V. I. Lenin

Meeting Of The Petrograd Soviet Of Workers' And
Soldiers' Deputies

October 25 (November 7), 1917 [1]

1

Report On The Tasks Of The Soviet Power

Newspaper Report

C omrades, the workers' and peasants' revolution, about the necessity of which the Bolsheviks
have always spoken, has been accomplished.

What is the significance of this workers' and peasants'
revolution? Its significance is, first of all, that we shall
have a Soviet government, our own organ of power, in which the
bourgeoisie will have no share whatsoever. The oppressed masses
will themselves create a power. The old state apparatus will be
shattered to its foundations and a new administrative apparatus
set up in the form of the Soviet organisations.

From now on, a new phase in the history of Russia begins, and
this, the third Russian revolution, should in the end lead to
the victory of socialism.

One of our urgent tasks is to put an immediate end to the
war. It is clear to everybody that in order to end this war,
which is closely bound up with the present capitalist system,
capital itself must be fought.

We shall be helped in this by the world working-class movement,
which is already beginning to develop in Italy, Britain and
Germany.

The proposal we make to international democracy for a just and
immediate peace will everywhere awaken an ardent response among
the international proletarian masses.
All the secret treaties [2] must be immediately published in order
to strengthen the confidence of the proletariat.

Within Russia a huge section of the peasantry have said that
they have played long enough with the capitalists, and will now
march with the workers. A single decree putting an end to landed
proprietorship will win us the confidence of the peasants. The
peasants will understand that the salvation of the peasantry
lies only in an alliance with the workers. We shall institute
genuine workers' control over production.

We have now learned to make a concerted effort. The revolution
that has just been accomplished is evidence of this. We possess
the strength of mass organisation, which will overcome everything and lead the proletariat to the world revolution.

We must now set about building a proletarian socialist state in Russia.

Long live the world socialist revolution! ( Stormy applause. )

2

RESOLUTION

The Petrograd Soviet of Workers' and Soldiers' Deputies hails
the victorious revolution of the proletariat and the garrison of
Petrograd. The Soviet particularly emphasises the solidarity,
organisation, discipline and complete unanimity displayed by the
masses in this unusually bloodless and unusually successful
uprising.

It is the unshakable conviction of the Soviet that the workers'
and peasants' government which will be created by the revolution, as a Soviet government, and which will ensure the
urban proletariat the support of the whole mass of the poor
peasantry, will firmly advance towards socialism, the only means
of saving the country from the untold miseries and horrors of
war.

The new workers' and peasants' government will immediately propose a
just and democratic peace to all belligerent nations.

It will immediately abolish landed proprietorship and hand over
the land to the peasants. It will institute workers' control
over the production and distribution of goods and establish
national control over the banks, at the same time transforming
them into a single state enterprise.

The Petrograd Soviet of Workers' and Soldiers' Deputies calls on
all workers and all peasants to support the workers' and
peasants' revolution devotedly and with all their energy. The
Soviet expresses the conviction that the urban workers, in
alliance with the poor peasants, will display strict, comradely
discipline and establish the strictest revolutionary order,
which is essential for the victory of socialism.

The Soviet is convinced that the proletariat of the West
European countries will help us to achieve a complete and
lasting victory for the cause of socialism.

---
Notes:
[1] The
meeting opened at 2.35 p.m. on October 25 (November 7), and
heard a report of the Revolutionary Military Committee on the
overthrow of the Provisional Government and the triumph of the
revolution. Lenin gave a report on the tasks facing Soviet
power. The resolution motioned by Lenin was adopted by an
overwhelming majority.

[2] The
reference is to secret diplomatic documents, such as the secret
treaties concluded by the tsarist and later by the bourgeois
Provisional Government of Russia with the governments of
Britain, France, Germany, Japan and other imperialist powers. From November 10 (23), 1917, these documents were
published in Pravda and Izvestia , and in
December were put out in a series entitled Collection of Secret Documents from the Archives of the Former Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Seven volumes were published from December
1917 to February 1918. By publishing the secret treaties, the
Soviet Government's revolutionary propaganda struck a great blow
for a general democratic peace, without annexations and
indemnities, and exposed the imperialist nature of the First
World War.