198 THE UTOPIAN COMMUNIST
Philadelphia, and for a time, it was vigorously supported by the
Philadelphia Freie Presse. The Arbeiterverein of Newark adopted
a constitution which was reprinted in Die Republik der Arbeiter,
and its 122 signers, representing a number of different crafts,
joined Weitling's movement. A farewell banquet for Arnold in
Baltimore was attended by more than 600 persons. George Lip¬
pard, a youthful exponent of Weitling's principles, founder of a
labor league, and publisher of an English-language paper, worked
untiringly for the Bund in his City of Brotherly Love, and in
Boston some American radicals found Weitling's theories not un
like those of Josiah Warren. In April, 1850, at the Shakespeare
Hotel, Weitling addressed meetings of German bookbinders,
portfolio makers, shoemakers, cigar makers and cabinetmakers
and sought their support for his association.^10
By the fall of 1850, the optimistic promoter of the Arbeiter
bund expected to have 100,000 followers of all nationalities,
enough "to control the presidential election." He called upon the
"new apostles" to carry his gospel from city to city and from house
to house. In St. Louis, long extracts from Die Republik der Arbeiter were read aloud at mass meetings of enthusiastic workers.
In Pittsburgh, a workingmen's congress launched a Volks Tribun
with 500 subscribers. In New York, a weekly addressed special
appeals to French workers. German tailors paraded with a band
through the streets of Buffalo, to the great disgust of more con
servative citizens. Weitling announced that he was busy with
plans for a German workers' congress to be held in October.
Though all such activities were merely preliminary to the forma
tion of the Arbeiterbund, the leader of the proposed organization
was completely satisfied with his achievements during his first year
of activity in the United States. He was especially pleased by the
attention he was receiving from some of the German-language
press and pointed out that he would have been treated far less
generously in Germany.^11
(^10) New York Tribune, April 29, 1850.
(^11) See Schlüter, Anfänge der deutschen Arbeiterbewegung, 128-60. Among