V. I.

Lenin

Controversial Issues

AN OPEN PARTY AND THE MARXISTS

III. THE ATTITUDE OF THE LIQUIDATORS TO THE DECISIONS OF 1908 AND
1910

In the preceding article [ Pravda No. 95 (299)], we quoted the
exact words of the unanimous Party decision on liquidationism, which define
it as a manifestation of bourgeois influence over the proletariat.

As we have pointed out, this decision was adopted in January 1910 . Let us now examine the behaviour of those liquidators who are
brazenly assuring us that there is not, and never has been, any such thing
as liquidationism.

In February 1910, in No. 2 of the magazine Nasha Zarya , which
had only just begun to appear at that time, Mr. Potresov wrote bluntly that
“ there is no Party in the shape of an integral and organised
hierarchy” (i.e., ladder, or system of “institutions”) and that it was
impossible to liquidate “ what in reality no longer exists as an
organised body”. (See Nasha Zarya , 1910, No. 2, 61.)

This was stated a month or even less after the unanimous
decision of the Party!

And in March 1910, another liquidationist journal, namely
Vozrozhdeniye , [3] having the same set of contributors—Potresov, Dan, Martynov, Yezhov, Martov, Levitsky and Co.—stressed and gave a
popular explanation of Mr. Potresov’s words:

“ There is nothing, to liquidate and—we for our part
[i.e., the editors of Vozrozhdeniye ] would add—the dream of
re-establishing this hierarchy in its old, underground form is simply a
harmful, reactionary utopia indicating a loss of political intuition by
members of a party which at one time was the most realistic of all.”
( Vozrozhdeniye , 1910, No. 5, p. 51.)

There is no party, and the idea of re-establishing it is a harmful
utopia—these are clear and definite words. Here we have a plain and
direct renunciation of the Party. The renunciation (and the invitation to
the workers to renounce) came from people who had deserted the underground
and were “longing for” an open party.

This desertion from the underground was, moreover, quite definitely and
openly supported by P. B. Axelrod in 1912, both in Nevsky Golos [4] (1912, No. 6) and in Nasha Zarya (1912, No. 6).

“ To talk about non-factionalism in the conditions now obtaining,” wrote P. B. Axelrod, “means behaving like an ostrich, means
deceiving oneself and others.” “Factional organisation and consolidation
is the manifest responsibility and urgent duty of the supporters of Party
reform, or to be more exact, of a revolution in the Party.”

Thus P. B. Axelrod is openly in favour of a Party revolution ,
i.e., the destruction of the old Party and the formation of a new one.

In 1913, Luch No. 101, in an unsigned editorial stated plainly
that “among the workers in some places there is even a revival and growth
of sympathy for the underground” and that this was “a regrettable fact ”. L. Sedov, the author of that article, admitted himself
( Nasha Zarya , 1913, No. 3, p. 49) that the article had “caused
dissatisfaction”, even among the supporters of Luch tactics. L. Sedov’s explanations, furthermore, were such as to cause
renewed dissatisfaction on the part of a Luch supporter, namely
An, who has an item in No. 181 of Luch , opposing Sedov. He
protests against Sedov’s assumption that the “underground is an obstacle
to the political organisation of our movement, to the building up of a workers’ Social-Democratic Party. An ridicules L. Sedov
for his “vagueness” as to whether the underground is desirable or not.

In their long comment on the article the editors of Luch came
out in favour of Sedov and stated An to be “mistaken in his
criticism of L. Sedov”.

We will examine the arguments of the Luch editors and the
liquidationist mistakes of An himself in their proper place. That is not
the point we are discussing here. What we must go into carefully at the
moment is the fundamental and principal conclusion to be drawn from the
documents quoted above. [1]

The entire Party, both in 1908 and in 1910, condemned and rejected
liquidationism, and explained the class origin and the danger of this trend
clearly and in detail. All the liquidationist newspapers and
journals— Vozrozhdeniye (1909-10), Nasha Zarya (1910-13), Nevsky Golos (1912), and Luch
(1912–13) [2] all of them, after the most definite and even unanimous decisions
of the Party, reiterate thoughts and arguments of an obvious
liquidationist nature.

Even “ Luch ” supporters are forced to declare that they disagree with these arguments, with this preaching. That
is a fact. Therefore, to shout about the “baiting” of liquidators, as
Trotsky, Semkovsky and many other patrons of liquidationism do, is
downright dishonesty, for it is an absolute distortion of the truth.

The truth proved by the documents I have quoted, which cover a period
of more than five years (1908-13), is that the liquidators,
flouting all Party decisions, continue to abuse and bait the Party, i.e.,
the “underground”.

Every worker who himself wants to examine seriously the
controversial and vexed questions of the Party, who wants to decide these
questions for himself , must first of all assimilate this truth,
making an independent study and verification of these Party decisions and
of the liquidator arguments. Only those who carefully study, ponder over
and reach an independent decision on the problems and the fate of
their Party deserve to be called Party members and builders of the workers’
party. One must not be indifferent to the question of whether it is the
Party that is “guilty” of “baiting” (i.e., of too trenchant and
mistaken attacks on) the liquidators or whether it is the
liquidators who are guilty of flagrantly violating Party
decisions, of persistently advocating the liquidation, i.e., the destruction of the Party.

Clearly, the Party cannot exist unless it fights with might and main
against those who seek to destroy it.

Having quoted the documents on this fundamental question, we shall, in
the next article, pass on to an appraisal of the ideological
content of the plea for an “ open party ”.