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Lunacharsky Articles and speeches on international politicsOn the bend
One of the most burning questions of our time is the question of whether the Duma labor group will free itself from the influence, or rather, from the tutelage of the Cadets Party. There are already some indications that the labor group is coming to its senses and is beginning to understand that it has no place in the tail of the bourgeois liberals, or even alongside them. The thought of the Cadet Party, the meaning of all its tactics, what they are proud of not only before the people, but also before Europe and, finally, before themselves, is their peacefulness, peacefulness, at all costs. From the point of view of the individual, it is based on the friability, on the hereditary Oblomovism of the Russian liberal landowner - and the Russian "established" intellectual. From the class point of view, there is a historical class slyness in the Cadets' love of peace; the middle class, on the contrary, the sharper the struggle, the deeper layers of the people act in close phalanxes, realize and partly create the power of the masses. Oblomov's friability formulates the soul of Cadet tactics as follows: "We do not want the horrors of bloodshed, human life is too dear to us, let the movement grow slowly, let its fruits be half-hearted, it is still better than blood!" This is what Oblomov's humanity says, this is how it weakens the crisis, which could be salutary, atoning for the suffering of entire future generations with a period of open struggle. The lower classes value human life less, because the life that they are allowed to live costs nothing, and all the more brightly shines in the eyes of the destitute what he can conquer; over the Oblomovs they don’t drip, they value more what is, and therefore less what should be implemented.
Class slyness, and it must be said that among some Cadets it shows through very transparently, is expressed differently. The newspaper Volna has already noted the chagrin with which Mr. Struve stated that "they" did not even want to bargain, and in Duma No. literally repeats this expression: "foreign countries do not allow such a reception," he writes in his editorial: "in which they do not compromise, do not bargain, but directly challenge the country." The Cadets assured, and sincerely, the weak Cadets, that in the address they enumerated the minimum requirements, striving to achieve the unanimity of the Duma; but the crafty Cadets are gradually blurting out their thought: that was the maximum, with a request. In the same No. 18 of The Duma, the author of the note “In the Higher Spheres” states with bated breath that it seems that there, in the higher spheres, “the consciousness of the need to reckon with the moral demands of the people is finally seeping through.” O! the crafty Cadets would have thrown it off, there is no doubt about it. The Cadets would improve a great deal if the government even took a step to the left. One can almost certainly say that they would agree to support the Shipov-Urus ministry with a corresponding program. And they would have been admirably able to defend their new position, and the Cadet bumpkins, the plump Cadet idealists, would have gone after the Cadet snakes. The whole party would have spoken in unison: “We gave the country a small constitution, the mountain of our promises gave birth to a mouse, but on the other hand the birth was bloodless, on the other hand, it’s a tit right in the hands, on the other hand, we led the state ship so that it avoided the danger of sharp upheavals in which the people perhaps he would have caught a crane, or perhaps he would have simply broken his neck. Citizens! our winnings are small, but we played for sure.” And how they would attack the "bloodthirsty troublemakers" who want to put the blood of the people at stake, how energetically they would move forward those "convict laws" that now huddle like drafts in the backyard of the Rech.
But in order for the Cadets to finally turn into guardians of the constitution, the government needs to take at least a small step to the left, a couple of briefcases are needed for the Cadet "geniuses", some reforms are needed, even if they crawl with the speed of snails, a decent measure of promises is needed. finally, for the government to wash the blood off their faces and hands. But the government doesn't want it yet. And the Cadets begin to glance "to the left and down." It's amusing to read how the defector Izgoev, now a cadet in soul, urges the people in the "Speech": "well, well, what are you? - push brother, give us weight, support.
Shakespearean kings, when some dethroned Richard disturbs their hearts, usually sigh. “Oh, if I had friends, would I be sad? Friends are found, Richard is dying. but instead of a reward, the angry king thunders: "You killed my Richard - into exile!" “But you yourself ordered!” - "Lies: we hate murder." Sometimes kings do this through the servants, through the black girls; the Cadet "kings" are doing the same thing through the black girl - Izgoev. He's writing:
With the requirement of "cases" they turn to the wrong address. This demand must first of all be addressed to the people.
But not only does the “deal” turn out to be up to the people, the Duma must, according to Izgoev, thoroughly wash its hands:
If the masses of the people are already sufficiently prepared to impart to the moral strength of their chosen ones, when the government does not retreat before it, all the might of physical strength, then everything happens of itself. Representatives of the people should not emphasize anything, draw up special resolutions, handle manifestos.
See how! In this way, it is possible to maintain innocence before the government and acquire capital: “We, your in-company, the people did not rebel, it was he himself!” And at the same time, let the people scare, so that not ambiguously, but directly shouting: “Our stomachs are for the Duma - we will put our mother!” And for this purpose, the newspaper Duma, without spoiling the porridge with a drop of rancid butter, reprinted a whole half of Comrade Potresov's article from Kurier. This article is divided into two halves: so the Cadets reprinted the half where Comrade Potresov advises to support the Duma with all his might, while the one where the author speaks of the need for the Duma to support the revolutionary movement was omitted. Isn't it significant? But now even Comrade Potresov is no longer in favor with the Cadets, and an eminent Social-Democrat has been found who turned out to be much more to their liking: Comrade Potrosov made a certain demand to the Duma, urged it to set foot on the path of self-organized organization of small people's units; - Comrade Plekhanov does not lay down any conditions, Plekhanov recognizes the notorious "organic" work, that is, the very Frankfurt chatter that Marx scourged, as a most instructive school for the people. Marx wrote: "instead of surrounding itself with the armed force of the people, the assembly moved on to the next business after each act of violence on the part of the government." And Comrade Plekhanov promises the Duma unconditional support, if only it, avoiding too sharp conflicts, will engage in its regular instructive chatter. The meaning of Comrade Plekhanov's new teaching is this: the Russian people are not yet strong enough to have a parliament—they need a pacifier, they need a talking shop.
As far as we are concerned, the slogan "support the Duma" by no means satisfies us. It means, obviously, to support the Duma Cadet majority in its so far unsuccessful trade. T. Potresov proposes to straighten the "crooked paths" of the Cadets. We think that if anything other than the grave can fix a hunchbacked man, then it is not the gilded, although bitter pills of a comrade from the Courier, but a serious surgical operation: straightening the crooked Cadet paths can only be done with a hammer, and if they do not straighten even with a hammer, then they will have to throw the crooked nail into outer darkness.
And the hammer is already forming. This is a labor group, the more it goes on, the more it frees itself from under the tutelage of the Cadets. There is no doubt that the Cadets were the guardians of the Trudoviks, they succeeded in jokingly drawing them into various "unprofitable deals", they are patronizing them even now through the mouth of the "irreproachable" Muromtsev, who, to this day, does not stop making stern remarks every time, like one of the Trudoviks will want to name this or that particular part of the created tragicomic situation with suitable words. The last act of guardianship that became known before this article was written was a clash between the chairman and deputy Onipko, which ended with the following statement by the chairman:
I consider it my duty to make a clarification on this point, once it has been raised.
The ministers spoke here on the basis of the law. 40 art. Institutions on the Duma says that ministers must be heard every time they say so. In addition, under the same article, they must give explanations to the State Duma on requests submitted to them and on which they find it possible to respond.
Thus, ministers can speak for two reasons: 1) when asked by the Duma; 2) when they themselves find it necessary to speak.
Mr. Muromtsev stands for the law, whatever it may be: just like Minister Shcheglovitov.
But the most important thing is that Mr. Muromtsev considers any direct appeal to the people absolutely unparliamentary. Mr. Muromtsev is trying to swindle the Trudoviks in the manner of the Cadets.
As soon as the Trudoviks started talking and began to determine "where are yours and where are ours", the Cadets became angry, their newspapers are full of sweet and sour "corrections" to the "inaccuracies" of the Trudoviks. Thus, for example, the Cadets find it inaccurate that it was the Trudoviks who insisted on including in the address a clause on the mandatory alienation of privately owned lands. But the Trudoviks repeated their assertion and, recognizing that the Cadets were true friends of the people, not without irony pointed out through the mouth of Deputy Bondarev that they had to be urged in order to frankly express all their sincere wishes. Recall, readers, that one Cadet somehow slipped through the confession that their party is "much more right" than it wants to appear. Very characteristic is the gloatingly boyish trick of the Duma chronicler of the newspaper Rech in the following way:
- The word belongs to Zabolotny.
At these words of the chairman, the deputies quickly removed from their seats and rushed in strings to the exits. “This is not a break,” they explain to the public walking in the hall, “this is what the dep says. Zabolotny. And while Zabolotny was speaking, and Mr. Sedelnikov, who was following him, the Ekaterininsky Hall was crowded, and only when some Cadet professor again entered the department did "all the deputies" rush into the hall.
In fact: the bloody ghosts that were rushing around the White Hall, according to the testimony of the "Rech", turned pale - it was. Good gentlemen want to talk, to listen coolly; here Pr. Kovalevsky will tell you that the death penalty is borrowed by the Bible from Babylon, here Pr. Petrazhitsky will explain to you that there were novelists, and then there were Germanists ... And suddenly the extreme Trudoviks again cause ghosts, they are nervous, they demand something ... How boring it is gentlemen, let's go smoke!
But the country ignores the learned flaunting of professorial erudition and eagerly waits to see if the extreme Left Dumas say a decisive word.
The Trudoviks are finding themselves, no matter how "boring" it may be for the Cadets. The draft program of the labor group has been published. Without going into a detailed discussion of it, which one of the comrades in the Vestnik Zhizn will take care of, we will only note the extreme practical importance of such measures as the call to organize village committees in the localities to prepare for the land reform, or rather, to prepare for it. No less important is the invitation to set up soviets of workers' deputies arbitrarily, "on a whim," as they say, to reform our self-government on truly democratic principles.
Of course, the Cadets smile wryly when they hear about the secret order. It marks the end of their brief role. It is curious, however, that they almost unanimously blurt out: “To speak now of a secret order is the height of frivolity” and (in Izgoev’s article) “The Duma will embody only in finished forms what the people will do, and, obviously, by a secret order. If the secret order will beat the Duma with a forehead: “I did it - come incarnate in forms!” - then this is not frivolous, but if he says: "I have done it, go Duma out, I will create a constituent assembly in your place to incarnate you" - the height of frivolity!
Undoubtedly, the immediate implementation and beginning of self-organization, even the immediate and solemn appeal of the Duma to the cause of self-organization, would be a step forward. At the same time, it is necessary to turn to the country with a detailed declaration explaining the policy of the government, the need for struggle, the impotence of the Duma, the self-organization of the people all over the face of the Russian land - as the only way out.
But there are few programs alone, just as there are few swearing at the ministers in Izvestia of the Peasant Deputies. - The program is only a collection of wishes. Energetic swearing is not yet an energetic struggle. If the Trudoviks are exactly at the turning point, if the petty bourgeoisie and the peasantry really straighten their backs in their face, then they will insist on the urgency of addressing the people, stepping over the "gentleman without fear and reproach" who takes care of them from the height of the chairman's chair. We must say to the Cadets: "We don't want any more professorial lectures or other chatter." The appeal to the people is urgent, it is just as constitutional as the existence of an irresponsible ministry spitting in the face of popular representation. We demand from the "People's Freedom" party to join our call: "Citizens, organize!"
And if kg aunts play a parliamentary comedy, and generally try. squirm like a snake, slither like an eel, then let the Trudoviks say to them: “You don’t want to take this only business step under the given conditions? So you know, we will turn to the people ourselves! That true representative of the people who boldly, not just words, fights for their interests. We will tell the people that you are talkers, afraid of everything that smells of power!
Let the people choose between us and you, between the road of struggle and the road of rigmarole.
But then... Will the Duma be dispersed?
Member of the State Dumas Kotlyarevsky necessarily explains to us that it is “superstition” to consider the Duma as a power that can do anything.
And a real assessment of popular representation, as a palladium of the rights and interests of the people, can arise only after the inevitable disappointments associated with the disappearance of these initial superstitious assessments.
But why do people need this powerless palladium, some kind of fetish, a talisman, like an ark, which Israel carried on its shoulders in search of the promised land. The people have their own banners under which they will enter their Canaan. Why does he need an ark full of talkers, in which, unlike Noah's ark, unclean animals are in the majority?
The Duma is needed as an organ of the revolution, or it is not needed at all. No one thinks that the Duma is power, except perhaps those who, in our opinion, rather frivolously advise it to appoint its own ministry without authority, but it seems that all the energetic friends of the people demand that it use the mouthpiece that fell into its hands, and she loudly shouted at him that she was powerless in the struggle and that the people needed in order for the new “power” to really arise, she would shout so that it could be heard from end to end of the earth.
Only by fulfilling this role can the extreme Left of the Duma rise, resurrect to a new life, to a new form, merging with other strictly revolutionary, people's centers.
A. Lunacharsky.