All-Russian Union of Workers on Public
Communications.
The history of the Union begins from October 1905. During the revolutionary movement of 1905 the post and telegraph workers impulsively joined the struggle against the tsarist system regardless of the hardships they had to suffer under the monarchist regime, their own inactivity and the lack of solidarity created by the wide gulf existing between the upper and the lower classes. During the days of freedom in 1905 the workers undertook the organisation of the Union. Several committees were started, but they had a hard struggle for their existence. In November 1905 a Congress was convened in Moscow; 100 delegates from all parts of Russia were present. It is to be noted that most of the delegates and leaders of the movement belonged to the middle and higher officials. Therefore the movement was of a moderate character, ready to compromise, in spite of the efforts of the socialist party to lead them on for the revolutionary struggle aganst tsarism. The movement acquired a distinctly revolutionary character only after the dissolution of the Congress and when the majority of the delegates and active members were arrested or dismissed. It became evident that under the then prevailing conditions no Union of Post and Telegraph Workers could exist. A spontaneous, unorganised strike of the Post and Telegraph Workers broke out; it spread over the whole country and had a great influence upon the development of the revolutionary movement. During this period the moderate
