Page:The Proletarian Revolution in Russia - Lenin, Trotsky and Chicherin - ed. Louis C. Fraina (1918).djvu/234

 ganized persecutions of the Bolsheviki, begin a persecution of the Soviets. The Social-Revolutionists and Mensheviki bound themselves hand and foot to these counter-revolutionary policies; and, like chained men, they called or "permitted a call" of counter-revolutionary troops to Petrograd and that bound them still more. They sank completely into the detestable counter-revolutionary swamp. Like cowards, they dismiss their own committee appointed to investigate the "affairs" of the Bolsheviki. They delivered the Bolsheviki to the counter-revolution. They participate, meekly, in the funeral of the dead Cossacks, and thus kiss the hands of the counter-revolutionists. They are chained men; they are at the bottom of the swamp. They toss about desperately: they give the Premier's portfolio to Kerensky: they arrange a "Zemstvo Assembly," or the "coronation" of a counter-revolutionary government in Moscow; Kerensky discharges Polovtzev.

But these tossings remain tossings, not in the least changing the situation. Kerensky discharges Polovtzev, but at the same time legalizes and makes formal Polovtzev's measures, his policy. Kerensky suppresses Pravda, introduces the death penalty for soldiers, forbids the right of assemblage at the front, continues the arrests of Bolsheviki (including even Alexandra Kollontay)—all according to the program of Alexinsky.

The "constitutional" condition of Russia is defined with amazing clarity: the offensive at the front and the coalition with the Cadets in the rear sweep the Social-Revolutionists and Mensheviki into the swamp of counter-revolution. In fact, the government power passes into the hands of the counter-revolution, into the hands of a military band, with the government of Kerensky, Tseretelli and Chernov as merely a screen for it: the government is forced indirectly to legalize the measures and the policy of the military counter-revolution.

The compromise of Kerensky, Tseretelli and Chernov with the Cadets has a secondary, if not a very remote significance: whether the Cadets will gain by this compromise; whether Chernov and Tseretelli will hold out "alone," the question will not be changed. The basic and decisive fact remains: the turning of the Social-Revolutionists and Mensheviki to the counter-revolution, the direct consequences of their whole policy since May 18.

The cycle of party development is completed. The Social-Revolutionists and Mensheviki tumbled down from step to step—from "confidence" in Kerensky during the period March 12 to May 18,