Kerensky and his colleagues do not believe a bit in the promises of Admiral Koltchak in regard to the convening of the Constituent Assembly on a democratic basis. M. A. N. Briantchaninoff categorically rejects M. Kerensky. M. Miliukoff, as it appears, professes no confidence in the Constituent Assembly presided over by V. Tchernoff, and Admiral Koltchak even shoots its members, which crime M. Schreider will never forgive him. If there exists such a complete mistrust among the Russian groups in regard to one another, if people who know the valuable qualities of their fellow-countrymen release floods of accusations on one another, what faith is it possible to have, I will not say in the sincerity of their promises, but in the possibility of fulfilling them? IMPOSSIBILITY OF A RUSSIAN FEDERATION Besides personal confidence or mistrust, there are also much deeper reasons of an objective kind which clearly show that the promises of the Russian groups are, in spite of their good will, absolutely unrealisable. One would need to be imbued with an absolute Bolshevist disregard for the laws of historical continuity to admit that Russia, by the mere force of a decree and solely by the good will of honest people, will straightway pass from being a country subject to Tzarist despotism and unaccustomed to the respect of rights, of personality, and of nationalities, to a régime of equality of rights and justice for all. There are no big jumps in History; and if they are attempted, they are paid for grievously. The proof of this is afforded by the happenings in Russia, which, it was boasted, had passed without bloodshed from the autocratic régime of the Tzar to the “freest régime in the world”--the Lvov-Kerensky régime; but streams of blood and unheard-of cruelties have followed. Russia has fallen to ruins under the despotic régime of Lenin and Trotsky. HISTORICAL IMPOSSIBILITY OF AN ALL-RUSSIAN FEDERATION The history of centuries, customs and habits, rooted usages and popular psychology are much more effectual than the best intentions and decrees, which in the most favourable circumstances can only bring about an external change. But under the mask of the latter the Past continues to exist. We have already shown that in the proposal itself of the Russian Political Conference, under a new phraseology, there is concealed at the bottom the psychology of the Tzarist bureaucracy, of which the Russian Political Conference has not succeeded in freeing itself. If the old psychology is so sturdy in the minds of the best sons of Russia, who are accustomed to direct themselves according to the best theoretical conceptions, and who have been brought up in the atmosphere of European ideas, what then can be expected from the over-excited instincts of ignorant masses reared in utter contempt of another’s personality and rights?