a. Has the land-owners’ property been taken over, and if so, in what districts?
b. Who administers the confiscated land—the former proprietor, or the Land Committees?
c. What has been done with the agricultural machinery and with the farm-animals?
3. Has the ground cultivated by the peasants been augmented?
4. How much and in what respect does the amount of land now under cultivation differ from the amount fixed by the Government as an average minimum?
5. The emissary must insist that, after the peasants have received the land, it is imperative that they increase the amount of cultivated land as quickly as possible, and that they hasten the sending of grain to the cities, as the only means of avoiding famine.
6. What are the measures projected or put into effect for the transfer of land from the land-owners to the Land Committees and similar bodies appointed by the Soviets?
7. It is desirable that agricultural properties well appointed and well organised should be administered by Soviets composed of the regular employees of those properties, under the direction of competent agricultural scientists.
All through the villages a ferment of change was going on, caused not only by the electrifying action of the Land decree, but also by thousands of revolutionary-minded peasant-soldiers returning from the front…. These men, especially, welcomed the call to a Congress of Peasants.
Like the old Tsay-ee-kah in the matter of the second Congress of Workers’ and Soldiers’ Soviets, the Executive Committee tried to prevent the Peasant Congress summoned by Smolny. And like the old Tsay-ee-kah, finding its resistance futile, the Executive Committee sent frantic telegrams ordering the election of Conservative delegates. Word was even spread among the peasants that the Congress would meet at Moghilev, and some delegates went there; but by November 23d about four hundred had gathered in Petrograd, and the party caucuses had begun….