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They are—the Union of the Russian People, the monarchists, the
Party of Law and Order, the Union of October Seventeenth,the
Commercial and Industrial Party, the Party of Peaceful Renovation.
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They are—the party of “people’s” freedom or
Constitutional-“Democratic” (in reality
liberal-monarchist) Party, the Party of “Democratic”
Reforms, the radicals, etc.
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The Russian Social-Democratic Labour Party. It is the party
of the class-conscious-workers of all the nationalities of Russia,
of Russians, Letts, Poles, Jews, Ukrainians, Armenians, Georgians,
Tatars, etc.
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| Whose Interests Do the Three Chief Parties Defend? |
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The Black Hundreds defend the present tsarist government,
they stand for the landlords, for the government
officials, for the
power of the police, for military courts, for pogroms.
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The Cadets defend the interests of the liberal bourgeois, the
liberal landlords, merchants and capitalists. The Cadets are a
party of bourgeois lawyers, journalists, professors and such like.
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The Social-Democrats are the party of the working class,
defending the interests of all the working and exploited people.
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| What Do the Three Chief Parties Strive For? |
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The Black Hundreds strive for the preservation of the old
autocracy, the lack of rights of the people, the unlimited rule
over it of the landlords, officials and police.
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The Cadets strive for the transfer of power into the hands
of the liberal bourgeoisie. The monarchy; by preserving the police
and military regime, is to safeguard the capitalists’ right to rob
the workers and peasants.
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The Social-Democrats strive for the transfer of all power
into the hands of the people, i.e., a democratic republic. The
Social-Democrats need complete freedom in order to fight for
socialism, for the emancipation of labour from the yoke of capital.
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| What Kind of Freedom do the Three Chief Parties Want
to Give the People? |
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The Black Hundreds do not give the people any freedom, any
power. All power is for the tsarist government. The rights of the
people are: to pay taxes, to toil for the rich, to rot in gaol.
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The Cadets want the kind of “people’s freedom” which
will be subordinated, firstly, to the Upper Chamber, i.e., to the
landlords and capitalists; secondly, to the monarchy, i. e., the
tsar with the irresponsible police and armed forces. One-third of
t.he power to the people, one-third to the capitalists and one-third
to the tsar.
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The Social-Democrats want complete freedom and all power
for the people, all officials to be elected, the soldiers to be
freed from barrack servitude, and the organisation of a free,
people’s militia.
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| How Do the Three Chief Parties Regard the Peasants’
Demand for Land? |
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The Black Hundreds defend the interests of the feudal landlords. No
land for the peasants. Only the rich to be allowed to buy land from
the landlords by voluntary agreement.
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The Cadets want to preserve the landlord system of agriculture by
means of concessions. They propose redemption payments by the
peasants which already once before in 1861 ruined the peasants. The
Cadets do not agree that the land question should be settled by
local committees elected by universal, direct and equal suffrage by
secret ballot.
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The Social-Democrats want to abolish our landlord system of
agriculture. All land must be transferred to the peasants
absolutely, with out redemption payments. The land question must be
settled by local committees elected by universal, direct and equal
suffrage by secret ballot.
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| What Can the Three Chief Parties Achieve if Their
Whole Struggle is Successful? |
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The Black Hundreds, using every possible means of struggle, can
cause the people to be finally ruined and all Russia subjected to
the savagery of military courts and pogroms.
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The Cadets, using only “peaceful” means of struggle, can
cause the pogrom-mongers’ government to buy off the big bourgeoisie
and the rich in the countryside at the cost of petty concessions,
while it will chase out the liberal chatter-boxes for insufficiently
servile
speeches about the beloved, blameless, inviolable, constitutional
monarch.
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The Social-Democrats, using every possible means of struggle,
including an uprising, can, with the aid of the politically
conscious peasantry and urban poor, win complete freedom and all the
land for the peasants. And with freedom, and with the help of the
class-conscious
workers of all Europe, the Russian Social-Democrats can advance with
rapid strides to socialism.
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