A political pilgrim in Europe

by Ethel Snowden

I am not a Communist in the Russian sense of the term. And the Communism of primitive Christianity, voluntary and unselfish, appears not to be practical politics at the moment. I believe that the system called Capitalism will have to give place some day to a collectivist internationalism which shall secure life and the fruits of the earth to its populations in proportion to their needs. I believe this change will come about slowly as the intelligence of the peoples develops, as they become acquainted with facts and see demonstrated before their eyes the insufficiency, insecurity and injustice of a system based upon production for profit rather than for use. Such things as are fundamental to life itself—land, minerals and means of communication—should not be at the disposal and under the control of a small number of private persons any more than the army, the navy and the arsenals. It is too unsafe. For the rest: Those things of which there is an abundant supply might not unreasonably be held privately; provided that nobody who desires them goes without, and nobody’s private ownership inflicts injury on the community at large.

But the Russian Communists favour the complete abolition of private property down to the books one reads and the clothes one wears. This programme they have carried out by methods of wholesale and swift confiscation without the slightest consideration for the unfortunate owners, creating new injustices in order to remove the old, and provoking thereby the inevitable reaction. This is of the essence of the revolutionary method. It is not happy for Russia. It would be just as unhappy for England or America.

The Bolshevik Government is now in the fourth year of its existence. This fact is adduced by its admirers in this country as a mark of super-excellence. Truly at a time when European Governments are changed with the regularity and rapidity of moving pictures at a theatre some credit is due to a Government which can survive the shocks of war and revolution through nearly four years of Europe’s stormiest history.

But the long life of the present Russian Government is due to three or four primary causes. It is due to Allied support of counter-revolutionary movements, which drew every section of the Russian population together for common defence against the foreign intruder. It is due to the fact that no alternative government has presented itself with a programme which would give more food and furniture, clothes and medicines to the people of Russia. It is due to the fear of the Extraordinary Commission with its agents and spies and prisons and executioners. But above all it is due—and particularly in these latter days since the fear of foreign invasion has departed—to the acceptance by Lenin and his friends of moderate counsels, and the gradually achieved ascendancy in the government of the nation of the more moderate men amongst the Bolsheviks.

It is, and always has been, a mistake to assume that all the Bolshevik leaders are equally extreme. It was not true when we visited Russia in May, 1920. It is much less true to-day. During the period of civil wars and Allied invasions the extreme element was dominant. Now the moderates rule. Lenin has never wavered from his fixed idea of world-communism and world-revolution; but he has proved his greatness to his friends and has confounded his enemies by yielding to the necessity for compromise, making deals with the alien capitalist governments and with the native individualist peasants alike.

Turning to my other pages on Russia for the estimate I there recorded of the keen-brained, merry-eyed fanatic of the Kremlin (for the wisdom and statesmanship of twelve months later have astonished me as much as they have surprised most people), I discovered the following sentences:

“He (Lenin) impressed me with his fanaticism. This is surely the source of his driving power. And yet I am told that compared with the really fanatical Communist Lenin is mildness itself, and should be classed with the ‘Right.’ It was rumoured that he is engaged on a new book to be given the name ‘The Infant Diseases of Communism,’ or some such title, which suggests an honest confession of mistakes made in the early days of the commune. If this be true there is hope of happiness for Russia yet. But I must confess his firm belief in the necessity of violence for the establishment throughout the world of his ideals makes one doubt miserably.”

I no longer doubt Lenin’s capacity. More than that I am inclined to believe that history will accord to him one of her foremost places when the tale of these times comes to be told, in spite of the terrible blunders and awful crimes for which he will, in part, be held responsible. It takes either a true lover of his country or one who having tasted power knows how to keep it, to confess his mistakes in the ear of a listening world apt to say “I told you so.” If Lenin loves power and means to keep it, I, who differ from him in aim and loathe with a deadly loathing his past methods, declare my conviction that it is for no selfish end that he seeks to preserve his hold upon the Russian nation, but for the good of his cause and for the ultimate realization of his dreams that he has risked unpopularity with his extreme supporters, and has met half-way the capitalists at home and abroad. The following sentences extracted from his speech to the Annual Congress of the Russian Communist Party held on March 7, 1921, promise a bright era for Russia yet:

“As far back as April, 1918, it was thought that the civil war was concluded. In March, 1920, the Soviet Government supposed that a period of peace was beginning, but already in the following month the Polish attack was launched. This experience teaches us that we should not cherish undue optimism, although at the present time there is not a single enemy soldier on Russian territory. Our internal affairs are concerned mainly with problems of demobilization, food supplies and fuel. We have made mistakes in the distribution of the food supplies, although these supplies were much greater than in previous years. Difficulties with fuel were due to the fact that we began to renew our industries at too rapid a rate. We over-estimated our powers in the transition from war-time to peace-time management. Agriculture is passing through a period of crisis, not only in consequence of the imperial and civil war, but also because the new State mechanism is building up its methods of work only by a gradual process, and for that reason it still makes mistakes from time to time. The most important political problem of the present period is the relation between the peasants and the industrial population which in Russia preponderates to a considerable degree. The international situation is marked by an unusually slow development of the revolutionary movement throughout the world, and in no case do we look for its speedy victory. The Soviet Government is therefore considering the question of the necessity for an agreement with the bourgeois Governments, which would result in the granting of concessions to foreign capitalists in Russia. The agricultural population, which supposes that the Czarist generals are no longer a menace to it and that it is receiving too small a share of industrial products, considers that the sacrifices demanded of it are too great. We must show consideration for the efforts of the agricultural workers. We are introducing a natural food tax which will be distributed in proportion to the resources of the peasantry, and will give a free scope of activity to their material interests. This tax will absorb only a portion of the agricultural worker’s produce. What he has left he will be able to sell by means of local markets and trade. And just as the concessions are to provide us with the means of production for our industries, so, too, by showing consideration for the wishes of the agricultural worker, we are at the same time mitigating the agricultural crisis and improving at the same time the relationship between the working classes in the cities and the peasantry. The question of the natural food tax is the most important problem of the Soviet policy. The accomplishment of this task is beset with serious obstacles, and demands the closest concentration of the Party, as well as a clear understanding of the difficulties delaying the dictatorship of the proletarist in a petty bourgeois state.”

Thus passes at a stroke the communal ownership of the fruits of the land as well as of the land itself! Thus return the bourgeois institution of private trading and the ancient exploitation of the concessionaire! It was inevitable, and the wise man bowed to the necessity. Lenin’s line is the one upon which I hoped and believed that Russia’s future might develop, the line which, but for the fanaticism of a comparative few, once including Lenin, might have been taken very much earlier with advantage to Russia and the rest of Europe.