TELEGRAM TO K. N. NEŠEMSKY, SOVDEP, WITH PRIZES FOR WORKERS
ESTABLISHING FOOD SUPPLY DEPARTMENTS /
May 24, 1918, 5:05 PM
To All Workers of the Kineshema District. Comrades, workers—
The wealthy landowners of the producing provinces are concealing vast reserves of grain and refusing to turn them over to the starving working class. These wealthy exploiters prefer to sell grain at exorbitant, speculative prices—prices that only the urban bourgeoisie can afford, while the impoverished, famine-stricken masses cannot. By speculating in grain, the rich seek to extend their speculative practices to the goods they receive in exchange for grain. The urban bourgeoisie is agitating for the abolition of the grain monopoly, for the imposition of fixed prices, and for the introduction of free trade in grain. From agitation, the bourgeoisie moves to provocation, skillfully—and almost imperceptibly—inciting the hungry working class to stage protests, riots, and disturbances, all in an effort to seize power into their own hands. The Council of People’s Commissars is fighting with all its might to uphold the grain monopoly; without it, only the bourgeoisie will prosper, while the poorest segments of the population will be left utterly destitute, deprived of even a single loaf of bread. Comrades, workers, do not fall for the provocations of dark forces; do not play into the hands of the bourgeoisie and the counter-revolutionaries who seek to reap the benefits of your struggles while undermining all the gains of the revolution. Do not, through reckless protests or unauthorized barter, introduce disorder into the arduous task of securing bread for yourselves. The Council of People’s Commissars is now undertaking large-scale exchanges of goods for grain and has begun, through armed detachments, to requisition the grain reserves held by the rural bourgeoisie. If you wish to help, to lend support to your worker-peasant government, act in an organized manner: select from among your ranks the most capable experts—
* Printed according to the text of the telegram, typed on a typewriter. Ed.