V. I.

Lenin

There is nothing more important to class-conscious workers
than to have an understanding of the significance of their
movement and a thorough knowledge of it. The only source of
strength of the working-class movement—and an invincible one at that—is
the class-consciousness of the workers and the broad scope of
their struggle, that is, the participation in it of the masses of
the wage-workers.

The St. Petersburg Marxist press, which has been in existence for
years, publishes exclusive, excellent, indispensable and easily verifiable
material on the scope of the working-class movement and the various trends
predominating in it. Only those who wish to conceal the truth can ignore
this material, as the liberals and liquidators do.

Complete figures concerning the collections made for the Pravdist
(Marxist) and liquidationist newspapers in St. Petersburg for the period
between January 1 and May 13, 1914, have been compiled by Comrade
V.A.T. [3] We publish his table below in full, and shall quote round
figures in the body of this article as occasion arises, so as not to burden
the reader with statistics.

The following is Comrade V.A.T.’s table. (See pp. 364–65.) First of
all we shall deal with the figures showing the number of workers’
groups. These figures cover the whole period of existence of the Pravdist
and liquidationist newspapers. Number of workers ’ groups:

Supporting the Pravdist newspapers Supporting the liquida- tionist newspapers
For 1912 . . . . . . . . . . 620 89
For 1913 . . . . . . . . . . 2,181 661
1914, from Jan. 1 to May 13 . 2,873 671
Total 5,674 1,421

Collections made by St. Petersburg Moscow Provinces Total
Pravdist Liquidationist
No. [1] rubles [2] No. Rubles
Workers’ groups . . 2,024 13,943.24 308 2,231.98 130 865.00 25 263.52 719 4,125.86 338 2,800.62 2,873 18,934.10 671 5,296.12
Total from non-workers including: 325 1,256.92 165 1,799.40 46 260.51 24 1,137.30 332 1,082.79 230 2,113.90 713 2,650.01 453 6,759.77
Student and youth groups 26 369.49 19 292.13 8 119.30 3 21.00 20 162.13 23 317.09 54 650.92 45 630.22
Groups of “adherents”, “friends”, etc. 8 164.00 14 429.25 6 42.10 5 892.00 28 252.72 35 1,129.35 42 458.82 54 2,450.60
Other groups 2 8.00 6 72.60 1 2.00 — 30 115.29 24 113.52 33 125.29 186.12
Individuals 281 650.96 120 966.72 29 63.61 14 197.30 221 332.05 132 443.80 531 1,046.62 266 1,608.32
Unspecified 8 64.47 6 38.70 2 33.50 26.50 33 220.60 16 110.14 43 318.57 24 175.34
From abroad — 10 49.79 34 1,709.17
Total . . 2,349 15,200.16 473 4,103.38 176 1,125.51 49 1,400.82 1,051 5,208.65 568 4,914.52 3,586 21,584.11 1,124 12,055.89
1 /

The total number of groups is 7,095. Of course, there are groups which
made several collections, but separate data for these are not available.

We see that only one-fifth of the total number of workers’
groups are in sympathy with the liquidators. In two-and-a-half years,
Pravdism, Pravdist decisions and Pravdist tactics have united
four-fifths of Russia’s class-conscious workers. This fact of workers’
unity can well bear comparison with the phrases about “unity” uttered by
the various grouplets of intellectuals, the Vperyodists, Plekhanovites,
Trotskyists, etc., etc.

Let us compare the figures for 1913 and 1914 (those for 1912 are not
comparable, because Pravda appeared in April, and Luch five months later). We shall find that the number of Pravdist groups has
grown by 692, i. e., 31.7 per cent , whereas the liquidationist
groups have gone up by 10, i. e., 1.5 per cent . Hence, the
workers’ readiness to support the Pravdist newspapers has grown 20 times as last as their readiness to support the liquidationist
newspapers.

Let us see how the workers in various parts of Russia are divided
according to trend:

per cent of total workers’ groups {
Pravdist Liquidationist
St. Petersburg . . . . . 86 14
Moscow . . . . . . . . 83 17
Provinces . . . . . . . 68 32

The inference is clear: the more politically developed the masses of
the workers are, and the higher their level of class-consciousness and
political activity, the higher is the number of Pravdists among
them. In St. Petersburg the liquidators have been almost completely
dislodged (fourteen out of a hundred); they still have a precarious hold in
the provinces (32 out of 100), where the masses are politically less
educated.

It is highly instructive to note that figures from an entirely
different source, namely, those giving the number of workers’ delegates
elected during the Insurance Board elections, tally to a remarkable degree
with those of the workers’ groups. During the election of the Metropolitan
Insurance Board, 37 Pravdist and 7 liquidationist delegates were elected, i. e., 84 per cent and 16 per cent respectively. Of the total
number of delegates elected, the Pravdists constituted 70 per cent (37 out
of 53), and at the election of the All-Russia Insurance Board they
obtained 47 out of 57, i. e., 82 per cent. The liquidators, non-party
people and Narodniks form a small minority of workers, who still remain
under bourgeois influence.

To proceed. The following are interesting figures on the average
amounts collected by workers groups:

Average amounts collected by work ers’ groups
Pravdist (rubles) Liquidationist (rubles)
St. Petersburg . . . . . 6.88 7.24
Moscow . . . . . . . . 6.65 10.54
Provinces . . . . . . . 5.74 8.28
Whole of Russia . . . . 6.58 7.89

The Pravdist groups show a natural, understandable and, so to speak,
normal tendency: the average contribution from the average workers’ group
rises with the increase in the average earnings of the working masses.

In the case of the liquidators, we see, apart from the spurt in the
Moscow groups (of which there are only 25 in all!), that the average
contributions from the provincial groups are higher than those
from the St. Petersburg groups! How are we to explain this odd phenomenon?

Only a more detailed analysis of the figures could provide a
satisfactory reply to this question, but that would be a laborious
task. Our conjecture is that the liquidators unite the minority of the
higher-paid workers in certain sections of industry. It has been observed
all over the world that such workers cling to liberal and opportunist
ideas. In St. Petersburg, the longest to put up with the liquidators were
the printing workers, and it was only during the last elections in their
Union, on April 27, 1914, that the Pravdists won half the seats on the
Executive and a majority of the seats for alternate members. In all
countries the printers are most inclined towards opportunism, and some
grades among them are highly paid workers.

If our conclusion about the minority of the workers, the labour
aristocracy, being in sympathy with the liquidators is merely conjectural, there can be no doubt whatever where
individuals are concerned. Of the contributions made by
non-workers, more than half came from individuals (531 out of 713
in our case, 266 out of 453 in the case of the liquidators). The average
contribution from this source in our case is R.1.97 whereas among the
liquidators it is R.6.05!

In the first case, the contributions obviously came from lower-paid
office workers, civil servants, etc., and from the petty-bourgeois elements
of a semi-proletarian character. In the case of the liquidators, however,
we see that they have rich friends among the bourgeoisie.

These rich friends from among the bourgeoisie take still more definite
shape as “groups of adherents, friends, etc.” These groups collected
R.458.82 for us, i. e., two per cent of the total sum collected, the
average donation per group being R.10.92, which is only half as much again
as the average donation of workers’ groups. For the liquidators, however,
these groups collected R.2,450.60, i. e., over 20 per cent of the
total sum collected, the average donation per group being R.45.39 ,
i. e., six times the average collected by workers’ groups!

To this we add the collections made abroad, where bourgeois students
are the main contributors. We received R.49.79 from this source, i. e.,
less than one-fourth of one per cent; the liquidators received R.1,709.17,
i. e., 14 per cent .

If we add up individuals, “adherents and friends”, and collections
made abroad, the total amount collected from these sources will be as
follows:

Pravdists—R.1,555.23, i. e., 7 per cent of the total collections.

Liquidators—R.5,768.09, i. e., 48 per cent of the total
collections.

From this source we received less than one-tenth of what we received
from the workers’ groups (R.18,934). This source gave the liquidators
more than they received from the workers’ groups (R.5,296)!

The inference is clear: the liquidationist newspaper is not a
workers’ but a bourgeois newspaper. It is run mainly on funds
contributed by rich friends from among the bourgeoisie .

As a matter of fact, the liquidators are far more dependent upon the
bourgeoisie than our figures show. The Pravdist newspapers have
frequently published their financial re ports for public
information. These reports have shown that our newspaper, by adding
collections to its income, is paying its way. With a circulation of 40,000
(the average for May 1914), this is understandable, in spite of
confiscations and a dearth of advertisements. The liquidators, however,
published their report only once ( Luch No. 101), showing
a deficit of 4,000 rubles. After this, they adopted the usual bourgeois
custom of not publishing reports. With a circulation of 15,000, their
newspaper cannot avoid a deficit, and evidently this is covered again and
again by their rich friends from among the bourgeoisie.

Liberal-labour politicians like to drop hints about an “ open
workers’ party”, but they do not like to reveal to genuine
workers their actual dependence upon the bourgeoisie! It is left for us,
“underground” workers, to teach the liquidator-liberals the benefit of
open reports....

The overall ratio of worker and non-worker collections is as follows:

Collected by Out of every ruble collected for
Pravdist newspapers Liquidationist newspapers
Workers . . . . . 87 kopeks 44 kopeks
Non-workers . . . 13 ” 56 ”
Total 1.00 ruble

The Pravdists get one-seventh of their aid collections from the
bourgeoisie and, as we have seen, from its most democratic and least
wealthy sections. The liquidationist undertaking is largely a
bourgeois undertaking, which is supported only by a minority of the
workers.

The figures concerning the sources of funds also reveal to us the class
status of the readers and buyers of the newspapers.

Voluntary contributions are made only by regular readers, who most
intelligently sympathise with the trend of the given newspaper. In its
turn, the trend of the given news paper willy-nilly “adapts itself” to
the more “influential” section of its reading public.

The deductions that follow from our figures are, first, theoretical,
i. e., such as will help the working class to understand the conditions of
its movement, and secondly, practical deductions, which will give us direct
guidance in our activities.

It is sometimes said that there is not one working-class press in
Russia, but two. Even Plekhanov repeated this statement not long ago. But
that is not true. Those who say this betray sheer ignorance, if not a
secret desire to help the liquidators spread bourgeois influence among the
workers. Long ago and repeatedly (for example, in 1908 and 1910), the Party
decisions clearly, definitely, and directly pointed to the bourgeois nature
of liquidationism. Articles in the Marxist press have explained this truth
hundreds of times.

The experience of a daily newspaper, which openly appeals to the
masses, was bound to disclose the real class character of
the liquidationist trend . And that is what it did. The
liquidationist newspaper has indeed proved to be a bourgeois undertaking,
which is supported by a minority of the workers.

Moreover, let us not forget that almost up to the spring of 1914 the
liquidationist newspaper was the mouthpiece of the August bloc. It was only
lately that the Letts with drew from it, and Trotsky, Em-El, An,
Buryanov and Yegorov have left, or are leaving, the liquidators. The
break-up of the bloc is continuing. The near future is bound to reveal
still more clearly the bourgeois character of the liquidationist
trend and the sterility of the intellectualist grouplets ,
such as the Vperyodists, Plekhanovites, Trotskyists, etc.

The practical deductions may be summed up in the following points:

1)
5,674 workers’ groups united by the Pravdists in less than two-and-a-half
years is a fairly large number, considering the harsh conditions obtaining
in Russia. But this is only a beginning. We need, not thousands, but tens
of thousands of workers’ groups. We must intensify our activities
tenfold. Ten rubles collected in kopeks from hundreds of workers are more
important and valuable, both from the ideological and organisational point
of view, than a hundred rubles from rich friends among the bourgeoisie.

Even from the financial aspect, experience goes to prove that it is
possible to run a well-established workers’ newspaper with the aid of
workers’ kopeks, but impossible to do so with the aid of bourgeois
rubles. The liquidationist under taking is a bubble, which is bound to
burst.

2)
We lag behind in the provinces, where 32 per cent of the workers’ groups
support the liquidators! Every class-conscious worker must exert every
effort to put an end to this lamentable and disgraceful state of
affairs. We must bring all our weight to bear in the provinces.

3)
The rural workers are apparently still almost untouched by the
movement. Difficult as work in this field may be, we must press forward
with it in the most vigorous manner.

4)
Like a mother who carefully tends a sick child and gives it better
nourishment,, the class-conscious workers must take more care of the
districts and factories where the workers are sick with
liquidationism. This malady, which emanates from the bourgeoisie, is
inevitable in a young working-class movement, but with proper care and
persistent treatment, it will pass without any serious after effects. To
provide the sick workers with more plentiful nourishment in the shape of
Marxist literature, to explain more carefully and in more popular form the
history and tactics of the Party and the meaning of the Party decisions on
the bourgeois nature of liquidationism, to explain at greater length the
urgent necessity of proletarian unity, i. e., the submission of the
minority of the workers to the majority, the submission of the one-fifth to
the four-fifths of the class-conscious workers of Russia—such are some of
the most important tasks confronting us.

Notes:
[1]
Number of collections. — Lenin

[2]
Sums collected (rubles) — Lenin

[3]
V. A. T. —initials of V. A. Tikhomirnov, a member of the
Pravda staff.