V. I.

Lenin

We have just read a message from the St. Petersburg correspondent of the liberal
bourgeois Frankfurter Zeitung dated August 8 (21) to the effect that
the Congress of Zemstvo and municipal leaders, which by decision of the July
Congress was to have met immediately after publication of the Bulygin scheme and
was already fixed for the end of August, will not take place. What
would you think the reason is? It is because on August 6 the tsar withdrew his
ukase to the Senate, dated February 18, 1905! The correspondent goes on to say:
“This absolutely inexplicable [??— Editorial Board of “ Proletary ”] cowardice on the part of the Zemstvo representatives
has aroused general amazement in political quarters here, since at a moment like the present
nobody was inclined to expect such flabbiness in the Zemstvos. That is why the
news I have sent has not yet been given full credence, and people are cautious
in their attitude towards it.” We long ago foretold that the government would
not find it hard to win the liberal bourgeois over to its side and make them
“recoil from the revolution”.

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