Date: 1910-10-07
Source: ru:PSS/v47
Source: CW vol 47

When the "hegemony of the proletariat in the Russian revolution" prevailed in the five-volume "Public Movement" (edited by Martov and Potresov), Plekhanov left this editorial board and declared "Public Movement" to be the work of liquidators. Martov now represents not the entire Menshevism, but only that part from which Plekhanov, who remained a Menshevik, has distanced himself and declared it opportunism.

Martov contrasts the defense of the boycott ("political abstention") "in ganz Westeuropa"* by anarchists with the Russian boycott of 1906. We have spoken separately about the 1906 boycott (as you have already mentioned). But why, when speaking about the boycott in general, does Martov forget the main application of the boycott in the Russian revolution, the boycott of the Bulygin Duma (the law of August 6, 1905)?? Was it because all the liberals, even the left ones (the "Union of Liberation"), were against this boycott, while the Bolsheviks supported it? Is it because this boycott was victorious? Or is it because this boycott was a slogan of the victorious Niederwerfungsstrategie?

All Mensheviks (especially in "Nasha Zarya," "Vozrozhdeniye," and "Zhizn") seized upon the dispute between Rosa Luxemburg and Kautsky to declare K. Kautsky a "Menshevik." And Martov goes to great lengths, resorting to kleinliche und miserable Diplomatie,** to deepen the chasm between Rosa Luxemburg and K. Kautsky. These elende*** methods will not succeed. Revolutionary Social-Democrats could argue about the timing of the Niederwerfungsstrategie in Germany, but not about its appropriateness for Russia in 1905. The idea of denying its appropriateness for Russia in 1905 never occurred to Kautsky. Only liberals and German and Russian Quesnels could deny this!

And what, will the outcome of the question of the mass strike in Magdeburg (the adoption of Rosa's resolution and her withdrawal of the second part) not lead to a reconciliation between her and Kautsky? And with the Vorstand*? Or will it take longer? 263 ((I wrote to Rosa Luxemburg about two weeks ago from Stockholm.))

My address: Vl, Oulianoff. 4. Rue Marie Rose. 4. Paris. XIV.

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Sent to Leipzig

First published in 1925 in Lenin Collection III

Printed from the manuscript

* - "in all of Western Europe". Ed.
** - petty and miserable diplomacy. Ed.
*** - wretched. Ed.
* - Executive Committee. Ed.