The Decline of Bolshevism.

Press, Volume LIV, Issue 16308, 4 September 1918, Page 6

The Decline of Bolshevism.

If it be true —and one should not hastily believe apy report from Russia that does not come through sources known to bo ■well-informed and.truthful —that Lenin has been assassinated by some modern Charlotte Corday, the completo downfall of Bolshevik rule should speedily follow. His position in the present stormy chaos in Russia is summed up in a statement by a Petrograd paper, and a declaration by Lenin himself. "With even more right than Louis XY. had for his famous boast, said the paper referred to, Lenin.could say, "I am Bolshevism." His own declaration of his attitudo was contained in the first speech ho made to the Petrograd Soviet. Having declared that the time was ripe for the transition of the world into the realm of Socialism, he was asked whether the experiment -would not be dangerous to a backward agricultural country, iike Russia. "Let it be so," he replied. "Let her perish, but wo -will kindle " social revolution throughout the " world, and we will, if necessary, "hand over its banner to other coun- " tries and nations." Lenin probably "had somo faith in the success of his revolutionary programme, although it was wholly destructive. But his colleagues did not all share his faith, although apparently they were not less reckless of consequences. Mr David Soskice, who is a high authority on Russian affairs, recently quoted Vorovsky. the Bolshevik Ambassador in Stockholm, as saying to him last November: "We know that our rule will "bo short, but in that short time mtl " intend to destroy the capitalistic or- " ganisation so thoroughly that it will '• bo utterly impossible to build it up " again." The programme which they expected to destroy capitalism, and which has very nearly destroyed Russia was based upon the offer to Germany of an immediate armistice, and peace with the right of every nationality to self-determination. The domestic reforms of Lenin, which were actually put into force, are concisely stated by tho writer quoted in the following terms: — They decreed that the peasants should immediately seize ana divide among themselves all the lands, livo and dead stock,,and property belonging to tho landlords; that the workmen of each factory, mill, or workshop should take over the control of the particular industrial concern in which they worked; that all concessions and mineral wealth should bo confiscated and their -working handaJ «ver to labour committees; that a ; .I banks should be nationalised as branches of the Peoples' State Bank; finally, that all propertied classes should bo suppressed, and that a dictatorship of the working class, tho proletariat, should be established, and the State and local administration be managed by Labour Councils, the

! Soviets of workmen, soldiers, and peasant deputies. The freedom of tie Press and the National Assembly were suppressed, State debts were repudiated, and the law courts closed. At first the Bolshevik banner was enthusiastically followed, since the masses appeared to have suddenly acquired perfect freedom and undreamedof privileges, but at the beginning of this year tho evil effects of Bolshevik policy began to become as clear to the general mass of the people a3 the majority of the educated leaders of Russian democracy had all along known that thoy would be. The civil -war in Finland and the Ukraine, and the loss of Russian provinces made a quick end of the idea that Bolshevism had any inherent power to ovcrcom© the ordinary forces of European politics. Then the mills, mines factories, and workshops began to close, partly because of the disappearance of engineers and experts, and partly because of the exhaustion of raw material. In'the financial and industrial chaos the discontent of the masses has grown steadily. Tho growing unemployment, the appalling prices charged for everything, and the actual scarcity of tho necessaries of life alienated tho workmen from the Bolsheviks. The wcrkmen began to elect new antiBolshevik delegates to tho local Soviets, but these were not recognised by the Leninites. In Moscow the workman of the closed industrial concerns are paid regular -jj-ages by the Bolshevik Government in order to secure their allegiance, yet in June last they called for the abolition of Bolshevik rule, and the summoning of the Constituent Assembly. In the country districts the peasants, robbed of their corn by tho Bolsheviks' forces, become anti-Bol-shevik everywhere. Nothing has been more significant than the fact that wherever the Czecho-Slovaks have begun operations against the Bolsheviks tho Russian population has flocked to the Czocho-Slovak Standard. "What will succeed the Bolshevik rule nobody can say with any confidence, but it can hardly bo doubted that one result of the Bolshevik nightmare will be to discredit for centuries to come, not revolutionary aims—which will be held in every society until the end of time, perhaps—but revolutionary methods based on the assumption that the structure of society, which is something quite other than the system of Government, can be altered by sudden and violent action.