As soon as news came from the front great bulletins were distributed through the city and posted on the walls of buildings where every one could read them. These bulletins contained the news of both defeat and victory. If prisoners had been taken or a retreat had been necessary, the populace was informed of it frankly. There was no attempt to keep up the “morale” of the civilian population by assuring it that all went well and that victory was certain. Any one in Soviet Russia who accepted the responsibilities of the new order did so knowing that it meant hardship and defeat—for a time.
In Moscow many statues have been erected since the revolution. Skobileff Square,—now called Soviet Square,—has a statue of Liberty which takes the place of the old statue of Skobileff. I saw sculptors at work all over the city, putting in medallions and bas-reliefs, on public buildings. In Red Square, along the Kremlin wall, are the graves of many who fell in the revolution. Sverdlov, formerly president of the executive committee, and a close friend of Lenin, is buried here. I was told that his death had been a great loss to the Soviet Government.
Moscow, like all the other Russian cities I saw, had schools everywhere, art schools, musical conservatories, technical schools, in addition to the regular schools for children.
On “Speculator’s Street” in Moscow all kinds of private trading went on without interference. I found this street thronged with shoppers and with members of the old bourgeoisie selling their belongings along the curb; men and women unmistakably of the former privileged classes offering, dress suits, opera cloaks, evening gowns, shoes, hats, and jewelry to any one who would pay them the rubles that they, in turn, must give to the exorbitant speculators for the very necessities of life.
These irreconcilables of the old regime, unwilling to cooperate with the new government and refusing to engage in useful work which would entitle them to purchase their supplies at the Soviet shops, at Soviet prices, were compelled to resort to the speculators and under pressure of the constantly decreasing ruble and the wildly soaring prices, were driven to sacrifice their valuables in order to avoid starvation. Any one who desired and who had the money could buy from the speculators; but one pays dearly for pride in Soviet Russia. The speculators charged seventy-five rubles a pound for black bread that could be bought in the Government shops for ten rubles. The right to buy at the Soviet shops and to eat in the Soviet restaurants was to be had by the mere demonstration of a sincere desire to do useful work of hand or brain. Nevertheless these defenders of the old order still held out—fewer of them every day, to be sure—and the speculators throve accordingly.
It seemed at first glance a strange anomaly. I could see through the windows of the speculator’s shops canned goods and luxuries, and even necessities, for which the majority of the population were suffering. I asked why the Government did not put its principles into practice by requisitioning all these stocks and ending the speculation. There were many things in their program, the Bolshevists said, which could not be carried out at once because the energy of the Government was consumed in the mobilization of all available resources for national defence. There were thousands of speculators all over Russia, and it would take a small army to eliminate them entirely. Half measures would only drive them underground where they would be a constant source of irritation and anti-Government propaganda. It was better to let them operate in the open, they said, where they could be kept under observation and restrained within certain limits.
Meanwhile the speculators were eliminating themselves and dragging with them the recalcitrant bourgeoisie on whom they preyed. Hoarded wealth and old finery do not last forever. As the ruble falls and the speculator’s prices rise their victims are compelled to sacrifice more and more of their dwindling resources. The Government prices are a standing temptation to reconciliation. Only the obdurate bourgeoisie and the speculators suffer from the depreciation of the ruble. Every two months wages are adjusted to meet depreciation, by a Government commission which acts in conjunction with the Central Federation of All Russian Professional Alliances, representing skilled and unskilled labor. This serves to stabilize the purchasing power of the workers earnings, although in the past unavoidable and absolute dearth of necessities has tended to work against this stabilization.
In the meantime the falling ruble and the avaricious speculator between them drive thousands of the stubborn into the category of useful laborers. Every day brings numbers who have, either through a change of heart, or by economic necessity, been driven to ask for work which will entitle them to their bread and food cards. Thus the Communists, too busy with the military defence of their country to attend to the last measures of expropriation, make use of the irresistible economic forces of the old order and allow the capitalists to expropriate themselves.
LENIN IN SWITZERLAND, MARCH, 1916