V. I. Lenin

The assassination of the arch-hangman Stolypin occurred at
a time when a number of symptoms indicated that the first period in the
history of the Russian counter-revolution was coming to an end. That is why
the event of September 1, quite insignificant in itself, again raises the
extremely important question of the content and meaning of the
counter-revolution in Russia. One discerns notes of a really serious and
principled attitude amid the chorus of reactionaries who are servilely
singing the praises of Stolypin, or are rummaging in the history of the
intrigues of the Black-Hundred gang which is lording it over Russia, and
amid the chorus of the liberals who are shaking their heads over the “wild
and insane” shot (it goes without saying that included among the liberals
are the former Social-Democrats of Dyelo Zhizni who used the
hackneyed expression quoted above). Attempts are being made to view “the
Stolypin period” of Russian history as a definite entity.

Stolypin was the head of the counter-revolutionary government for about
five years, from 1906 to 1911. This was indeed a unique period crowded with
instructive events. Externally, it may be described as the period of
preparation for and accomplishment of the coup d’état of June 3,
1907. The preparation for this coup, which has already shown its results in
all spheres of our social life, began in the sum mer of 1908, when Stolypin
addressed the First Duma in his capacity as Minister of the Interior. The
question is, on what social forces did the men who staged the coup rely, or
what forces prompted them? What was the social and economic content of the period ushered in on June 3? Stolypin’s personal
“career” provides instructive material and interesting examples bearing
on this question.

A landowner and Marshal of the

Nobility, [1] he was appointed governor in 1902, under Plehve, gained
“fame” in the eyes of the tsar and the reactionary court clique by his
brutal reprisals against the peasants and the cruel punishment he inflicted
upon them (in Saratov Gubernia), organised Black-Hundred gangs and pogroms
in 1905 (the pogrom in Balashov), became Minister of the Interior in 1906
and Chairman of the Council of Ministers after the dissolution of the First
Duma. That, in very brief out line, is Stolypin’s political biography. The
biography of the head of the counter-revolutionary government is at the
same time the biography of the class which carried out the
counter-revolution—Stolypin was nothing more than an agent or clerk in
its employ. This class is the Russian landed nobility with Nicholas
Romanov, the first nobleman and biggest landowner, at their head. It is
made up of the thirty thousand feudal landowners who control seventy
million dessiatines of land in European Russia—that is to say, as much
land as is owned by ten million peasant house holds. The latifundia owned
by this class form a basis for feudal exaction which, in various forms and
under various names (labour-service, bondage, etc.) still reigns in the
traditionally Russian central provinces. The “land hunger” of the Russian
peasant (to use a favourite expression of the liberals and Narodniks) is
nothing but the reverse side of the over-abundance of land in the
hands of this class. The agrarian question, the central issue in our 1905
Revolution, was one of whether landed proprietorship would remain
intact—in which case the poverty-stricken, wretched, starving, browbeaten
and downtrodden peasantry would for many years to come inevitably
remain as the bulk of the population—or whether the bulk of the
population would succeed in winning for themselves more or less human
conditions, conditions even slightly resembling the civil liberties of the
European countries. This, however, could not be accomplished
unless landed proprietorship and the landowner monarchy inseparably bound
up with it were abolished by a revolution.

Stolypin’s political biography is the faithful reflection and
expression of the conditions facing the tsarist monarchy. Stolypin could
only act as he did in the situation in which the revolution placed the
monarchy. The monarchy could not act in any other way when it
became quite clear—became clear in actual practice both prior to
the Duma, in 1905, and at the time of the Duma, in 1906—that the
vast, the overwhelming majority of the population had already realised that
its interests could not be reconciled with the preservation of the
landowning class, and was striving to abolish that class. Nothing could be
more superficial and more false than the assertions of the Cadet writers
that the attacks upon the monarchy in our country were merely the
expression of “intellectual” revolutionism. On the contrary, the
objective conditions were such that it was the struggle of the peasants
against landed proprietorship that inevitably posed the question of whether
our landowning monarchy was to live or die. Tsarism was compelled
to wage a life-and-death struggle, it was compelled to seek other
means of defence in addition to the utterly impotent bureaucracy and the
army which had been weakened as a result of military defeat and internal
disintegration. All that the tsarist monarchy could do under the
circumstances was to organise the Black-Hundred elements of the population
and to perpetrate pogroms. The high moral indignation with which our
liberals speak of the pogroms gives every revolutionary an impression of
something abominably wretched and cowardly, particularly as this high moral
condemnation of pogroms has proved to be fully compatible with the idea of
conducting negotiations and concluding agreements with the pogromists. The
monarchy had to defend itself against the revolution, and the semi-Asiatic,
feudal Russian monarchy of the Romanovs could only defend itself
by the most infamous, most disgusting, vile and cruel means. The only
honourable way of fighting the pogroms, the only rational way from the
point of view of a socialist and a democrat, is not to express high moral
condemnation, but to assist the revolution selflessly and in every way, to
organise the revolution for the over throw of this monarchy.

Stolypin the pogrom-monger groomed himself for a ministerial post in
the only way in which a tsarist governor could; by torturing the peasants, by organising pogroms and by showing an ability
to conceal these Asiatic “practices” behind glib phrases, external
appearances, poses and gestures made to look “European”.

And the leaders of our liberal bourgeoisie, who are expressing their
high moral condemnation of pogroms, carried on negotiations with the
pogromists, recognising not only the latters’ right to existence, but their
leadership in the work of setting up a new Russia and of ruling it! The
assassination of Stolypin has occasioned a number of interesting
revelations and confessions concerning this question. Witte and Guchkov,
for instance, have published letters concerning the former’s negotiations
with “public figures” (road: with the leaders of the moderate
liberal-monarchist bourgeoisie) about forming a Cabinet after

October 17, [2] 1905. Among those who took part in the negotiations with
Witte—these negotiations must have taken a long time, because Guchkov
writes of “the wearisome days of protracted negotiations”—were Shipov,
Trubetskoi, Urusov, and M. Stakhovich, i.e., the future leaders of the
Cadets, and of the Party of Peaceful

Renovation, [3] and of the Octobrist Party. The negotiations,
it turns out, were broken off on account of Durnovo, whom the “liberals”
refused to accept as Minister of the Interior, while Witte demanded this in
the form of an ultimatum. Urusov, however, a leading light of the Cadet
Party in the First Duma, “ardently supported Durnovo’s candidacy”. When
Prince Obolensky suggested Stolypin for the post “some of those present
supported the idea, others said that they did not know him”. “I remember
definitely, “writes Guchkov, “that no one raised the objection
of which Count Witte writes in his letter.”

Now the Cadet press, in its desire to emphasise its “democracy”
(don’t be funny!), particularly, perhaps, in view of the elections in the
first curia in St. Petersburg, where a Cadet opposed an Octobrist, is
trying to sling mud at Guchkov for those negotiations. “How often,”
writes Rech in its issue of September 28, “the Octobrist
fraternity with Guchkov at their head, joined hands with Mr. Durnovo’s
colleagues in order to please the powers that be. How often, with their
eyes riveted on the powers that be, did they turn their backs on public
opinion!” The same reproach levelled by the Cadets at the Octobrists is repeated in a number of
variations in the leading article of Russkiye Vedomosti of the
same date.

But, pardon me, gentlemen of the Cadet Party, what right have
you to reproach the Octobrists, since your representatives also took part in those very same negotiations and even
defended Durnovo? At that time, in November 1905, were not all the
Cadets, like Urusov, in the position of people who have “their eyes
riveted on the powers that be” and “their backs turned on public
opinion”? Yours is a “family quarrel”; not a matter of principle, but
rivalry between equally unprincipled parties; that is what we have
to say apropos of the present reproaches levelled by the Cadets against the
Octobrists in connection with the “negotiations” at the end of 1905. An
altercation of this sort only serves to obscure the really important and
historically undeniable fact that all shades of the liberal
bourgeoisie, from the Octobrists to the Cadets inclusive, “ had their eyes riveted on the powers that be ” and “turned their backs” on
democracy from the time our revolution assumed a really popular
character, i.e., from the time it became a democratic revolution because of
the democratic forces taking an active part in it. The Stolypin period of
the Russian counter-revolution is characterised specifically by the fact
that the liberal bourgeoisie had been turning its back on democracy, and
that Stolypin was able to turn for assistance, sympathy, and
advice first to one then to another representative of this bourgeoisie. Had
it not been for this state of affairs, Stolypin would not have been able to
give the Council of the United Nobility dominance over the
counter-revolutionary-minded bourgeoisie and obtain the assistance,
sympathy, and active or passive support of that bourgeoisie.

This aspect of the matter deserves special attention, precisely because
it is lost sight of, or intentionally ignored, by our liberal press, as
well as by such organs of liberal labour policy as Dyelo Zhizni . Stolypin not only represented the dictatorship of the feudal
landlords, and anyone confining himself to this characterisation has
understood nothing of the specific nature and meaning of the “Stolypin
period”. Stolypin was minister during a period when counter-revolutionary
sentiments prevailed among the entire liberal bourgeoisie, including the Cadets, when the feudal landowners
could , and did, rely on these sentiments, when they could , and did, approach the leaders of this bourgeoisie with
“offers” (of hand and heart), when they could regard even the
most “Left” of these leaders as “His Majesty’s Opposition”, when they
could , and did, refer to the fact that the ideological leaders of
the liberals were turning towards them, towards the side of reaction,
towards those who fought against democracy and denigrated it. Stolypin was
minister during the period when the feudal landowners bent all their
efforts to inaugurate and put into effect as speedily as possible a
bourgeois policy in peasant life in the countryside, when they had
thrown overboard all romantic illusions and hopes based on the muzhik’s
“patriarchal” nature, and had begun to look for allies among the
new, bourgeois elements of Russia in general and of rural Russia in
particular. Stolypin tried to pour new wine into old bottles, to reshape
the old autocracy into a bourgeois monarchy; and the failure of Stolypin’s
policy is the failure of tsarism on this last, the last
conceivable , road for tsarism. The landowner monarchy of
Alexander III tried to gain support in the “patriarchal” countryside and
in the “patriarchal element” in Russian life in general. That
policy was completely defeated by the revolution. After the revolution, the
landowner monarchy of Nicholas II sought support in the
counter-revolutionary sentiments of the bourgeoisie and in a bourgeois
agrarian policy put into effect by these very same landowners. The failure
of these attempts, which even the Cadets, even the Octobrists can no longer
doubt, is the failure of the last policy possible for tsarism.

Under Stolypin the dictatorship of the feudal landowner was not
directed against the whole nation, including the entire “third estate”,
the entire bourgeoisie. On the contrary, the dictatorship was exercised
under conditions most favourable for it when the Octobrist bourgeoisie
served it with heart and soul, when the landowners and the bourgeoisie had
a representative body in which their bloc was guaranteed a majority, and an
opportunity was provided for conducting negotiations and coming to an
agreement with the Crown, when Mr. Struve and the other Vekhi
writers reviled the revolution in a hysterical frenzy and propounded an ideology which gladdened the heart of Anthony, Bishop of Volhynia, and
when Mr. Milyukov proclaimed that the Cadet opposition was “His Majesty’s
Opposition” (His Majesty being a feudal relic). Nevertheless, despite all
these favourable conditions for the Romanovs, despite all these conditions
being the most favourable that can be conceived from the point of view of
the alignment of social forces in twentieth-century capitalist Russia,
Stolypin’s policy ended in failure. Stolypin has been assassinated at a
moment when a new grave-digger of tsarist autocracy—or, rather, the
grave-digger who is gathering new strength—is knocking at the door.

*     * *
Stolypin’s attitude to the leaders of the bourgeoisie, and theirs to
him, is most fully characterised by the relations that existed at the time
of the First Duma. “The period from May to July 1906 was decisive for
Stolypin’s career,” writes Rech . What was the centre of gravity
during that period?

“ The centre of gravity during that period, was not, of course, the
speeches in the Duma,” states the official organ of the Cadet Party.

That is a valuable admission, isn’t it? How many lances were broken at
that time in tilts with the Cadets over the question of whether the
“speeches in the Duma” could be regarded as the “centre of gravity”
during that period I What a torrent of angry abuse and supercilious
doctrinaire lecturing was let loose in the Cadet press against the
Social-Democrats who, in the spring and summer of 1906, maintained that the
centre of gravity during that period was not the speeches in the
Duma! What reproaches were levelled by Rech and Duma at
the whole of Russian “society” at that time because it dreamed about a
“Convention” and was not sufficiently enthusiastic over the Cadet
victories in the “parliamentary” arena of the First Duma! Five years have
passed since then; it is necessary to make a general estimate of the period
of the First Duma, and the Cadets proclaim quite nonchalantly, as if
changing a pair of gloves, that, “of course, the centre of gravity during
that period was not the speeches in the Duma”.

Of course not, gentlemen! But what was the centre of gravity?

“ Behind the scenes,” we read in Rech, “a sharp struggle was
going on between the representatives of two trends. One recommended a
policy of compromise with the people’s representatives, not even shrinking
at the formation of a ‘Cadet Cabinet’. The other demanded vigorous action,
the dissolution of the State Duma and a change in the election law. That
was the programme advocated by the Council of the United Nobility which
enjoyed the support of powerful influences.... At first Stolypin
hesitated. There are indications that on two occasions, with Kryzhanovsky
acting as intermediary, he made overtures to Muromtsev, proposing to
discuss the possibility of forming a Cadet Cabinet with himself as Minister
of the Interior. But at the same time Stolypin undoubtedly maintained
contact with the Council of the United Nobility.”

That is how history is written by the educated, learned and well-read
liberal leaders! It appears that the “centre of gravity” was not
the speeches, but the struggle of two trends within the Black-Hundred
tsarist Court clique! Immediate “attack”, without delay, was the policy
of the Council of the United Nobility, i.e., the policy not of individual
persons, not of Nicholas Romanov, not of “one trend” in “ high places ”, but the policy of a definite class . The Cadets
clearly and soberly see their rivals on the right . But anything
to the left of the Cadets has disappeared from their field of
vision. History was being made by “high places”, by the Council of the
United Nobility and the Cadets; the common people, of course , took
no part in the making of history! A definite class (the nobility) was
opposed by the party of people’s freedom, which stands above
classes, while the “high places” (i.e., Our Father the Tsar) hesitated.

Is it possible to imagine a higher degree of selfish class blindness, a
worse distortion of history and forgetfulness of the elementary truths of
historical science, a more wretched muddle and a worse confusion of class,
party and individuals?

None are so blind as those who will not see democracy and its
forces.

Of course , the centre of gravity during the, period of the
First Duma was not the speeches in the Duma. It was out side the Duma, in
the struggle between classes, in the struggle waged by the feudal
landowners and their monarchy against the masses, against the
workers and peasants. It was precisely during that period that the
revolutionary movement of the masses was again on the upgrade; the spring
and summer of 1906 were marked by a menacing upsurge of the strike wave in
general and of political strikes, of peasant riots and of mutinies in the
armed forces in particular. That , Messrs. Cadet historians, was
why there was hesitation in “high places”. The struggle between
the trends within the tsar’s gang was over the question whether, bearing in
mind the strength of the revolution at the time, they should attempt the
coup d’état at once , or whether they should bide their time and lead the bourgeoisie by the nose a little longer.

The First Duma fully convinced the landowners (Romanov, Stolypin and
Co.) that there could be no peace between them and the peasant and
working-class masses. This conviction of theirs was in complete accordance
with objective reality. All that remained for them to decide was a question
of minor importance; when and how to change the election law, at once or
gradually? The bourgeoisie wavered; but its entire behaviour, even that of
the Cadet bourgeoisie, showed that it feared the revolution a hundred times
more than it feared reaction. That was why the landowners deigned to invite
the leaders of the bourgeoisie (Muromtsev, Heyden, Guchkov and Co.) to
conferences at which they discussed the question of whether they might not
jointly form a Cabinet. And the entire bourgeoisie, including the Cadets, conferred with the tsar, with the pogromists, with
the leaders of the Black Hundreds about the means of combating the
revolution; but never once since the end of 1905 has the bourgeoisie ever
sent representatives of a single one of its parties to confer with the
leaders of revolution about how to overthrow the autocracy and the
monarchy.

That is the principal lesson to be drawn from the “Stolypin period”
of Russian history. Tsarism consulted the bourgeoisie when the revolution
still seemed to be a force; but it gradually applied its jackboot to kick
out all the leaders of the bourgeoisie—first Muromtsev and Milyukov, then Heyden and
Lvov, and, finally, Guchkov—as soon as the revolutionary pressure from
below slackened. The difference between the Milyukovs, the Lvovs, and the
Guchkovs is absolutely immaterial—it is merely a matter of the sequence
in which these leaders of the bourgeoisie turned their cheeks to receive
the ... “kisses” of Romanov-Purishkevich-Stolypin and the sequence in
which they did receive these ... “kisses”.

Stolypin disappeared from the scene at the very moment when the
Black-Hundred monarchy had taken everything that could be of use to it from
the counter-revolutionary sentiments of the whole Russian bourgeoisie. Now
this bourgeoisie—repudiated, humiliated, and disgraced by its own
renunciation of democracy, the struggle of the masses and
revolution—stands perplexed and bewildered, seeing the symptoms of a
gathering new revolution. Stolypin helped the Russian people to learn a
useful lesson: either march to freedom by overthrowing the tsarist
monarchy, under the leadership of the proletariat; or sink deeper into
slavery and submit to the Purishkeviches, Markovs and Tolmachovs, under the
ideological and political leadership of the Milyukovs and Guchkovs.

---
Notes:
[1]
Marshal of the Nobility —the representative of the nobility
of a gubernia or uyezd in tsarist Russia, elected by the local nobility for
each uyezd and gubernia. The Marshal of the Nobility was in charge of all the affairs of the nobility, held an influential post in the
administration and took the chair at the Zemstvo meetings.

[2]
In the Manifesto of October 17, 1905, the tsar, terrified by the
revolution, promised the people civil liberties and a constitution.

[3]
The Party of Peaceful Renovation —a party of big commercial
and industrial capitalists and big landowners; it was formed in 1906 and
united the Left Octobrists and the Right Cadets.