From the Archives (September 1932)

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Tomsky on the Endurance of Indian Elephants

On January 20, 1926, in the days of the greatest sharpening of the struggle between the right-centrist bloc and the Zinovievist opposition, Tomsky said at the Putilov factory:

"The party understands Vladimir Ilyich's teaching, understands that the main danger lies in a split. Vladimir Ilyich saw this danger too; it was his last thought, when he called the workers of the Central Committee and die Central Control Commission to see to it, irrespective of persons, that differences of opinion and splits not be permitted. If anyone erred, he was to be condemned. There was no need to crucify him, to chop him off, as they wanted to do with Trotsky. Do perhaps a quarter of what was done to Trotsky. But what was done to Trotsky not even an Indian elephant could bear!"

Tomsky, who was at that time carrying out Stalin's commands, was trying to insure himself by setting a limit beyond which one cannot go in persecution: as a standard the endurance of the Indian elephant was indicated. Tomsky's criterion was too primitive. In revolutionary politics endurance is determined above all by the significance and correctness of the ideas represented by a given person or a given group. Historical experience shows that real revolutionaries, supported by a scientific doctrine, are capable in struggle with enemies and with hostile tendencies of leaving far behind all endurance records set up by the thickest-skinned Indian elephants.

Stalin in the Epoch of the "Triumvirate”

At the time of the Twelfth Party Congress [1923], when the "triumvirate" (Stalin, Zinoviev, Kamenev) appeared openly on the arena for the first time as a nucleus of the "Leninist old guard" in the struggle against Trotsky, Stalin defended the indissolubility of the Leninist core in the following heartfelt words:

"I cannot, comrades, ignore the attack of Comrade Osinskyagainst … Comrade Zinoviev. He praised Comrade Stalin, praised Comrade Kamenev, and struck out at Comrade Zinoviev, thinking that at first it is enough to eliminate one, and that then will come the others' turn. He has taken the course of destroying the nucleus which has been formed inside the Central Committee during years of work, in order to destroy everything later, step by step. … If Comrade Osinsky seriously intends to undertake such attacks against one or another member of our Central Committee, I must warn him that he will bump into a stone wall on which, I fear, he will smash his head."

The subsequent course of events has shown that the "stone wall" of the Leninist old guard proved to consist of semi-Social Democrats, semi-Mensheviks, bourgeois liberals, and the like.

Molotov as a Trotskyist Contrabandist

"This must be said straight out: the party did not have the clarity and decisiveness which the revolutionary moment demanded. It did not have them because it did not have a sufficiently definite orientation toward socialist revolution. Agitation and the revolutionary work of the party as a whole did not have a firm foundation, for thought had not yet reached bold conclusions about the necessity of direct struggle for socialism and socialist revolution."

Thus Molotov describes the policy of the party until the arrival of Lenin in Russia in April 1917, in the German edition of Rabochaya Literatura [Workers' Literature] number 1-2, p. 36. In the same article Molotov says:

"From the time of Lenin's arrival in Russia in April 1917 our party felt firm soil under its feet … Up to this moment the party merely felt its way weakly and without confidence" (p. 35).

We have given the quotations in translation back from the German, since we do not have the Russian edition of the article on hand. We shall be very grateful if any of our friends can get us Molotov's Trotskyist contraband in the original.

"Tales of Differences Between Lenin and Trotsky”

In the notes to the sixteenth volume of Lenin's Collected Works, published during the author's lifetime, we read:

"Tales of differences between Lenin and Trotsky during the civil war were widespread among the bourgeoisie and petty bourgeoisie, and sometimes reached the countryside, strongly inflated by kulak elements" (Collected Works, volume 16, p. 505).

The bourgeoisie, petty bourgeoisie, and kulak elements then found themselves successors and continuators in the form of the Stalinist bureaucracy.

Lenin on Slanders Against Trotsky

On March 1, 1920, Lenin said at the All-Russian Congress of Working Cossacks:

"British writers have written that the armies all over the world are disintegrating, and that if there is any country in the world whose army is gaining strength, that country is Soviet Russia. They tried to slander Comrade Trotsky and said that this was so because the Russian army is being kept under iron discipline, which is enforced by ruthless measures …" (Collected Works, volume 17, p. 32) [Collected Works, volume 30, "Speech Delivered at the First All-Russian Congress of Working Cossacks," March 1, 1920].

The British writers of Churchill's school did not, as is known, remain without successors and imitators.

"Democratic Dictatorship” and "Dictatorship of the Democracy”

The well-known Left Menshevik Sukhanov writes about his political position at the end of May 1917:

”… I personally fully supported those who were demanding the complete removal of the bourgeoisie from power; and I began to use the term 'dictatorship of the democracy' a lot."

On March 23, 1919, Lenin wrote on the same topic:

"Attempts are sometimes made to lend these words what is considered to be greater force by speaking of the 'dictatorship of democracy.' That is sheer nonsense. We know perfectly well from history that the dictatorship of the democratic bourgeoisie meant nothing but the suppression of the insurgent workers" (Collected Works, volume 16, p. 141) [ibid., volume 29, "Report on Work in the Countryside," March 23, 1919].

All this did not prevent the "democratic dictatorship" from getting into the program of the Comintern, as a state above classes.

Lenin on Party Democracy, Discipline, and Unity

The Bolshevik-Leninists stand for democracy in all proletarian organizations. But it is fully apparent that the amount of democracy and its methods will differ not only as a result of the general objective conditions, but also, above all, in view of the nature of the proletarian organizations themselves. The democracy of a trade union must have an immeasurably wider base than party democracy, which is limited in advance by definite program, tactics, and political tradition. In turn, party democracy is necessarily broader than the democracy of a faction.

On July 3, 1909, Lenin wrote:

"In our party Bolshevism is represented by the Bolshevik section. But a section is not a party. A party can contain a whole gamut of opinions and shades of opinion, the extremes of which may be sharply contradictory. In the German party, side by side with the pronouncedly revolutionary wing of Kautsky, we see the ultra-revisionist wing of Bernstein. That is not the case within a section. A section in a party is a group of like-minded persons formed for the purpose primarily of influencing the party in a definite direction, for the purpose of securing acceptance for their principles in the party in the purest possible form" (Collected Works, volume 11, part i, p. 282) [ibid., volume 15, "Report on the Conference of the Extended Editorial Board of Proletary,” July 3, 1909].

This important thought, which we find in Lenin more than once, must be very seriously thought through and carefully assimilated by the Left Opposition.

How Lenin conceived of the normal relations between the Central Committee and the local party organizations is well shown by Lenin's letter of June 6, 1917, to the Petrograd committee:

"If you, comrades, have weighty and serious reasons for not trusting the Central Committee, then say so openly. It is the duty of every member of our democratically organized party to do so, and then it would be the duty of our party's Central Committee to give special consideration to this distrust of yours, report it to the party congress and enter into special negotiations with a view to overcoming this deplorable lack of confidence in the Central Committee on the part of the local organization" (first legal PC, minutes, p. 129) [ibid., volume 24, "Letter to the District Committees of the Petrograd Organization of the RSDLP (Bolshevik)," May 31, 1917].

On January 23, 1921, Lenin wrote:

"There being deep and basic disagreements on principle — we may well be asked — do they not serve as a vindication for the sharpest and most factional pronouncements? Is it possible to vindicate such a thing as a split, provided there is need to drive home some entirely new idea?

"I believe it is, provided of course the disagreements are truly very deep and there is no other way to rectify a wrong trend in the policy of the party or of the working class" (Collected Works, volume 18, part i, p. 47) [ibid., volume 32, "Once Again on the Trade Unions," January 25, 1921].

The theory and practice of Lenin have, as we see, nothing in common with the disciplinary cretinism which has been implanted in the Communist Party and the Comintern by the Stalinist apparatus.

Christian G. Rakovsky

In the notes to Lenin's Collected Works, in volume 17, which came out in the author's lifetime, the following brief character sketch of Rakovsky is given: "Rakovsky, Ch. — active in the Romanian SD movement, participant at Zimmerwald and Kienthal, member of the 'Zimmerwald Left.' Imprisoned during the war by the Romanian government for internationalist propaganda. R was freed in 1917 by the revolutionary Russian troops and since then has worked in Russia, occupying the post of president of the Council of People's Commissars of the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic. Member of the CC of the Communist Party of the Ukraine and the CC RCP. One of the founders and prominent figures of the Third International" (Collected Works, volume 17, p. 448).

Lenin on Sverdlov and Stalin

In his funeral speech on Sverdlov, avoiding exaggerated praise even in respect to the dead, Lenin said, on March 18, 1919:

"… the fact that the leading groups of the party could so firmly, quickly, and unanimously decide the most difficult problems is due entirely to the prominent place among them occupied by such an exceptionally talented organizer as Yakov Sverdlov," who combined a knowledge of the personal composition of the party, a flair for practice, and incontestable authority. "The work he performed as an organizer … will be performed in the future only if we appoint whole groups of men … and if these men, following in his footsteps, come near to doing what this one man did alone [ibid., volume 29, "Speech in Memory of Y. M. Sverdlov at a Special Session of the All-Russian Central Executive Committee," March 18, 1919].

Lenin saw in Sverdlov an organizer, as also in Stalin. It is therefore instructive to compare this description of Sverdlov with later descriptions of Stalin.

From Lenin's opinion of Sverdlov — and this opinion was repeated more than once by him — it is fully apparent that the work of leading party organizer was in the previous period in the hands of Sverdlov, not of Stalin. As far as the future was concerned, Lenin considered Sverdlov could not be replaced by an individual, but only by a collective, in the form of the organizational bureau. True to his evaluation of people and circumstances, Lenin in March 1922 spoke out decisively against the appointment of Stalin as general secretary ("that cook will make only peppery dishes"), and in January 1923, in his so-called "testament," he recommended that Stalin be removed from the post of general secretary.

Once Again on Dnieprostroi and the Phonograph

We have already quoted in the Biulleten the penitential declaration of the former Oppositionist S. Gorsky, who retroactively accused Trotsky of equating Dnieprostroi with … a phonograph. We then explained the error of the strayed penitent: he had ascribed to Trotsky the words of Stalin. In number 19 of the Biulleten we had to cite that interesting political episode from memory. Not long ago we found accurate documentation in our files. Here verbatim is what Stalin said at the plenum of the Central Committee in April 1926:

"There is talk … of our constructing Dnieprostroi through our own means. But the sums here are large, several hundred million. How can we avoid falling into the position of the peasant who had saved up some money, but instead of repairing his plough and renewing his equipment, bought a phonograph and went bankrupt? (laughter) … How can we not take into account the congress resolution that our industrial plans must correspond to our resources? But Comrade Trotsky clearly does not take this congress decision into account" (stenographic report of the plenum, p. 110).

Since Dnieprostroi is now, and with full justification, an object of socialist construction, we consider it completely appropriate to put this episode right in accordance with the documents.

Lenin on the Alliance Between Worker and Peasant

In his well-known work on "The Tax in Kind," finished on April 21, 1921, Lenin wrote:

"The correct policy of the proletariat exercising its dictatorship in a small-peasant country is to obtain grain in exchange for the manufactured goods the peasant needs. That is the only kind of food policy that corresponds to the tasks of the proletariat, and can strengthen the foundations of socialism and lead to its complete victory" (Collected Works, volume 18, part i, p. 214) [ibid., volume 32, "The Tax in Kind," April 21, 1921].

Until such time as this problem is solved it is not only impossible to assert that we have entered socialism, but it must be admitted that we have not yet set up the very "foundations of socialism."

On the Freedom of Individual Commodity Circulation

At the Tenth Congress, which sanctioned the first steps of the New Economic Policy (NEP), Lenin said at the March 15, 1921, session:

"I must say a few words about the individual exchange of commodities. When we speak of free exchange, we mean individual exchange of commodities, which in turn means encouraging the kulaks. What are we to do? We must not close our eyes to the fact that the switch from the appropriation of surpluses to the tax will mean more kulaks under the new system. They will appear where they could not appear before. This must not be combated by prohibitive measures but by association under state auspices and by government measures from above" (Collected Works, volume 18, part i, pp. 144-5) [ibid., volume 32, "Report on the Substitution of a Tax in Kind for the Surplus-Grain Appropriation System," March 15, 1921],

We think that this quote, like many others, should be posted up in the premises of the Council of People's Commissars.