a special means of struggle suitable under special conditions. To confuse Bolshevism with "boycottism" would be as bad as confusing it with "boyevism".[22a] The difference between the Bolshevik and Menshevik lines of tactics is now quite clear and has taken shape in the fundamentally different resolutions adopted in the spring of 1905 at the Bolshevik Third Congress in London and the Menshevik Conference in Geneva. There was no talk then either of boycott or of "boyevism", nor could there have been. As everyone knows, our line of tactics differed essentially from the Menshevik line both in the elections to the Second Duma, when we were not boycottists, and in the Second Duma itself. The lines of tactics diverge in every field of the struggle whatever its means and methods may be, without any special methods of struggle peculiar to either line being created. And
if a boycott of the Third Duma were to be justified or caused by the collapse of revolutionary expectations in regard to the First or the Second Dumas, by the collapse of a "lawful", "strong", "stable", and "genuine" constitution, it would be Menshevism of the worst kind.
VI
We have left an examination of the strongest and the only Marxist arguments in favour of a boycott to the last. Active boycott has no meaning apart from a broad revolutionary upswing. Granted. But a broad upswing evolves from one that is not broad. Signs of a certain upswing are in evidence. The boycott slogan ought to be launched by us, since that slogan supports, develops, and expands the incipient upswing.
Such, in my opinion, is the basic argument which, in a more or less clear form, determines the tendency towards boycott among Social-Democrats. Moreover, the comrades who stand closest to direct proletarian work proceed not from any argumentation "constructed" according to a certain type, but from a sum total of impressions derived from their contact with the working-class masses.
One of the few questions on which so far it seems there are not, or were not, disagreements between the two factions of the Social-Democrats, is that of the reason for the protracted lull in the development of our revolution. "The proletariat has not recovered" -- that is the reason. Indeed, the brunt of the October-December struggle was borne by the proletariat alone. The proletariat alone fought in a systematic, organised, and unremitting way for the whole nation. No wonder that in a country with the smallest percentage of proletarian population (by European standards), the proletariat should have found itself utterly exhausted by such a struggle. Besides, ever since Deccmber the combined forces of governmental and bourgeois reaction have been striking their hardest all the time at the proletariat. Police percecutions and executions have decimated the ranks of the proletariat in the course of eighteen months, while systematic lock-outs, beginning with the "punitive" closing down of state-owned factories and ending with capitalist conspiracies against the workers, have increased poverty among the mass of the working class to an unprecedented extent. And now, some Social-Democratic functionaries say, there are signs of a rising challenge among the masses, a mustering of strength by the proletariat. This rather vague and indefinite impression is supported by a stronger argument, namely, indubitable evidence of a business revival in certain branches of industry. The growing demand for workers should inevitably intensify the strike movement. The workers will be bound to attempt to make up for at least some of the tremendous losses they sustained in the period of repression and lock-outs. Finally, the third and most powerful argument is the one that points not to a problematical or generally expected strike movement, but to a single great strike already decided upon by the workers' organisations. At the beginning of 1907, the representatives of 10,000 textile workers discussed their position and outlined steps for strengthening the trade unions in that industry. The delegates have met again, this time representing 20,000 workers, and they resolved to call a general strike of the textile workers in July 1907. This movement may involve up to 400,000 workers. It originates in the Moscow region, i.e., the biggest centre of the labour movement in Russia and the biggest trade and industrial centre. It is in Moscow, and only in Moscow, that the mass workers' movement is most likely to develop into a wide popular movement of decisive political importance. As for the textile workers, they are the worst paid and least developed element of the total of the working class, who participated least of all in previous movements and who have the closest connections with the peasantry. The initiative of such workers may be an indication that the movement will embrace much wider strata of the proletariat than before. As regards the connection between the strike movement and the revolutionary upswing of the masses, this has already been demonstrated repeatedly in the history of the Russian revolution.
It is the bounden duty of the Social-Democrats to concentrate supreme attention and special efforts on this move-
page 46
ment. Work in this field should certainly be given precedence over the elections to the Octobrist Duma. The masses should be made to see the necessity of converting this strike movement into a general and broad attack on the autocracy. That is just what the boycott slogan means -- a shifting of attention from the Duma to the direct mass struggle. The boycott slogan means imbuing the new movement with a political and revolutionary content.
Such, roughly, is the train of thought which has led certain Social-Democrats to the conviction that the Third Duma must be boycotted. This argument in favour of the boycott is undoubtedly a Marxist one, and has nothing in common with the bare repetition of a slogan dissociated from specific historical conditions.
But strong as this argument is, it is not enough, in my opinion, to make us accept the boycott slogan straightaway. This argument emphasises what no Russian Social-Democrat who ponders the lessons of our revolution should have any doubts about, namely, that we cannot renounce boycott, that we must be prepared to put that slogan forward at the proper time, and that our way of stating the boycott issue has nothing in common with the liberal, wretchedly philistine way -- to keep clear of it or not to keep clear of it?* -- which is devoid of all revolutionary content.
Let us take it for granted that everything the Social Democratic adherents of the boycott say about the changed temper of the workers, about the industrial revival, and about the July strike of the textile workers is wholly in accord with the facts.
What follows from all this? We have before us the beginning of a partial upswing of revolutionary import.**
* See Tovarishch for a specimen of liberal argumentation by L. Martov, a former contributor to Social-Democratic publications and now a contributor to liberal newspapers.
** Some hold that the textile strike is a movement of a new type which sets the trade-union movement apart from the revolutionary movement. But we pass over this view, first because to read a pessimistic meaning into all symptoms of phenomena of a complex type is generally a dangerous practice which often muddles many Social Democrats who are not quite "firm in the saddle". Secondly, if the textile strike was found to have these characteristics we Social-Democrats would have to fight against them in the most energetic man- [cont. onto p. . -- DJR] ner. Consequently, in the event of the success of our struggle the question would be just as we have stated it.
page 47
Must we make every effort to support and develop it, and try to convert it into a general revolutionary upswing, and then into a movement of an aggressive type? Undoubtedly. There can be no two opinions about this among the Social-Democrats (except, perhaps, those contributing to Tovarishch ). But do we need the boycott slogan for developing the movement at this very moment, at the beginning of this partial upswing, before it has definitely passed into a general upswing? Is this slogan capable of promoting the movement today? This is a different question, one which, in our opinion, would have to be answered in the negative.
A general upswing can and should be developed from a partial upswing by direct and immediate arguments and slogans without any relation to the Third Duma. The entire course of events after December fully confirms the Social-Democratic view on the role of the monarchist constitution, on the necessity of direct struggle. Citizens, we shall say, if you do not want to see the cause of democracy in Russia going steadily faster and faster downhill as it did after December 1905 during the hegemony of the Cadet gentlemen over the democratic movement, then support the incipient workers' movement, support the direct mass struggle. Without it there can be no guarantee of freedom in Russia.
Agitation of this type would undoubtedly be a perfectly consistent revolutionary-Social-Democratic agitation. Would we necessarily have to add to it: Don't believe in the Third Duma, citizens, and look at us, Social-Democrats, who are boycotting it as proof of our protest!
Such an addition under prevailing conditions is not only unnecessary, but sounds rather odd, sounds almost like mockery. In any case, no one believes in the Third Duma, i.e., among the strata of the population that are capable of sustaining the democratic movement there is not and cannot be any of that enthusiasm for the constitutional institution of the Third Duma that undoubtedly existed among the public at large for the First Duma, for the first attempts in Russia to set up any kind of institutions provided they were constitutional.
Widespread public interest in 1905 and the beginning of 1906 was focused on the first representative institution, even though it was based on a monarchist constitution. That is a fact. That is what the Social-Democrats had to fight against and show up as clearly as possible.
Not so today. It is not enthusiasm for the first "parliament" that forms a characteristic feature of the moment, not belief in the Duma, but unbelief in an upswing.
Under these conditions we shall not be strengthening the movement by prematurely putting forward the boycott slogan, we shall not be paralysing the real obstacles to that movement. Moreover, by doing so we even risk weakening the force of our agitation, for the boycott is a slogan associated with an upswing that has taken definite shape, but the trouble now is that wide circles of the population do not believe in the upswing, do not see its strength.
We must first of all see to it that the strength of this upswing is demonstrated in actual fact, and we shall always have time afterwards to put forward the slogan which indirectly expresses that strength. Even so it is a question whether a revolutionary movement of an aggressive character requires a special slogan diverting attention from . . . the Third Duma. Possibly not. In order to pass by something that is important and really capable of rousing the enthusiasm of the inexperienced crowd who have never seen a parliament before, it may be necessary to boycott the thing that should be passed by. But in order to pass by an institution that is absolutely incapable of rousing the enthusiasm of the democratic or semi-democratic crowd of today it is not necessary to proclaim a boycott. The crux of the matter now is not in a boycott, but in direct and immediate efforts to convert the partial upswing into a general upswing, the trade-union movement into a revolutionary movement, the defence against lock-outs into an offensive against reaction.
VII
To sum up. The boycott slogan was the product of a special historical period. In 1905 and the beginning of 1906, the objective state of affairs confronted the contending
social forces with the immediate choice between the path of direct revolution or that of a turn to a monarchist constitution. The purpose of the campaign for a boycott was mainly to combat constitutional illusions. The success of the boycott depended on a sweeping, universal, rapid, and powerful upswing of the revolution.
In all these respects the state of affairs now, towards the autumn of 1907, does not call for such a slogan and does not justify it.
While continuing our day-to-day work of preparing for the elections, and while not refusing beforehand to take part in representative institutions, however reactionary, we must direct all our propaganda and agitation towards explaining to the people the connection between the December defeat and the whole subsequent decline of liberty and desecration of the constitution. We must instil in the masses the firm conviction that unless there is a direct mass struggle such desecration will inevitably continue and grow worse.
While not renouncing the use of the boycott slogan at times of rising revolution, when the need for such a slogan may seriously arise, we must at the present moment exert every effort in an endeavour by our direct and immediate influence to convert one or another upswing of the working class movement into a sweeping, universal, revolutionary, and aggressive movement against reaction as a whole, against its foundations.
June 26, 1907
NOTES
[1] The article "Against Boycott
" was published at the end of July 1907 in a pamphlet entitled Concerning the Boycott of the Third Duma printed by the illegal Social-Democratic press in St. Petersburg. Its cover bore the fictitious inscription: "Moscow, 1907, Gorizontov Press, 40, Tverskaya". The pamphlet was confiscated in September 1907.
[p. 15]
[2] This refers to the Fourth Delegate Congress of the All-Russian Teachers' Union, held June 19-24 (July 2-7), 1907, in Finland. It was attended by 50 Socialist-Revolutionary, 23 Social-Democrat and 18 non-party delegates, representing nearly two thousand organised teachers of Russia. The following questions were on the agenda: adoption of the Union Rules, elections to the Third Duma, attitude towards other trade unions, attitude towards the modern Zemstvo, boycott of discharged teachers' posts, mutual benefit societies, and other items. The Congress was held in an atmosphere of tense ideological struggle between the Social-Democrats and the Socialist-Revolutionaries.
In calling the Teachers' Union a "professional and political" union, Lenin had in mind that under Clause I of the Rules it fought for a free school while at the same time endeavouring to improve the material conditions of the teachers; it was, at one and the same time, a teachers' trade union and a political league of struggle for a free school.
[p. 17]
[3] Socialist-Revolutionaries (S.R.'s) -- a petty-bourgeois party formed in Russia at the end of 1901 and beginning of 1902 through the amalgamation of various Narodnik groups and circles (The "Union of Socialist-Revolutionaries", "Party of Socialist-Revolutionaries", and others). Its official organs were the newspaper
Revolutsionnaya Rossiya (Revolutionary Russia ) (1900-05) and the magazines
Vestnik Russkoi Revolutsii (Herald of the Russian Revolution ) (1901-05) and
Znamya Truda (Banner of Labour ) (1907-14). The S.R.'s failed to perceive the class distinctions between the proletariat and petty proprietors; they glossed over the class differentiation and antagonisms within the peasantry, and rejected the leading role of the proletariat in the revolution. The views of the S.R.'s were an eclectic medley of Narodism and revisionism; they tried, as Lenin put it, to "patch up the rents in the Narodnik ideas with bits of fashionable opportunist 'criticism' of Marxism"
(see present edition, Vol. 9, p. 310 [Transcriber's Note: See Lenin's "Socialism and the Peasantry". --
DJR]). The tactics of individual terrorism which the S.R.'s advocated as the principal method of struggle against the autocracy caused great harm to the revolutionary movement, since it made it difficult to organise the masses for the revolutionary struggle.
The agrarian programme of the S.R.'s envisaged the abolition of private ownership of the land and its transfer to the village communes on the basis of the "labour principle" and "equalised" land tenure, as well as the development of co-operatives of all kinds. The S.R.'s called this programme "socialisation of the land", but there was nothing socialist about it. Lenin's analysis of it showed that the preservation of commodity production and private farming on the common land does not eliminate the domination of capital, does not save the toiling peasants from exploitation and ruin nor can co-operation be a saving remedy for the small peasants under capitalism, since it serves to enrich the rural bourgeoisie. At the same time Lenin pointed out that the demand for equalised land tenure while not socialist, was of a historically progressive revolutionary-democratic nature, since it was aimed against reactionary landlordism.
The Bolshevik Party exposed the S.R.'s attempts to masquerade as socialists, waged an unremitting struggle against the S.R.'s for influence on the peasantry, and revealed the harm their tactics of individual terrorism were causing the labour movement. At the same time the Bolsheviks were prepared, on definite terms, to come to temporary agreements with the S.R.'s in the struggle against tsarism.
The heterogeneous class character of the peasantry determined the political and ideological instability and organisational disunity of the S.R. Party, and its members' continual vacillation between the liberal bourgeoisie and the proletariat. Already during the first Russian revolution of 1905-07 its Right wing split away from the party and formed the legal "Trudovik Popular Socialist Party" (Popular Socialists), whose views were close to those of the Constitutional-Democrats; the Left wing organised itself into the semi-anarchist League of "Maximalists". During the Stolypin reaction the S.R. Party was in a state of complete collapse ideologically and organisationally. The First World War found most of the S.R.'s taking a social-chauvinist stand.
After the victory of the bourgeois-democratic revolution of February 1917, the S.R.'s, together with the Mensheviks and Cadets were the mainstay of the counter-revolutionary Provisional Government of the bourgeoisie and landlords, and the leaders of the party (Kerensky, Avksentyev, Chernov) were members of that government. The S.R. Party refused to support the peasants' demands for the abolition of landlordism and stood for private ownership of the land; the S.R. ministers in the Provisional Government sent punitive expeditions against the peasants who had seized the landlords' estates.
At the end of November 1917 the Left wing of the party founded a separate Left Socialist-Revolutionary Party. In an endeavour to maintain their influence among the peasant masses, the Left S.R.'s formally recognised the Soviet government and entered into an agreement with the Bolsheviks, but very soon turned against the Soviet power.
During the years of foreign military intervention and civil war the S.R.'s engaged in counter-revolutionary subversive activities, zealously supported the interventionists and whiteguard generals, took part in counter-revolutionary plots, and organised terrorist acts against leaders of the Soviet state and Communist Party. After the civil war they continued their anti-Soviet activities within the country and as whiteguard émigrés abroad.
[p. 17]
[4] Coup d'état of June 3 (16), 1907 -- a counter-revolutionary act by which the government dissolved the Second Duma and altered the electoral law. On the basis of a trumped-up charge framed by the Okhranka (the secret police) against the Social-Democratic members of the Duma, accusing them of being connected with a military organisation and preparing an armed uprising, Stolypin, on June 1907, demanded that these members be banned from taking part in the Duma sittings, sixteen members of the Social-Democratic group in the Duma were to be arrested. A committee was set up by the Duma to verify the charge. Without waiting for the results of this committee's investigations, the government, on the night of June 3 (16) had the Social-Democratic group arrested. On June 3 the tsar's manifesto dissolved the Duma and announced modifications in the electoral law, which greatly increased representation of the landlords and the commercial and industrial bourgeoisie in the Duma and considerably reduced the already meagre representation of the workers and peasants. This was a gross violation of the Manifesto of October 17, 1905 and the Fundamental Law of 1906 under which no laws could be issued by the government without the approval of the Duma.
Under the new electoral law one elector was elected to the landowners' curia from 230 people, to the urban curia of the first degree from 1,000 people, to the urban curia of the second degree from 15,000 people, to the peasants' curia from 60,000 people, and to the workers' curia from 125,000 people. The landlords and bourgeoisie were able to elect 65 per cent of all the electors, the peasants 22 per cent (formerly 42 per cent), and the workers 2 per cent (formerly 4 per cent). The law deprived the indigenous population of Asiatic Russia and the Turkic peoples of the Astrakhan and Stavropol gubernias of the franchise, and reduced the number of deputies returned by Poland and the Caucasus by half. All persons throughout Russia who did not know the Russian language were deprived of the franchise. The Third Duma elected on the basis of this law, which assembled on November 1, 1907, was a Duma of Black-Hundred and Octobrist deputies.
The coup d'état of June 3 was, in Lenin's words, "a turning-point in the history of our revolution" (see present edition, Vol. 15, "The Straight Road"), which ushered in the period of Stolypin reaction.
[p. 17]
[5] The Bulygin Duma -- the consultative "representative body" which the tsarist government had promised to convene in 1905. The tsar's manifesto the law providing for the establishment of the Duma, and regulations governing elections to it were promulgated on August 6 (19),1905. It came to be known as the Bulygin Duma because the Bill inaugurating it was drafted on the tsar's instructions by A. G. Bulygin the Minister of the Interior. Electoral rights were granted only to the landlords, the big capitalists, and a small number of peasant householders. The peasants were given only 51 out of the 412 seats established by the law. The majority of the population -- the workers, poor peasants, farm-labourers, and democratic intelligentsia -- were deprived of the franchise. Women, servicemen, students, persons under twenty-five, and a number of subject nationalities were not allowed to vote. The Duma had no right to pass laws and could merely discuss certain questions in the capacity of a consultative body under the tsar. Lenin described the Bulygin Duma as "the most barefaced mockery of 'popular representation'" (see present edition, Vol. 9, p. 194 [Transcriber's Note: See Lenin's "'Oneness of the Tsar and the People, and of the People and the Tsar'". --
DJR]).
The Bolsheviks called upon the workers and peasants to actively boycott the Bulygin Duma, and concentrated their agitational campaign around the slogans of an armed uprising, a revolutionary army, and a provisional revolutionary government. The Mensheviks considered it possible to take part in the elections to the Duma and stood for co-operation with the liberal bourgeoisie.
The Bulygin Duma boycott campaign was used by the Bolsheviks to rally all the revolutionary forces, to organise mass political strikes, and to prepare for an armed uprising. The elections to the Bulygin Duma did not take place, and the government failed to convene it. It was swept away by the mounting wave of revolution and the All-Russian political strike of October 1905. On the subject of the Bulygin Duma, see Lenin's articles "The Constitutional Market-Place", "The Boycott of the Bulygin Duma, and Insurrection", "Oneness of the Tsar and the People, and of the People and the Tsar", "In the Wake of the Monarchist Bourgeoisie, Or in the Van of the Revolutionary Proletariat and Peasantry?" and others (see present edition, Vol. 8, pp. 351-55; Vol. 9, pp. 179-87, 191-99, 212-23).
[p. 18]
[6] The Ninth of January 1905 -- "Bloody Sunday", the day on which by order of the tsar, a peaceful procession of St. Petersburg workers was shot down. The workers were marching to the Winter Palace to present a petition to the tsar.
This cold-blooded massacre of unarmed workers started a wave of mass political strikes and demonstrations all over Russia under the slogan of "Down with the Autocracy!".
The events of January 9 precipitated the revolution of 1905-07.
[p. 19]
[7] Potemkin -- armoured cruiser of the Russian Black Sea Fleet, the crew of which mutinied on June 14-24, 1905. The revolutionary outbreak on the Potemkin was of great political importance, since it was the first time that any big tsarist military unit had joined the revolution.
[p. 19]
[8] The Witte Duma -- Russia's First Duma, convened on April 27 (May 10), 1906 on a franchise drafted by the Prime Minister Witte. Although the electoral law governing elections to the First Duma was anti-democratic, the tsar did not succeed in convening a wholly docile Duma. The majority in the Duma were Cadets, who tried to win the confidence of the peasantry with false promises of reforms, including an agrarian reform.
The tsarist government dissolved the Duma on July 8 (21), 1906.
[p. 21]
[9] The man in the muffler -- the chief character in Chekhov's story of the same name, typifying the narrow-minded philistine, who fights shy of all innovations and display of initiative.
[p. 22]
[10] See Friedrich Engels,
Flüchtlingsliteratur, Internationales aus dem Volksstaat, Berlin, 1957.
[p. 23]
[11] The Fourth (Unity
) Congress of the R.S.D.L.P. was held in Stockholm, April 10-25 (April 23-May 8), 1906.
It was attended by 112 delegates with the right to vote, representing 57 local organisations, and 22 consultative delegates. In addition, there were representatives from the non-Russian Social-Democratic parties: three each from those of Poland and Lithuania, the Bund, the Lettish Social-Democratic Labour Party, and one each from the Ukrainian Social-Democratic Labour Party and the Labour Party of Finland, and a representative of the Bulgarian Social-Democratic Labour Party. The Bolshevik delegates included F. A. Artyom (Sergeyev), M. F. Frunze, M. I. Kalinin, V. I. Lenin, S. G. Shaumyan, and V. V. Vorovsky. The Congress discussed the agrarian question, the current situation and the class tasks of the proletariat, the attitude towards the Duma, and organisational questions. There was a sharp struggle between the Bolsheviks and the Mensheviks on all issues. Lenin delivered reports and made speeches at the Congress on the agrarian question, on the current situation, on the tactics to be assumed in regard to the elections to the Duma on the armed uprising, and other questions.
The Mensheviks' numerical preponderance at the Congress, though slight, determined the character of the Congress decisions. On a number of questions the Congress adopted Menshevik resolutions the agrarian programme, the attitude towards the Duma, etc.). The Congress adopted Lenin's formulation of Paragraph One of the Party Rules. The Congress admitted into the R.S.D.L.P. the non-Russian Social-Democratic organisations: the Social-Democratic Party of Poland and Lithuania, and the Lettish Social-Democratic Labour Party and adopted a draft laying down the conditions on which the Bund could join the R.S.D.L.P.
The Central Committee elected at the Congress consisted of three Bolsheviks and seven Mensheviks. Only Mensheviks were elected to the Editorial Board of the Central Organ.
An analysis of the Congress is given in Lenin's pamphlet
Report on the Unity Congress of the R.S.D.L.P. (See present edition, Vol. 10, pp. 317-82.)
[p. 27]
[12] Dubasov -- the Governor-General of Moscow who suppressed the Moscow armed uprising in December 1905.
Stolypin -- Russian Prime Minister.
[p. 29]
[13] Cadets -- (abbreviated) members of the Constitutional-Democratic Party, the chief party of the liberal-monarchist bourgeoisie in Russia. Founded in October 1905, its membership was made up of representatives of the bourgeoisie, Zemstvo leaders of the landowning class, and bourgeois intellectuals. Leading personalities of the party were P. N. Milyukov, S. A. Muromtsev, V. A. Maklakov, A. I. Shingarev, P. B. Struve, and F. I. Rodichev, among others. To hoodwink the working people the Cadets called themselves the "Party of People's Freedom". Actually, they did not go beyond the demand for a constitutional monarchy. They considered it their chief aim to combat the revolutionary movement, and sought to share the power with the tsar and the feudal landlords. During the First World War the Cadets actively supported the tsarist government's aggressive foreign policy. During the bourgeois-democratic revolution of February 1917 they tried their hardest to save the monarchy. They used their key positions in the bourgeois Provisional Government to pursue a counter-revolutionary policy opposed to the interests of the people, but favouring the U.S., British, and French imperialists. After the victory of the October Revolution the Cadets came out as implacable enemies of the Soviet power. They took part in all the counter-revolutionary armed actions and campaigns of the interventionists. Living abroad as émigrés after the defeat of the interventionists and whiteguards, the Cadets did not cease their anti-Soviet counter-revolutionary activities.
[p. 30]
[14] Tovarishch (The Comrade
) -- a bourgeois daily published in St. Petersburg from March 15 (28), 1906 to December 30, 1907 (January 12, 1908). Though formally not the organ of any particular party it was in fact the mouthpiece of the Left Cadets. Active contributors were S. N. Prokopovich and Y. D. Kuskova. The newspaper also published contributions from Mensheviks.
[p. 31]
[15] Leaflet of the C.C. -- "Letter to Party Organisations" No. 1 written in connection with the coup d'état of June 3. "The proletariat and its spokesman -- revolutionary Social-Democracy," the letter states, "cannot leave the government's act of violence unanswered and unprotested. Social-Democracy does not give up the idea of continuing and developing the revolution." Without calling for immediate action the C.C. of the R.S.D.L.P. appealed to the Party organisations to "support and go the whole way in developing mass movements as they arise, and in cases where the active and decisive support of the broad masses can be counted on, to immediately take upon themselves the initiative in the movement and notify the C.C. about it".
[p. 35]
[16] See Marx's letter to Kugelmann of March 3. 1869. (K. Marx and F. Engels,
Selected Correspondence, Moscow, p. 263).
[p. 37]
[17] Balalaikin -- a character in Saltykov-Shchedrin's
Modern Idyll ; a liberal windbag, adventurer, and humbug, who places his selfish interests above all else.
Molchalin -- a character in Griboyedov's play Wit Works Woe typifying an unprincipled climber and toady.
[p. 39]
[18] K. Marx and F. Engels,
Selected Works, Vol. I, 1958, p. 497. [Transcriber's Note: See Marx's
The Civil War in France. --
DJR]
[p. 40]
[19] Black Hundreds -- monarchist gangs formed by the tsarist police to combat the revolutionary movement. They assassinated revolutionaries, assaulted progressive intellectuals, and organised anti-Jewish pogroms.
[p. 41]
[20] Octobrists -- members of the Octobrist party (or Union of October Seventeenth), founded in Russia after the promulgation of the tsar's Manifesto of October 17 (30), 1905. It was a counter-revolutionary party representing and defending the interests of the big bourgeoisie and landlords who engaged in capitalist farming. Its leaders were the well-known industrialist and Moscow houseowner A. I. Guchkov and the big landowner M. V. Rodzyanko. The Octobrists unreservedly supported the home and foreign policies of the tsarist government.
[p. 41]
[21] Proletary (The Proletarian
) (Geneva issue) -- an illegal Bolshevik weekly, central organ of the R.S.D.L.P., founded in accordance with a resolution of the Third Congress of the Party. By a decision of a plenary meeting of the Party's Central Committee on April 7 (May 10), 1905, Lenin was appointed Editor-in-Chief of the paper. It was published in Geneva from May 14 (27) to November 12 (25), 1905. Altogether twenty-six issues were brought out.
Proletary followed tbe line of the old, Lenin Iskra, and maintained full continuity of policy with the Bolshevik newspaper
Vperyod.
Lenin wrote about 90 articles and items for Proletary, whose political character, ideological content, and Bolshevik angle they determined. Lenin performed a tremendous job as the paper's manager and editor. V. V. Vorovsky, A. V. Lunacharsky and M. S. Olminsky regularly took part in the work of the editorial board. Important work was also done by N. K. Krupskaya, V. M. Velichkina, and V. A. Karpinsky. The paper had close ties with the labour movement in Russia, publishing articles and items written by workers who participated directly in the revolutionary movement. The collection of correspondence locally and its delivery to Geneva were organised by V. D. Bonch-Bruyevich, S. I. Gusev, and A. I. Ulyanova-Yelizarova. The editors' correspondence with the local Party organisations and readers was handled by N. K. Krupskaya and L. A. Fotieva.
Proletary reacted immediately to all important events in the Russian and international labour movement and waged an irreconcilable struggle against the Mensheviks and other opportunist revisionist elements. The newspaper carried out a great deal of work in propaganda for the decisions of the Third Congress of the Party and played an important part in organising and ideologically uniting the Bolsheviks. It consistently defended revolutionary Marxism and worked out all the fundamental issues of the revolution which was developing in Russia. By highlighting the events of 1905
Proletary helped to rouse the broad masses of the working people to the struggle for the victory of the revolution.
Proletary exercised great influence on the local Social-Democratic organisations. Some of Lenin's articles in the paper were reprinted in local Bolshevik papers and circulated in leaflet form. Publication of
Proletary was discontinued shortly after Lenin's departure for Russia at the beginning of November 1905. The last two issues (Nos. 25 and 26) were edited by V. V. Vorovsky, but for them too Lenin wrote several articles, which were published after his departure from Geneva.
[p. 42]
[22] Proletary (The Proletarian
) (Russian issue) -- an illegal Bolshevik newspaper published from August 21 (September 3), 1906 to November 8 (December 11), 1909 under the editorship of Lenin. Altogether 50 issues were put out. An active part in the work of the Editorial Board was taken by M. F. Vladimirsky, V. V. Vorovsky, A. V. Lunacharsky, and I. F. Dubrovinsky. The technical work was handled by Y. S. Schlichter, A. G. Schlichter, and others. The first twenty issues were prepared for the press and set up in Vyborg (printing from the matrices sent was organised in St. Petersburg for purposes of secrecy the newspaper carried the statement that it was published in Moscow). Eventually, owing to the extremely difficult conditions created for the publication of an illegal organ in Russia, the Editorial Board of
Proletary, in accordance with a decision of the St. Petersburg and Moscow committees of the R.S.D.L.P. arranged to have the paper published abroad (Nos. 21-40 were issued in Geneva, and Nos. 41-50 in Paris).
Proletary was in fact the Central Organ of the Bolsheviks. The bulk of the work on the Editorial Board was done by Lenin. Most of the issues carried several articles by him. Altogether over 100 articles and items by Lenin on all vital issues of the revolutionary struggle of the working class were published in
Proletary. The paper devoted a good deal of space to tactical and general political questions, and published reports on the activities of the C.C of the R.S.D.L.P., the decisions of conferences and C.C. plenary meetings, C.C. letters on various questions of Party activity, and a number of other documents. The paper was in close touch with the local Party organisations.
During the years of the Stolypin reaction Proletary played an important role in preserving and strengthening the Bolshevik organisations and combating the liquidators, otzovists, ultimatists and god-builders. At the plenary meeting of the Party's Central Committee in January 1910 the Mensheviks, with the help of the conciliators, succeeded in obtaining a decision to close down the paper on the pretext of fighting factionalism.
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[22a] Boyevism -- from the Russian word
boyevik, a member of the revolutionary fighting squads, who, during the revolutionary struggle, used the tactics of armed action, helped political prisoners to escape, expropriated state-owned funds for the needs of the revolution, removed spies and
agent provocateurs, etc. During the revolution of 1905-07 the Bolsheviks had special fighting squads.
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