Chapter XII: Jurisdiction of the Local Organs of the Soviets (4)

In connection with the murder of Uritzky five hundred persons
have been shot by order of the Petrograd Extraordinary
Commission to Combat Counter-Revolution. The names of the
persons shot, and those of candidates for future shooting, in
case of a new attempt on the lives of the Soviet leaders, will
be published later.[18]

[18] Desiring to confine the evidence here strictly to Bolshevist sources, I have passed over much testimony by well-known Socialists-Revolutionists, Social Democrats, and others. Because it has not been possible to have the item referring to the retaliatory massacre in Petrograd satisfactorily verified, I introduce here, by way of corroboration, a statement by the Socialists-Revolutionists leader, Eugene Trupp, published in the organ of the Socialists-Revolutionists, _Zemlia i Volia_, October 3, 1918:

“After the murder of Uritzky in Petrograd 1,500 people were arrested; 512, including 10 Socialists-Revolutionists, were shot. At the same time 800 people were arrested in Moscow. It is unknown, however, how many of these were shot. In Nizhni-Novgorod, 41 were shot; in Jaroslavl, 13; in Astrakhan, 12 Socialists-Revolutionists; in Sarapool, a member of the Central Committee of the party of Socialists-Revolutionists, I. I. Teterin; in Penza, about 40 officers.”

See also the corroboration of this incident quoted from the _Weekly Journal of the Extraordinary Commission_, on p. 171.

Two days later, September 5, 1918, a single column of _Izvestia_ contained the following paragraphs, headed “Latest News”:

_Arrest of Right Socialists-Revolutionaries_

At the present moment the ward extraordinary commissioners are
making mass arrests of Right Socialists-Revolutionaries, since
it has become clear that this party is responsible for the
recent acts of terrorism (attempt on life of Comrade Lenin and
the murder of Uritzky), which were carried out according to a
definitely elaborated program.

_Arrest of a Priest_

For an anti-Soviet sermon preached from the church pulpit,
the Priest Molot has been arrested and turned over to the
counter-revolutionary section of the All-Russian Extraordinary
Commission.

_Struggle Against Counter-Revolutionaries_

We have received the following telegram from the president
of the Front Extraordinary Commission, Comrade Latsis: “The
Extraordinary Commission of the Front had shot in the district
of Ardatov, for anti-Soviet agitation, 4 peasants, and sent to
a concentration camp 32 officers.

“At Arzamas were shot three champions of the Tsarist régime,
and one peasant-exploiter, and 14 officers were sent to the
concentration camp for anti-Soviet agitation.”

_House Committee Fined_

For failure to execute the orders of the dwelling section of
the All-Russian Extraordinary Commission, the house committee
at 42, Pokrovka, has been fined 20,000 rubles.

This fine is a punishment for failure to remove from the
house register the name of the well-known Cadet Astrov, who
disappeared three months ago.

All the movable property of Astrov has been confiscated.

_The Arrest of Speculators_

On September 3d members of the Section to Combat Speculation
of the All-Russian Extraordinary Commission arrested Citizen
Pitkevich, who was trying to buy 125 food-cards at 20 rubles
each. A search was made in the apartment of Pitkevich, which
revealed a store of such cards bearing official stamps.

This section also arrested a certain Bosh, who was speculating
in cocaine brought from Pskov.

On September 5, 1918, the Council of the People’s Commissaries ordered that the names of persons shot by order of the Extraordinary Commission should be published, with full particulars of their cases, a decision which was flouted by the Extraordinary Commission, as we shall see. The resolution of the Council of People’s Commissaries was published in the _Severnaya Communa_, evening edition, November 9, 1918, and reads as follows:

The Council of the People’s Commissaries, having considered the
report of the chairman of the Extraordinary Commission, finds
that under the existing conditions it is most necessary to
secure the safety of the rear by means of terror. All persons
belonging to the White Guard organizations or involved in
conspiracies and rebellion are to be shot. Their names and the
particulars of their cases are to be published.

On September 10, 1918, the _Severnaya Communa_ published in its news columns the two following despatches:

JAROSLAVL, _September 9th_.--In the whole of the Jaroslavl
Government a strict registration of the bourgeoisie and its
partizans has been organized. Manifestly anti-Soviet elements
are being shot; suspected persons are being interned in
concentration camps; non-working sections of the population are
being subjected to compulsory labor.

TYER, _September 9th_.--The Extraordinary Commission has
arrested and sent to concentration camps over 130 hostages from
among the bourgeoisie. The prisoners include members of the
Cadet Party, Socialists-Revolutionists of the Right, former
officers, well-known members of the propertied class, and
policemen.

Two days later, September 12th, the same journal contained the following:

ATKARSK, _September, 11th_.--Yesterday martial law was
proclaimed in the town. Eight counter-revolutionaries were shot.

On September 18, 1918, the _Severnaya Communa_ published the following evidences of the wide-spread character of the terrorism which the Bolsheviki were practising:

In Sebesh a priest named Kikevitch was shot for
counter-revolutionary propaganda and for _saying masses for the
late Nicholas Romanov_.

In Astrakhan the Extraordinary Commission has shot _ten
Socialists-Revolutionists of the Right involved in a plot
against the Soviet power_. In Karamyshev a priest named
Lubinoff and a deacon named Kvintil have been shot for
_revolutionary agitation against the decree separating
the Church from the State_ and for an appeal to overthrow
the Soviet Government. In Perm, _in retaliation for the
assassination of Uritzky and for the attempt on Lenin, fifty
hostages from among the bourgeois classes and the White Guards
were shot_.

The shooting of innocent hostages is a peculiarly brutal form of terrorism. When it was practised by the Germans during the war the world reverberated with denunciation. That the Bolsheviki ever were guilty of this crime, so much more odious than anything which can be charged against czarism, has been many times denied, but the foregoing statement from one of their most influential official journals is a complete refutation of all such denials. Perm is more than a thousand miles from Petrograd, where the assassination of Uritzky occurred, and no attempt was ever made to show that the fifty hostages who were shot, or any of them, were guilty of any complicity in the assassination. It was a brutal, malignant retaliation upon innocent people for a crime of which they knew nothing. The famous “Decree No. 903,” signed by Trotsky, which called for the taking of hostages as a means of checking desertions from the Red Army, was published in _Izvestia_, September 18, 1918:

Decree No. 903: Seeing the increasing number of deserters,
especially among the commanders, orders are issued to arrest as
hostages all the members of the family one can lay hands on:
father, mother, brother, sister, wife, and children.

The evening edition of _Severnaya Communa_, September 18, 1918, reported a meeting of the Soviet of the first district of Petrograd, stating that the following resolution had been passed:

The meeting welcomes the fact that mass terror is being used
against the White Guards and higher bourgeois classes, and
declares that every attempt on the life of any of our leaders
will be answered by the proletariat by the shooting down
not only of hundreds, as the case is now, but of thousands
of White Guards, bankers, manufacturers, Cadets, and
Socialists-Revolutionists of the Right.

On the following day, September 19th, the same journal quoted Zinoviev as saying:

To overcome our enemies we must have our own Socialist
Militarism. We must win over to our side 90 millions out of
the 100 millions of population of Russia under the Soviets.
_As for the rest, we have nothing to say to them; they must be
annihilated._

Reference has already been made to the fact that the Council of the People’s Commissaries ordered that the Extraordinary Commission publish the names of all persons sentenced to be shot, with particulars of their cases, and the further fact that the instruction was ignored. It is well known that great friction developed between the Extraordinary Commissions and the Soviet power. In many places the Extraordinary Commissions not only defied the local Soviets, _but actually suppressed them_. Naturally, there was friction between the Soviet power and its creature. There were loud protests on the part of influential Bolsheviki, who demanded that the _Chresvychaikas_ be curbed and restrained and that the power to inflict the death penalty be taken from them. That is why the resolution of September 5th, already quoted, was passed. Nevertheless, in practice secrecy was very generally observed. Trials took place in secret and there was no publication, in many instances, of results. Reporting a meeting of the Executive Committee of the Moscow Soviet, which took place on October 16, 1918, _Izvestia_, the official Bolshevist organ, contained the following in its issue of the next day:

The report of the work of the All-Russian Extraordinary
Commission was read at a secret session of the Executive
Committee. _But the report and the discussion of it were held
behind closed doors and will not be published._ After a debate
the doors of the Session Hall were thrown open.

From an article in the _Severnaya Communa_, October 17, 1918, we learn that the Extraordinary Commission “has registered 2,559 counter-revolutionary affairs and 5,000 arrests have been made”; that “at Kronstadt there have been 1,130 hostages. Only 183 people are left; 500 have been shot.”

Under the heading, “The Conference of the Extraordinary Commission,” _Izvestia_ of October 19, 1918, printed the following paragraph:

PETROGRAD, _October 17th_.--At to-day’s meeting of the
Conference of the Extraordinary Investigating Commission,
Comrades Moros and Baky read reports giving an account of the
activities of the Extraordinary Commission in Petrograd and
Moscow. Comrade Baky threw light on the work of the district
commission of Petrograd after the departure of the All-Russian
Extraordinary Commission for Moscow. The total number of people
arrested by the Extraordinary Commission amounted to 6,220.
_Eight hundred people were shot._

On November 5, 1918, _Izvestia_ said:

A riot occurred in the Kirsanoff district. The rioters
shouted, “Down with the Soviets.” They dissolved the Soviet
and Committee of the Village Poor. The riot was suppressed by
a detachment of Soviet troops. Six ringleaders were shot. The
case is under examination.

The _Weekly Journal of the Extraordinary Commissions to Combat Counter-Revolution_ is, as the name implies, the official organ in which the proclamations and reports of these Extraordinary Commissions are published. It is popularly nicknamed “The Hangmen’s Journal.” The issue of October 6, 1918 (No. 3), contains the following:

We decided to make it a real, not a paper terror. In many
cities there took place, accordingly, _mass shootings of
hostages_, and it is well that they did. In such business
half-measures are worse than none.

Another issue (No. 5), dated October 20, 1918, says:

Upon the decision of the Petrograd Extraordinary Commission,
500 hostages were shot.

These are typical extracts: it would be possible to quote from this journal whole pages quite similar to them.

How closely the Extraordinary Commissions copied the methods of the Czar’s secret police system can be judged from a paragraph that appeared in the _Severnaya Communa_, October 17, 1918:

The Extraordinary Commission has organized the placing of
police agents in every part of Petrograd. The Commission has
issued a proclamation to the workmen exhorting them to inform
the police of all they know. The bandits, both in word and
action, must be forced to recognize that the revolutionary
proletariat is watching them strictly.

Here, then, is a formidable array of evidence from Bolshevist sources of the very highest authority. It is only a part of the whole volume of such evidence that is available; nevertheless, it is sufficient, overwhelming, and conclusive. If we were to draw upon the official documentary testimony of the Socialist parties and groups opposed to the Bolsheviki, hundreds of pages of records of _Schrecklichkeit_, even more brutal than anything here quoted, could be easily compiled. Much of this testimony is as reliable and entitled to as much weight as any of the foregoing. Take, for example, the statement of the Foreign Representatives of the Russian Social Democratic Party upon the shooting of six young students arrested in Petrograd: In the New York _World_, March 22, 1920, Mr. Lincoln Eyre quotes “Red Executioner Peters” as saying: “We have never yet passed the sentence of death on a foreigner, although some of them richly deserved it. The few foreigners who have lost their lives in the Revolution have been killed in the course of a fight or in some such manner.” Shall we not set against that statement the signed testimony of responsible and honored spokesmen of the Russian Social Democratic Party?

Three brothers, named Genzelli, French citizens, were arrested and shot without the formality of a trial. They had been officers in the Czar’s army, and, with three young fellow-officers, Russians, were discovered at a private gathering, wearing the shoulder-straps indicative of their former military rank. This was their offense. According to a statement issued by the Foreign Representatives of the Russian Social Democratic Party, Lenin was asked at Smolny, “What is to be done with the students?” and replied, “Do with them what you like.” The whole six were shot, but it has never been possible to ascertain who issued the order for the execution.

Another example: The famous Schastny case throws a strong light upon one very important phase of the Bolshevist terror. Shall we decline to give credence to Socialists of honorable distinction, simply because they are opposed to Bolshevism? Here are two well-known Socialist writers, one French and the other Russian, long and honorably identified with the international Socialist movement. Charles Dumas, the French Socialist, from whose book[19] quotation has already been made, gives an account of the Schastny case which vividly illustrates the brutality of the Bolsheviki:

[19] _La Vérité sur les Bolsheviki_, par Charles Dumas, Paris, 1919.

The Schastny case is the most detestable episode in Bolshevist
history. Its most repulsive feature is the parody of legality
which the Bolsheviki attempt to attach to a case of wanton
murder. Admiral Schastny was the commander of the Baltic
Fleet and was put in command by the Bolsheviki themselves.
Thanks to his efforts, the Russian war-ships were brought
out of Helsingfors harbor in time to escape capture by the
Germans on the eve of their invasion of Finland. In general,
it was he who contributed largely to the saving of whatever
there was left of the Russian fleet. His political views were
so radical that even the Bolsheviki tolerated him in their
service. Notwithstanding all this, he was accused of complicity
in a counter-revolutionary plot and haled before a tribunal.
In vain did the judge search for a shred of proof of his
guilt. Only one witness appeared against him--Trotsky--who
delivered an impassioned harangue full of venom and malice.
Admiral Schastny implored the court to allow witnesses for the
defense to testify, but the judges decreed that his request
was sheer treason. Thereupon the witnesses who were prevented
from appearing in court forwarded their testimony in writing,
but the court decided not to read their communication. After
a simulated consultation, Schastny was condemned to die--a
verdict which later stirred even Krylenko, one of his
accusers, to say: “That was not a death sentence--that was a
summary shooting!”

The verdict was to be carried out in twenty-four hours. This
aroused the ire of the Socialists-Revolutionists of the Left,
who at that time were represented in the People’s Commissariat,
and they immediately forwarded, in the name of their party, a
sharp protest against the official confirmation of the death
sentence. The Commissaries, in reply, ordered the immediate
shooting of Schastny.

Apparently Schastny was subjected to torture before his death.
He was killed without witnesses, without a priest, and even
his lawyer was not notified of the hour of his execution.
When his family demanded the surrender of his body to them,
it was denied. What, if otherwise, did the Bolsheviki fear,
and why did they so assiduously conceal the body of the dead
admiral? The same occurred after the execution of Fanny Royd,
who shot at Lenin. There is also indisputable evidence that the
Bolsheviki are resorting to torture at inquests. The assassin
of Commissary Uritzky (whose family, by the way, was entirely
wiped out by the Bolsheviki as a matter of principle, without
even the claim that they knew anything about the planned
attempt) was tortured by his executioners in the Fortress of
St. Peter and Paul.

In the modern revolutionary movement of Russia few men have served with greater distinction than L. Martov, and none with greater disinterestedness. His account of the Schastny trial is vibrant with the passionate hatred of tyranny and oppression characteristic of his whole career:

He was accused of conspiring against the Soviet power. Captain
Schastny denied it. He asked the tribunal to hear witnesses,
including Bolshevist commissaries, who had been appointed to
watch him. Who was better qualified to state whether he had
really conspired against the Soviet power?

The tribunal refused to hear witnesses. Refused what every
court in the world, except Stolypin’s field court martials,
recognized the worst criminal entitled to.

A man’s life was at stake, the life of a man who had won the
love and confidence of his subordinates, the sailors of the
Baltic Fleet, who protested against the captain’s arrest.
The life of a man who had performed a marvelous feat! He had
somehow managed to take out of Helsingfors harbor all the ships
of the Baltic Fleet, and had thus saved them from capture by
the Finnish Whites.

It was not the enraged Finnish Whites, nor the German
Imperialists, who shot this man. He was put to death by men
who call themselves Russian Communists--by Messrs. Medvedeff,
Bruno, Karelin, Veselovski, Peterson, members of the Supreme
Revolutionary Tribunal.

Captain Schastny was refused the exercise of the right
to which every thief or murderer is entitled--_i.e._, to
call in witnesses for the defense. But the witness for the
prosecution was heard. This witness was Trotsky, Trotsky, who,
as Commissary for War and Naval Affairs, had arrested Captain
Schastny.

At the hearing of the case by the tribunal, Trotsky acted, not
as a witness, but as a prosecutor. As a prosecutor he declared,
“This man is guilty; you must condemn him!” And Trotsky did
it after having gagged the prisoner by refusing to call in
witnesses who might refute the accusations brought against him.

Not much valor is required to fight a man who has been gagged
and whose hands are tied, nor much honesty or loftiness of
character.

It was not a trial; it was a farce. There was no jury. The
judges were officials dependent upon the authorities, receiving
their salaries from the hands of Trotsky and other People’s
Commissaries. And this mockery of a court passed the death
sentence, which was hurriedly carried out before the people,
who were profoundly shaken by this order to kill an innocent
man, could do anything to save him.

Under Nicholas Romanov one could sometimes stop the carrying
out of a monstrously cruel sentence and thus pull the victim
out of the executioner’s hands.

Under Vladimir Ulianov this is impossible. The Bolshevist
leaders slept peacefully when, under the cover of night, the
first victim of their tribunal was stealthily being killed.

No one knew who murdered Schastny or how he was murdered. As
under the Czars, the executioners’ names are concealed from the
people. No one knows whether Trotsky himself came to the place
of the execution to watch and direct it.

Perhaps he, too, slept peacefully and saw in his dreams the
proletariat of the whole world hailing him as the liberator of
mankind, as the leader of the universal revolution.

In the name of Socialism, in thy name, O proletariat, blind
madmen and vainglorious fools staged this appalling farce of
cold-blooded murder.

The evidence we have cited from Bolshevist sources proves conclusively that the Red Terror was far from being the unimportant episode it is frequently represented to have been by pro-Bolshevist writers. It effectually disposes of the assiduously circulated myth that the Extraordinary Commissions were for the most part concerned with the suppression of robbery, crimes of violence, and illegal speculation, and that only in a few exceptional instances did they use their powers to suppress anti-Bolshevist propaganda. The evidence makes it quite clear that from the early days of the Bolshevist régime until November, 1918, at least, an extraordinary degree of terrorism prevailed throughout Soviet Russia. According to a report published by the All-Russian Extraordinary Commission in February of the present year, not less than 6,185 persons were executed in 1918 and 3,456 in 1919, a total of 9,641 in Moscow and Petrograd alone. Of the total number for the two years, _7,068 persons were shot for counter-revolutionary activities_, 631 for crimes in office--embezzlement, corruption, and so on--217 for speculation and profiteering, and 1,204 for all other classes of crime.

That these figures understate the extent of the Red Terror is certain. In the first place, the report covers only the work of the Extraordinary Commissions of Moscow and Petrograd. The numerous District Extraordinary Commissions are not reported on. In the next place, there is reason to believe that many of the reports of the Extraordinary Commissions were falsified in order not to create too bad an impression. Quite frequently, as a matter of fact, the number of victims reported by the _Chresvychaikas_ was less than the number actually known to have been killed. Moreover, the figures given refer only to the victims of the Extraordinary Commissions, and do not include those sentenced to death by the other revolutionary tribunals. The 9,641 executions--even if we accept the figures as full and complete--refer only to the victims of the Moscow and Petrograd _Chresvychaikas_, men and women put to death without anything like a trial.[20] When to these figures there shall be added the victims of all the District Extraordinary Commissions and of all the other revolutionary tribunals, the real meaning of the Red Terror will begin to appear. But even that will not give us the real measure of the Red Terror, for the simple reason that the many thousands of peasants and workmen who have been slain in the numerous uprisings, frequently taking on the character of pitched battles between armed masses and detachments of Soviet troops, are not included.

[20] The figures are taken from _Russkoe Delo_ (Prague), March 4, 1920.

The naïve and impressionable Mr. Goode says of the judicial system of Soviet Russia: “Its chief quality would seem to be a certain simplicity. By a stroke of irony the people’s courts aim not only at punishment of evil, but also at reformation of the wrongdoer! A first offender is set free on condition that he must not fall again. Should he do so, he pays the penalty of his second offense together with that to which his first crime rendered him liable.”[21] That Mr. Goode should be ignorant of the fact that such humane measures were not unknown or uncommon in the administration of justice by the ordinary criminal courts under czarism is perhaps not surprising. It is somewhat surprising, however, that he should write as though the Soviet courts have made a distinct advance in penology. Has he never heard of the First Offenders Act in his own country, or of our extensive system of suspended sentences, parole, probation, and so on? It is not necessary to deny Mr. Goode’s statement, or even to question it. As a commentary upon it, the following article from _Severnaya Communa_, December 4, 1918, is sufficient:

[21] _Bolshevism at Work_, by William T. Goode, pp. 96-97.

It is impossible to continue silent. It has constantly been
brought to the knowledge of the Viborg Soviet (Petrograd) of
the terrible state of affairs existing in the city prisons.
That people all the time are dying there of hunger; _that
people are detained six and eight months without examination,
and that in many cases it is impossible to learn why they have
been arrested, owing to officials being changed, departments
closed, and documents lost_. In order to confirm, or otherwise,
these rumors, the Soviet decided to send on the 3d November
a commission consisting of the president of the Soviet, the
district medical officer, and district military commissar, to
visit and report on the “Kresti” prison. Comrades! What they
saw and what they heard from the imprisoned is impossible to
describe. Not only were all rumors confirmed, but conditions
were actually found much worse than had been stated. I was
pained and ashamed. I myself was imprisoned under czardom in
that same prison. Then all was clean, and prisoners had clean
linen twice a month. Now, not only are prisoners left without
clean linen, but many are even without blankets, and, as in
the past, for a trifling offense they are placed in solitary
confinement in cold, dark cells. But the most terrible sights
we saw were in the sick-bays. Comrades, there we saw living
dead who hardly had strength enough to whisper their complaints
that they were dying of hunger. In one ward, among the sick
a corpse had lain for several hours, whose neighbors managed
to murmur, “Of hunger he died, and soon of hunger we shall
all die.” Comrades, among them are many who are quite young,
who wish to live and see the sunshine. If we really possess a
workmen’s government such things should not be.

Following the example of Mr. Arthur Ransome, many pro-Bolshevist writers have assured us that after 1918 the Red Terror practically ceased to exist. Mr. Ransome makes a great deal of the fact that in February, 1919, the Central Executive Committee of the People’s Commissaries “definitely limited the powers of the Extraordinary Commission.”[22] Although he seems to have attended the meeting at which this was done, and talks of “the bitter struggle within the party for and against the almost dictatorial powers of the Extraordinary Committee,” he appears not to have understood what was done. Perhaps it ought not to be expected that this writer of fairy-stories who so naïvely confesses his ignorance of “economics” should comprehend the revolutionary struggle in Russia. Be that how it may, he does not state accurately what happened. He says: “Therefore the right of sentencing was removed from the Extraordinary Commission; but if, through unforeseen circumstances, the old conditions should return, they intended that the dictatorial powers of the Commission should be returned to it until those conditions had ceased.” Actually the decision was that the power to inflict the death penalty should be taken from the Extraordinary Commissions, _except where and when martial law existed_. When Krylenko, Diakonov, and others protested against the outrage of permitting the Extraordinary Commissions to execute people without proof of their guilt, _Izvestia_ answered in words which clearly reveal the desperate and brutal spirit of Bolshevism: “_If among one hundred executed one was guilty, this would be satisfactory and would sanction the action of the Commission._”

[22] _Russia in 1919_, by Arthur Ransome, pp. 108-114.

As a matter of fact, the resolution which, according to Mr. Ransome, “definitely limited the powers of the Extraordinary Commission,” was an evasion of the issue. Not only was martial law in existence in the principal cities, and not only was it easy to declare martial law anywhere in Soviet Russia, but it was a very easy matter for accused persons to be brought to Moscow or Petrograd and there sentenced by the Extraordinary Commission. _This was actually done in many cases after the February decision._ Mr. Ransome quotes Dzerzhinsky to the effect that criminality had been greatly decreased by the Extraordinary Commissions--in Moscow by 80 per cent.!--and that there was now, February, 1919, no longer danger of “large scale revolts.” What a pity that the All-Russian Extraordinary Commission did not consult Mr. Ransome before publishing its report in February of this year! That report shows, first, that in 1919 the activities of the Extraordinary Commission were much greater than in 1918; second, that the number of arrests made in 1919 was 80,662 as against 46,348 in 1918; third, that in 1919 the arrests of “ordinary criminals” nearly equaled the total number of arrests made in 1918 for _all causes_, including counter-revolutionary activity, speculation, crimes in office, and general crime. The figures given in the report are: arrests for ordinary crimes only in 1919, 39,957; arrests for all causes in 1918, 47,348. When it is remembered that all the other revolutionary tribunals were active throughout this period, how shall we reconcile this record of the Extraordinary Commission with Mr. Ransome’s account? The fact is that crime steadily increased throughout 1919, _and that at the very time Mr. Ransome was in Moscow conditions there were exceedingly bad, as the report of arrests and convictions shows_.

Terrorism continued in Russia throughout 1919, the rose-colored reports of specially coached correspondents to the contrary notwithstanding. There was, indeed, a period in the early summer when the rigors of the Red Terror were somewhat relaxed. This seems to have been connected with the return of the bourgeois specialists to the factories and the officers of the Czar’s army to positions of importance in the Red Army. This could not fail to lessen the persecution of the bourgeoisie, at least for a time. In July the number of arrests made by the Extraordinary Commission was small, only 4,301; in November it reached the high level of 14,673. To those who claim that terrorism did not exist in Russia during 1919, the best answer is--this very illuminating official Bolshevist report.

On January 10, 1919, _Izvestia_ published an article by Trotsky in which the leader of the military forces of the Soviet Republic dealt with the subject of terrorism. This was, of course, in advance of the meeting which Mr. Ransome so completely misunderstood. Trotsky said:

By its terror against saboteurs the proletariat does not at
all say, “I shall wipe out all of you and get along without
specialists.” Such a program would be a program of hopelessness
and ruin. _While dispersing, arresting, and shooting saboteurs
and conspirators_, the proletariat says, “_I shall break your
will, because my will is stronger than yours, and I shall force
you to serve me_.” Terror as the demonstration of the will
and strength of the working-class is historically justified,
precisely because the proletariat was able thereby to break
the will of the Intelligentsia, pacify the professional men of
various categories and work, and gradually subordinate them to
its own aims within the fields of their specialties.

On April 2, 1919, _Izvestia_ published a proclamation by Dzerzhinsky, president of the All-Russian Extraordinary Commission, warning that “demonstrations and appeals of any kind will be suppressed without pity”:

In view of the discovery of a conspiracy which aimed to
organize an armed demonstration against the Soviet authority by
means of explosions, destruction of railways, and fires, the
All-Russian Extraordinary Commission warns that demonstrations
and appeals of any kind will be suppressed without pity. In
order to save Petrograd and Moscow from famine, in order
to save hundreds and thousands of innocent victims, the
All-Russian Extraordinary Commission will be obliged to take
the most severe measures of punishment against all who will
appeal for White Guard demonstration or for attempts at armed
uprising.

[Signed] F. DZERZHINSKY,
_President of the All-Russian Extraordinary Commission_.

The _Severnaya Communa_ of April 2, 1919, contains an official report of the shooting by the Petrograd Extraordinary Commission of a printer named Michael Ivanovsky “_for the printing of proclamations issued by the Socialists-Revolutionists of the Left_.” Later several Socialists-Revolutionists, among them Soronov, were shot “for having proclamations and appeals in their possession.”

On May 1, 1919, the _Izvestia_ of Odessa, official organ of the Soviet in that city, published the following account of the infliction of the death penalty for belonging to an organization. It said:

The Special Branch of the Staff of the Third Army has uncovered
the existence of an organization, the Union of the Russian
People, now calling itself “the Russian Union for the People
and the State.” The entire committee was arrested.

After giving the names of those arrested the account continued:

The case of those arrested was transferred to the Military
Tribunal of the Soviet of the Third Army. Owing to the obvious
activity of the members of the Union directed against the
peaceful population and the conquests of the Revolution, the
Revolutionary Tribunal decided to sentence the above-mentioned
persons to death. The verdict was carried out on the same night.

On May 6, 1919, _Severnaya Communa_ published the following order from the Defense Committee:

Order No. 8 of the Defense Committee. The Extraordinary
Commission for Combating Counter-Revolution is to take measures
to suppress all forms of official crime, and not to hesitate at
shooting the guilty. The Extraordinary Committee is bound to
indict not only those who are guilty of active crime, but also
those who are guilty of inaction of authority or condonement of
crime, bearing in mind that the punishment must be increased in
proportion to the responsibility attached to the post filled by
the guilty official.

On May 14, 1919, _Izvestia_ published an article by a Bolshevist official describing what happened in the Volga district as the Bolsheviki advanced. This article is important because it calls attention to a form of terrorism not heretofore mentioned: it will be remembered that in the latter part of 1918 the Bolsheviki introduced the system of rationing out food upon class lines, giving to the Red Army three times as much food per capita as to the average of the civil population, and dividing the latter into categories. The article under consideration shows very clearly how this system was made an instrument of terrorism:

Instructions were received from Moscow to forbid free trade,
and to introduce the class system of feeding. After much
confusion, _this made the population starve in a short time_,
and rebel against the food dictatorship.... “Was it necessary
to introduce the class system of feeding into the Volga
district so haphazardly?” asks the writer. “Oh no. _There
was enough bread ready for shipment in that region, and in
many places it was rotting, because of the lack of railroad
facilities._ The class-feeding system did not increase
the amount of bread.... It did create, together with the
inefficient policy, and the lack of a distribution system, a
state of starvation, which provoked dissatisfaction.”

Throughout 1919 the official Bolshevist press continued to publish accounts of the arrest of hostages. Thus _Izvestia_ of the Petrograd Soviet of Workmen’s and Red Army Deputies (No. 185), August 16, 1919, published an official order by the acting Commandant of the fortified district of Petrograd, a Bolshevist official named Kozlovsky. The two closing paragraphs of this order follow:

I declare that all guilty of arson, also all those who have
knowledge of the same and fail to report the culprits to the
authorities, _will be shot forthwith_.

I warn all that in the event of repeated cases of arson I will
not hesitate to adopt extreme measures, _including the shooting
of the bourgeoisie’s hostages_, in view of the fact that all
the White Guards’ plots directed against the proletarian state
_must be regarded not as the crime of individuals, but as the
offense of the entire enemy class_.

That hostages were actually shot, and not merely held under arrest, is clearly stated in the _Severnaya Communa_, March 11, 1919:

By order of the Military Revolutionary Committee of Petrograd
several officers were shot for _spreading untrue rumors that
the Soviet authority had lost the confidence of the people_.

_All relatives of the officers of the 86th Infantry Regiment
(which deserted to the Whites) were shot._

The same journal published, September 2, 1919, the following decree of the War Council of the Petrograd Fortified District:

It has been ascertained that on the 17th of August there was
maliciously cut down in the territory of the Ovtzenskaya
Colony about 200 sazhensks of telegraph and telephone wire. In
consequence of the above-mentioned criminal offense, the War
Council of the Petrograd Fortified District has ordered--

(1) To impose on the Ovtzenskaya Colony a fine of 500,000
rubles; (2) the guarding of the intactness of the lines
to be made incumbent upon the population under reciprocal
responsibility; and (3) _hostages to be taken_.

Note: The decree of the War Council was carried out on the 30th
of August. The following hostages have been taken: Languinen,
P. M.; Languinen, Ya. P.; Finck, F. Kh.; Ikert, E. S.; Luneff,
F. L.; Dalinguer, P. M.; Dalinguer, P. Ya.; Raw, Ya. I.;
Shtraw, V. M.; Afanassieff, L. K.

This drastic order was issued and carried out nearly a month before the district was declared to be in a state of siege.

* * * * *

The _Krasnaya Gazeta_, November 4, 1919, published a significant list of Red Army officers who had deserted to the Whites and of the retaliatory arrests of innocent members of their families. Mothers, brothers, sisters, and wives were arrested and punished for the acts of their relatives in deserting the Red Army. The list follows:

1. Khomutov, D. C.--brother and mother arrested.

2. Piatnitzky, D. A.--mother, sister, and brother arrested.

3. Postnov--mother and sister arrested.

4. Agalakov, A. M.--wife, father, and mother arrested.

5. Haratkviech, B.--wife and sister arrested.

6. Kostylev, V. I.--wife and brother arrested.

7. Smyrnov, A. A.--mother, sister, and father arrested.

8. Chebykin--wife arrested.

In September, 1919, practically all the Bolshevist papers published the following order, signed by Trotsky:

I have ordered several times that officers with indefinite
political convictions should not be appointed to military
posts, especially when the families of such officers live
on the territory controlled by enemies of the Soviet Power.
My orders are not being carried out. In one of our armies
an officer whose family lives on the territory controlled
by Kolchak was appointed as a commander of a division.
Consequently, this commander betrayed his division and went
over, together with his staff, to the enemy. Once more I order
the Military Commissaries to make a thorough cleansing of all
Commanding Staffs. In case an officer goes over to the enemy,
_his family should be made to feel the consequences of his
betrayal_.

Early in November, 1919, the Petrograd Extraordinary Commission announced that by its orders forty-two persons had been shot. A number of these were ordinary criminals; several others had been guilty of selling cocaine. Among the other victims we find one Maximovich, “for organizing a mass desertion of Red Army soldiers to the Whites”; one Shramchenko, “_for participating in a counter-revolutionary conspiracy_”; E. K. Kaulbars, “for spying”; Ploozhnikoff and Demeshchenke, “_for exciting the politically unconscious masses and hounding them on against the Soviet Power_.”

In considering this terribly impressive accumulation of evidence from the Bolshevist press we must bear in mind that it represents not the criticism of a free press, but only that measure of truth which managed to find its way through the most drastic censorship ever known in any country at any time. Not only were the organs of the anti-Bolshevist Socialists suppressed, but even the Soviet press was not free to publish the truth. Trotsky himself made vigorous protest in the _Izvestia_ of the Central Executive Committee (No. 13) against the censorship which “prevented the publication of the news that Perm was taken by the White Guards.” A congress of Soviet journalists was held at Moscow, in May, 1919, and made protest against the manner in which they were restrained from criticizing Soviet misrule. The _Izvestia_ of the Provincial Executive Committee, May 8, 1919, quotes from this protest as follows:

The picture of the provincial Soviet press is melancholy
enough. We journalists are particularly “up against it” when we
endeavor to expose the shortcomings of the local Soviet rule
and the local Soviet officials. Immediately we are met with
threats of arrest and banishment, _threats which are often
carried out_. In Kaluga a Soviet editor was nearly shot for a
remark about a drunken communist.

Under such conditions as are indicated in this protest the evidence we have cited was published. What the record would have been if only there was freedom for the opposition press can only be imagined. In the light of such a mass of authoritative evidence furnished by the Bolsheviki themselves, of what use is it for casual visitors to Russia, like Mr. Goode and Mr. Lansbury, for example, to attempt to throw dust into our eyes and make it appear that acts of terrorism and tyranny are no more common in Russia than in countries like England, France, and America? And how, in the light of such testimony, shall we explain the ecstatic praise of Bolshevism and the Bolsheviki by men and women who call themselves Socialists and Liberals, and who profess to love freedom? It is true that the abolition of the death penalty has now been decreed, the decree going into effect on January 22, 1920. Lenin has declared that this date marks the passing of the policy of blood, and that only a renewal of armed intervention by the Allies can force a return to it. We shall see. This is not the first time the death penalty has been “abolished” by decree during the Bolshevist régime. Some of us remember that on November 7, 1918, the Central Executive Committee in Moscow decreed the abolition of the death penalty and a general amnesty. After that murder, by order of the Extraordinary Commissions, went on worse than before.[23]

[23] As proofs of these pages are being revised, word comes that the death penalty has been revived--_Vide_ London _Times_, May 26, 1920.

In Odessa an investigation was made into the workings of the _Chresvychaika_ and a list of fifteen classes of crimes for which the death penalty had been imposed and carried out was published. The list enumerated various offenses, ranging from espionage and counter-revolutionary agitation to “dissoluteness.” The fifteenth and last class on the list read, “Reasons unknown.” Perhaps these words sum up the only answer to our last question.

VIII

INDUSTRY UNDER SOVIET CONTROL

For the student of the evolution of Bolshevism in Russia there is, perhaps, no task more difficult than to unravel the tangled skein of the history of the first few weeks after the _coup d’état_. Whoever attempts to set forth the development of events during those weeks in an ordered and consecutive narrative, and to present an accurate, yet intelligible, account of the conditions that prevailed, must toil patiently through a bewildering snarled mass of conflicting testimony, charges and counter-charges, claims and counter-claims. Statements concerning apparently simple matters of fact, made by witnesses whose competence and probity are not to be lightly questioned, upon events of which they were witnesses, are simply irreconcilable. Moreover, there is a perfect welter of sweeping generalizations and an almost complete lack of such direct and definite information, statistical and other, as can readily be found relating to both the earlier and the later stages of the Revolution.

Let us first set down the facts concerning which there is substantial agreement on the part of the partizans of the Bolsheviki and the various factions opposed to them, ranging from the Constitutional-Democrats to such factions as the Socialists-Revolutionists of the Left and the “Internationalist” section of the Menshevist Social Democrats, both of which were quite closely allied to the Bolsheviki in sympathy and in theory. At the time when the Bolsheviki raised the cry, “All power to the Soviets!” in October, 1917, arrangements were well under way for the election, upon the most democratic basis imaginable, of a great representative constitutional convention, the Constituent Assembly. Not only had the Bolsheviki nominated their candidates and entered upon an electoral campaign in advocacy of their program; not only were they, in common with all other parties, pledged to the holding of the Constituent Assembly; much more important is the fact that they professed to be, and were by many regarded as, the special champions and defenders of the Constituent Assembly, solicitous above all else for its convocation and its integrity. From June onward Trotsky, Kamenev, and other Bolshevist leaders had professed to fear only that the Provisional Government would either refuse to convoke the Constituent Assembly or in some manner prevent its free action. No small part of the influence possessed by the Bolsheviki immediately prior to the overthrow of Kerensky was due to the fact that, far from being suspected of hostility to the Constituent Assembly, they were widely regarded as its most vigorous and determined upholders. To confirm that belief the Council of the People’s Commissaries issued this, its first decree:

In the name of the Government of the Russian Republic, chosen
by the All-Russian Congress of Soviets of Workers’ and
Soldiers’ Deputies with participation of peasant deputies, the
Council of People’s Commissars decrees:

1. The elections for the Constituent Assembly shall take place
at the date determined upon--November 12th.

2. All electoral commissions, organs of local self-government,
Soviets of Workers’, Soldiers’, and Peasants’ Deputies, and
soldiers’ organizations on the front should make every effort
to assure free and regular elections at the date determined
upon.

In the name of the Government of the Russian Republic,

_The President of the Council of People’s Commissars_,
VLADIMIR ULIANOV--LENIN.

That was in November, 1917--and the Constituent Assembly has not yet been convoked. In _Pravda_, December 26, 1917, Lenin published a series of propositions to show that the elections, which had taken place since the Bolsheviki assumed power, did not give a clear indication of the real voice of the masses! The elections had gone heavily against the Bolsheviki, and that fact doubtless explains Lenin’s disingenuous argument. Later on Lenin was able to announce that no assembly elected by the masses by universal suffrage could be accepted! “The Soviet Republic repudiates the hypocrisy of formal equality of all human beings,” he wrote in his _Letter to American Workmen_.

It is quite certain that the political power and influence of the Soviets was never so small at any time since the birth of the Revolution in March as it was when the Bolsheviki raised the cry, “All power to the Soviets!” The reasons for this, if not obvious, are easily intelligible: the mere facts that the election of a thoroughly democratic constitutional convention at an early date was assured, and that the electoral campaign had already begun, were by themselves sufficient to cause many of those actively engaged in the revolutionary struggle to turn their interest from the politics of the Soviets to the greater political issues connected with the campaign for the Constituent Assembly elections. There were other factors at work lessening the popular interest in and, consequently, the political influence of, the Soviets. In the first place, the hectic excitement of the early stages of the Revolution had passed off, together with its novelty, and life had assumed a _tempo_ nearer normal; in the second place, city Dumas and the local Zemstvos, which had been elected during the summer, upon a thoroughly democratic basis, were functioning, and, naturally, absorbing much energy which had hitherto been devoted to the Soviets.

Concerning these things there is little room for dispute. The _Izvestia_ of the Soviets again and again called attention to the waning power and influence of the Soviets, always cheerfully and with wise appreciation. On September 28, 1917, it said:

At last a truly democratic government, born of the will of
all classes of the Russian people, the first rough form of
the future liberal parliamentary régime, has been formed.
Ahead of us is the Constituent Assembly, which will solve all
questions of fundamental law, and whose composition will be
essentially democratic. The function of the Soviets is at an
end, and the time is approaching when they must retire, with
the rest of the revolutionary machinery, from the stage of a
free and victorious people, whose weapons shall hereafter be
the peaceful ones of political action.

On October 23, 1917, _Izvestia_ published an important article dealing with this subject, saying:

We ourselves are being called the “undertakers” of our own
organization. In reality, we are the hardest workers in
constructing the new Russia.... When autocracy and the entire
bureaucratic régime fell, we set up the Soviets as barracks in
which all the democracy could find temporary shelter. Now, in
place of barracks we are building the permanent edifice of a
new system, and naturally the people will gradually leave the
barracks for the more comfortable quarters.

Dealing with the lessening activity of the local Soviets, scores of which had ceased to exist, the Soviet organ said:

This is natural, for the people are coming to be interested in
the more permanent organs of legislation--the municipal Dumas
and the Zemstvos.

Continuing, the article said:

In the important centers of Petrograd and Moscow, where the
Soviets were best organized, they did not take in all the
democratic elements.... The majority of the intellectuals did
not participate, and many workers also; some of the workers
because they were politically backward, others because the
center of gravity for them was in their unions.... We cannot
deny that these organizations are firmly united with the
masses, whose every-day needs are better served by them....

That the local democratic administrations are being
energetically organized is highly important. The city Dumas are
elected by universal suffrage, and in purely local matters have
more authority than the Soviets. Not a single democrat will see
anything wrong in this....

... Elections to the municipalities are being conducted
in a better and more democratic way than the elections
to the Soviets.... All classes are represented in the
municipalities.... And as soon as the local self-governments
begin to organize life in the municipalities, the rôle of the
local Soviets naturally ends....

... There are two factors in the falling off of interest in
the Soviets. The first we may attribute to the lowering of
political interest in the masses; the second to the growing
effort of provincial and local governing bodies to organize the
building of new Russia.... The more the tendency lies in this
latter direction the sooner disappears the significance of the
Soviets....

It seems to be hardly less certain, though less capable of complete demonstration, perhaps, that the influence of the Soviets in the factories was also on the wane. Perhaps it would be fairer to say that there was an increasing sense of responsibility and a lessening of the dangerous recklessness of the earlier stages of the Revolution. The factory Soviets in the time of the Provisional Government varied so greatly in their character and methods that it is rather difficult to accurately represent them in a brief description. Many of them were similar, in practice, to the shop meetings of the trades-unions; others more nearly resembled the Whitley Councils of England. There were still others, however, which asserted practically complete ownership of the factories and forced the real owners out.

On March 20, 1917, _Izvestia_ said:

If any owner of an undertaking who is dissatisfied with the
demands made by the workmen refuses to carry on the business,
then the workmen must resolutely insist on the management
of the work being given over into their hands, under the
supervision of the Commissary of the Soviets.

That is precisely what happened in many cases. We must not forget that the Bolsheviki did not introduce Soviet control of industry. That they did so is a very general belief, but, like so many other beliefs concerning Russia, it is erroneous. The longest trial of the Soviet control of industry took place under the régime of the Provisional Government, in the pre-Bolshevist period. Many of the worst evils of the system were developed during that period, though as a result of Bolshevist propaganda and intrigue to a large degree.

Industrial control by the workers, during the pre-Bolshevist period of the Revolution, and especially during the spring and early summer, was principally carried on by means of four distinct types of organization, to all of which the general term “Soviet” was commonly applied. Perhaps a brief description of each of these types will help to interpret the history of this period: