V. I. Lenin

Petrograd City R.S.D.L.P.(B.) Conference {1}

APRIL 14–22 (APRIL 27–MAY 4), 1917

REPORT ON THE PRESENT SITUATION AND THE ATTITUDE TOWARDS THE
PROVISIONAL GOVERNMENT

APRIL 14 (27)

NEWSPAPER REPORT

The old traditional formulas (dictatorship of the proletariat and the peasantry) no longer meet the changed conditions. A
revolutionary-democratic dictatorship has been established but not in the form we envisaged: it is inter locked with the
dictatorship of the imperialist bourgeoisie. The imperialist war has
confused everything, turning the rabid opponents of the revolution—the
Anglo-French capitalists—into supporters of the revolution for victory
(the same applies to the lop army command and counter revolutionary
bourgeoisie).

It is this unique historical concurrence of circumstances that has
brought about a dual dictatorship: the dictatorship of the bourgeoisie and
the dictatorship of revolutionary democracy. In organisational terms, the
people have never managed to keep abreast of the bourgeoisie; in Russia the
people have set up their own organised power without having achieved
political independence. Hence, the dual power, the unconsciously trusting
attitude on the part of the petty-bourgeois majority of the soldier masses
and a section of the workers to the Provisional Government, and the
voluntary submission of revolutionary democracy to the bourgeois
dictatorship. The specific feature of the present situation is that lack of
political awareness on the part of the masses is preventing the
establishment of a stable and conscious majority on the side of the
proletarian policy (all other political trends have gone over entirely to
the petty-bourgeois position). The revolutionary democracy is an assembly
of the most diverse elements (in terms of class status and
interests , which is not the same thing at all!). Their
stratification: in the countryside—the well-to-do peasants, who have been
strengthened by the November 9 law, and the poor, one-horse and horseless
peasants, and in the towns—the sections close to the working class and
the petty proprietors; the separation of the proletarians and the
semi proletarians from the petty bourgeoisie is inevitable, but
the consolidation of the propertied elements in the revolutionary bloc may
well advance to a point where it will prevail over the organisation of the
masses rallying round the proletarian slogans. It is quite possible,
therefore, that power will remain in the hands of the bourgeoisie, and that
there will be no transfer of power to the Soviets of Workers’ and Soldiers’
Deputies. The conclusion: we are not faced with the task of overthrowing
the Provisional Government—it rests on the confidence of the
petty-bourgeois and a section of the workers’ masses—but with that of painstaking explanation
of the class tasks and organisation.

| Pravda No. 40, May 8 (April 25), 1917 | |
| --- | --- |
| Printed from the Pravda text | |

SPEECH IN MOVING A RESOLUTION ON THE WAR APRIL 22 (MAY 5)

The resolution on the war was drafted in the committee, but
the final version is yet to be worked out. I think that in its final
wording the resolution will be put before the general Party conference, and
I now move that it be read out in its present form.

The resolution consists of three parts: 1) objective causes of the war,
2) revolutionary defencism, and 3) how to end the war.

| First published in 1925 in the book Petrogradskaya obshchegorodskaya i Vserossiiskaya konferentsii R.S.D.R.P.(B.) v aprele 1917 goda (Petrograd City and All-Russia Conferences of the R.S.D.L.P.[B.], April 1917) | |
| --- | --- |
| Printed from a typewritten copy of the minutes | |

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Notes:
{1}
The Petrograd City Conference of the R.S.D.L.P. ( B. )
was called by decision of the St. Petersburg Committee of April 6 (19) and
was hold from April 14 to 22 (April 27–May 5), 1917. It was attended by 57
delegates, including delegates from the Finnish, Estonian, Latvian, Polish
and Lithuanian organisations, representatives of the Military Organisation,
and also two mezhraiontsi (see Note 556).

On the agenda were the following questions: current tasks—present situation; attitude to the Soviet of Workers’ and Soldiers’
Deputies and the question of its reorganisation; structure of Party
organisation; attitude to the other Social-Democratic trends; municipal
elections; harassment of Pravda .

Lenin was elected honorary Chairman of the Conference. He gave the main
political report on “Current Tasks—Present Situation”, and was on the
committee to work out the resolutions: “On the Attitude Towards the
Provisional Government” and “On the War”; he motioned the resolutions
“On the Municipal Elections” and “On the Attitude Towards the Parties of
Socialist-Revolutionaries, Menshevik Social-Democrats, ‘non-factional’
Social-Democrats and other kindred political trends”.

Kamenev’s attempt in his speech and amendments to Lenin’s resolution on
the attitude to the Provisional Government to put through the demand of
control over it, was exposed by Lenin as conciliatory, as the policy of
Chkheidze and Steklov.

By an overwhelming majority, the Conference adopted Lenin’s resolution
on the attitude to the Provisional Government. At the first sitting it
adopted Lenin’s appeal “Against the Riot-mongers. To the Workers, Soldiers
and the Whole Population of Petrograd.”

On April 19 (May 2) the sittings were interrupted in view of the
massive protest movement in response to the Provisional Government’s note
to the allied powers on April 18 (May 1) expressing its readiness to
continue the imperialist war. The Conference decided to urge the workers
and soldiers to give organised expression to their solidarity with the
basic propositions of the Party Central Committee resolution of April 20
(May 3) on the crisis in connection with the said note of the Provisional
Government (see present edition, Vol. 24, pp. 184–85).

The delegates took part in explanatory work carried on by the Central
Committee in the masses. In view of this, subsequent sittings were not
fully attended.

The decisions of the Petrograd City Conference testified to the
cohesion of the Petrograd Bolsheviks round Lenin’s “April Theses”;
Lenin’s tactics were given approval by the Party organisation of the
capital, the largest In the country. The resolutions of the Petrograd
Conference largely formed the basis of the resolutions of the Seventh
(April) All-Russia Conference of the R.S.D.L.P.(B.)

(see present edition, Vol. 24, pp. 139–70).

p. 400