Written January 13–14 (26–27), 1907.

Printed from the text of the pamphlet

Social-Democracy and the Elections in St. Petersburg

The Conference of the St. Petersburg Social-Democratic organisation adopted a decision not to conclude a bloc with the Cadets, but to propose an agreement with the Trudoviks and the Socialist-Revolutionaries. The Mensheviks lodged a number of protests on formal grounds and, being in the minority, walked out of the Conference.

The liberal newspapers have already raised a great hue and cry over this incident. They foresee a split in the Social-Democratic Party and hasten to draw a whole series of political conclusions. In view of all this, it is extremely important that every class-conscious worker should have a clear idea of what is really going on in the Social-Democratic organisation of St. Petersburg and what attitude to take to what is happening.

We therefore propose to examine the basic questions arising out of this incident, namely: 1) the composition of the Conference; 2) the immediate cause of the Mensheviks’ walkout—the attempt of the Central Committee to split the Conference into two parts, city and gubernia—and 3) the significance of the whole incident, especially in view of the election campaign now under way in St. Petersburg.

I. Conditions of Calling and Composition of the S.D. Conference

The Conference of the St. Petersburg organisation was to take a final decision on the most important political issue of the moment: whether or not to conclude agreements with the Cadets at the first stage of the elections to the Duma.

The Russian Social-Democratic Labour Party is organised on democratic lines. This means that all the affairs of the Party are conducted, directly or through representatives, by all the members of the Party on equal terms and without exception; moreover, all Party officials, all directing bodies, all institutions of the Party are elected, accountable, and subject to recall. The affairs of the St. Petersburg organisation are managed by the elected St. Petersburg Committee of the R.S.D.L.P. The supreme body of the St. Petersburg organisation, since it is impossible to assemble all the Party members (about 6,000), is the Conference of representatives of the organisation. To this Conference all members of the organisation have the right to send representatives: one delegate for a definite number of Party members—for example, one delegate for every 50 Party members, as was adopted with respect to the last Conference. These representatives must be elected by all the Party members, and the decision of the representatives is the supreme and final decision of the question for the whole local organisation.

But this is not all. In order that the decision of the question may be really democratic, it is not enough to assemble elected representatives of the organisation. It is necessary that all the members of the organisation, in electing representatives, should at the same time, independently and each for himself, express their opinion on the controversial question of interest to the whole organisation. Democratically organised parties and unions cannot, in principle, refuse to poll all their members without exception—at least in the most important cases and especially when it is a matter of a political action in which the mass acts independently, for instance, a strike, an election, a boycott of some big local establishment, etc.

Why is the sending of representatives considered insufficient in these cases? Why is a poll of all Party members, or a so-called “referendum”, required? Precisely because, for the success of mass actions, the conscious and voluntary participation of each individual worker is necessary. A strike cannot proceed smoothly, elections cannot be held consciously, unless each worker quite consciously and voluntarily decides for himself the question: shall we strike or not? Shall we vote for the Cadets or not? All political questions cannot be decided by polling all Party members; that would be an eternal, tiresome, fruitless voting. But the most important questions, and moreover, those that are directly connected with a definite action of the masses themselves, must be decided, in the name of democracy, not only by sending representatives, but also by polling all the Party members.

That is why the St. Petersburg Committee decided that the elections of delegates to the Conference should take place only after the Party members had discussed the question whether agreements should be concluded with the Cadets, and after all the Party members had voted on this question. Elections are a matter in which the mass itself directly participates. Socialists regard the consciousness of the masses as the chief force. Consequently, every Party member must consciously decide the question whether or not to vote for the Cadets at the elections. Only after an open discussion of this question by all the assembled Party members does it become possible for everyone to adopt one or another conscious and firm decision. Only on the basis of such a decision will the election of representatives to the Conference no longer be a matter of personal connections, friendship, or habit (“We’ll elect our Nikolai Nikolayevich or Ivan Ivanovich!”), but a matter of conscious determination by the “rank and file” themselves (i.e., all the Party members) of their own political conduct.[49]

The elections to the Duma, i.e., the initial and fundamental voting for electors or for delegates, will be conducted not through representatives, but by each voter individually. Hence, if we want to be Socialists in deed, and not merely in word, organised in a really democratic, working-class party, we must strive to ensure that every worker clarifies for himself the question whether to vote for the Cadets or not. It is not enough to entrust representation to a familiar Ivan Ivanovich or a fine fellow Sidor Sidorovich—the controversial question must be discussed on its merits in the “rank and file”. Only then will the democratic decision be a consciously democratic decision of the mass, and not merely a decision of representatives sent “by acquaintance”.

The St. Petersburg Committee is the elected leader of the entire Social-Democratic organisation of St. Petersburg and the St. Petersburg Gubernia. In order to lead the mass in such a matter as the elections to the Duma, it was obliged (if it recognises democracy not only in words) to strive for the conscious participation of the entire mass in the elections. And in order that the participation of the entire mass in the elections may be conscious and united, it is necessary that not only the Party representatives, but also every Party member should give a definite answer to his St. Petersburg Committee: is he for agreements with the Cadets or not?

Such is the significance of the “discussions”, i.e., the debate on the most controversial question before the election of representatives. At every meeting of Party members, before elections of representatives to the Conference were held, it was necessary first to discuss the controversial political question, to hear a speaker from the St. Petersburg Committee, i.e., from the guiding local organisation, and also to give the floor to supporters of other views. After the discussion, all Party members vote: are they for agreements with the Cadets or not? The voting is verified by members of the Control Commission, in which there are representatives of both trends (if there are two trends in the organisation on the given question). Only if these conditions are observed can the St. Petersburg Committee really know the conscious opinion of the whole mass of Party members and can, consequently, lead not blindly, but with reliance on the full clarification of the question by the mass.

This explanation was necessary because disputes arose at the Conference over the “discussions” and the poll of all Party members.

The groundlessness of such disputes is all the more obvious to Party members in that the letter of the Central Committee itself of November 10, concerning the decision of the question (whether to conclude agreements) by local organisations, directly recommends “preliminary discussion” of the question by all Party members.

Let us now look at the actual composition of the Conference. At first, all the representatives elected in one or another organisation were admitted to it, without verification of the elections (i.e., without verification of the “mandates” or credentials). The total number of representatives, or delegates, was 71, including 40 Bolsheviks and 31 Mensheviks. This is the distribution of this number by individual districts:

*   Vasileostrovsky District – 8 Bolsheviks, 2 Mensheviks
*   Vyborgsky District – 9 Bolsheviks, 6 Mensheviks
*   City District – 2 Bolsheviks, 6 Mensheviks
*   Railway District – 5 Bolsheviks, 0 Mensheviks
*   Latvian District – 4 Bolsheviks, 4 Mensheviks
*   Moscow District – 2 Bolsheviks, 4 Mensheviks
*   Narva District – 3 Bolsheviks, 3 Mensheviks
*   Nevsky District – 2 Bolsheviks, 3 Mensheviks
*   Petersburg District – 2 Bolsheviks, 3 Mensheviks
*   Estonian District – 2 Bolsheviks, 0 Mensheviks
*   Military Organisation – 1 Bolshevik, 0 Mensheviks

Two delegates from the Estonians (both Bolsheviks) and one from the Latvians (Menshevik) were absent. With them, the number would have been 42 Bolsheviks and 32 Mensheviks.

From this it is clear that even initially, before any verification of credentials, the Bolsheviks had predominance. Consequently, all and sundry talk about the “artificiality” of the Bolshevik predominance falls to the ground of itself. The complaints that the Bolsheviks did not confirm all the credentials have now been carried by the Mensheviks even into the bourgeois press. They only forgot to inform that press that even before the verification of mandates, before any revision of credentials, the majority was in any case with the Bolsheviks!

To decide this question of predominance at the Conference still more clearly, and once and for all, let us take not the number of mandates (credentials), but the total number of votes cast by Party members.

We then obtain the following picture:

*   Uncontested votes: Bolshevik – 1,848, Menshevik – 787 (Total 2,635; delegates: 37 Bolsheviks, 16 Mensheviks)
*   Contested votes: Bolshevik – 413, Menshevik – 833 (Total 1,246; delegates: 6 Bolsheviks, 16 Mensheviks – according to norm of 1:75; 8 Bolsheviks, 17 Mensheviks – according to norm of 1:50)
*   Grand total: Bolshevik – 2,261, Menshevik – 1,620 (Total 3,881; delegates: 42 Bolsheviks, 32 Mensheviks – excluding military organisation)

* This includes 185 votes which, by decision of the Conference, were recognised as completely correctly collected. Without them, the uncontested votes would be 1,663.

Thus, a total of about 4,000 (3,881) Party members voted. The Bolshevik majority is over 400 votes.

It is therefore indisputable that, even if all the contested votes were recognised as valid, a substantial majority still remains with the Bolsheviks. Hence, the disputes over the validity or invalidity of some portion of the votes did not at all concern the question of Bolshevik predominance; the disputes were about how to implement the principle of democratic representation in its entirety.

Why then did the Bolsheviks annul a part of the credentials (mandates)? Because the contested mandates could not be recognised as valid. And invalid mandates cannot be put on a par with valid, uncontested ones.

What mandates were contested? Those in the obtaining of which irregularities had been committed; for example, there was no control by members of the Control Commission, there were no discussions (debates) before the voting, there was no voting “by platforms” (i.e., there was no poll of all those voting as to whether they were for or against agreements with the Cadets). Invalid mandates cannot be recognised as democratically obtained.

Now the question is, what was to be done with the contested mandates? It was impossible to examine each case separately. That would have meant sitting an extra day, and the Conference had the barest minimum of time: it barely managed to meet the deadline by which the workers had to go to the elections of the electors (January 7).

There remained one way out: to raise the “norm of representation” for all the contested mandates, i.e., to count for them one mandate not for every 50, but for every 75 votes. This method was adopted for three considerations: 1) it eliminated arbitrariness and mutual irritation in appraising individual contested mandates; 2) it placed in equal conditions the mandates contested by one side or the other; 3) it was based on a decision of the St. Petersburg Committee adopted long before the Conference—namely: the St. Petersburg Committee decided that in cases where democratic elections to the Conference are utterly impossible (e.g., it is impossible under police conditions to convene meetings), to admit representatives elected not entirely democratically, while raising the norm of representation, i.e., admitting one delegate not from 50, but from 75, 100, etc.

Now take the number of contested and uncontested votes. From the uncontested, counting 1 delegate per 50 votes, we have: 37 Bolsheviks and 16 Mensheviks. From the contested, counting 1 delegate per 75 votes, we have: 4 Bolsheviks and 12 Mensheviks. Total: 41 Bolsheviks (plus 1 from the Military Organisation, where democratic elections are impossible) and 28 Mensheviks.

The distribution of these finally confirmed 70 mandates by districts was as follows:

*   Vasileostrovsky – 8 Bolsheviks, 2 Mensheviks
*   Vyborgsky – 9 Bolsheviks, 4 Mensheviks
*   City – 2 Bolsheviks, 4 Mensheviks
*   Railway – 5 Bolsheviks, 0 Mensheviks
*   Latvian – 4 Bolsheviks, 3 Mensheviks
*   Moscow – 1 Bolshevik, 3 Mensheviks
*   Narva – 3 Bolsheviks, 3 Mensheviks
*   Nevsky – 2 Bolsheviks, 2 Mensheviks
*   Petersburg – 2 Bolsheviks, 2 Mensheviks
*   Estonian – 2 Bolsheviks, 0 Mensheviks
*   Military Organisation – 1 Bolshevik, 0 Mensheviks
*   Other districts – ? (actually not listed, but total: 41 Bolsheviks, 28 Mensheviks)

From this it is clear that the complaints about the composition of the Conference are completely groundless. Of course, if before an uninformed public one shouts about the annulment of so-and-so’s mandate, the non-recognition of so-and-so’s credentials—this may make an impression for a moment, if the public does not go deeply into the matter. But that is not an argument, but empty wrangling.

One has only to acquaint oneself with all the data on the composition of the Conference, and it at once becomes clear that in raising the norm of representation for all the contested votes there was nothing arbitrary. For it is not accidental that there were 2,635 votes that were indisputable, uncontested by anyone, and only 1,246 contested votes! And it cannot be seriously asserted that the mass of contested votes were accidentally contested, without any grounds whatever!

Just think, for example, of the meaning of voting “without a platform”, which the Mensheviks so often carried out (it is only because of this that they accumulated nearly a thousand contested votes). This means that no poll is taken of all the Party members as to whether they are for agreements with the Cadets or against the Cadets. The elections of the delegates take place without such a poll or without platforms. Hence, the Conference cannot know exactly the opinion of the Party members themselves! Hence, the mass itself is not polled on the controversial question (concerning an action of the mass). Can irregularities be avoided under these conditions?

Can a sincere supporter of democracy in the organisation defend such voting? Democracy consists not in the mass trusting particular representatives of theirs by acquaintance, but in the whole mass itself expressing consciously its vote on the essence of the most important questions.

Finally, the complaints about the composition of the Conference must be recognized as completely groundless also because a number of similar conferences have been held in St. Petersburg recently. A year ago there was a conference on the question of the boycott. The majority remained with the Bolsheviks. During the First Duma, there was a conference on the question of supporting the demand for a Duma (i.e., a Cadet) ministry. The majority remained with the Bolsheviks.

Is it not ridiculous to hear now that the predominance of the Bolsheviks on the question of agreements with the Cadets at the elections could have been accidental?

II. The Question of Splitting the Conference

The Central Committee of the Party, consisting of a predominant number of Mensheviks, presented the St. Petersburg Conference with a demand that it be split into a city and a gubernia conference. It is on the non-fulfilment of this demand that the Mensheviks try to rely in justification of their walkout.

Let us see, then, whether this demand was lawful under the Party Rules, whether it was binding on the Conference, and whether it was feasible.

The Rules of our Party quite definitely establish its democratic organisation. The whole organisation is built up from below, on the basis of electivity. The local organisations are declared, by the Party Rules, to be autonomous (self-governing) in their local activities. The Central Committee, according to the Rules, unites and directs all the work of the Party. It is clear from this that it has no right to interfere in determining the composition of local organisations. Once the organisation is built up from below, interference from above in its composition would be a complete violation of all democracy, of the entire Party Rules. Suppose that an organisation, for one reason or another, unites heterogeneous parts, for instance, unites the city and the gubernia together. Under a democratic system, this union cannot be maintained (or prescribed) by order from above. Hence, division is possible only at the desire from below: the city can separate from the gubernia, and no one can forbid it. The gubernia can separate from the city, and no one can forbid it. If not a single more or less large, more or less separate part of the organisation from below has put forward a demand for separation, this means that the Central Committee could not convince any influential part of the organisation of the necessity of separation! To try, under such conditions, to impose division from above is mockery of democracy, mockery of the Party Rules. This is nothing more nor less than an attempt to use the power of the Central Committee for evil, i.e., not in the interests of Party unity, but in the interests of one section of the Party (the Mensheviks), to use power to distort the will and decision of the local workers. The Central Committee felt so strongly the untenability of its demand that in its written general resolution it expressed itself very cautiously. The general resolution of the Central Committee recommends to all Party organisations “to the extent possible” (verbatim expression!) to adapt the bounds of the organisation to the bounds of the electoral districts. There could be no question, and there was no question, of this advice being obligatory. That the Central Committee pursued some special aims precisely with regard to St. Petersburg is evident from the fact that in no other town in Russia did the Central Committee demand a division of the conference. For example, in Vilna, the city conference includes also Social-Democratic representatives of establishments located beyond the city boundaries, i.e., in another electoral district. The Central Committee never even thought of raising the question of dividing the Vilna Conference!

In Odessa, too, there was one general conference, although there also some establishments are situated outside the police boundaries of the city. Can one indeed name a single large town in which the bounds of the organisation correspond to the police division into city and part of the gubernia? Can one seriously speak of separating the suburbs in large towns, centres of the working-class Social-Democratic movement, of separating the often largest factories, the most proletarian “environs”? This is such a gross mockery of common sense that only the most unscrupulous people, in their search for a pretext for a split, could have seized upon such a pretext.

Look at the districts of St. Petersburg to convince yourself of the impracticability of the demand to split the Conference. In order to carry out the division of the organisation in general, or of the conference in particular, into a city and a gubernia part, one must either know the address, the place of residence, of every Party member, or have already ready-made nuclei, departments, districts formed on a territorial basis, i.e., districts constituted on the basis of the place of residence of the Party members or the location of the factories in one or another police precinct.

And we see that in St. Petersburg (as, probably, in the majority of towns in Russia) the districts, sub-districts, and lower nuclei are formed not only on a territorial (local) basis, but also on a craft basis (one or another trade, occupation of the workers and the population in general) and on a national basis (different nationality, different language).

For example, in St. Petersburg there is the Railway District. It is formed on a craft basis. How can it be divided into a city and a gubernia part? By the place of residence of each individual railwayman: Petersburg, Kolpino, other stations? Or by the location of the trains, which, unfortunately for our Central Committee, have the habit of moving from the “city” of Petersburg “into the gubernia” and even into different gubernias?

Just try to divide the Latvian District! And then there are the Estonian and the Military Organisation.

Even the territorial districts cannot be divided. The workers at the Conference themselves pointed this out. A worker from the Moscow District gets up and says: I know factories in our district which are situated not far from the city boundary. When work is finished, one can see at once that some of the workers head for the “city”, others—for “the gubernia”. How, then, are we going to divide here? And the workers frankly laughed at the Central Committee’s proposal.

Only very naive people can fail to notice the clumsily sewn lining of the whole affair. Only very naive people can say: all the same, we should have tried to divide “approximately”, “to the extent possible”.

If division is approximate, it means that some arbitrariness must be tolerated, for it is impossible to divide exactly the Latvian, Railway, and other districts. And any arbitrariness would have evoked new, endless protests, complaints, new decisions of the Central Committee, would have given a mass of new pretexts for a split. Look at the list of districts (given above)—you will see that there might be people who would declare only four districts as purely city districts, undoubtedly city districts: Vasileostrovsky, City, Vyborgsky, Petersburg. Why only these? Because the Mensheviks would have obtained a predominance in them. And how could such arbitrariness be justified?

And how did the Central Committee justify the arbitrariness that it never even thought of dividing Vilna, while demanding division from St. Petersburg? If you start arguing against arbitrariness, who will finally decide your dispute? Why, that very same Central Committee....

Even the most naive people will now understand that the complaints about the composition of the Conference and its refusal to split are a simple blind. And the essence of the matter is that the Mensheviks decided not to submit to the majority of the St. Petersburg organisation and to bring about a split on the eve of the elections in order to go over from the Socialist workers to the Cadets.

III. What Does the Walkout of the Mensheviks from the Conference Mean?

The conclusion we have drawn may seem too harsh to some readers. But we think that to conceal, to gloss over the truth in a serious political matter is a thing unworthy of a Socialist. We must call things by their right names. We must expose all manner of excuses and blinds so that the working-class masses may clearly understand the essence of the matter. Only bourgeois parties look upon elections as a behind-the-scenes game and a sharing of the spoils. The workers’ party must, above all, strive to ensure that the people correctly understand the relations between the parties, correctly understand their own interests and tasks of the struggle, correctly understand the essence of what goes on behind the scenes.

We have seen that the complaints about the composition of the Conference of the St. Petersburg organisation of the R.S.D.L.P., about its unwillingness to split, are empty excuses. We know that the essence of the matter is simple. The Mensheviks wished at any price to have an agreement with the Cadets. The Mensheviks knew that the majority of the members of the St. Petersburg organisation do not share this view. The Mensheviks decided at the All-Russia Conference to submit in each locality to the decision of the local organisation. Now they have broken their promise, trying by a split to achieve their aims.

The 31 Mensheviks who walked out of the Conference have already announced today (January 13) in the St. Petersburg newspapers that they propose a bloc both to the Cadets and to all the labour parties, not only to the Socialist-Revolutionaries and Trudoviks (to whom the Conference proposed an agreement), but also to the “Popular Socialists”.

The matter, therefore, is quite clear. The class-conscious proletariat decided to conduct an independent election campaign. The petty bourgeoisie (including the Trudoviks) is vacillating, rushing from one side to the other; it is capable of preferring a deal with the Cadets to a principled struggle. The Mensheviks are the petty-bourgeois section of the workers’ party. At the last minute, seizing upon the most paltry excuses, they desert the revolutionary proletariat and go over to the side of the Cadets.

The correctness of this conclusion is best confirmed by the Cadet newspapers. And no one, after all, will suspect the Cadets of sympathy with the views of the St. Petersburg, i.e., Bolshevik Social-Democracy!

Look at the central organ of the Cadet Party, the newspaper _Rech_. Everyone knows perfectly well that, along with the newspaper _Tovarishch_, it has constantly pushed the Mensheviks towards a split and tried in every way to praise them, carefully distinguishing them from the Bolsheviks. As soon as it became known that the Mensheviks had walked out of the Social-Democratic Conference, _Rech_ straight away (January 11) printed an editorial entitled “The Social-Democratic Conference and Agreements”. This article directly hails the “decisiveness” of the Mensheviks, hails the split they have started. This article directly declares that “outside the bloc of the revolutionary parties in the strict sense” (i.e., outside the St. Petersburg Social-Democrats and those to whom they proposed an agreement, i.e., the S.R.s and the Committee of the Trudovik Group) there remain the Mensheviks and the Popular Socialists (the most moderate, semi-Cadet, of the petty-bourgeois, labour parties).

And the Cadets directly declare that they are ready to “renew” negotiations with these “both moderately socialist parties”. They directly declare that “the differentiation (division) that has taken place in the midst of the socialist parties promises to some extent to bring the concepts of the moderate socialists regarding Duma tactics closer to our own (i.e., the Cadets’) concepts”.

These words of the chief Cadet newspaper are extremely important. The Cadets not only appraise the practical results of the Menshevik turn. The Cadets clearly see that the split arranged by the Mensheviks has a principled significance, i.e., that this split in practice changes the Mensheviks’ relation to the basic views on the political struggle, on the tasks of the working class. The Cadets have understood perfectly that the Mensheviks have turned not only in the sense of practical admission of agreements, but have also turned in the direction of the basic views of the bourgeoisie, have drawn away from proletarian politics, have drawn closer to bourgeois politics. _Rech_ directly says that the moderate socialists (i.e., the Mensheviks) are approaching Cadet tactics, are in practice recognising Cadet primacy and leadership. Without yet knowing whether the S.R.s and Trudoviks will accept the proposal of the Social-Democratic Conference, the Cadets already take into account a quite definite correlation of political forces: the liberal bourgeoisie guides the moderate petty bourgeoisie and the petty-bourgeois section of the proletariat; the revolutionary proletariat goes independently, drawing after it in the best case (best for us, worst for the Cadets) only a part of the petty bourgeoisie.

That is exactly how the Cadets picture the matter. And one cannot but admit that the Cadets are quite right here. As the sun in a little drop of water, so is reflected in the small St. Petersburg incident the constant correlation, inevitably inherent in all capitalist countries, of the politics of the liberal bourgeoisie, the working class, and the petty bourgeoisie. Everywhere and always the liberal bourgeoisie seeks to bribe the undeveloped masses with little places, in order to draw them away from revolutionary Social-Democracy. The Cadets are beginning to apply in Russia the “English” method of the bourgeoisie’s struggle against the proletariat, a struggle not by violence, but by bribery, flattery, division, coaxing the “moderate”, pushing them into ministers, deputies, electors, etc.

The phrase about the “renewal” of negotiations in the Cadet _Rech_ is also quite clear. While the Social-Democrats were united, and the revolutionary Social-Democrats predominated among them, negotiations were broken off. Now, when “both moderately socialist parties” have split away from the revolution, the Cadets now declare: “negotiations could be renewed.”

If the reader does not quite understand the practical meaning of these words, we will explain them to him. The Cadets were offering two seats (out of six) to the Lefts, namely: one seat to the workers’ curia, one to the socialists in general. The negotiations broke down. Now the Cadets are again calling the “moderate socialists”: come back, buyer, we might come to terms! Either we shall now give one seat to a Menshevik, the other to a “Popular Socialist”, or we shall be generous even to the extent of three seats.

That is the meaning of the Cadets’ words about the “renewal” of negotiations: we did not make concessions to the Lefts, but we will make concessions to the moderates among the Lefts!

A person naive or inexperienced in politics may shake his head as much as he likes, express doubts, commiserate, etc.—the fact is not altered by this. After all, it is not important just how a certain result was achieved; what is important is the result itself (that is, for the Cadets it is not important, but for the working-class masses, who want to adopt a class-conscious attitude to politics, it is very important).

How exactly the negotiations of the Mensheviks with the Cadets were conducted we do not know—whether in writing, verbally, or even by mere hint. It is possible that prominent moderate Mensheviks simply hinted to the Cadet leaders at a probable split among the Social-Democrats, hinted at the permissibility of district agreements. And the Cadets, of course, seized the hint on the wing: “they” will split the St. Petersburg Social-Democrats, and “we” will insert “them” into a district list! “They” for us, and we for “them”. Is that a less real, a less businesslike, a less solid deal than if “they” had gone straight to Kutler, Milyukov, or Nabokov and directly said: we will split the St. Petersburg Social-Democratic Conference for you, and you put us through by means of some district list?

It is a fact