Bolshevism: The Enemy of Political and Industrial DemocracySpargo, John
History
Bolshevism: The Enemy of Political and Industrial Democracy
Spargo, John
Communism -- Soviet Union; Soviet Union -- History -- Revolution, 1917-1921
If there is any one thing which may be said with certainty concerning the
state of working-class opinion in Russia at that time, two months after the
overthrow of the old regime, it is that the overwhelming majority of the
working-people, both city workers and peasants, supported the policy of the
Mensheviki and the Socialist-Revolutionists--the policy of co-operating
with liberal bourgeois elements to win the war and create a stable
government--as against the policy of the Bolsheviki. The two votes of the
Petrograd Soviet told where the city workers stood. That very section of
the proletariat upon which the Bolsheviki leaders based their hopes had
repudiated them in the most emphatic manner. The Delegates of the Soldiers
at the Front had shown that they would not follow the advice of the leaders
of the Bolsheviki. And at the first opportunity which presented itself the
peasants placed themselves in definite opposition to Bolshevism.
On the afternoon preceding the action of the Soviet in giving its
indorsement to the new Provisional Government and instructing its
representatives to enter the Coalition Cabinet, there assembled in the
People's House, Petrograd, more than one thousand peasant delegates to the
first All-Russian Congress of Peasants. Never before had so many peasant
delegates been gathered together in Russia to consider their special
problems. There were present delegates from every part of Russia, even from
the extreme border provinces, and many from the front. On the platform were
the members of the Organizing Committee, the Executive Committee of the
Council of Workmen's and Soldiers' Delegates, the Socialist-Revolutionary
party, the Social Democratic party, and a number of prominent Socialist
leaders. As might be expected in a peasants' Congress, members of the
Socialist-Revolutionary party were in the majority, numbering 537. The next
largest group was the Social Democratic party, including Bolsheviki and
Mensheviki, numbering 103. There were 136 delegates described as
non-partizan; 4 belonged to the group called the "People's Socialists" and
6 to the Labor Group. It was the most representative body of peasant
workers ever brought together.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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