On December 26, 1917, Lenin published in _Pravda_ a series of nineteen “theses” concerning the Constituent Assembly. He therein set forth the doctrine that although the elections had taken place after the Bolshevist _coup d’état_, and under the authority and protection of the temporary Soviet power, yet the elections gave no clear indication of the real mind of the masses of the people, because, forsooth, the Socialists-Revolutionists Party, whose candidates had been elected in a majority of the constituencies, had divided into a Right Wing and a Left Wing subsequent to the elections. That the differences between these factions would be fully threshed out in the Constituent Assembly was obvious. Nevertheless, Lenin announced that the Constituent Assembly just elected was not suitable. Again we are compelled to connect this announcement with the fact that the Bolsheviki had not succeeded in winning the support of the electorate. In these tortuous logomachies we encounter the same immoral doctrine that we have noticed in Lenin’s discussion of the demand for freedom of speech, publication, and assemblage. The demand for the convocation of the Constituent Assembly had been “an entirely just one in the program of revolutionary Social-Democracy” in the past, but now with the Bolsheviki in power it was a different matter! Whereas the Soviets had been declared to be the loyal protectors of the Constituent Assembly, Lenin’s new declaration was, “The Soviet Republic represents not only a higher form of democratic institutions (in comparison with the middle-class republic and the Constituent Assembly as its consummation), it is also the sole form which renders possible the least painful transition to Socialism.” When the Constituent Assembly finally convened on January 18, 1918, there were sailors and Lettish troops in the hall armed with rifles, hand-grenades, and machine-guns, placed there to intimidate the elected representatives of the people. The Bolshevist delegates demanded the adoption of a declaration by the Assembly which was tantamount to a formal abdication. One of the paragraphs in this declaration read: “Supporting the Soviet rule and _accepting the orders of the Council of People’s Commissaries_, the Constituent Assembly acknowledges its duty to outline a form for the reorganization of society.” When the Constituent Assembly, which represented more than thirty-six million votes, declined to adopt this declaration, the Bolsheviki withdrew and later, by force of arms, dispersed the Assembly. It was subsequently promised that arrangements for the election of a new Constituent Assembly would be made, but, as all the world knows, _no such elections have been held to this time_.