CHAPTER XVI
THE LOCAL SOVIET AT WORK
The Vladivostok Soviet had taken power without shedding a drop of blood. That was easy. But the task now facing it was hard—terribly hard and complex.
The first problem to grapple with was the economic. The dislocation of industry thru war and Revolution, the homecoming of the soldiers, and the employers' lockouts, filled the streets with the workless. The Soviet saw the menace of these idle hands and started to open the factories. The management was placed in the hands of the working-men themselves, and credit was furnished by the Soviet.
The leaders voluntarily limited their own wages. By decree of the Central Russian Soviet the maximum salary of any Soviet official was fixed at 500 rubles a month. The Vladivostok commissars, pointing out the lower cost of living in the Far East, scaled theirs down to 300 rubles a month. After this, when anyone felt the itching desire for a fatter pay-envelope, he was liable to be asked: "Do you want
228
