Bolshevism Part 22

This is the report under the t.i.tle of a doc.u.ment that I present here, without commentary, asking you to communicate it without delay to all the sections of the International. Two words of explanation, only: First, I wish to draw your attention to the fact that this is the second time that the Executive Committee of the Soviet of the Peasants of All-Russia addresses itself publicly to the International.

At the time of my journey to Stockholm in the month of September, 1917, I made, at a session of the Holland, Scandinavian committee, presided over by Branting, a communication in the name of the Executive Committee of the Soviet of Peasants. I handed over on this occasion to our secretary, Camille Huysmans, an appeal to the democrats of the entire world, in which the Executive Committee indicated clearly its position in the questions of the world war and of agrarian reform, and vindicated its place in the Workers'

and Socialist International family.

I must also present to you the author of this report. The citizen Rakitnikov, a member of the Russian Revolutionary Socialist party, has worked for a long time in the ranks of this party as a publicist and organizer and propagandist, especially among the peasants. She has known long years of prison, of Siberia, of exile. Before and during the war until the beginning of the Revolution she lived as a political fugitive in Paris. While being a partizan convinced of the necessity of national defense of invaded countries against the imperialistic aggression of German militarism--in which she is in perfect accord with the members of our party such as Stepan Sletof, Iakovlef, and many other voluntary Russian republicans, all dead facing the enemy in the ranks of the French army--the citizen Rakitnikov belonged to the international group. I affirm that her sincere and matured testimony cannot be suspected of partizans.h.i.+p or of dogmatic partiality against the Bolsheviki, who, as you know, tried to cover their follies and their abominable crimes against the plan of the Russian people, and against all the other Socialist parties, under the lying pretext of internationalist ideas, ideas which they have, in reality, trampled under foot and betrayed.

Yours fraternally, E. ROUBANOVITCH, _June 28, 1918._ _Member of the B.S.I._

"The Bolsheviki who promised liberty, equality, peace, etc., have not been ashamed to follow in the footsteps of Czarism. It is not liberty; it is tyranny." (Extract from a letter of a young Russian Socialist, an enthusiast of liberty who died all too soon.)

I

_Organization of the Peasants after the Revolution in Soviets of Peasant Delegates_

A short time after the Revolution of February the Russian peasants grouped themselves in a National Soviet of Peasant Delegates at the First Congress of the Peasants of All-Russia, which took place at Petrograd. The Executive Committee of this Soviet was elected. It was composed of well-known leaders of the Revolutionary Socialist party and of peasant delegates sent from the country. Without adhering officially to the Revolutionary Socialist party, the Soviet of Peasant Delegates adopted the line of conduct of this party.

While co-ordinating its tactics with the party's, it nevertheless remained an organization completely independent. The Bolsheviki, who at this Congress attempted to subject the peasants to their influence, had not at the time any success. The speeches of Lenine and the other members of this party did not meet with any sympathy, but on the contrary provoked lively protest. The Executive Committee had as its organ the paper _Izvestya of the National Soviet of Peasant Delegates_. Thousands of copies of this were scattered throughout the country. Besides the central national Soviet there existed local organizations, the Soviets, the government districts who were in constant communication with the Executive Committee staying at Petrograd.

From its foundation the Executive Committee exercised great energy in the work of the union and the organization of the peasant ma.s.ses, and in the development of the Socialist conscience in their b.r.e.a.s.t.s. Its members spread thousands and hundreds of thousands of copies of pamphlets of the Revolutionary Socialist party, exposing in simple form the essence of Socialism and the history of the International explaining the sense and the importance of the Revolution in Russia, the history of the fight that preceded it, showing the significance of the liberties acquired. They insisted, above all, on the importance of the socialization of the soil and the convocation of the Const.i.tuent a.s.sembly. A close and living tie was created between the members of the Executive Committee staying at Petrograd and the members in the provinces. The Executive Committee was truly the expression of the will of the ma.s.s of the Russian peasants.

The Minister of Agriculture and the princ.i.p.al agrarian committee were at this time occupied in preparing the groundwork of the realization of socialization of the soil; the Revolutionary Socialist party did not cease to press the government to act in this sense. Agrarian committees were formed at once to fight against the disorganized recovery of lands by the peasants, and to take under their control large properties where exploitation based on the co-operative principle was in progress of organization; agricultural improvements highly perfected would thus be preserved against destruction and pillage. At the same time agrarian committees attended to a just distribution among the peasants of the lands of which they had been despoiled.

The peasants, taken in a body, and in spite of the agrarian troubles which occurred here and there, awaited the reform with patience, understanding all the difficulties which its realization required and all the impossibilities of perfecting the thing hastily. The Executive Committee of the Soviet of Peasants' Delegates played in this respect an important role.

It did all it could to explain to the peasants the complexity of the problem in order to prevent them from attempting anything anarchistic, or to attempt a disorganized recovery of lands which could end only with the further enrichment of peasants who were already rich.

Such was, in its general aspect, the action of the National Soviet of Peasants' Delegates, which, in the month of August, 1917, addressed, through the intermediary of the International Socialist Bureau, an appeal to the democracies of the world. In order to better understand the events which followed, we must consider for a moment the general conditions which at that time existed in Russia, and in the midst of which the action of this organization was taking place.

II

_The Difficulties of the Beginning of the Revolution_

The honeymoon of the Revolution had pa.s.sed rapidly. Joy gave place to cares and alarms. Autocracy had bequeathed to the country an unwieldy heritage: the army and the whole mechanism of the state were disorganized. Taking advantage of the listlessness of the army, the Bolshevist propaganda developed and at the same time increased the desire of the soldiers to fight no more. The disorganization was felt more and more at the front; at the same time anarchy increased in the interior of the country; production diminished; the productiveness of labor was lowered, and an eight-hour day became in fact a five or six-hour day. The strained relations between the workers and the administration were such that certain factories preferred to close. The central power suffered frequent crises; the Cadets, fearing the responsibilities, preferred to remain out of power.

All this created a state of unrest and hastened the preparations for the election of the Const.i.tuent a.s.sembly, toward which the eyes of the whole country were turned. Nevertheless, the country was far from chaos and from the anarchy into which further events plunged it. Young Russia, not accustomed to liberty, without experience in political life and autonomous action, was far from that hopeless state to which the Bolsheviki reduced it some months later. The people had confidence in the Socialists, in the Revolutionary Socialist party, which then held sway everywhere, in the munic.i.p.alities, the zemstvos, and in the Soviets; they had confidence in the Const.i.tuent a.s.sembly which would restore order and work out the laws.

All that was necessary was to combat certain characteristics and certain peculiarities of the existence of the Russian people, which impelled them toward anarchy, instead of encouraging them, as did the Bolsheviki, who, in this respect, followed the line of least resistance.

The Bolshevist propaganda did all within its power to weaken the Provisional Government, to discredit it in the eyes of the people, to increase the licentiousness at the front and disorganization in the interior of the country. They proclaimed that the "Imperialists" sent the soldiers to be ma.s.sacred, but what they did not say is that under actual conditions it was necessary for a revolutionary people to have a revolutionary army to defend its liberty. They spoke loudly for a counter-revolution and for counter-revolutionaries who await but the propitious moment to take hold of the government, while in reality the complete failure of the insurrection of Kornilov showed that the counter-revolution could rest on nothing, that there was no place for it then in the life of Russia.

In fine, the situation of the country was difficult, but not critical. The united efforts of the people and all the thousands of forces of the country would have permitted it to come to the end of its difficulties and to find a solution of the situation.

III

_The Insurrection of Kornilov_

But now the insurrection of Kornilov broke out. It was entirely unexpected by all the Socialist parties, by their central committees, and, of course, by the Socialist Ministers. Petrograd was in no way prepared for an attack of this kind. In the course of the evening of the fatal day when Kornilov approached Petrograd, the central committee of the Revolutionary Socialist party received by telephone, from the Palace of Hiver, the news of the approach of Kornilovien troops. This news revolutionized everybody. A meeting of all the organizations took place at Smolny; the members of the party alarmed by the news, and other persons wis.h.i.+ng to know the truth about the events, or to receive indications as to what should be done, came there to a reunion. It was a strange picture that Smolny presented that night. The human torrent rushed along its corridors, committees and commissions sat in its side apartments. They asked one another what was happening, what was to be done. News succeeded news. One thing was certain.

Petrograd was not prepared for the fight. It was not protected by anything, and the Cossacks who followed Kornilov could easily take it.

The National Soviet of Peasants' Delegates in the session that it held that same night at No. 6 Fontaka Street adopted a resolution calling all the peasants to armed resistance against Kornilov. The Central Executive Committee with the Soviet of Workmen's and Soldiers' Delegates established a special organization which was to defend Petrograd and to fight against the insurrection. Detachments of volunteers and of soldiers were directed toward the locality where Kornilov was, to get information and to organize a propaganda among the troops that followed the General, and in case of failure to fight hand to hand. As they quit in the morning they did not know how things would turn; they were rather pessimistic with regard to the issue of the insurrection for the Socialists.

The end of this conspiracy is known. The troops that followed Kornilov left him as soon as they found out the truth. In this respect, everything ended well, but this event had profound and regrettable circ.u.mstances.

The acute deplorable crisis of the central power became chronic. The Cadets, compromised by their partic.i.p.ation in the Kornilov conspiracy, preferred to remain apart. The Socialist-Revolutionists did not see clearly what there was at the bottom of the whole affair. _It was as much as any one knew at the moment_. Kerensky, in presence of the menace of the counter-revolution on the right and of the growing anarchy on the extreme left, would have called to Petrograd a part of the troops from the front to stem the tide. Such was the role of different persons in this story. It is only later, when all the doc.u.ments will be shown, that the story can be verified, but at all events it is beyond doubt that the Revolutionary Socialist party was in no wise mixed in this conspiracy. The conspiracy of Kornilov completely freed the hands of the Bolsheviki. In the Pravda, and in other Bolshevist newspapers, complaints were read of the danger of a new counter-revolution which was developing with the complicity of Kerensky acting in accord or in agreement with the traitor Cadets. The public was excited against the Socialist-Revolutionists, who were accused of having secretly helped this counter-revolution. The Bolsheviki alone, said its organs, had saved the Revolution; to them alone was due the failure of the Kornilov insurrection.

The Bolsheviki agitation a.s.sumed large proportions. Copies of the _Pravda_, spread lavishly here and there, were poisoned with calumny, campaigns against the other parties, boasting gross flatteries addressed to the soldiers and appeals to trouble. Bolsheviki meetings permeated with the same spirit were organized at Petrograd, Moscow, and other cities.

Bolshevist agitators set out for the front at the same time with copies of the _Pravda_ and other papers, and the Bolsheviki enjoyed, during this time--as Lenine himself admits--complete liberty. Their chiefs, compromised in the insurrection of June 3d, had been given their freedom.

Their princ.i.p.al watchword was "Down with the war!" "Kerensky and the other conciliators," they cried, "want war and do not want peace. Kerensky will give you neither peace, nor land, nor bread, nor Const.i.tuent a.s.sembly. Down with the traitor and the counter-revolutionists! They want to smother the Revolution. We demand peace. We will give you peace, land to the peasants, factories and work to the workmen!" Under this simple form the agitation was followed up among the ma.s.ses and found a propitious ground, first among the soldiers who were tired of war and athirst for peace. In the Soviet of the Workmen's and Soldiers' Delegates of Petrograd the Bolshevist party soon found itself strengthened and fortified. Its influence was also considerable among the sailors of the Baltic fleet. Cronstadt was entirely in their hands. New elections of the Central Executive Committee of the Soviet of Workmen's and Soldiers' Delegates soon became necessary; they gave a big majority to the Bolsheviki. The old bureau, Tchcheidze at its head, had to leave; the Bolsheviki triumphed clamorously.

To fight against the Bolsheviki the Executive Committee of the National Soviet of Peasants' Delegates decided at the beginning of December to call a Second General Peasants' Congress. This was to decide if the peasants would defend the Const.i.tuent a.s.sembly or if they would follow the Bolsheviki. This Congress had, in effect, a decisive importance. It showed what was the portion of the peasant cla.s.s that upheld the Bolsheviki. It was princ.i.p.ally the peasants in soldiers' dress, the "decla.s.se soldiers,"

men taken from the country life by the war, from their natural surroundings, and desiring but one thing, the end of the war. The peasants who had come from the country had, on the contrary, received the mandate to uphold the Const.i.tuent a.s.sembly. They firmly maintained their point of view and resisted all the attempts of the Bolsheviki and the "Socialist-Revolutionists of the Left" (who followed them blindly) to make their influence prevail. The speech of Lenine was received with hostility; as for Trotzky, who, some time before, had publicly threatened with the guillotine all the "enemies of the Revolution," they prevented him from speaking, crying out: "Down with the tyrant! Guillotineur! a.s.sa.s.sin!" To give his speech Trotzky, accompanied by his faithful "capotes," was obliged to repair to another hall.

The Second Peasants' Congress was thus distinctly split into two parties.

The Bolsheviki tried by every means to elude a straight answer to the question, "Does the Congress wish to uphold the Const.i.tuent a.s.sembly?" They prolonged the discussion, driving the peasants to extremities by every kind of paltry discussion on foolish questions, hoping to tire them out and thus cause a certain number of them to return home. The tiresome discussions carried on for ten days, with the effect that a part of the peasants, seeing nothing come from it, returned home. But the peasants had, in spite of all, the upper hand; by a roll-call vote 359 against 314 p.r.o.nounced themselves for the defense without reserve of the Const.i.tuent a.s.sembly.

Any work in common for the future was impossible. The fraction of the peasants that p.r.o.nounced itself for the Const.i.tuent a.s.sembly continued to sit apart, named its Executive Committee, and decided to continue the fight resolutely. The Bolsheviki, on their part, took their partizans to the Smolny, declared to be usurpers of the Soviet of Peasants' Delegates who p.r.o.nounced themselves for the defense of the Const.i.tuante, and, with the aid of soldiers, ejected the former Executive Committee from their premises and took possession of their goods, the library, etc.

The new Executive Committee, which did not have at its disposition Red Guards, was obliged to look for another place, to collect the money necessary for this purpose, etc. Its members were able, with much difficulty, to place everything upon its feet and to a.s.sure the publication of an organ (the _Izvestya_ of the National Soviet of Peasants'

Delegates determined to defend the Const.i.tuent a.s.sembly), to send delegates into different regions, and to establish relations with the provinces, etc.

Together with the peasants, workmen and Socialist parties and numerous democratic organizations prepared themselves for the defense of the Const.i.tuent a.s.sembly: The Union of Postal Employees, a part of the Union of Railway Workers, the Bank Employees, the City Employees, the food distributors' organizations, the teachers' a.s.sociations, the zemstvos, the co-operatives. These organizations believed that the _coup d'etat_ of October 25th was neither legal nor just; they demanded a convocation with brief delay of the Const.i.tuent a.s.sembly and the restoration of the liberties that were trampled under foot by the Bolsheviki.

These treated them as _saboteurs_, "enemies of the people," deprived them of their salaries, and expelled them from their lodgings. They ordered those who opposed them to be deprived of their food-cards. They published lists of strikers, thus running the risk of having them lynched by the crowds. At Saratov, for example, the strike of postal workers and telegraphers lasted a month and a half. The inst.i.tutions whose strike would have entailed for the population not only disorganization, but an arrest of all life (such as the railroads, the organizations of food distributers), abstained from striking, only asking the Bolsheviki not to meddle with their work. Sometimes, however, the gross interference of the Bolsheviki in work of which they understood nothing obliged those opposed to them, in spite of everything, to strike. It is to be noted also that the professors of secondary schools were obliged to join the strike movements (the superior schools had already ceased to function at this time) as well as the theatrical artistes: a talented artist, Silotti, was arrested; he declared that even in the time of Czarism n.o.body was ever uneasy on account of his political opinions.

IV

_The Bolsheviki and the Const.i.tuent a.s.sembly_

At the time of the accomplishment of their _coup d'etat_, the Bolsheviki cried aloud that the ministry of Kerensky put off a long time the convocation of the Const.i.tuante (which was a patent lie), that they would never call the a.s.sembly, and that they alone, the Bolsheviki, would do it.

But according as the results of the elections became known their opinions changed.

In the beginning they boasted of their electoral victories at Petrograd and Moscow. Then they kept silent, as if the elections had no existence whatever. But the _Pravda_ and the _Izvestya_ of the Soviet of Workmen's and Soldiers' Delegates continued to treat as caluminators those who exposed the danger that was threatening the Const.i.tuent a.s.sembly at the hands of the Bolsheviki. They did not yet dare to a.s.sert themselves openly.

They had to gain time to strengthen their power. They hastily followed up peace pourparlers, to place Russia and the Const.i.tuent a.s.sembly, if this met, before an accomplished fact.

They hastened to attract the peasants to themselves. That was the reason which motived the "decree" of Lenine on the socialization of the soil, which decree appeared immediately after the _coup d'etat_. This decree was simply a reproduction of a Revolutionary Socialists' resolution adopted at a Peasants' Congress. What could the socialization of the soil be to Lenine and all the Bolsheviki in general? They had been, but a short time before, profoundly indifferent with regard to this Socialist-Revolutionist "Utopia." It had been for them an object of raillery. But they knew that without this "Utopia" they would have no peasants. And they threw them this mouthful, this "decree," which astonished the peasants. "Is it a law?

Is it not a law? n.o.body knows," they said.

It is the same desire to have, cost what it may, the sympathy of the peasants that explains the union of the Bolsheviki with those who are called the "Socialist-Revolutionists of the Left" (for the name Socialist-Revolutionist spoke to the heart of the peasant), who played the stupid and shameful role of followers of the Bolsheviki, with a blind weapon between their hands.

A part of the "peasants in uniform" followed the Bolsheviki to Smolny. The Germans honored the Bolsheviki by continuing with them the pourparlers for peace. The Bolshevist government had at its disposal the Red Guards, well paid, created suddenly in the presence of the crumbling of the army for fear of remaining without the help of bayonets. These Red Guards, who later fled in shameful fas.h.i.+on before the German patrols, advanced into the interior of the country and gained victories over the unarmed populace. The Bolsheviki felt the ground firm under their feet and threw off the mask. A campaign against the Const.i.tuent a.s.sembly commenced. At first in _Pravda_ and in _Izvestya_ were only questions. What will this Const.i.tuent a.s.sembly be? Of whom will it be composed? It is possible that it will have a majority of servants of the bourgeoisie--Cadets Socialist-Revolutionists.

_Can we confide to such a Const.i.tuent a.s.sembly the destinies of the Russian Revolution? Will it recognize the power of the Soviets?_ Then came certain hypocritical "ifs." "If," yes, "if" the personnel of the Const.i.tuent a.s.sembly is favorable to us; "if" it will recognize the power of the Soviets, it can count on their support. _If not--it condemns itself to death_.