Category | Template | Form |
---|---|---|
Text | Text | Text |
Author | Author | Author |
Collection | Collection | Collection |
Keywords | Keywords | Keywords |
Subpage | Subpage | Subpage |
Template | Form |
---|---|
BrowseTexts | BrowseTexts |
BrowseAuthors | BrowseAuthors |
BrowseLetters | BrowseLetters |
Template:GalleryAuthorsPreviewSmall
Special pages :
Letter to Vyacheslav Molotov for the Politbureau of the RCP(b) CC on the Steinberg Concession, January 23, 1922
Published: First published in 1959 in Lenin Miscellany XXXVI. Printed from secretarial notes.
Source: Lenin Collected Works, Progress Publishers, 1976, Moscow, Volume 45, pages 436b-438a.
1
17.I.1922
To Comrade Molotov for the Politbureau
I enclose Lezhavaâs report on the Steinberg concession. Please have this matter raised in the Politbureau on Thursday, so as to allow the CPC to pass the CC decision through Soviet government channels on Friday.[1]
Appoint two rapporteurs on this question for the Politbureau: A. D. Tsyurupa and a representative of the CPC majority.
This is an important business, and I very much fear that the CPC majority (opposing Tsyurupa) is about to make another mistake in the spirit of âcommunist conceitâ: they are afraid to allow a merchant who knows how to trade to make money, and their overriding concern is only to secure a majority for the Communists, most of whom may bawl a bit, but then they never touch the stuff.[2]
I draw your attention to § 5: three Communists (ignorant of trade? I know of only two Communists who have shown an ability to trade: Belov (GUM) and Serg. Malyshev) are about to teach two merchants how to trade.
I am afraid that this âmajorityâ will look very much like Shchedrinâs accoucheurs.[3]
Perhaps § 5 should be amended as follows: Steinberg, as representative, be empowered to decide everything alone, while the majority of the board should have the right to know everything and to complain to us about Steinbergâs acts, without suspending them (i.e., the majority of three against two will nominally retain the right to reverse Steinbergâs decisions, but we shall tell him that we shall not reverse anything without a special CLD decision).
Meanwhile, the three Communists will be given the duty, by a special CC decision, to study and to learn the business in three years or so, otherwise they will be expelled with ignominy.
Lenin
2
To Comrade Molotov (for members of the Politbureau)
To Comrade Tsyurupa and Comrade Lezhava with a request
for their opinion
The CLD is meeting in plenary session today. Perhaps, it could be possible, so as not to put off the matter, to adopt by phone the following proposal concerning the Steinberg concession (Politbureau decision mandatory upon the CLD): âTo accept the Lezhava commissionâs proposal with an addendum of this kind: Steinberg, as representative of the board, shall act on his own, with decisions by the board majority (3 representatives of the board, 1âSteinberg, 1âcapitalist), without suspending Steinbergâs order, only referable to the CLDâ[4]
This addendum should be adopted by the CLD, but not written into the boardâs charter. Then, by informing Steinberg of this decision, we shall, on the one hand, provide the possibility of really doing business commercially to a man who knows commerce otherwise than from reading communist booklets and, on the other, in the event of Steinberg committing any crime, we shall assure ourselves of the possibility of revoking our decision through the CLD, without altering the Societyâs charter in any way. I think that such a guarantee is quite sufficient.
Lenin
- â Leninâs letter to the Politbureau of the RCP(b) CC on January 17, 1922, was discussed on January 20. The Politbureau decided to have the question of granting Steinberg a concession finally settled by the CPC (see also this volume, Document 515).
- â These words are from Ivan Krylovâs fable, âThe Musiciansâ, which tells of a choir of serf peasants who sang very poorly, but were a model of sobriety.
- â Meaning people who are prepared to engage in any activity regardless of their qualification, so long as they have the authority and the assignment. âI am prepared to be an accoucheur at any time,â is a sentence from an introduction by the Russian satirical writer Saltykov-Shchedrin to his novel The Golovlyov Family.
- â Leninâs proposal was adopted the same day by the Politbureau of the RCP(b) CC On January 24, the Council of Peopleâs Commissars approved in substance the draft statutes of the Joint-Stock Company for Domestic and Export Trade in Hides and Skins (Kozhsyryo). On February 1, the statutes of the company and the articles of association were approved by the CLD