Page:Trade Unions in Soviet Russia - I.L.P. (1920).djvu/28

 committees arose which began to act as parallel bodies to the responsible trade union council. New economic organisations were thus formed the growth of which would inevitably lead to a fratricidal war between the trade unions and the factory committees. On the other hand, as the trade unions grew and embraced an ever larger number of factories, the factory committees became elected organs of the organised members of the particular union. This eased the way to the subordination of the factory committees to the unions, as decided at the third conference of Trade Unions in June, 1917, and finally confirmed at the First All-Russian Congress which decided that "the factory committees must become the local organs of the union."

After the first Trade Union Congress the Central Councils of Factory Committees were abolished and the factory committees became units of the union, carrying out the instructions, and resolutions of the centre.

In the period immediately prior to the October Revolution, when the central organs of national economy were just being established, the factory committees, in many cases, undertook the management of the factories. But that only lasted as long as the corresponding central industrial management organ had not yet been established. After this the factory committees had their representatives in the factory management boards which were usually composed of the representatives of the trade unions, the Council of National Economy and the factory committees. In the middle of 1918 the All-Russia Central Council of Trade Unions dratted special "Regulations on Factory Committees." According to these regulations the factory committees: