The material which Kollontai is so passionately attempting to mould is the peasant mind. It seems to me that peasant women are naturally slow-moving and stolidly honest and will accept only as much of Kollontai’s philosophy as they find compatible with or necessary to the immediate situation; not because they are lacking in spirituality, for they are capable of deep religious fervor, but simply because much of it would be inharmonious and artificial to their normal development. At present her mission is to awaken them so that they may build a truth of their own which need by no means be a lesser truth than Kollontai’s. If she attempts to make them swallow her formula intact she will certainly fail. If she compromises as Lenin compromises and as Kalinin does, she will perform for Russia a never-to-be-forgotten task. To-day everything has been melted down in the crucible of the revolution. The only banner-bearer who counts is the one who will give to the great mass of those emerging into the new day the broad fundamental things of life.
Madame Kollontai is the only woman who has ever been a member of the Russian Cabinet. She puts forth the argument that women have more conscience than men and therefore do not attempt to obtain offices which they are not fitted for by previous training, and that this is the reason woman’s influence is so slight in Russia to-day. But her history refutes her theory. She herself was particularly fitted for the position of Minister of Welfare. Her record was splendid. She lost her post because she was a woman and allowed her love for her husband to interfere with her political judgment.
Early in 1918, Madame Kollontai, who was the widow of a Tsarist officer, married Fedore Dubenko, the picturesque leader of the turbulent Kronstadt sailors. Dubenko is a handsome, daring young man, some years her junior. Shortly after the wedding Dubenko was arrested. He had entrusted certain ships under his command to officers of the old régime who had pretended loyalty to the Soviets, but who had turned the ships over to the Germans without a struggle. Certainly Dubenko had no intention of betraying the revolution, he was merely trying to make use of skilled officers, of whom there was a pressing dearth. Nevertheless, he was held responsible.
While he was in prison awaiting trial, Kollontai made rather violent and conspicuous protests both publicly and privately. As a result she was removed from office. Revolutionists have no tolerance for romance among their leaders during critical moments; they place the revolution far above personal relationship. From the beginning they looked with disapproving eyes upon Kollontai’s infatuation for Dubenko.
When Dubenko was released, Kollontai went abroad and spent some months in Sweden. On her return she threw herself into a new work—that of educating her own sex to take an active part in politics.
Rightly speaking, there never was a woman’s movement in Russia until after the revolution. Equal suffrage came first and political education afterwards. This condition appears particularly curious when one recalls that, during some years before the revolution, even more women than men were sent to Siberia for plots against the Tsar’s government. Yet when the revolution came women sank mysteriously into the background. Russians explain this by various theories. One was that Russian women possess the fervor necessary to martyrs, but little of the balance needed for practical reconstructive work. Personally, I think it is entirely a matter of experience and education, for it is evident that women enter politics everywhere with great hesitancy. Even in America where equal suffrage has been a fact in some states for many years, we have only one or two women to point to as having attained political prominence.
Madame Kollontai possesses much charm. She is slim and pretty and vivacious. With a little too much the manner of a public speaker she talks so easily on any subject, even to reporters, that it almost gives an impression of insincerity. Her open mind is in reality an evidence of the kind of sincerity which has no fear of publicity. She likes Americans and knows more about this country than most Russians. But she has not always known. Some years ago, when lecturing here, she happened to be in Paterson during the great strike there. When she saw the workers marching through the streets, she rushed into a room full of people and exclaimed: “A revolution has begun!” Last year, in speaking of America, she said it was the country least agitated by revolutionary thought.
Like all enthusiastic Communists, she follows Lenin’s lead in striving to westernize Russia. One day she very greatly surprised me by saying, “Why don’t you write a series of articles about America? Write for Russia about America as you now write for America about Russia.”
“What good will it do?” I asked.
“A great deal,” she replied. “It is time Russia got acquainted with America. Because of the old censorship we never learned the value of reporters. And now that we are through forever with isolation, except when it is forced upon us, we ought to acquaint ourselves thoroughly with other countries. The women ought to know, for example, how American women got suffrage and what part women take in public affairs. We ought to know the status of the immigrants and of the Negroes, how you solve your unemployment problems, the status of farmers, of city workers, the percentage of wealth controlled by rich people. We ought to know about your schools and colleges. It ought to be explained to us just what the real difference is between the Republican and the Democratic Party and how much influence the Socialist Party has. Yes, there are a thousand things we ought to know.”