III

We shall sum up the first period by saying that even in their so-called Communist revolutionary stage the Bolshevists proved their capitalist character by the distribution of the soil, their slogan of self-determination of all nations, the peace of Brest-Litovsk, by admitting the peasants to the Soviets and giving them political power, and finally by their party dictatorship.

We shall now examine the second period, which began after February, 1921.

Hitherto, both the peasants and the proletariat, under the guidance of the Bolshevists, had fulfilled their historic mission in striving, the proletariat to establish Communism, the peasants to establish the democratic-capitalist Republic.

In February 1921, the rising in the fortress of Kronstadt, on the battleships and in Petersburg, broke out. Then — as by a breath — Communism collapsed. Its foundations disappeared in an instant. It may be argued that the rising was very insignificant considering the huge size of the country. Moreover, the peasants were not, and are not, organised as a class; but the small act of a small group of peasants was sufficient — it is said that the warships were mostly manned by peasants’ sons.

The Bolshevist party represented principally the vast millions who wanted land, and as soon as quite a small section of those millions showed that they wanted something more than land, the party at once gave way, and the proletariat, out of which the party had been evolved, had finished with its Communism. The proletariat was made the servant of the peasantry, the proletariat had to secure under the orders of its own party, which was, from now, no longer the representative of the proletariat and its Communism, but of the peasantry and its capitalism.

We shall recapitulate now the greatest changes in the changing over to capitalism, not in their chronological order, which is of small importance here, but to explain what has happened. The reader must understand that behind all these changes is the hidden influence of the peasants, which did not even move as a mass, which was not even organised. It only showed itself locally, but by its enormous numbers it made the whole Bolshevist party its tool. It was like an elementary power which forced the Bolsheviks — even men like Lenin — to stand against the class from which the Bolshevists had sprung, and which was inimical to the peasantry.

We can cite examples from the bourgeois revolutions where the representatives of a class were compelled to rise against their class by the power of other classes. But in these bourgeois revolutions both or all the bourgeois classes, that is to say, the landed proprietors, industrialists and financiers stood on this same basis. Such a fight was always small. But here in Russia the representatives of quite a new world — a Communist one — were opposed to the reactionaries who wanted to be the builders of the old capitalist order. They did what the reactionaries wanted, though it was against their own class. What the reactionaries wanted, of course, was to build up capitalism.

Without resistance all that was Communist disappeared. Industry was denationalised, at first partly. The absolute State monopoly of the most important food stuffs and raw materials was cancelled; the State regulation of trade unions was abolished. Private trading, at first only internal, afterwards also with foreign countries, was again introduced; the principle of unpaid service to the State disappeared; the principle of the free maintenance of the workers and employees was abandoned, and the wage system re-introduced.

Communism vanished like a ghost into the background, and capitalism re-appeared, even stronger, in the foreground.

Let us recall its main work, in detail, so that proletarians may see how capitalism is made by Communists in a peasant State. Thus the workers in Western Europe may no longer be fooled, but may learn that they who are not dwelling in a State controlled by peasants can bring about Communism.

Capitalist property re-appeared, and how? We take the following extract from a decree of the Russian Soviet Republic, dated 27th May, 1921 (published in Izvestia of June 18th, and in the French newspaper, Journal des Débats, in a French translation by a Russian delegate at the Hague Congress).

“All citizens have the right to engage in industrial and commercial occupations.

This right is founded on:

(1) The right to hold property in houses, including the right to sell them, and to sell or let the ground on which such houses are situated.

(2) The right to make contracts with local authorities to build on urban and rural land, with the right of ownership for 49 years.

(3) The right to own houses, factories and workshops, industrial and commercial undertakings, machinery, and means of production, agricultural and industrial property, financial capital.

(4) The right to mortgage these properties or to borrow money on land.

(5) The right to inventions, trade marks, and author’s royalties.

(6) The right of married people and their children to testamentary or legal inheritance, up to 10,000 gold roubles, the right of legal enforcement of contracts.”

The private ownership of the soil naturally re-appeared. The law of May 15th states, it is true, that the whole land belongs to the Republic. In fact, under the mantle of the Socialist State the law gives the peasants full ownership. For the law declares that a peasant can only lose the right to use the soil, on three conditions:

(1) If he himself ceases to use it; (2) For criminal reasons; (3) If the State claims the soil for its own purposes.

There are a few other restrictions, but in the main they are rules for personal acquisition of property. The Soviet Republic has returned to the policies of Stolypin, the last minister of the Czar.

The law makes two important stipulations. It gives the peasants the right to sub-let their land for one year (or, in exceptional cases, for two years).

The second and more important stipulation is the cancelling of the order which forbade the hiring of workmen. This is now permitted if all the members of a peasant family are at work.

The carrying out of the law regarding rent and the hiring of workers is left to the Peasant Committees; that it to say, the Soviet State gives the peasant absolute freedom on these important points. Agriculture thus becomes the basis of a capitalist State. In the present condition of Russia this will not be a rapid process, but if the harvests are good it will be more rapid than many people think.

Proprietors and landlords are created, and a rural proletariat is formed. A home market springs up and becomes the basis for the wholesaler and a reservoir of workers owning nothing but their labour, which may be exploited by capitalist industry and commerce.

This is the way Russia will go if the European revolution does not come to her aid. It is the way all capitalist States have grown up from a peasant population. In this case the capitalist State is being developed under the guidance of celebrated Communists and a small bureaucratic party which was once Communist.