, and not the boyars, who are "a gang of robbers".

Balchescu devoted his entire life as a thinker and politician to the struggle against the oppressive class, the boyars, whom he did not consider representatives of national interests. He exposed all those who tried to assign merits to the boyars in preserving national traditions. "After studying the history of our motherland for so long," N. Balchesku wrote, " we have become more convinced than anyone that the country owes its suffering to the selfishness, treachery, greed and cowardice of the boyars." But the boyars, Balchescu wrote, have no love for the Romanian people, have no homeland: "They only need income that would bring them wealth. The boyar does not love the nation, but he does love the profits made by exploiting the peasantry." The peasants and workers of the city are the main producers of material goods, the creators of the state's material values. However, they did not enjoy these benefits in boyar Romania, and were deprived of all their rights.

In his work" Economic Issues in the Danubian Principalities", Balcescu paints a vivid picture of social inequality: the parasitic life of luxurious feudal lords and the hopeless hard life of working people crushed by poverty and exploitation.

"Whether an artist, a scholar, a poet, or a merchant," writes Balcescu, " who among them, when traveling through the Lower Danube countries, does not admire the rich nature of the Romanian principalities: the rich rivers, the fertile land, the high mountains containing huge treasures, the temperate climate, the blue and clear sky... Seeing such a beautiful sight, the traveler can not help but exclaim: happy country! Happy are the people to whom providence has given this cheerful garden as a gift. But this is only a deceptive appearance, which quickly disappears!.. He learns that the only creator of the country's wealth is the peasant, that palaces are built by those who live in underground caves, that the barefoot, exposed to all the harsh influences of the seasons, produce diamonds and rich clothes that adorn the rich citizens, and pay the cost of carriages in which the rich take their lazy walks. He learns that the one who creates this wealth has no other food than a piece of hominy, a sip of milk, and a spoonful of beans; that the only producer in the country is constantly being robbed, whether in the name of the state or in the name of property; that the one who owns nothing has no rights, no position in society, he doesn't even own his hands..."

Making a merciless accusation of feudal society, angrily attacking the exploitation, looting and violence of the boyars, Balcescu defends with noble passion the demand for the elimination of serfdom and the allocation of land to the peasants, a demand for which he consistently fought in the revolution of 1848.

Firmly believing in the victory of the people, in the triumph of justice, Balcescu appealed to the people to rise up to fight against the oppressors.

In one of his works, Past and Present, there are such remarkable words: "The history of mankind shows us the continuous struggle of law against tyranny, the struggle of the disenfranchised class against its usurpers, an endless struggle that is still taking place today and will continue until there is not even a shadow of tyranny left. as long as the peoples don't get their rights, as long as equality doesn't prevail in the world."

"It is in vain that you will kneel and beg at the gates of the royal palaces and at the doors of their ministers," Balcescu wrote to the peasants in Economic Questions in the Danubian Principalities. "They won't give you anything... So, be ready to take everything yourself, because the emperors, princes and boyars do not give anything except what the people snatch from them by force."

In the fierce struggle of the people against tyranny, Balcescu is at the forefront

fighters for a "democratic and social revolution", which, as Balcescu wrote, will inevitably lead to the "elevation of the people", to a democratic republic, to "equality of the people".

Balcescu was a staunch Republican and internationalist.

As a supporter of fraternity between peoples in the struggle against despotism, Balcescu called for the cooperation of advanced Hungarian and Romanian revolutionaries in the revolution of 1848: "The same despotism suffocates both Romanians and Hungarians... Freedom of nationalities cannot come from the imperial palaces or by the grace of emperors and despots, but only through close unity and joint insurrection, in solidarity with all oppressed peoples." At the same time, Balcescu linked the national question with issues of democracy and State sovereignty. He could not imagine a national liberation struggle without a struggle for social revolution.

Balcescu's progressive position on the issue of national independence and fraternal cooperation of peoples gave great strength to his patriotic ideas. Through his works, Balcescu tried to awaken a sense of fervent patriotism among the people. Pride in the valiant deeds of the Romanians in the past was supposed to help the people in the struggle for their national and social liberation, for the approach of the day when "there will no longer be slaves, there will be no slave nations, there will be no people who are masters over others, there will be no peoples who are masters over other peoples, but justice and brotherhood will".

Balcescu's writings contain elements of a materialistic worldview. Balcescu pointed out that the study of history should begin with an analysis of the economic and social situation. In his works, he was able to show the social differentiation of society; he considered the class struggle to be the source of revolution.

Balcescu's role as an ideologist of the 1848 revolution in Romania is extremely important. He was trying to put the great national movement on the right track. Balcescu first took part in the revolutionary struggle while abroad, in France, where he was forced to leave in 1846 due to government persecution. However, he did not stay long in France and returned to Bucharest, where he formed a new revolutionary committee.

The Committee adopted the program put forward by Balchesk, later known as the "Islam Constitution" (proclamation). One of the most important points of this program was the demand for the emancipation of serfs and allotment of their land by dividing most of the landlords ' and monastic estates. The program also provided for the transfer of monastic lands to State ownership and the establishment of a democratic republic in which all citizens would be equal before the law and have the right to vote. To protect the revolutionary gains, the program required the organization of a national guard of armed citizens.

In drawing up the program, Balcescu faced opposition from the majority of the committee, which consisted of right-wing elements such as Eliade Radulescu, Rosetti, Bratianu and others, who made every effort to remove the article on land allocation from the constitution. Nicolae Balcescu sternly condemned the treacherous policy of the right and tirelessly demanded the immediate release of the peasants and the allocation of land to them. Speaking about the article of the constitution that provided for the emancipation of serfs and allotment of land, Balcescu wrote:: "The entire revolution of 1848 is contained in article 13, which contains the following words:" ... corvee, as well as shameful serfdom, are liquidated, the landless peasant becomes the owner of the land."

However, the demands put forward by Balchesk to protect the interests of the peasants were not implemented in 1848 due to the betrayal of the bourgeoisie, which conspired with the landlords against the revolution. They were implemented only a hundred years later in the People's Democratic Republic of Romania, where a broad, truly democratic agrarian reform was carried out. At present, the Romanian working class, in alliance with the working peasantry, is waging a decisive struggle for the socialist transformation of agriculture for the benefit and happiness of all working people.

Balcescu's revolutionary-democratic ideas could not be realized in 1848, because, as Comrade Gheorghiu-Dej pointed out, during the period of capitalist development in Romania, the bourgeoisie entered into an agreement with the landlords in order to suppress the struggle of the people. As a result, large landlords ' ownership of land remained unshakable, which led to the preservation of significant feudal remnants in the economy and to the economic and social backwardness of the country.

The provisional Government created in 1848 by Bratianu, Radulescu, Rosetti and other bourgeois leaders not only prevented the masses from mobilizing to defend the revolution, but also called in Turkish troops to suppress it.

As a result of the betrayal of the bourgeoisie, the masses found themselves unarmed in the face of the counter-revolutionary intervention of Turkey.

Once again, Balchesk was forced to seek refuge abroad.

In the difficult days of defeat, Balcescu wrote: "The revolution is not over yet... it's just beginning." Balcescu believed that the revolution of 1848 in Romania was defeated, among other things, because the revolutionary battles in Transylvania, Wallachia and Moldova unfolded separately from each other and were not connected with the revolutionary battles of other peoples. In order to defeat the counter-revolution, it was necessary to unite the Romanian principalities into a single independent national state. These ideas were expressed by Balcescu in the " History of Romania at the Time of

Mihai the Brave", which calls for strengthening the struggle of the Romanian people for independence.

With fiery anger, Balcescu attacked Bratiana and other traitors to the revolution of 1848.

The ruling classes forced Balcheska to emigrate abroad, but his thoughts always belonged to the motherland, the people. From distant lands, he called on the people to continue the struggle. Ill and poor, Balcescu died in exile in Palermo in 1852, far from the homeland he loved dearly.

After his death, the bourgeoisie and the landlords did everything possible to conceal his activities from the people, to distort and falsify his great ideas. But in the heart of the Romanian people, the memory of Balcescu as an ardent fighter for the independence and freedom of Romania has been preserved.

Balcescu foresaw a happy, bright future for the Romanian people. The whole life and activity of the outstanding Romanian revolutionary democrat Nicolae Balcescu is a vivid example of patriotism and selfless service to his homeland.

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