V. I.

Lenin

In its editorial of April 17, Finansovaya Gazeta , [1] organ of the big capitalists and banks, discloses a
fact of stupendous importance, namely, how the parties of the Socialist-Revolutionaries ,
the Menshevik Social-Democrats , etc., have bound themselves hand and foot
by tying themselves to the capitalists through their notorious
“agreement” [the contact commission ] with the Provisional Government .

Here is the full text of the article:

THE LEFTS AND THE LOAN

The Liberty Loan issued by the Provisional Government has not
evoked in Left-wing circles the enthusiasm that it has met with
among the population at large.

The Left-wing press has split up into three groups. Lenin’s
Pravda has come out definitely against the Loan, expressing the point of view of the Bolsheviks. Plekhanov’s
Yedinstvo strongly supports the Loan. Finally, the other organs of the socialist press Rabochaya Gazeta, Zemlya i Volya, and Volya Naroda have taken a
“middle” stand, neither here nor there; they are not exactly for
the Loan, nor are they exactly against it. This is the position
also of the Soviet of Soldiers’ and Workers’ Deputies, which
decided to support the Loan in principle, but is now having its
doubts and is wavering. Dyen was right when it recently
reproved this central and most powerful group, which includes
the Mensheviks and Socialist-Revolutionaries, for its uncertain
and ambiguous stand.

As if to confirm the justice of this reproof, the Soviet of
Soldiers’ and Workers’ Deputies yesterday again returned to the
once settled question of the Loan and had a discussion about
it. N. S. Chkheidze announced that the government was expected
shortly to issue a new statement exhaustively explaining its
stand on issues of foreign and domestic policy. Until then,
N. S. Chkheidze proposed that consideration of the question of
supporting the Loan be postponed.

This attitude of the Lefts is puzzling, to say the least. After
all, someone bas to run the government and carry out the reforms
which suffering Russia has been craving for.

One of the two: either the present government enjoys the
confidence of the Lefts, having so far done nothing to shirk the
obligations it has assumed; or it does not enjoy such confidence. In the latter case, the Lefts, in withdrawing their
support of the Provisional Government, must take upon themselves
not only “control” over its activities, but the whole burden of
government and responsibility before the people and history. If,
however, they cannot blame the Provisional Government for
anything that it has done up to now, then, naturally ,they have
no right to wait for its future statements and should give it
their full support. In any case, this equivocalness, this
evasive reticence, these mental reservations on their part are
quite intolerable. On the one hand, this does not in the least
lighten the responsibility of the Provisional Government, which
cannot even plead isolation against the verdict of history; on
the other, this practically deprives the government of the
support of the broad democratic masses and thus puts it in a
difficult position.

Straightforwardness has always been a primary virtue of
socialist trends. Socialist parties have always eschewed a
policy of evasion, philistine spinelessness, and elastic
opportunism. But now, in the question of the Loan, the central
groups of Russian socialism have abandoned these traditional
principles of theirs and taken to the path of
Octobrist [2] pussyfooting. Public opinion has a right to ask that they make
their attitude on the question of the Loan perfectly clear, that
they honestly and openly declare their participation or
non-participation in it and thus fulfil their moral obligation
to the Provisional Government, which means, either to give it
the backing of the Left groups or to make known their disagreement with it.

The bank bosses are men of business. They take a sane view of
politics: once you’ve promised to support the capitalist
government (which is conducting an imperialist war), then come
across with the Loan.

Correct! Having bound themselves hand and foot, the
Socialist-Revolutionaries and the Mensheviks have meekly
surrendered to the capitalists. The government’s promise
“shortly to issue a new statement exhaustively {!} explaining
{it has been by now explained more than enough!} its stand on
issues of foreign and domestic policy” is nothing but an empty
phrase.

No “statements” in the form of declarations, assurances, or
pronunciamentos will alter the fact of the matter. And the fact
of the matter is that the capitalist government of Lvov , Guchkov ,
Milyukov and Co. represents the interests of capitalism, is bound up with
those interests, and cannot (even if it wanted to) break free
from the imperialist, annexationist policies of conquest.

To gain the “ backing ” of the “Lefts” by means of empty
non-committal phrases, that is, to use the authority of the
Lefts to bolster up its imperialist policy without receding a
step from it—this is what our imperialist government is
trying to do, this is what, objectively, Chkheidze and his
friends are helping it to do.

“ Octobrist pussyfooting”—what a winged little phrase!
This is not only a practical, but also a correct evaluation of
the Socialist-Revolutionary and Menshevik political line by
people who really know what it’s all about.

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Notes:
[1]



[2]