V. I.

Lenin

The ruling parties of Russia, i. e., the Cadets, who have a
majority in the government and the omnipotence of capital in the economy, and the
Socialist-Revolutionaries and Mensheviks, who now have an
obvious majority in the country (but who are powerless in the
government and in the country’s capitalist economy), have
all suffered an obvious defeat over the Ukrainian issue, and what is more, a nation-wide defeat over an issue of
vast importance.

The Socialist-Revolutionaries and the Mensheviks put up with the
fact that the Provisional Government of the Cadets, i. e., of
the counter-revolutionary bourgeoisie, had not done its
elementary democratic duty, had not declared itself in favour of the Ukraine’s autonomy and of her right to
freely secede. According to Minister Chernov’s report in today’s
Dyelo Naroda , the Ukrainians demanded far less than that. They only wanted the Provisional Government “to
declare by a special act that it is not opposed to the
Ukrainian people’s right to autonomy”. This is a most modest and legitimate demand. The other two demands are just as
modest: (1) The Ukraine should through her own people elect one
representative to the central Russian Government. The modesty
of this demand can be seen from the fact that in 1897 the Great
Russians in Russia were estimated at 43 per cent, and the
Ukrainians at 17 percent of the population. In other words, the
Ukrainians could have insisted on having not one but six
Ministers out of the sixteen!! (2) In the Ukraine there should
be “one representative of the central Russian Government
elected by the local population”. What could be more legitimate than this? By what right does a democrat make free to
depart from the principle, proved in theory and confirmed by the
experience of democratic revolutions, that “no officials
for the local population should be appointed from above”??

The Provisional Government’s rejection of these very modest and
legitimate demands was an instance of utter shamelessness, of
savage impertinence, on the part of the counter-revolutionaries,
and a true manifestation of the policy of
Derzhimorda.  [1]
The
Socialist-Revolutionaries and the Mensheviks made a mockery of
their own party programmes by tolerating that in the government,
and are now defending it in their papers! I To what a disgraceful
level the Socialist-Revolutionaries and Mensheviks have fallen!
How pitiful the subterfuges of their organs, Dyelo Naroda
and Rabochaya Gazeta , are today!

Chaos, confusion, “Leninism over the national question”, anarchy—these are a wild landowner’s
outcries [2] that the two newspapers are hurling at the
Ukrainians.

Let us ignore their outcries. What is the substance of their
argument?

Their only argument is that until a Constituent Assembly is
convened it will be impossible to settle in a “regular” manner the issue of the Ukraine’s
boundaries, her freedom, her right to collect taxes, and so on
and so forth. They insist on a “guarantee of regularity”—this expression used in Rabochaya Gazeta’s editorial gives the whole gist of their
argument.

But that is an obvious lie, gentlemen, it is a manifestly
shameless thing on the part of the counter-revolutionaries. For
to advance such an argument means actually helping real traitors
to the revolution!!

“ Guarantees of regularity” ... stop and think for a second. Nowhere in Russia, neither in the central government nor in any local department (except in a very
small institution, the Petrograd district councils), is there
any guarantee of regularity. In fact, there is admittedly
no regularity. There is admittedly no “regularity” in the existence of the Duma or of the
Council of
State. [3]

There is admittedly no “regularity” in the composition of the Provisional Government, for its composition
is a mockery of the will and intelligence of the majority of
Russia’s workers, soldiers and peasants. There is admittedly no
“regularity” in the composition of the Soviets (of
Workers’, Peasants’ and Soldiers’ Deputies), for these institutions have not yet worked out any guarantees of really
complete and strictly democratic elections. Still, this does not
prevent either our Party or the mass of the workers and
peas ants from regarding the Soviets as the best exponent of the will of the majority of the population so
far. Nowhere in Russia are there, can there be, or have there ever been at a revolutionary time like the present
any “guarantees of regularity”. Everyone realises that, no one asks anything different, everyone is aware that it
is inevitable.

It is only for the Ukraine that “we” demand “guarantees of regularity”!

You are paralysed with fear, Socialist-Revolutionary and
Menshevik gentlemen, having yielded to the counter revolutionary
howls of the Great-Russian landowners and capitalists led by
Rodzyanko, Milyukov, Lvov, Tereshchenko, Nekrasov, Shingaryov
and Co. You are already the perfect picture of people overawed
by the rising Cavaignacs ( and those “ lying low ?”).

There is absolutely nothing terrible, not the shadow of anarchy
or chaos, either in the resolutions or in the demands of the
Ukrainians. Accede to their most legitimate and most modest
demands and authority will be just as effective in the Ukraine
as it is everywhere in Russia, where the Soviets (which have
no “guarantees of regularity”!!) are the sole authority. You and all the peoples of Russia will
be given a “guarantee of regularity” by the future
Diets, by the future Constituent Assembly, not only in regard to
the Ukrainian issue, but in regard to all issues. For at this moment there is admittedly no “regularity”
in Russia about any issue. Accede to the
Ukrainians—common sense demands it. For, unless you do,
things will be worse. Force will not check the Ukrainians. It
will only embitter them. Accede to the Ukrainians, and you will
open the way to mutual confidence and brotherly union between
the two nations on the basis of equality!

The Socialist-Revolutionaries and the Mensheviks, who constitute
ruling parties, have been defeated over the Ukrainian issue by
yielding to the counter-revolutionary Cadet Cavaignacs.

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Notes:
[1]
Derzhimorda —a policeman in Gogol’s Inspector-General , a boorish,
insolent oppressor, a petty tyrant.

[2]
Wild Landowner —a character in M. Saltykov-Shchedrin’s fairy-tale
of the same name.

[3]
The Council of State—one of the supreme organs of state power in
tsarist Russia; was established in 1810, according to M. M.
Speransky’s plan, as a legislative-advisory body whose members were
appointed and confirmed by the tsar. A reactionary institution,
it voted down even moderate Bills approved by the Duma.