V. I.

Lenin

Preface to N. Shakhov’s Pamphlet The Fight for a Congress

Inthe pamphlet here offered to the reader we have endeavoured to
give as full as possible a collection of documents showing
the attitude of various Party organisations working on the spot
towards the present crisis in our Party. These documents are
reproduced partly from texts already published in Iskra and
partly direct from the manuscripts, and the reader should bear in mind
that owing to the conditions under which these manuscripts were
delivered mistakes and omissions were sometimes bound to creep in.

Thecontents of the documents revolve around one central
point—the fight for the party spirit against the circle
spirit, the fight for a congress. Originally this was a fight
for the Second Party Congress, for the recognition and honest
observance of its decisions; now it is for the Third Congress,
as the only method worthy of the Party of ending the present
intolerable situation. We have also tried to show as fully as
possible, on the basis of documentary evidence, the fight of
the Party’s present central institutions against a third
congress.

Ourwork has been confined to arranging the documents in chronological
order (as far as possible) and adding the briefest explanations to
indicate the connection between them. We leave all comment for
subsequent publications. Tile bare facts regarding the fight for a
congress speak for themselves, and anybody who studies them will be
able to form his own judgement of the internal struggle in our Party.

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