Having discussed reports and communications from comrades working in Soviets of Workers' and Soldiers' Deputies in various localities of Russia, the conference establishes:

In a whole series of provincial localities, the revolution is advancing through the spontaneous organization of the proletariat and peasantry in Soviets, the spontaneous removal of the old authorities, the creation of a proletarian and peasant militia, the transfer of all land into the hands of the peasantry, the introduction of workers' control over the factories, the introduction of an 8-hour working day, the increase of wages, the assurance of uninterrupted production, the establishment of workers' supervision over the distribution of provisions, and so forth.

This expansion of the revolution in the provinces in breadth and depth, on the one hand, represents the growth of the movement toward the transfer of all power to the Soviets and toward the control by the workers and peasants themselves over production, and on the other hand, serves as a guarantee of the preparation on an all-Russian scale of forces for the second stage of the revolution, which must transfer all state power into the hands of the Soviets or other organs directly expressing the will of the majority of the people (organs of local self-government, the Constituent Assembly, and so forth).

In the capitals and in some large cities, the task of transferring state power to the Soviets presents especially great difficulties and requires especially prolonged preparation of the forces of the proletariat. Here are concentrated the greatest forces of the bourgeoisie. Here is observed more sharply the policy of compromise with the bourgeoisie—a policy that not infrequently retards the revolutionary initiative of the masses and weakens their independence, which is especially dangerous in view of the guiding significance of these Soviets for the provinces.

The task of the proletarian party is therefore, on the one hand, comprehensive support for the indicated development of the revolution at the local level; on the other hand, systematic struggle within the Soviets (through propaganda and re-elections) for the triumph of the proletarian line; the direction of all efforts and all attention to the working and soldier masses, toward the separation of the proletarian line from the petty-bourgeois, the internationalist from the defensist, the revolutionary from the opportunist, toward the organization and arming of the workers, toward the preparation of their forces for the next stage of the revolution.

The conference declares once again that comprehensive work is necessary within the Soviets of Workers' and Soldiers' Deputies, the increase of their number, the strengthening of their forces, the consolidation within them of the proletarian, internationalist groups of our party.

*Pravda* No. 46, May 15 (May 2) 1917

Printed from a typewritten copy of the protocol record