The list of candidates published by the Central Committee is drawn up in an utterly unacceptable manner and demands the most vigorous protest. For in a peasant-dominated Constituent Assembly, we need four or even five times as many workers—only they are capable of forging close, intimate bonds with the peasant deputies. It is equally unacceptable to include an exorbitant number of candidates who are little more than newly minted members, having only recently joined our Party (such as Larin). By populating the list with such candidates—candidates who ought first to have spent months and months working within the Party—the Central Committee throws wide open the doors to careerism, to the relentless pursuit of seats in the Constituent Assembly. An urgent review and correction of the list is imperative.

It goes without saying that among the interdistrict delegates{111}, so few of whom have been thoroughly tested in proletarian work aligned with the aims of our Party, no one would dispute a candidacy like Trotsky’s—for, first, Trotsky adopted an internationalist stance immediately upon his arrival; second, he championed the cause of fusion among the interdistricts; and third, during those fateful July days, he rose to the occasion, standing steadfastly as a devoted supporter of the Party of the revolutionary proletariat. Clearly, this cannot be said of the many “yesterday’s” Party members who have been added to the list.

Particularly scandalous is the inclusion of Larin—and worse still, placing him ahead of Petrovsky, Krylenko, and others… During the war, Larin had already lent his support to chauvinists, speaking on their behalf at the Swedish Congress, helping to disseminate falsehoods against the Petersburg workers and their boycott of the military-industrial committees. Throughout the war, Larin never once distinguished himself as a champion of internationalism prior to the Revolution. Upon arriving in Russia, Larin long assisted the Mensheviks and even published in the press outrageous, Alexinsky‑style attacks against our Party. Larin is notorious for his frequent “shifts” in political stance—recall his pamphlet on the Workers’ Congress and his attempts to forge an alliance with the Socialist-Revolutionaries.

Of course, there would be no need to recall all this if Larin had joined our Party with a genuine desire to reform himself. But to propel him into the Constituent Assembly just a week or two after his entry into the Party means, in effect, transforming our Party into yet another squalid stable for careerists—no different from the majority of European parties[25].

Serious work within the Constituent Assembly will require a close, intimate, deeply personal engagement with the peasantry. Only workers who share a common life‑style with the peasants are truly suited for this task. To pack the Constituent Assembly with orators and literary figures means treading the well-worn path of opportunism and chauvinism—a path unworthy of the Third International.

Written between September 29 and October 4 (October 12 and 17), 1917.

Published in incomplete form in 1921 in Volume XIV, Part II of the Collected Works of N. Lenin (V. Ulyanov).

Printed here for the first time in full, based on a typewritten copy.