V. I.

Lenin

82

To:   THE ISKRA EDITORIAL BOARD [1]

To the Editorial Board of the Central Organ

December 12, 1903

I, as representative of the C.C., received today from Comrade Martov an inquiry
as to whether a report on the negotiations of the C.C. with the Geneva
opposition could be published or not. [2] I believe it could, and I
earnestly request the comrades on the editorial board of the C.O. to consider
once again the question of peace and good will in the Party.

It is not too late yet to secure such a peace, it is not too late yet to keep
from our people and our enemies the details of the split and the speeches about
dishonourable conduct and falsified lists, speeches which will probably be
utilised even by Moskovskiye Vedomosti . [3] I can guarantee
that the Majority will readily agree to consign all this dirt to oblivion,
provided peace and good will in the Party are secured.

Everything now depends on the editorial board of the C.O., which includes
representatives of the former opposition that rejected the C.C.’s peace
proposal of November 25,
1903. [4] I ask you, comrades, to take into
consideration that since then the C.C. has already made two further voluntary
concessions, by advising Comrade Ru to hand in his resignation and by trying to
settle the League affair “amicably”.

Meanwhile the boycott of the C.C., the agitation against it and the disruption
of practical work in Russia continue. People write to us from Russia that the
opposition are making a “hell” there. We have the most definite
information that the agents of the Minority are systematically continuing their disruptive work, making a round of the committees. People in
St. Petersburg write about Martyn’s visit there with the same aim. Things
have reached a point when the opposition are making their own transport arrangements and, through Dan, are offering the C.C. to share them on a fifty-fifty
basis!

I consider it my duty to the Party to ask the editorial board of the C.O. for
the last time that it persuade the opposition to subscribe to peace and good
will on the basis of a sincere recognition of the two central bodies by both
sides and cessation of the intestine war which renders any joint work
impossible.