Page:Samuel Gompers - Out of Their Own Mouths (1921).djvu/91

 Rh printers' meeting in Moscow in the presence of several members of the British labour delegates; he was, however obliged to hide after this speech, as it has made the Extraordinary Commission (Cheka) very angry, and they wanted to arrest him. They could not find him, and arrested instead his wife and daughters, aged 10 and 17 years.

5. Comrade Abramovich, member of the central committee of the socialist-democratic party, welcomed the British labour delegation at a meeting of the Moscow Soviet. In his speech he pointed out the actual condition of the Russian labour classes under the bolshevik yoke, and was in consequence, through intrigues and pressure from the Russian communist party, expelled from the soviet.

We are in possession of many other similar facts, but it would take too long to state them all here. We think that the above facts are quite sufficient proof that there is no freedom in soviet Russia, and that even the socialist parties can not propagate their ideas legally and unrestrictedly.

We feel we must put the following questions to the British workmen and to you, members of the British labour delegation. Do you know these facts? ''If you do, what do you intend to do in order to alleviate the sufferings of these Russian socialists who were bold enough to tell you the entire truth about Russia? Don't you consider that you are also responsible for their misfortunes and sufferings?''

We, the adherents of the socialists who are being so severely persecuted by the Russian communist party ruling in Russia under the disguise of the soviet government, think you can not and must not be indifferent to the actual results of your policy.

We are deeply convinced that in protesting against the blockade and intervention the British proletariat was prompted by noble motivesthe British workmen meant to support the cause of the Russian democracy, the cause