Page:Lenin - The Proletarian Revolution and Kautsky the Renegade (1920).pdf/15

 pace, Kautsky has attained a rare virtuosity in this art of being a Marxist in words, and a lackey to the bourgeoisie in practice.

One becomes still more convinced of this when the remarkable way is examined in which Kautsky has interpreted Marx's "shibboleth" about the dictatorship of the proletariat. Listen:

"Marx unfortunately has failed to show us in greater detail how he conceived this dictatorship." (This is a thoroughly mendacious phrase of a renegade, since Marx and Engels gave us quite a number of most precise indications which our schoolman of Marxism has deliberately ignored). "Literally, the world 'dictatorship' means the abrogation of democracy. But, of course, taken literally, this word also means the undivided rule of one individual who is not bound by any laws—an autocracy which differs from despotism only in this, that it is regarded not as a permanent State institution, but as an extreme measure of a temporary character. Hence the term, 'the dictatorship of the proletariat,' referring as is does to the dictatorship not of one individual, but of a class, ipso facto excludes the possibility that Marx in this connection used the word 'dictatorship' in its literal sense. In fact, he speaks in this connection not of a form of government, but of a state of things which must necessarily supervene whenever and wherever the proletariat has conquered political power. That Marx did not have in view a form of government is proved by the fact that he was of the opinion that in England and America the transition can take place peacefully, and therefore, in a democratic way" (p. 20.).

I quoted this disquisition in full on purpose, in order that the reader may clearly see the kind of method employed by Kautsky, the "theoretician."

Kautsky chooses to approach the question so as to begin with a definition of the word: "dictatorship." Very well. Everybody has the inalienable right to approach a