Written: Written July 3, 1911, in Paris
Published:
First published in 1933 in Lenin Miscellany XXV.
Printed from the original.
Source:
Lenin
Collected Works,
Progress Publishers,
[1977],
Moscow,
Volume 43,
pages 278b-279a.
Translated: Martin Parker and Bernard Isaacs
Transcription\Markup:
R. Cymbala
Public Domain:
Lenin Internet Archive
(2005).
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Dear Comrades,
Your speeches in the Second Group on July 1, 1911, which we have already qualified as the worst repetition of the worst speeches of the Economists,[2] and your “bloc” with the Poles (the worst of the Poles) with a view to a new “play of intrigue”, and with the Golos group (Leder’s “withdrawal”),[3] and with Trotsky (“ten invitations”), and with the Vperyod group, and with the liquidators (violation of the agreement which was accepted even by Igorev)—all this has made it fully and finally clear to us that no political and moral unity is possible between us. Since we have hitherto consulted with you on all cardinal steps, we consider it our duty to inform you of this.
At the last meeting Mark saw fit to say: “We ‘conciliators’ shall withdraw from the Technical Commission and the Organising Commission if you Bolsheviks persist in pursuing a ‘factional’ policy.”
We declare that we shall withdraw from the T.C. and the O.C. if you continue your policy, which we consider extremely harmful for the Party.
We shall wait for your reply—if such is necessary—until 11 a.m. on Wednesday, July 5, 1911, at Kamenev’s, after which we will submit our statement to the T.C. and the O.C. and will come out against you before the Party.
With Social-Democratic greetings,
N. Lenin[1]
[1] The letter was also signed by G. Y. Zinoviev, L. B. Kamenev, N. Alexandrov (N. A. Semashko) and Kamsky (M. F. Vladimirsky).—Ed.
[2] The R.S.D.L.P. Second Promotion Group in Paris formed on November 18 (new style), 1908, separated from the previous Paris group which had included the Mensheviks as well. In 1911 the group included Lenin, Nadezhda Krupskaya, N. A. Semashko, M. F. Vladimirsky, Inessa Armand and other Bolsheviks; A. I. Lyubimov, M. K. Vladimirov and other conciliators, and some Vperyod supporters.
A meeting of the group held on July 1 (new style), 1911, discussed the situation in the Party, and adopted a resolution drafted by Lenin (see present edition, Vol. 17, pp. 216–24) with a majority of 27 votes. Ten votes were cast for a conciliatory resolution submitted by the minority. It is the conciliatory speeches of Lyubimov and Vladimirov at this meeting that Lenin calls “the worst repetition of the worst speeches of the Economists”.
[3] The “bloc” of the conciliators with the Polish Social-Democrats (in the present letter the reference is to Tyszka and Leder) was directed against the Bolsheviks. After the June 1911 conference of members of the C.C., R.S.D.L.P., abroad at the time, the conciliators Lyubimov and Vladimirov, together with the Polish Social-Democrat Tyszka, challenged the composition of the Organising Commission Abroad, for the convocation of the Party conference, seeking with the support of the Polish Social-Democrats to win the majority in it for the conciliators.
The “play of intrigue” on the part of the conciliators and the Polish Social-Democrats with the Golos group was expressed in the support they gave to Martov and Dan, who had withdrawn from the Editorial Board of the Central Organ, Sotsial-Demokrat, after the June conference. The fifth member of the Editorial Board, Leder, issued an ultimatum that he would “withdraw” unless two other Mensheviks were brought in. The conciliators sided with the Polish Social-Democrats.
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