Date: 1917
Source: ru:PSS/v32

“When the real Cavaignac arrives, we will fight alongside you, in the same ranks,” wrote “Workers’ Gazette” — the organ of that very Menshevik party whose member, Minister Tsereteli, had, in his infamous and ill‑fated speech, gone so far as to threaten the disarmament of Petrograd’s workers.

The above quotation from “Workers’ Gazette” vividly exposes the fundamental errors of both ruling parties in Russia—both the Mensheviks and the Socialist Revolutionaries—and for that reason deserves close attention. You are seeking out Cavaignac at the wrong time, or in the wrong place—such is the tenor of the ministerial organ’s reasoning.

Let us recall Cavaignac’s class role. In February 1848, the monarchy was overthrown in France. The bourgeois republicans were now in power. Like our Kadets, they sought “order,” by which they meant the restoration and consolidation of the monarchical instruments of mass oppression: the police, the standing army, the privileged bureaucracy. Like our Kadets, they sought to put an end to the revolution, hating the revolutionary proletariat with its still very vague, at that time, “social” (that is, socialist) aspirations. Like our Kadets, they treated with ruthless hostility the policy of extending the French Revolution across all of Europe—of transforming it into a worldwide proletarian revolution. Like our Kadets, they skillfully exploited the petty-bourgeois “socialism” of Louis Blanc, bringing him into government as a minister, thereby turning him from the leader of socialist workers—as he had hoped to be—into a mere appendage, a lackey of the bourgeoisie.

Such were the class interests, the position, and the politics of the dominant class.

The other major social force was the petty bourgeoisie—wavering, intimidated by the red specter, easily swayed by cries against the “anarchists.” In its aspirations, dreamy and rhetorically “socialist,” readily calling itself “socialist democracy” (even adopting that very term now, along with the Mensheviks, by the Socialist Revolutionaries!), the petty bourgeoisie feared to entrust itself to the leadership of the revolutionary proletariat—unaware that this very fear condemned it to place its trust in the bourgeoisie. For in a society marked by fierce class struggle between bourgeoisie and proletariat, especially when that struggle inevitably intensifies through revolution, there can be no “middle ground.” Indeed, the very essence of the petty bourgeoisie’s class position and aspirations lies in its desire for the impossible, its striving toward the unattainable—precisely the kind of “middle ground” it seeks.

The third decisive class force was the proletariat, which sought not “reconciliation” with the bourgeoisie, but victory over it; it aimed to carry the revolution forward without fear, and to extend it on an international scale.

Such was the objective historical soil that gave rise to Cavaignac. The petty bourgeoisie’s vacillations “excluded” it from playing an active role, and taking advantage of its fear of trusting the proletariat, the French Kadet General Cavaignac proceeded to disarm the workers of Paris—and to order their mass execution.

The revolution came to an end with this historic massacre; the petty bourgeoisie, though numerically dominant, remained politically powerless, a tail wagging behind the bourgeoisie—and within three years, a Caesarist monarchy was restored in France, in an especially vile form.

Tsereteli’s historic speech of June 11—clearly inspired by Kadet Cavaignacs (perhaps directly instilled by bourgeois ministers, perhaps indirectly suggested by the bourgeois press and public opinion—though the distinction is of little consequence)—was remarkable precisely because it was historic; it became historic because Tsereteli, with an unparalleled naiveté, laid bare the “secret ailment” common to the entire petty bourgeoisie, both Socialist Revolutionary and Menshevik. This “secret ailment” consists, first, in a complete inability to pursue an independent political course; second, in a fear of entrusting oneself to the revolutionary proletariat and of supporting its independent policies wholeheartedly; and third, in the inevitable consequence of this—that one slides ever deeper into subservience to the Kadets, or to the bourgeoisie in general (that is, into submission to the Cavaignacs).

This, then, is the crux of the matter. It is not Tsereteli or Chernov personally—and not even Kerensky—who are destined to play the role of Cavaignac; others will arise who, at the proper moment, will say to the Russian Louis Blans: “Step aside”—but Tsereteli and Chernov are the leaders of a petty-bourgeois politics that makes the emergence of Cavaignacs both possible and necessary.

“When the real Cavaignac arrives, we will be with you”—what a fine promise, what a splendid intention! It is only a pity that it reveals the typical misunderstanding of class struggle found among the sentimental or timid petty bourgeoisie. For Cavaignac is no accident; his “arrival” is not a singular event. Cavaignac is a representative of a class—the counterrevolutionary bourgeoisie—and the bearer of its political program. And it is precisely this class, precisely this policy, that you are now supporting, esteemed Socialist Revolutionaries and Mensheviks! With your deliberate majority in the country at this very moment, with your preponderance in the government, you are giving this class—and its policies—a superb base from which to operate.

Indeed, at the All‑Russian Peasant Congress, the Socialist Revolutionaries held nearly absolute sway. At the All‑Russian Congress of Workers’ and Soldiers’ Deputies, the vast majority voted in favor of a bloc comprising Socialist Revolutionaries and Mensheviks. The same was true in the elections to the district councils of Petrograd. The facts are plain: the Socialist Revolutionaries and Mensheviks are now the ruling party. And yet this ruling party is voluntarily handing over power (its majority in the government) to the party of the Cavaignacs!!

If there is a swamp, devils will always find their way. If there is a petty bourgeoisie that is wavering, uncertain, and afraid of the revolution’s unfolding—then the emergence of Cavaignacs is assured.

Russia today has many features that distinguish our revolution from the French Revolution of 1848: imperialist war, the proximity of more advanced (rather than more backward, as in France at the time) nations, the agrarian and national movements. But all of this can alter only the form of Cavaignac’s appearance, the timing, the external pretexts, and the like. It cannot change the essence of the matter, for the essence lies in the relations among classes.

In words, Louis Blanc was as far removed from Cavaignac as heaven is from earth. He made countless promises to “fight in the same ranks” with the revolutionary workers against the bourgeois counterrevolutionaries. And yet not a single Marxist historian, not a single socialist, would dare to doubt that it was precisely the weakness, the vacillation, the tendency to trust the bourgeoisie in Louis Blanc and his followers that gave birth to Cavaignac, that secured his success.

It is solely the steadfastness and vigilance, the strength of Russia’s revolutionary workers, that will determine whether the Russian Cavaignacs—inevitably bred by the counterrevolutionary tendencies of the Russian bourgeoisie, led by the Kadets, and by the vacillation, timidity, and wavering of the petty-bourgeois parties of the Socialist Revolutionaries and Mensheviks—will meet with victory or defeat.

“Pravda,” No. 83, June 29 (16), 1917

Printed according to the text of the newspaper “Pravda.”