35
and only lying in wait for a chance of throwing themselves upon the workers and peasants.
As we have already seen, the right wing socialist revolutionaries and mensheviks, in declaring their motto to be "the Constituent Assembly," are only anxious for votes for the bourgeoisie. And just in the same way when they violently abuse destruction of freedom they are anxious for the freedom of the bourgeoisie. The bourgeois press, bourgeois leaders, the counter-revolutionary bourgeois organisations are not to touched—this is the real position of these gentlemen.
But, they will say, you yourselves used to close both menshevik and socialist revolutionary newspapers; the party of the Communists has more than once encroached on the liberty of worthy individuals, who in their time (in the reign of the Tzar) suffered imprisonment. How can we justify that This question may be answered by another: when Gotz, the right wing socialist revolutionary, organised a rising of Junkers and officers against the soldiers and the workers—what were we to do? Pat him on the head for it? When Roudneff, the right wing socialist revolutionary , together with Colonel Riabtzeff, in October armed the Moscow White Guards, consisting of the sons of the bourgeoisie, houseowners, and other gentry (the gilded youths), and in union with the officers and junkers tried to suppress by machine guns and drown in blood the October rising of workers and soldiers—what could we do? Decorate them with medals for their feats? When the menshevik organ "Forward" (which ought really to be named "Backward") and the socialist revolutionist "Labour" lied to the Moscow workers at the critical moment of the struggle, that Kerensky had taken Petrograd (which they did to break up the unanimity of the workers), were we expected to praise them for these provocatory tricks?
What follows from all this? It follows that when the socialist traitors and socialist traitors' organs begin to serve the bourgeoisie too fervently, or when they cease to differ in their line of action from the Black Hundred cadet organisers of pogroms—then they should and must be treated in the same way as their beloved teachers and benefactors. At the present moment there are many such, who, although having fought against the Tzar and landowners, now cry at the top of their voices when the workers seize the wealth of the bourgeoisie. For what they have done in the past we render them our thanks.
