V. I.

Lenin

Osvobozhdeniye-ists and New-Iskrists, Monarchists and Girondists

Osvobozhdeniye ,No. 66, published a review of Martynov’s pamphlet
Two Dictatorships (approved and recommended by the editors of
Iskra; see issue No. 84). As was to be expected, the liberal bourgeois
does not conceal his sympathies with the opportunist wing of the
Social-Democratic movement. Osvobozhdeniye regards Martynov’s
pamphlet, “like the work of Mr. Akimov” , as “one of the most interesting contributions to Social-Democratic literature of the present day”. Gould a liberal have reacted in any other way to the preaching
of tail-ism, which seeks to frighten the revolutionary class with the dire
perspective of participation in the provisional government and the
“revolutionary dictatorship” in a democratic revolution
(which Martynov, in his fear of “Jacobinism” confounds with the socialist revolution!)? Is it merely a coincidence that
Osvobozhdeniye , in the article “A Significant Turn”, welcomed Plekhanov’s ideas of making concessions to the revisionists? How is one
to account for Osvobozhdeniye’s assertion (No. 57) that in fact, the
Menshevists are now defending something more vital and essential than the
Bolshevists”? Is it not because “the only hope for the ideological
vitality of Russian liberalism lies in the vitality of Social-Democratic
opportunism” (see our publication An Obliging Liberal [1]

)?

Was Mr. Struve right or wrong in contending that Trotsky’s pamphlet
Our Political Tasks , published under the editorship of “Iskra” (see issue No. 72 ) “is
perfectly right in defending certain ideas with which readers of Social-Democratic literature have been familiar from
the writings of Messrs. Akimov, Martynov, Krichevsky, and other so-called
Economists” ( Osvobozhdeniye , No. 57)? Had Martynov and
Co. stopped to think of these questions, they might perhaps have been able
to grasp the puzzling (how very, very puzzling!) ideas of the old
Iskra about the similarity of the relations between the Jacobins
and the Girondists, on the one hand, and between the revolutionary
Social-Democrats and the opportunists, on the other. (This idea was first
advanced, if we are not mistaken, in the leading article of Iskra ,
No. 2, written by Plekhanov.) Were the Girondists traitors to the cause of
the Great French Revolution? They were not. But they were inconsistent,
wavering, opportunist champions of that cause. That is why they
were opposed by the Jacobins, who upheld the interests of the advanced class
of the eighteenth century as consistently as the revolutionary Social-Democrats uphold the interests of the advanced class of the twentieth. That
is why the downright betrayers of the cause of the great revolution, the
monarchists, the clerical constitutionalists, etc., supported the Girondists
and shielded them from the attacks of the Jacobins. Are you beginning to see
light now, most honourable Girondist Martynov? Not yet? Well, we shall try
to clarify the point further. Are the new-Iskrists traitors to the
proletarian cause? No. But they are inconsistent, wavering, opportunist
champions of the cause (and of the organisational and tactical principles
illumining the cause). That is why their position is opposed by the
revolutionary Social-Democrats (by some directly and overtly, by others
covertly, behind the closed doors of their editorial offices, with devices
and ruses). That is why the new-Iskrists are ideologically sup ported and
shielded by the Osvobozhdeniye crowd—the down right betrayers of the proletarian cause. Are you beginning to see light
now, most honourable Girondist Martynov?

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Notes:
[1]
First published as a leaflet, Geneva, November 6, 1904. See present
edition, Vol. 7, pp. 486-89.— Ed .