Personal letter from Lenin to Yevsey (Malyutkin)

20/IX.

Dear comrade! We received your letter, written in Gritsko's cipher, and deciphered it with great difficulty, thanks to the fact that you wrote according to a different edition. We are writing in the same cipher.

The conciliators here are busy with the liquidation of the majority. While informing the committees through official channels about the peace that has allegedly reigned in the party, the Central Committee forgot to add that it itself has passed into the minority and has begun persecuting the majority. Besides the points proclaimed in Central Committee resolutions, there are still other points not subject to public disclosure—not on account of any conspiratorial considerations, but in order to avoid scandal. The Central Committee has resolved: to liquidate the Southern Bureau287 for agitation in favor of a congress, to liquidate the expedition, to apologize to the pamphlet binders, not to publish the protocols of the Council because they compromise the minority and reveal that the majority (the solid majority), before raising agitation for a congress, had proposed an honest peace and insisted on the cessation of all boycotts on both sides; the Central Organization responded to this proposal with mockery; to establish special censorship over works of the majority; a special censor from among the conciliators has been appointed, who will decide whether Lenin's works or other works can be published; all rights of Lenin as a foreign representative have been withdrawn. Furthermore, the Central Committee is arranging a conference with the minority, completely ignoring the majority. The minority, of course, is jubilant and lauding the Central Committee.

The composition of the Central Committee has changed—two members have been arrested, two have resigned, one member has been excluded in a completely unlawful manner. The Central Committee, which in April stood on the side of the majority, now finds that the Central Organization stands at the height of the task. Meanwhile, if there were no principled disagreements at the beginning, there are now plenty of them. In order to justify themselves, the minority is engaged in spitting upon the old *Iskra*. It declares (Dana's report at the international congress, Trotsky's pamphlet) that the old *Iskra* was far less a social-democratic than a democratic organ, that *Iskra* did not think of the organization of the working class but of the organization of the intelligentsia, that Axelrod did not take part in *Iskra* because it was not a genuine social-democratic organ. Only the new *Iskra* put forward the slogan "to the masses," and so on and so forth. It is difficult to convey all the nonsense that they are now spouting, speculating on the public's ignorance, on its unfamiliarity with the history of the movement. The Central Committee is not in the least indignant about this and is only too glad that it has earned forgiveness from the Central Organization through its declaration.* The Central Organization, under the pretext of peace reigning in the party, does not publish the resolutions of committees in favor of a congress—thus they do not publish those of Ekaterinoslav, Petersburg, Moscow, Nizhny Novgorod, Kazan.

Out of 20 Russian committees (whose votes count) in favor of a congress, 12 have already spoken (St. Petersburg, Tver, Tula, Moscow, Siberian, Tiflis, Baku, Batumi, Ekaterinoslav, Nikolayev, Odessa, Nizhny Novgorod); besides this, in favor of a congress are the committees: Riga, Kazan. But the new Central Committee declared that now, in addition to the committees having a voice, there are joined the committees of Samara, Oryol-Bryansk, Smolensk. These committees are conciliationist and the work in them is utterly insignificant...

In view of everything set forth above, the majority has decided not to let itself be silenced and is publishing its works separately; Bonch-Bruevich has undertaken the publishing. The Council, which remained silent when Ryazanov and Akimov issued their pamphlets, has raised a fuss and demands that the pamphlets not bear the inscription: "Russian Social-Democratic Workers' Party." In Bonch-Bruevich's edition there have already come out Galerka's pamphlet "Down with Bonapartism!" and a collection of articles by Galerka and a Regular Contributor "Our Misunderstandings." One of these days there will appear a small pamphlet "The Struggle for the Congress," in which the resolutions of the committees, including that of Riga, will be published. The Rigans declare that they are striving to ensure that the party insti-

* Reference is made to the "July Declaration" of the Central Committee. Ed.