Bolshevism in Russia and America/Chapter 1

by Raymond Augustine McGowan

Bolshevism in Russia and America

 

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I. BOLSHEVISM IN RUSSIA.

OLSHEVIK and Menshevik are the names of two opposed groups of Socialists in Russia. Their opposition is over the method of introducing; Socialism. The Bolsheviki declare that Socialism can only come through the direct seizure of the political power of society. They call this "the dictatorship of the proletariat" or the dictatorship of the propertyless masses. The Mensheviki looked forward to the introduction of the Socialist society through the more orderly process of majority vote in a political election.

The doctrine of Marx, the founder of modern Socialism, was originally a theory of revolutions and a call to the propertyless of the world to unite and seize the power of the State at the moment of capitalist bankruptcy. It is said that Marx really favored in private the gradual and legislative method of introducing Socialism, but certainly the implications of his teachings leaned all towards the dictatorship of the proletariat. Later he saw in the French Commune the pattern of the future international revolution and the future international society. He thought that Capitalism would develop until on one side would stand a few property owners and on the other the suffering masses. And he prophesied that then would come the break-down of industry and society and Government, and the seizure of political power by the propertyless. Then would come the dictatorship of the proletariat; they would hold the political power and introduce, as speedily as possible, economic socialism.

But the theory of a revolutionary seizure of political power was after a time discarded by most Socialists. They began to rely upon the ballot. They looked forward either to a gradual and almost imperceptible entrance of society into Socialism, or to the victory of the Socialist party at the polls and the introduction of the coöperative commonwealth after a majority had voted its adoption.

The difference in tactics also developed two sets of ideas regarding the organization of industry and government in the Socialist society. Both posited a central power directing industry and social life, but the revolutionary Socialists, especially in recent years, have looked forward to a State which would have vast industrial unions as its constituents, while the moderate Socialists have left this matter for future decision, or have thought that the present organization of the State would remain under Socialism. Still the chief difference between the revolutionary and the moderate Socialists—between the Bolsheviki and the Mensheviki—was one of tactics and present policy. One group looked forward to the seizure of political power by the class-conscious proletariat; the other group looked forward to political victory for Socialism at the polls. One prepared for a revolution; the other prepared for victory at an election.

The Russian Bolsheviki, before the Revolution, were a party in Siberian or foreign exile. When the Tsar was deposed in March, 1917, they were able to return to Russia and returning they did all in their power to effect the plans that they had prepared long before. They joined in with other parties to overthrow the first Provisional Government, and when the Kerensky Government came to power they attacked it as mercilessly as they had the first Government.

As allies they had the extremist wing of the Social Revolutionaries led by Maria Spiridonova, a terrorist, lately returned from Siberia. This group was not Marxian but almost anarchistic centering its efforts upon a change in the land system, in contrast to the Marxian emphasis upon the industrial system. Their revolutionary character, however, drew them towards the Bolsheviki.

They prepared for the revolution by agitating among the Soviets. These were simply associations of workingmen, soldiers, or peasants. The first Soviet after the Russian revolution was formed among the workmen and soldiers in Petrograd, and from there they spread over Russia. The first Soviets of the peasants started with the poorest peasants and the soldiers, themselves peasants, gathering together at the village inn.

In the absence of a democratic Duma or Parliament, the Soviets soon became the representative organizations of their communities. Their first action, however, was to back Kerensky's Government, carry on whatever local duties were needed or desired, and express the aspirations of the Russian people in the new days.

The peasants wanted land. The city workmen wanted bread and the comforts of life and control of their work. The soldiers wanted respite from the caste discipline of the Russian army. All wanted peace. Lacking a legislative body to help them gain their ends immediately, they formed their Councils or Soviets and often took what they wanted and could get. Nevertheless they were waiting for a Constituent Assembly or Constitutional Convention to legalize what they had already done, and bring on the new era over all Russia.

 

The Soviet Revolution.

The Constituent Assembly was being delayed, and the Bolsheviki used this delay for propaganda purposes. They called out for the Assembly but they did not want it to meet. It would be a body elected by all the people and if it met it would be so powerful, unless something were done first, that it would thwart the revolutionary aims of the Bolsheviki. The Bolsheviki wanted the dictatorship of the class-conscious proletariat and they were educating the more militant section of the city workmen and soldiers to their way of thinking. At last they obtained a majority in the Petrograd Soviet of Workmen and Soldiers and a following elsewhere throughout Russia. The Soviets were the logical agency at hand for a Bolshevik revolution, and so the Bolshevik leaders made as their campaign cry, "All Power to the Soviets." Their strength in the Soviets, however, lay not among the peasants, but among the workmen of the large cities and among some of the soldiers.

The election for the Constituent Assembly, a democratically elected body, was called for November. The Bolsheviki saw that they must act quickly if they were to win. They called the Soviet Congress of Workmen and Soldiers to meet in Petrograd. At first the Executive Committee of the Soviets, which was not Bolshevik, countermanded the order; then, too late, it sent out another call for the Congress to convene. This helped the Bolsheviki who could rely also upon the growing strength and increased impatience of the workmen and the soldiers, and upon the general trust, outside their own ranks, in the forthcoming Constituent Assembly.

The Soviet Congress met. Only a sprinkling of peasants were present to represent their eighty per cent. of the Russian people. Not all of the workmen and soldiers were represented. But this small fraction of the Russian people declared during a night meeting of November 7th that a new type of Government ruled Russia and that they were the Government. Outside, a still smaller faction, the, Petrograd Soviet of Workmen and Soldiers—the Trades' Assembly and the garrison of one city—were deposing the Government and dispersing the Pre-Parliament.

The dictatorship of the militant vanguard of the proletariat had come. Kerensky's ill-starred drive upon Petrograd, street battles in Moscow and Kiev, civil war and terrorism rampant were yet to be met, but that night of the 7th of November ushered in the reign of a group of city workmen and soldiers. A few determined men led them and they backed their leadership with bayonets, street battles, terrorism and machine gun squads in armored cars. They were determined at all costs to attempt a Socialist society in Russia.

"Two hundred thousand members of the Bolshevik party are imposing their proletariat will on the mass," said Lenin, their leader, shortly after the Soviet Revolution. The Russian people were one hundred and eighty millions; one hundred and fifty millions or more of them were peasants; ten million were workingmen. But 200,000 members of one party aided by the few extremist Social Revolutionaries seized the power of Russia and were determined to rule.

The Soviet Revolution was the act of a small minority of the people. It has also been kept alive by undemocratic means. In the January following, the Constituent Assembly, which had been elected by all the people of Russia, met in Petrograd. The Councils of People's Commissars demanded of the Assembly that it declare Russia "to be a Republic of Soviets of workmen's, soldiers' and peasants' Deputies" and that "all the power in the centre and in the provinces belongs to these Soviets."^[1] When it refused, it was formally dissolved by the Commissars.

 

Electoral System.

The new Government is a government of the Soviets. Power is supposed to rest ultimately in the councils of the workmen in their factories or local unions, in the company and regimental meetings of the soldiers, and in the village gatherings of the peasants. Theoretically it is a Government of all the propertyless, or more strictly, of all who do productive work and hire no one to gain greater profits. Article 4, Chapter XIII, No. 65, of the Constitution reads:

"The following persons enjoy neither the right to vote nor the right to be voted for, even though they belong to one of the categories enumerated above, namely:

"(a) Persons who employ hired labor in order to obtain from it an increase in profits.

"(b) Persons who have an income without doing any work, such as interest from capital, receipts from property, etc.

"(c) Private merchants, trade and commercial brokers.

"(d) Monks and Clergy of all denominations.

"(e) Employees and agents of the former police, the gendarme corps, and the Okhrana (Tsar's secret service), also members of the former reigning dynasty."

According to these laws, a farmer or shopkeeper employing even one person is without a vote. It is what one man has called a "limited democracy," which, of course, means no democracy at all.

The elections are mass elections and "are conducted according to custom on days fixed by the local Soviets,"^[2] The right of recall; and of a new election carried on in the same way for another deputy are also given. These features of the Soviets' elections—mass elections, local determination of the time of election, and the recall of the deputies by mass elections locally decided on, serve very well the purposes of the class-conscious and militant city workmen and poorest peasants. They make it easy for a small and active group to control the elections; just as, for example, mass primaries in this country are easily controlled. Lenin, to prove the Socialist character of the Soviet Republic, emphasizes that through the Soviet System, "the best possible mass organization of the vanguard of the toilers—of the industrial proletariat—is formed, enabling it to direct the exploited masses, to attract them to active participation in political life, to train them politically through their own experiences, that in this way a beginning is made for the first time to get actually the whole population to learn how to manage and how to begin managing."^[3] In other words, the Soviet form of Government is very easy for an active vanguard now to control and use.

Lenin narrows the vanguard here to the industrial proletariat. In other places he includes the poorest peasants. But the Soviet Government is so formed as to give to the city workmen power far beyond their members. The vote of a city workman under the law is worth four or five votes of peasants. The central Congress is composed of representatives or Deputies of the Urban Soviets on the basis of one delegate for every 25,000 voters and of the Provincial Soviets on the basis of one delegate to every 125,000 persons. This makes the deputies of the cities two or three times as many in proportion to the votes as the deputies of the Provincial Soviets. The Provincial Soviets are then composed of both city and rural deputies in the same ratio as that above—one city voter to five rural inhabitants or a ratio of one to two or three. By this method the peasants are handicapped in the All-Russian Congress to the advantage of the city workmen. Moreover, the Red Guard or the Soviet Army also sends its delegates to help swing the balance for the Bolshevik Government.

Sometimes these precautions fail, and non-Bolshevik elements enter the Soviet Congress in numbers too large for the safety of Bolshevik power. In such cases, to retain its power, the Central Government has used all the means at its disposal from merely unseating the Deputies to imprisoning them.

Indirect Elections.

These elections, poor as they are and so readily liable to change from an election into a conspiracy, are not for the purpose of sending representatives to the Central Government. The elections of the Deputies to the All-Russian or Central Congress are indirect. The peasants have three or four grades of delegates between them and the All-Russian Congress. The city workmen are two or three steps removed from their deputies in the Congress. Nor is the All-Russian Congress, far removed as it is from the people, itself the real Government. According to the Constitution, the Congress is "the supreme power of the Russian Socialist Federated Soviet Republic."^[4] But it meets only twice a year for short sittings; to supply the intervening period, it elects an executive committee which is "the supreme legislative, executive and controlling organ,"^[5] and in the periods between the sessions of the Congress, is the supreme power of the country.^[6] The acting power thus, for most of the year, is another step removed from the voters.

 

The Real Government.

Still another step intervenes. The Executive Committee appoints Commissars "for the purpose of general management of the affairs" of the Republic.^[7] Theoretically, they are under the control of the Executive Committee, but from various sources it is learned that they, who are still another step removed. from the voters, are the real rulers of Russia. One of them, Lenin, the President of the Council of Commissars, is their chief, and, according to Lincoln Steffins in a report favorable to the Soviet Republic, Lenin "is farther removed from the people than the Tsar was, or than any actual ruler in Europe." He adds: "To form an idea of his stability, independence and power, think of the process that would have to be gone through with_by the people to remove and elect a successor."^[8]

 

The Power of the Commissars.

These Commissars, who are farther removed from the people than the Tsar was, have more power than the Tsar had. They exercise the power of a government introducing Socialism and such power, no State in the world enjoys. They impress their wills upon the lives of the people with greater force and continuity. than any other government in the world. A Socialist State or a State introducing Socialism, is a most powerful State. Russia, introducing Socialism, is ruled by a few Commissars, who are, in turn, ruled by Lenin. They are practically irremovable. But they confiscate property and bank deposits; they make the land laws; they are the great employer of the Russian workmen; they ration food; they make laws about religion and determine the type of education for Russian children; they stifle criticism leveled against them; they forbid meetings and newspapers; they are the executioners and the jailers and have an army at their command. Yet they gained their power through the will of 200,000 Bolsheviks in a country of 180,000,000 people, and they have retained their power through the energy of the militant "vanguard of the toilers."

 

Terrorism.

They have called on terrorism to keep their power. Lenin told American workmen that "to get power and keep it, civil war, terrorism, etc., are necessary." Bolsheviki do not desire blood, but they will not hesitate to murder those who inconveniently stand in their way. Apologists for the Soviet Republic say that not more than 5,000 were killed in the Russian Red Terror. A recent report has it that the Soviet Republic has executed 9,641 and arrested 128,000 in the struggle against the counter-revolution. But the number killed and imprisoned is not the chief consideration. The central point is the fact that a revolution by a minority, particularly if it is a Socialist revolution, will meet with determined and justifiable opposition. But, according to the Bolshevik leaders, any such opposition, whether it comes from individuals or groups or armed bands, must be crushed without mercy. The exact numbers killed and imprisoned is of secondary importance before this fact.

Besides terrorism, they have other ways of keeping their power. One source of their power is that the State is the Capitalist. The power of the Capitalist becomes the power of a Monopolist-Capitalist, and then to it is joined the power of the State. The State and the Commissars, who control the State, control the jobs, the livelihood, and the lives of a part of the people; as Capitalist or as Executioners they can crush opposition.

 

Land Laws.

But perhaps the chief strength of the Bolsheviki lies in the compromises they have made with Socialism to quell the opposition of such groups as the peasants and the members of the coöperative societies. It is of the very nature of Socialism to have common ownership of production and distribution. The Bolsheviki have compromised on their principles, perhaps irredeemably, to retain their power and effect ultimately the Socialist Society. Unlike Reformist Socialists, who compromise before they obtain political power by the ballot, the Revolutionary Socialists seize the political power first and compromise afterwards.

The first compromise became in practice a fundamental attack upon common ownership. The Constitution declares that "for the purpose of realizing the socialization of the land, all private property in land is abolished and the entire land is declared to be national property and is to be apportioned among husbandmen, without any compensation to the former owners, in the measure of each ones' ability to till it."^[9] Earlier decrees of a similar nature had been passed. The land was nationalized according to the law, and the distribution of the land was left to the local communities. Theoretically, almost all private ownership in land was abolished, but what the laws have really done has been to confiscate the large landed estates and divide some of them among the landless people of the community. Practically, private ownership has been extended wider than before the decree was issued. For a time "Committees of the Poor" tried to confiscate the land of the more comfortably situated peasants. This failed, however, and the administration of the land laws has remained in the hands of the peasants. Sareda, the Commissar of Agriculture, told Arthur Ransome that "they had no intention of any such idiocy as the attempt to force the peasants to give up private ownership. The establishment of communes (collective farming) was not to be compulsory in any way; it was to be an illustration of the idea of communal work, not more."^[10]

What attempts they may make against the small proprietors in the future remains to be seen. The first land decree specifically exempted from confiscation lands belonging to enlisted Cossack soldiers and peasants. Whether even this explicit exemption will continue or not is a question, for the Bolsheviki have the law behind them for general confiscation. They might perhaps try to take by taxation all land values and leave to the peasants the shell of ownership. But thus far the Socialist theory has run against a stone wall in the peasant's love for personal ownership; the theory has encountered a fact and met defeat. And from all appearances its defeat is permanent.

City real estate has not all been nationalized, but arrangements have been made so that even when property has remained in the possession of its owners, it yields no profit. Mansions, etc., have been opened to the poor of the slums, and the homes of workingmen have escaped nationalization. Thus the situation of city real estate is similar to that of farm lands.

Very early after the Soviet Revolution, all the joint-stock banks were merged into the State bank. The chief purpose of this was to control the investment market. But the coöperative banks were able to resist nationalization and have grown very much under the Bolshevist régime. The most important of these is the Moscow Narodny Bank,. which has branches in sixteen other Russian cities, and in London and New York. The share capital of this bank has even been increased from 10 million to 100 million rubles.^[11] Credit socities were also allowed to continue. Being the sole competitors of the State banks, these coöperative banks have made great progress. The large bank deposits have been confiscated, as well as all the gold that had been hoarded in the safety vaults. Besides, only a certain amount of money can be withdrawn from deposit every week. As for the securities, there was no need of confiscating them since they could be reached, if of domestic issue, more easily in other ways. It is reported that foreign securities were confiscated by the Government. Capital levies were also made, and in this way much money was taken from its owners. Since then the State has made great efforts to encourage deposits in its own banks, allowing 3 per cent interest on savings.

The result in the banking field has been to divide it between the State and the voluntary coöperatives. This in itself is a compromise on Socialism, while the other compromise, 3 per cent. interest on savings, is even more fundamental.

 

Industry

Between the downfall of the Tsar and the Soviet Revolution, nearly eight months intervened. During that period, the city workmen were taking over, one by one, the industries in which they worked, and were trying to manage them through local work councils, very often without the help of technical experts. The Bolsheviki at their accession to power, encouraged this anarchy for a time, but when their power was considered not too insecure, they changed the system, and the local works council began to give way before centralized State direction of nationalized industries.

A Supreme Board of National Economy was established to direct the larger movements of production, distribution, and finance. Under the Supreme Board were established organizations charged with the direction of particular industries. These are called Centros and there are about sixty of them. Almost all large and medium-sized industries have been nationalized^[12] and have been taken over by the Central Government from the former owners without compensation and are being directed by the Central Government. The Centros, which direct industry, have become, even in a short time, very bureaucratic, employing a great many clerks possessed of much power.

Over a factory stands a high-salaried manager, sometimes the old owner or the former manager, again a new man, who is often a foreigner. These labor directors are, as Lenin says, dictators in the factory during the working hours. With them stand the much weakened works council of the workers, the chief duty of which is to apply locally the national regulations regarding the conditions of labor.

The national regulations regarding labor have also changed. It was the earlier policy to pay all the same wages. Later this was changed in two ways. Workers are now divided into 27 classes, the lowest class receiving 600 rubles a month, and the highest, 2,200 rubles. Piece rate and premiums have also been introduced.

Strikes. are prohibited and compulsory work is the rule. The bringing about of greater production and the prevention of loafing is a problem of administration, placed first in the hands of the local Soviets. Violators of the labor discipline. "should be discovered, tried and punished without mercy."^[13] That is to say, those, for example, who offend against the regulations regarding compulsory work, or who strike, will be seized, tried, and mercilessly punished.

The safeguard to industrial democracy in all this, according to Lenin, is to be found in the holding of meetings by the workers after their work is over. The local workers' assemblies and councils are the saving point for the time, and will become of greater importance and value when the "labor discipline" develops, as Lenin says, the new Socialist spirit.

Thus the local meetings or works' councils, as the nucleus of the future industrial democracy and as the 'chief organ for the enforcement of the present autocracy, become 6f great present importance. Lenin called out to the local conscious-vanguard to enforce the labor discipline locally. That means that he asked the help of the local Bolsheviki in the factories and on the railroads to stand behind the party, and direct the rest of the workers in their meetings. Local Bolshevik leadership was not very difficult to obtain, for the State controlled the jobs of the workers, their livelihood, and their very lives. Opposition to "the labor discipline" must not come out too boldly. As a result, local works' councils generally are Bolshevik in character. For example, in one section of Moscow in a number of factories there are 16,000 employees. But only 687 of them are Bolshevik party members and sympathizers, whi1e the works' councils are, as a rule, composed of members of this small minority.^[14]

The composition of these works' councils or Soviets indicates the kind of representatives sent to the Capitol—shows how false is the political democracy of Russia, even abstracting from the anti-democratic electoral laws. And since these works' councils are the present slight apparatus of industrial democracy, their composition proves also that Russia has not industrial democracy. Lenin recognizes that neither political nor industrial democracy rules in Russia. He hopes, however, that under the stress of revolution and necessity, such a spirit will spread among the Russian people as to develop true industrial and political democracy out of the dictatorship of the class-conscious vanguard of the militant proletariat, and out of the dictatorship of experts and Bolshevik works' councils in industrial life.

The labor unions early merged themselves into the Bolsheviki State, their activity centering itself in sending members to the Board of National Economy, and in giving advice to the Commissars and the heads of the Centros. No information is at hand concerning the party affiliation of the leaders of the Trade Unions and the position of the rank and file, except in isolated cases and from indirect reports, but it is, no doubt, similar to the situation among the Moscow works’ councils. The party controls the State and the works’ councils; it would also attempt to control the union organization.

All reports that come out of Russia unite in declaring that Russian industry is most inefficient. Apologists say that this is to be expected of a country isolated from the rest of the world and industrially backward. But it is also to be expected of a country which has passed from the industrial autocracy of the days of the Tsar to the anarchy. of 1917 and the industrial autocracy of Bolshevik. dictatorship. Still, whatever the cause, the fact stands. Industries generally are being subsidized by the State. This may be good policy for industries essential to the conduct of war, but for other industries it spells economic bankruptcy. There is no need of itemizing the very low efficiency of Russian industry; it is well known and admitted. One observer has recently said that the only nationalized industries in Russia which have not utterly failed are the war industries.^[15]

Recently it is reported that a part of the Red Army, which is composed of members of the vanguard of the Bolsheviks, is to be changed from fighting to labor units. This is a new measure to bring about the "reorganization of national economy,” and prevent the vast unemployment consequent upon a demobilization of the Red Guard. But it remains to be seen what success will be met.

Besides the nationalized and State-controlled industries, there are also a great many small industries which have remained in the hands of individuals or coöperative societies. The coöperative societies of producers have been very successful. Moreover, the cottage industries, carried on by the peasants in their homes during the long winter months, have grown and have formed flourishing coöperative socities for the purchase of materials and the sale of finished goods. Some of the factories of the old régime have been bought up by the coöperatives and are being run on the coöperative principles.

The industrial situation. under Bolshevism may be summarized in some such fashion as this: Nearly all capitalistic industries have been confiscated and are being directed by the State under the local dictatorship of appointed managers. The workers must not strike, must work, and must work well; local works' council, controlled by the militant vanguard in the factory and reënforced by the State; will mercilessly punish any infractions of the rules. Piece work, etc., have been introduced; wages are determined by the State. The efficiency of the nationalized industries is very low. Along side of the nationalized industries are coöperative factories, and coöperative associations of the peasants conducting cottage industries. These are very successful. Such a summary shows that Russia is not yet a Socialist society, as far as industrial production is concerned, and that it allows only slight control by the workers in their factories. The best name for the relation of men to their work is_that they are now under a dictatorship—the combined dictatorship of the State, the local manager, and the Bolshevik Works' Council. There appears to be far less industrial democracy than even political democracy.

 

The Distribution of Supplies.

Nor is the Socialist aim of common ownership of the means of distribution carried out any more fully than common ownership of the means of production. Food rationing and particularly the rationing of bread through the grain monopoly is practiced extensively in the cities. But private traders or "speculators," whom the Bolshevik State and the coöperative stores equally attack, still distribute most of the supplies. The coöperative stores distribute much more than the State. Norman Hapgood says that they distribute over a quarter of the necessities used by the Russian people, while the Central Government has been supplying only 1½ or 2 per cent. of their needs.^[16] An attempt was made to turn the coöperative stores into State concerns, but the attempt failed except with the labor coöperatives. No doubt another attempt will be made, but the probability is that it will meet with the same opposition as before.

 

Religion.

It is not new to anyone that Marxian Socialism is joined to hate of religion. Bakunin, the other theorist of the Russian revolution, was graduated in atheism in the school of Marx. Before the revolution, the program of the Bolshevik party called for separation of the Church and State and separation of the Church and School. Their seizure of power gave them their opportunity.

Among their decrees is to be found the following: "All the properties of the existing church and religious societies are declared national property. Buildings and articles designed for religious services are, by special decision of the local or central authorities, given for free use by corresponding religious societies."^[17] This decree took from the churches and religious societies not only their lands, but also their church buildings, schools, monasteries, hospitals, and asylums. It gives to men who hate religion and despise it, the power of forbidding public religious service. It attempts to put the Church under the complete control of the State. A later order tempered the certain rigor of the law by advising officials not to offend the feelings of the religious. Religious oaths are also forbidden in the courts and no sign of religion is allowed to appear in the Government. The net effect is to make the State an atheist State and place even the right to use the churches and hold pU8lic services in the hands of State officials, who, though despising religion, are advised not to be too severe.

Another law forbids "the teaching of religion in all State and public, as well as in private, educational establishments in which general subjects are taught."^[18] By virtue of this decree even parochial schools, such as we have in this country, are forbidden.

 

Marriage and Divorce.

The Soviet laws on marriage and divorce give further ground for the charge that Socialism is opposed to Christian marriage and the home. The only valid marriage ceremony in Russia is a civil marriage; a religious marriage is not considered a marriage. Marriage is contracted by merely signing a statement that it is being contracted voluntarily and that no legal impediments are present. When the marriage is recorded, it is legally effective. The divorce law is in keeping with the kind of marriage allowed by the State. It is very lax. All that is necessary is for either the husband or wife to want a divorce. A divorce may be obtained through mutual consent by merely having a record of the divorce made. If only one of the parties wants a divorce, the local court gives it, and either at the time of the divorce or in a later civil suit decides on the care of the children. Alimony is allowed the wife if she cannot work.

These two laws lead to moral degeneracy. They give color to the old accusation against Socialism that it stands for "free love." The border of "free love" is reached in Bolshevik Russia.

 

Conclusion.

From this, some idea of Bolshevism may be learned. Bolshevism is a kind of Socialism that considers it necessary for those who want Socialism to gain complete political power before the first step towards Socialism can be taken. Moreover, it holds that the only way to gain political power is for those who believe in Socialism to seize it, and not try to obtain it by a political election. All the tactics preceding the seizure of political power, are to be directed to that end; elections, strikes, etc., are all to be used, not for any immediate benefit that might be obtained from them, but as propaganda for the "dictatorship of the proletariat." When political power is obtained, the Government is fashioned:

1. To exclude all but the workers, soldiers, and, the traders and farmers who hire no labor and live by their work;

2. To diminish the influence of all but the propertyless city workmen and the poorest farmers;

3. To give the greater electoral power to the city workmen;

4. To concentrate the electoral power in the hands of the more zealous believers in the Bolshevist program;

5. And to hand over the real political power to the leaders.

Terrorism and civil war are necessary to keep the political power and will be prosecuted as strenuously as is thought necessary. The political power is to be used to usher in common ownership of the means of production and distribution, but this can only be reached after a measurably slow process, filled with fundamental compromises on Socialism. When property is nationalized, it is confiscated. Nor is it too much to include as basic in Bolshevism the spirit of the S9viet Republic's laws on religion, marriage, and divorce.

The element of Bolshevism, however, which differentiates it from ordinary Socialism, is its tactics. Bolshevism considers that the first step towards common ownership is the revolutionary seizure of political power by those who want Socialism.

Bolshevik Russia, by its disregard of property rights, its subjection of religion, and the profligacy of its marriage laws, has offended grievously against the moral law. Bolshevik Russia has confiscated property at its convenience. It has placed the practice of religion at the discretion of men who hate religion, fear it, and despise it as superstition. And finally, Bolshevik Russia has blasted away the foundations of marriage, family, and the home; if has dealt a death blow at social and individual we1fare.

 

The chief books on Bolshevism in Russia used in this pamphlet are the following:

Ten Days That Shook the World, by John Reed. New York: Boni and Liveright.

Bolshevik Russia, by Etienne Autonelli. New York: Alfred Knopf.

The Constitution of Soviet Russia and other documents, published in The Nation, New York City.

Russia in 1919, by Arthur Ransome. New York: B. W. Huebsch,

Articles by Lincoln Eyre in the New York World.

The Soviets at Work, by N. Lenin. Rand School Book Co.

The Proletarian Revolution in Russia, by N. Lenin and Leon Trotzky. Edited by Louis C. Fraina. New York: The Communist Press.

Bolshevism, by John Spargo. New York: Harper and Brothers.

1. Art. I. and II. of the "Declaration of the Rights of the Laboring Exploited People."
2. Art. IV., ch. xiii., no. 66.
3. Soviets at Work, by N. Lenin.
4. Art. III., ch. vi., no. 24 of the Constitution.
5. Art. III., ch. 7, no. 31 of the Constitution.
6. Art. III., ch. vi., no. 30.
7. Art. III., ch. vii., no. 35.
8. The Bullit Mission to Russia, p. 112. Testimony before the Committee on Foreign Relations, United States Senate.
9. Constitution, Art. I., ch. ii., no. 3A.
10. Russia in 1919. by Arthur Ransome, p. 151.
11. Struggling Russia, September 6, 1919, p. 413.
12. From report of Rykor to Executive Committee, no. 46, Economic Life.
13. Soviets at Work. by Lenin, p. 33.
14. American Federationist, editorial, February, 1920.
15. Norman Hapgood in The New Republic, February 25, 1920.
16. The New Republic, February 25, 1920.
17. Decree on Church and State, Art. XIII.
18. Decree on Church and State, Art. IX.