The Proletarian Revolution in Russia/Part 1/Chapter 2
II
THE COUNCIL OF WORKERS AND SOLDIERS.
Alongside of the Guchkov-Milyukov government, representing the imperialistic bougeoisie, there is developing a new, unofficial, as yet undeveloped and comparatively weak government, representing the interests of the proletariat and of the entire poorer elements of the city and country peculation. This is the government of the Soviets, the Councils of Workers and Soldiers' Delegates.
I
The actual facts in the political situation, on which we must base our Marxist tactics, are clear:
The monarchy of the Czar has been overthrown, but not as yet necessarily for good.
The Cadet, bourgeois government, wishing to carry on the imperialistic war "to the end," and in reality being the agent of the financial house of England, France & Co., was compelled to promise to the people the fullest measure of liberty and rights, compatible, however, with the preservation of power by this government and the carrying on of the war.
The Soviet of Workers' and Soldiers' Delegates constitutes the form of a government by the workers, and represents the interests of all the poorest of our people, of nine-tenths of the population, aiming to secure peace, bread and liberty.
The conflict between these forces defines the situation as it is at present, the transition stage from the first phase of the revolution to the second.
In order that there may be a real struggle against Czarism and its restoration, in order that the newly-won freedom may really be secured, and not exist simply in words and in the promises of rhetorical "liberals," it is necessary not that the workers should support the government, but that the government should support the workers! The only guarantee of liberty and of a complete abolition of Czarism is the arming of the proletariat, the strengthening, broadening, and development of the role and power of the Soviets of Workers and Soldiers. Accomplish this, and the liberty of Russia will be invincible, the monarchy incapable o£ restoration, and the republic assured.
Any other course will mean a deception of the people. Promises are cheap; promises are worth nothing. It is on promises that all the bourgeois politicians in all ti» bourgeois countries have been "feeding'" the people and "fooling" the workers.
"Our revolution is a bourgeois revolution, therefore the workers should support the bourgeoisie,"—this is the cry of the worthless politicians in the camp of the "Socialist" compromiser and opportunist.
"Our revolution is a bourgeois revolution," say we Marxists, "therefore the Socialist workers should open the eyes of the people to the deceptive practices of the bourgeois politician, should teach the people not to believe in words, but to depend wholly on their own strength, on their own organization, on their own unity, and on their own military equipment,"
The government of the Cadets, of the Guchkovs and Milyukovs, cannot give peace because it is the government for war; it is the government that wishes and prepares for a continuation of the imperialistic slaughter, the government of conquest, since it has not even hinted at renouncing the Czarist policy of conquest in Armenia, Galicia, Turkey, of capturing Constantinople, of reconquering Poland, Courland, etc. This government is bound hand and foot to Anglo-French imperialistic capital. Russian capital is merely one of the sub-divisions of the "concern" known under the firm name of "England, France & Co.," with its annual turnover of hundreds of milliards of roubles.
This government cannot give bread, since it is a bourgeois government. At best it may give the people, as the government of Germany has already done, "a magnificently organized hunger." But the people will not put up with hunger. The people will learn, and they will learn it very soon, that the bread exists and can be had, but by no other means than refusing to bend the knee before the sacred rights of capital and of private ownership in land.
And this government cannot give liberty, since it is a government of junkers and capitalists, who are afraid of the people and people's oppressors.
But this is a transition period. We are emerging from the first period of the Revolution into the second, from the revolt against Czarism into the revolt against the bourgeoisie, against the imperialistic war. In this transition the "order of the day" is: "Workers, you have displayed marvels of proletarian heroism in the civil war against Czarism; you must now display marvels of proletarian organization and international action in order to secure your victory in the second stage of the revolution."
The specific task of (the present period is to organize the proletariat, not according to the old standards of organization with which the betrayers of Socialism, the pro-war social-patriots and opportunists in all countries, are satisfied, but into a revolutionary organization. This organization, in the first place, must be general; and, in the second place, it must combine the functions of the army and the state. The Council of Workers' and Soldiers' Delegates is developing precisely this revolutionary organization.
II
If we scrutinize the Council of Workers and Soldiers we find that it represents three groups:
The first group is the one nearest to the social-patriots, the betrayers of Socialism. They trust Kerensky, the master of hollow words, a tool in the hands of Guchkov and Milyukov. In harmony with the social-patriots of the western European countries, Kerensky mouths plenty of fine phrases. Actually he reconciles the workers with the continuation of the imperialistic war of conquest. Through Kerensky, the imperialistic bourgeoisie addresses the workers as follows: "We give you the republic, the eight-hour day (which actually exists in Petrograd), we promise you this and that liberty, but only because we want you to help us take away the booty from German Imperialism and turn it over to English and French Imperialism."
The second group is represented by our party of the "Central Committee of the S. D. P." in Russia, the Bolsheviki. On March 18th the Central Committee issued a Manifesto which contains the following demands: Democratic republic; eight hour day; confiscation of the landed estates of the nobility in favor of the peasants; confiscation of stocks of grain; immediate preparations for peace negotiations,—not through the government of Guchkov and Milyukov, but through the Council of Workers and Soldiers. This Council, according to the Manifesto, constitutes the actual revolutionary government. Peace negotiations should not be carried on by and with bourgeois governments, but with the proletariat in each of the warring countries. The Manifesto appeals to all workers and peasants to send delegates to the Council.
These are the only possible Socialist and revolutionary tactics to pursue.
The third group is represented by Cheidse and his friends, the Mensheviki generally. They are drifting to and fro. In refusing to join the second Provisional Government (the government of Guchkov-Milyukov) if the latter declared the war an imperialistic war, Cheidse was in harmony with the revolutionary proletarian policy. But the fact that Cheidse participated in the first Provisional Government (the Duma Committee), his demand that a sufficient number of representatives of the Russian workers participate in this government (which would mean that Internationalists would assume responsibility for a government waging an imperialistic war), and his further demand, together with Skobeleff, that this imperialistic government initiate peace negotiations (instead of showing the workers that the bourgeoisie is tied hand and foot to the interests of finance, capital and incapable of renouncing Imperialism),—then Cheidse and his friends pursue the worst bourgeois policy against the interests of the Revolution.
The differences between the Bolsheviki and the Social-Revolutionists, as well as the Mensheviki, manifest themselves in three important issues,—issues that the Council of Workers and Soldiers must solve in the right way before it can carry on its revolutionary task. These issues are: the land problem, the organization of the state, and the problem of the war.
All the land must belong to the people. All the land of the large owners must be confiscated by the peasants, without compensation. But the vital tactical difference is whether the peasants should immediately and locally take possession of the land without paying any more rent to the owners, or whether they should wait for the convening of the Constituent Assembly?
Our party is of the opinion that the peasants should take immediate possession of the land. They should do this as much as possible in an organized way, without causing damage to the property, and should use all efforts to increase the production of grain and wheat, as the people suffer immensely from hunger. A temporary division of land for the coming harvest is only possible through the local Councils of Peasants' Delegates. In order that the rich peasants, who are also capitalists of a sort, shall be prevented from injuring and deceiving the day-laborers on the farms and the poorest peasant, it is necessary that these should consult, unite and co-operate apart from the others by forming their own Councils of Farm Laborers' Delegates.
The Council of Workers and Soldiers represents new republic in the making, a republic other than the bourgeois republic, more in accord with the interest of the people. The revolutionary workers and soldiers of Petrograd dethroned the Czar and cleared the capital of the police. Having begun the Revolution, we must strengthen and completer it through the Council assuming all functions of the Mate. The police must not be restored. All the power of government, from the smallest villages up to Petrograd, must be vested in the Council of Workers' and Peasants' Delegates. Neither the police nor officials not responsible to the people and placed over the people,—but the people itself shall govern the country, the people fully armed and united by the Soviets. The Soviet alone shall establish the necessary order, its power alone be obeyed and rejected by the workers and peasants. Only by means of a Soviet government win Russia move forward firmly and surely to the liberation of our country and of all humanity from the horrors of this war and from the yoke of Capitalism.
Out of the experience of the Paris Commune of 1871, Marx shows that "the working class cannot simply lay hold of the ready-made machinery of the state, and wield it for its own purposes." The proletariat must break down this machinery. And this has been either concealed or denied by the opportunists. But it is the most valuable lesson of the Paris Commune and of the Russian Revolution of 1905. The difference between us and the Anarchists is, that we admit the state is a necessity in our revolution. Our difference with the opportunists and the disciples of Karl Kautsky is, that we claim we do not need the machinery of the bourgeois state as established in the "democratic" bourgeois republics, but the direct power of armed and organized workers. Such was the character of (the Commune of 1871 and of the Council of Workers and Soldiers of 1905 and 1917. On this basis we build.[1]
A revolutionary government of the Soviets alone can act properly on the problem of the war. The Provisional Government, a government of capitalists, is continuing the war in the interests of capitalists. Just as German capitalists, with their crowned robber, Wilhelm, at the head, so the capitalists of all other countries carry on the war for the division of capitalist profits and for world domination. Hundreds of millions of men, almost all the world, are drawn into this criminal war. Hundreds of milliards of capital are invested in the "profitable" enterprises of death, hunger, destruction, bringing to the people atrocious suffering and scandalously-high profits to the capitalists. In order to break away from this terrible war and conclude a really democratic peace, and not a peace of force, there is only one way: the transfer of all government power into the hands of the Councils of Workers and Soldiers. The workers and the poorest peasants, not being interested in protecting the profits of capital and the plundering of weak nations, can actually accomplish that which the capitalists only promise, namely, to end the war by a lasting peace conserving liberty to all peoples without exception.
Our program of peace is as follows:
1.—The Council of Workers and Soldiers declares that as at revolutionary government, it does not recognize any treaty of Czarism or the bourgeoisie.
2.—It publishes immediately these treaties of exploitation and robbery.
3.—It proposes at once and publicly an armistice to all participants in the war.
4.—Peace terms are: liberation of all oppressed peoples and of all colonies.
5.—A declaration of distrust in all bourgeois governments; appeal to the working class to overthrow the governments.
6.—The war debts of the bourgeoisie to be paid exclusively by the capitalists.
By means of this policy, the majority of the workers and poorest peasants can be won for Socialism and for the revolutionary dictatorship of the Soviets.
We do not doubt for a minute that these peace terms would be unacceptable not only to a monarchical Germany, but also to a republican Germany, and equally unacceptable to the capitalist governments of England and France. And in that event we would be compelled to wage a revolutionary war against the German bourgeoisie, but not only against the German bourgeoisie, and we would take up the fight. We are not pacifists. We are against imperialistic wars waged by capitalists for profit. But we have always maintained that it is nonsense to declare that the proletariat should reject revolutionary wars, which may be necessary in the interests of Socialism.
This task would be a stupendous one and would mean a series of revolutionary class struggles all over the world. It is not our impatience and our desire to confront this issue, however, but the objective conditions resulting from the world war that put before the workers this dilemma: either sacrifice more millions of men in the destruction of European civilization, or conquer the governments through the Social Revolution. When in November, 1914, our party demanded, "conversion of the imperialistic war into a civil war of the oppressed against the oppressors, and for Socialism," the demand was considered ridiculous by the social-patriots and renegades of Socialism, as well as by the moderates of the "center." Nowadays even a blind man can see that this demand was correct.
Historic conditions have made the Russian workers, perhaps for a short period, the leaders of the international proletariat, but Socialism cannot now prevail in Russia. We can expect only an agrarian revolution, which will help to create more favorable conditions for further proletarian development. The main result of the present Revolution will have to be the creation of forces for more revolutionary activity, and to influence the more highly-developed European countries into action.
In the furtherance of its revolutionary policy, the Russian proletariat has two allies:
1.—The great majority of the population, consisting of the mass of the semi-proletarian and a part of the small peasants of Russia. This great mass needs peace, bread, liberty, land. This mass will inevitably be under the influence of the bourgeoisie, particularly of the petit bourgeois middle class, which it resembles rather closely owing to its conditions of life, which vaccillate between those of the bourgeoisie and of the proletariat. The cruel lessons of the war, which will become all the more cruel as Guchkov, Milyukov & Co. carry on the war with greater energy, will inevitably push this mass into the proletariat, compel it to co-operate with the proletariat. We must now, taking advantage of the freedom of the new regime and making use of the Councils of Workers' and Soldiers' Delegates, enlighten and organize this mass, above and before everything else. Councils of Peasants' Delegates, Council of Farm-Laborers,—these are among our immediate tasks. We must devote ourselves not only to encouraging the farm laborers to establish special Councils of their own, but to establishing organizations of the poorest peasants that shall be distinct from those of the more well-to-do-peasants.
2.—Another ally of the Russian proletariat is the proletariat not only of the warring countries, but all countries. At present they are in the clutches of the war, and unfortunately are being betrayed by the social-patriotic "Socialists" who have deserted to the bourgeoisie. But the liberation of the proletariat from the influence of the social-patriots was furthered by every month of the imperialistic war, and the Russian Revolution will necessarily accelerate this process tremendously.
The proletariat of Russia must go hand in hand with these two allies, is, in fact, already so proceeding. The proletariat must utilize the peculiar opportunity of the present moment of transition for the conquest, first, of a democratic republic and the emancipation of the peasantry, and then for the realization of Socialism, which alone can give peace, bread and liberty to the peoples exhausted by the war,
III
The papers of April 16 contain the following resolution adopted by the Executive Committee of the Petrograd Council of Soldiers' Delegates:
"Whereas, we have received from comrades information concerning the spreading of subversive propaganda, proceeding under the cover of the flag of the Revolution, and sometimes even under the flag of the Social-Democracy, and conceiming particularly the propaganda of the so-called Leninites; and,
"Whereas, we consider this propaganda to be just as harmful as any counter-revolutionary propaganda from the Right; and,
"Whereas, we recognize the imposibility of taking any repressive measures against propaganda as long as it remains within the bounds of propaganda, therefore,
"We, the Executive Committee of the Soviet of Soldiers' Delegates, declare that it is absolutely necessary to take every possible step to oppose this propaganda with our own propaganda and agitation. We should aim at making our organization so strong that it will be able at any moment to oppose with our own activity every counter-revolutionary activity, no matter from what quarter it may proceed. We declare emphatically that the Executive Committee should, to combat the subversive agitation, undertake an agitation of its own, not only in the press but also in the military units."
If we dispose of the personal issue by placing alongside of this resolution the declaration of an article in Isvestya of April 17 against the "dishonorable and reprehensible campaign of villification," we «hall at once see what political division is actually based on the question under consideration.
The resolution declares that the propaganda of Lenin is "just as harmful as any counter-revolutionary propaganda from the Right."
Let us see wherein is the difference between (1) the counter-revolutionary propaganda from the Right; then (2) the propaganda in favor of the Provisional Government and supporting it; and finally (3) the propaganda of the Bolsheviki.
The Right desires the overthrow of the Provisional Government and a restoration of the monarchy.
The Provisional Government has promised to act in agreement with the Petrograd Soviets of Workers' and Soldiers' Delegates.
Our propaganda is: all the power of government must pass to the Soviets of Workers', Soldiers', Peasants', etc., Delegates, alone, as these Soviets are the representatives of the great majority of the people. To attain this end we must spread "understanding" of the situation, so that the majority of the people may realize the necessity of this transfer of power to the Soviets.
The Right, therefore, is for the power of the monarch. The capitalists are for power in the hands of capitalists, the Provisional Government being a government of capitalists. The Bolsheviki want to convince the majority of the people that all power should belong to the Councils of Workers, Soldiers and Peasants.
It is more than clear that the statement stigmatizing our agitation as "just as harmful as any counter-revolutionary propaganda from the Right" is incorrect even from the standpoint of those who advocate action in agreement with the Provisional Government. For these advocates themselves claim to base their position on the majority of the people! How then can they designate as "just as harmful as the Right" our propaganda which is persuading the majority to seize all power? This is a manifest absurdity.
The Soviet of Soldiers' Delegates will hardly be able to defend very long this attitude of their Executive Committee. We are firmly convinced that the majority of the people will not call our attitude "just as harmful as any counter-revolutionary propaganda from the Right"
- ↑ Lenin uses Karl Kautsky, the intellectual leader of German Socialism and of the Second International that collapsed during the war, as typifying the attitude of moderate Socialism. Moderate Socialism in action conceives the present state as the starting point of the introduction of Socialism, through the extension of the industries functions of the state, which is to be captured by the workers through political action. The Bolsheviki, and revolutionary Socialists generally, maintain that the extension of the industrial functions of the state is not and never can become Socialism, simply strengthening Capitalism; that the proletariat must overthrow the bourgeois states with its parliamentary regime and territorial representation, and organize the new state of the organized producers functioning as a "dictatorship of the proletariat" in the preliminary stage of the Social Revolution.—L. C. F.