V. I.

Lenin

152

To:   THE CENTRAL COMMITTEE OF THE R.S.D.L.P.

I received your Letuchy Listok No. 2 for June 24, 19O5, only today,
October 3, 1905, new style. (It takes the “United Centre”
three months to inform its members....)

The article: “Fundamentals of Party Organisation” is very good. I
can imagine what it’s like to have to chew over the ABC to the Mensheviks! But
you have to. The writer of the article has made an excellent job of it. I am
thinking of publishing it in
Proletary . [1] It is late, of course, but better late than never.

This article has set me thinking that you can and should see to it that the
C.C. is not mute but always articulate. The time is past for ideological
leadership through “whisperings” in secret meeting places and
rendezvous with agents! Leadership should be through political
literature. Rabochy is not suitable for that, it has a different role
to perform. You must decidedly issue a C.C. bulletin in a format not
exceeding two printed pages , but you should issue it twice a week . It would contain a short article on a political, tactical or
organisational subject, then brief, minor items of three lines each. Only (1) it
must be printed, for the hectograph is now very bad (is there not some small
equipment that operates rapidly ?) and (2) it must be done punctually
and frequently.

Your plan of converting Rabochy into a smaller weekly newspaper is not
clear to me. In my opinion, a popular organ is one thing (I am not in favour of
it, but the Congress decided on it, so that’s that), and a
bulletin of really guiding political articles of a general kind is
another. You have three or four good contributors, so it would be as easy as
anything to get two small articles every week, and the significance would be
tremendous!

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Notes:
[1]

A. A. Bogdanov’s article “Fundamentals of Party Organisation” was not
published in Proletary .