The whole situation exposed the crying contradiction of the Duma fraction, where the Mensheviks were using their formal majority of one to dominate its activities and hamper the intervention of the Bolshevik deputies, a situation which the latter were prepared to accept in the name of unity. Lenin was highly critical of the Bolshevik Duma fraction for dragging its feet on the question of a break from the Menshevik seven: “The campaign against the seven began excellently,” he wrote, “but is now being carried on with insufficient determination.” (LCW, To the Editorial Board of Za Pravdu, vol. 34, p. 118.) As the Kraków meeting had failed to produce a definitive solution, this time the need for a split in the Duma fraction was spelled out in no uncertain terms. At a meeting of the Central Committee held in July, the ‘six’ were, in effect, censured, although only Malinovsky was present from the Duma fraction. This time, no excuses would be accepted. However, the way that this question was handled was important. It was absolutely necessary that the workers should understand the reasons for the split, and that the full responsibility be placed at the door of the Mensheviks. Badayev tries to present the conduct of the Bolshevik deputies in the best possible light, but it is clear that they only took the decision to break with the Mensheviks very reluctantly and under pressure:
Of course, it was obvious to all of us already at that period, that the time was drawing near for a complete rupture with the Mensheviks. But the desire to preserve unity within the Social Democratic Party by some means or other was still strong among the broad masses of the workers. Naturally the wide public did not know what was taking place inside the party organisation, in our underground committees or nuclei, owing to the police regime then prevailing in Russia. But the Duma fraction operated in the sight of all; every worker, not only in St. Petersburg, but even in the most remote corners of Russia, knew of its existence and activities. When the broad masses referred to party unity, they mainly had our fraction in mind. (A.Y. Badayev, Bolsheviks in the Tsarist Duma, p. 112, my emphasis.)
The Bolsheviks organised a campaign of collecting signatures to mobilise the maximum amount of support behind their Duma deputies. The result was an outstanding success.
By 1 November, in just two weeks, Pravda and the Bolshevik fraction received over eight resolutions of support bearing over 5,000 signatures. During the same period, the Mensheviks could only muster 3,500 signatures. And even this proportion was not maintained, since the Mensheviks had exhausted all their efforts in the first weeks, and every day saw a falling off in the number of Menshevik resolutions while the number of resolutions in favour of the ‘six’ continued to increase. In the course of the next month the Bolsheviks’ lead was still more pronounced; the flow of pro-Menshevik resolutions from the provinces virtually dried up, whereas that of the Bolsheviks was only just beginning. By 1 December, it was clear that the Bolsheviks could count at least two and a half times as many supporters among the Russian workers as the Mensheviks. The same conclusion was evident from the amount of money collected by each group among the workers. The Mensheviks were able to raise only about 150 roubles for every 1,000 obtained by the Bolsheviks.
Despite the fact that the Bolsheviks by this time had united behind them the decisive sections of the working class, conciliationist moods still persisted, as Badayev himself admits:
Some Social Democratic circles abroad too did not grasp the nature and meaning of the split in the fraction, but hovered between the two camps, passing from Bolshevism to Menshevism and vice versa. One of the largest of these two groups, Vperyod (Forward), thought that the split was the result of the “absence of a single leading party centre, enjoying the confidence of the majority of party members”. The Vperyodists recognised that the demands of the ‘six’ were just, but they thought that the whole question only amounted to minor organisational clashes within the fraction. Thus they entirely missed the significance of the split and the fundamental differences which had led to it.
The Mensheviks naturally seized upon the split in the Duma group to make a fuss abroad, taking advantage of the ignorance of Russian affairs among foreign Social Democratic parties and their natural reluctance to countenance a split. In this, they were helped by the fact that it was their nominee who represented the fraction on the International Socialist Bureau (of the Second International). The Mensheviks decided to raise the question at the next meeting of the Bureau on 1 December, and Chkheidze and Skobelev duly set out for London. Hoping to enlist the considerable authority of Plekhanov for the Menshevik cause, Chkheidze telegraphed him in Italy asking him to come to London to state his views on the split at the Bureau meeting.
Plekhanov, however, not only declined to come to London, but sent a letter to the International Socialist Bureau stating that he supported the ‘six’ and considered that the Mensheviks were to blame for the split. At the same time, since he believed that this matter finally clinched the question of a split in the Social Democratic Party, Plekhanov decided to resign from the Bureau, on which he was the representative of the whole party. The following extract from his letter is quoted from Badayev’s book:
The differences of opinion which have existed within the Russian Social Democratic Party during the last few years have now led to the division of our Duma fraction into two competing groups. This split occurred as the result of certain regrettable decisions taken by our Liquidationist comrades, who chanced to be in a majority (seven against six). Since a decisive blow has been dealt at the unity of our party, I, who represent among you the whole party, have no other choice but to resign. This I am doing by the present letter. (See A.Y. Badayev, Bolsheviks in the Tsarist Duma, p. 131, p. 132 and p. 133.)
The approach of a new revolution by no means signified that the party could abandon the struggle for partial demands. On the contrary, it invested this struggle with a new urgency. There was a need to fight for every partial demand, no matter how small, which tended to improve the working class’s living standards, conditions, and rights, in order to fuse the Party ever closer to the masses. The reality of the Bolshevik Party bears not the slightest resemblance to the caricature of Bolshevism advanced by Martov who spitefully defined it as “maximalism, the striving for immediate maximum results, indeed the realisation of social improvements, without taking into account objective conditions”. (J. Martov, Mirovoy Bol’shevism.) Had this really been the case, the Bolsheviks could never have succeeded in winning a majority of the working class, as it did, both in 1912-14, and once again in September – November 1917.
Writing as an exile after the October Revolution had already furnished the ultimate proof of the correctness of Lenin’s perspectives, policy, and methods, Martov’s spite is clearly the product of embittered envy and not just a defective memory. As we have already had occasion to observe, the difference between revolutionary Marxism and so-called reformism is not at all that the latter accepts the need to fight for reforms while the former denies it. In any event, the revolutionaries are distinguished from the reformists by being the most consistent and determined fighters for reforms, while the latter, especially in periods of capitalist crisis, always pass from reforms to counter-reforms and ‘austerity’ under the pressure of big business, while all serious reforms have historically been the by-product of the revolutionary struggle to change society. Unfortunately for the Liquidators, under Russia’s conditions even the fight for the most partial demands, if conducted seriously, led inexorably to the demand for the overthrow of tsarism.