It would be necessary (on the basis of data from Rafes and others) to formulate an additional point, roughly as follows:

The experience of proletarian dictatorship in Ukraine in those parts of it where in particular a mixed population is observed, equally in Byelorussia (and + ? + ? Hungary?), has shown that national struggle not only in the form of pogroms, from which even the most democratic bourgeois republic does not protect, but also in the form of petty, yet all-pervasive squabbling almost disappears. The reasons for this: 1) the interest, attention, all the spiritual forces of the workers and toiling peasants are wholly absorbed in the great struggle against the bourgeoisie, which struggle unites the toilers of all nations; 2) the dictatorship of the proletariat suppresses the "freedom" of action of the bourgeoisie, the petty bourgeoisie, the bourgeois intelligentsia, which freedom means the utilization of forces, influence, and knowledge by the bourgeoisie for kindling class struggle.

Could not 2 concrete facts be added—?

Written between June 21 and July 26, 1920

First published in 1942 in Lenin Collection XXXIV

Printed from the manuscript