1917 The national question

Written before April 27 (14), 1917.

This document is a redraft of the appeal To the Soldiers and Sailors, and was adopted by the Petrograd City Conference of the R.S.D.L.P. (Bolsheviks) on April 14 (27), 1917 during the discussion, out of order, of Point 6 of the agenda, namely, “The Hounding Campaign Against Pravda”.

Pravda No. 32, April 27 (14), 1917. Published according to the text in Pravda.

N. N. Pokrovsky, the former Minister of Foreign Affairs and the present Vice-Chairman of the Central War Industries Committee, has become a member of the Board of the Russian Bank for Foreign Commerce. Count V. N. Kokovtsov, the former Chairman of the Council of Ministers, has also become a member of the Board.

Pravda No. 28, April 22 (9), 1917. Signed: N. Lenin. Published according to the text in Pravda.

Written between April 8 and 13 (21 and 26), 1917

A brief note by Lenin on Blancism, written in early 1917.

A brief note by Lenin on his April Theses.

(1) Economic debacle is imminent. Therefore removal of the bourgeoisie is a mistake.

(This is the conclusion of the bourgeoisie. The more imminent the debacle, the more essential is it that the bourgeoisie be removed.)

(2) Proletariat is unorganised, weak, lacking class-consciousness.

Capitalist newspapers like Rech and Novoye Vremya have published articles attacking our passage through Germany and insinuating that the new arrivals were aiding the German imperialists. Izvestia of the Soviet of Workers’ and Soldiers’ Deputies reprints in full the report published in yesterday’s Pravda which was presented to the Executive Committee of the Soviet of Workers’ and Soldiers’ Deputies on the very first day after our arrival. In addition to the report, Izvestia publishes the resolution of the Executive Committee, which it gives in the following words:

First published in Russian in 1924 in Lenin Miscellany II. Published in Volksrecht No. 81, April 18 (5), 1917. Signed: N. Lenin.

This article was a report to the Executive Committee of the Petrograd Soviet made by Lenin the day after his arrival in Petrograd on April 17 (4), 1917, on behalf of the emigrants who returned from Switzerland together with him.