]
However, against the allied bourgeois, a coalition was made between the
small traders and the workingmen--the so-called Social Democratic party.
The small traders found themselves ill rewarded after the June days of
1848; they saw their material interests endangered, and the democratic
guarantees, that were to uphold their interests, made doubtful.
Hence, they drew closer to the workingmen. On the other hand, their
parliamentary representatives--the Mountain--, after being shoved aside
during the dictatorship of the bourgeois republicans, had, during the
last half of the term of the constitutive convention, regained their
lost popularity through the struggle with Bonaparte and the royalist
ministers. They had made an alliance with the Socialist leaders. During
February, 1849, reconciliation banquets were held. A common program
was drafted, joint election committees were empanelled, and fusion
candidates were set up. The revolutionary point was thereby broken off
from the social demands of the proletariat and a democratic turn given
to them; while, from the democratic claims of the small traders' class,
the mere political form was rubbed off and the Socialist point was
pushed forward.
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