Speech on the Question of the Constituent Assembly
Речь по вопросу об Учредительном собрании
Date: 1917
Source: PSS vol 35
Translated by: AI (Claude)

If we take the Constituent Assembly outside the environment of class struggle that has reached civil war, then we do not yet know an institution more perfect for revealing the will of the people. But one cannot soar in the realm of fantasies. The Constituent Assembly will have to act in the environment of civil war. The bourgeois-Kaledin elements began the civil war.

After an attempt to drag out the uprising in Moscow, after Kerensky's unsuccessful attempt to move troops on Petrograd, after a fruitless attempt to organize counterrevolutionary upper ranks of the army command, they are now undertaking an attempt to organize an uprising on the Don. This attempt is hopeless, as the toiling Cossacks are against the Kaledinites.

Objecting to the reproach of persecution of the Cadet party, comrade Lenin declares: it is impossible to separate class struggle from political opponent. When they say that the Cadet party is not a strong group - they speak untruth. The Cadet central committee is the political staff of the class of the bourgeoisie. The Cadets have absorbed all the propertied classes; elements standing to the right of the Cadets have merged with them. All of them support the Cadet party.

We are proposed to convene the Constituent Assembly as it was conceived. No sir, excuse me! It was conceived against the people. We made a coup in order to have guarantees that the Constituent Assembly will not be used against the people, so that these guarantees are in the hands of the government. In our decree it is clearly, unambiguously stated when the Constituent Assembly will be convened. In it we gave a precise answer to this question. Do not engage in reading hearts, we are hiding nothing. We said, when there are 400 people, we will convene the Constituent Assembly. It is not our fault that the elections took place later than they were appointed. In some places the Soviets themselves appointed later dates for elections. With the different timing of elections, it was necessary to determine what number of deputies is sufficient for opening the Constituent Assembly. There was an attempt to use the circumstance that the law does not indicate this number, in order to convene the Constituent Assembly with any number of deputies. In what position would be the power that would allow this? Soviet power acted correctly, decreeing at what number of deputies the Constituent Assembly will be considered correctly convened. Soviet power did this. Who does not agree - must criticize the decree. If instead of criticism we hear hints, general guesses, then we reject them.

When the revolutionary class wages struggle against the propertied classes that offer resistance, it must suppress this resistance; and we will suppress the resistance of the propertied by all those means by which they suppressed the proletariat - Other means have not been invented.

You said, it is necessary to isolate the bourgeoisie. But the Cadets, hiding behind the formally-democratic slogan, the slogan of the Constituent Assembly - in fact are opening civil war. They say: "We want both to sit in the Constituent Assembly and at the same time organize civil war," and you answer this with phrases about isolation.

We do not catch only violators of formality, we put forward a direct political accusation against a political party. The French revolutionaries acted this way too. This is our answer to those peasants who elected, not knowing whom they elected. Let the people know that the Constituent Assembly will gather not as Kerensky wanted. We introduced the right of recall, and the Constituent Assembly will not be such as the bourgeoisie conceived it. When the convocation of the Constituent Assembly is separated from us by several days, the bourgeoisie organizes civil war and increases sabotage, disrupting the matter of armistice. We will not allow ourselves to be deceived by formal slogans. They wish to sit in the Constituent Assembly and organize civil war at the same time. Let them examine our accusation against the Cadet party on its merits, let them prove that the Cadet party is not the staff of civil war, knowingly hopeless, flooding the country with blood. Comrade Steinberg did not try to prove this. He forgot everything that was clarified about the connection of the Cadets with Kornilov; not we, but Chernov, our political opponent, exposed this connection. We are proposed to catch switchmen. We will not hide political accusation against the staff of an entire class behind catching individual persons.

Further, comrade Lenin stops on the objection that the Bolsheviks were also declared enemies of the people. We were threatened that we would be declared enemies of the people, but this was not done. They did not dare to do this. We told them then: "Yes, if you can do this, then try. Try to tell the people that the Bolshevik party, as a party, as a direction, is an enemy of the people." They did not dare to do this, they caught individual persons, slandered. We told them: you cannot declare us enemies of the people, you do not have a shadow of principled objections against the Bolsheviks, you can only sow slander. Our accusation against the party puts an end to petty methods of political struggle. We will tell the people the truth. We will tell the people that their interests are higher than the interests of a democratic institution. It is not necessary to go back to old prejudices that subordinate the interests of the people to formal democratism. The Cadets shout: "All power to the Constituent Assembly," but in fact this means for them: "All power to Kaledin." This must be said to the people, and the people will approve us.

"Pravda" No. 207, December 19 (6) 1917
Printed from the text of the newspaper "Pravda"