Evening public ledger. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1914-1942, 1917-03-16
THIRD ESTATE TRIUMPHS; FRENCH
REVOLUTION REPEATED IN RUSSIA
Rising Commercial and Agricultural Classes Carried For
ward on Wave of Popular Revolt, End Rule OF
Absolutsm-German Plots for Separate
Peace Smashed-Liberalism Secure
BY JOSEPH SHAPLEN

Russian absolutism has lost It's rear
guard action. 1t has been fighting this
rear-guard action since the reign OF Alex
ander II and the abolition Of serfdom. To-
days news from Russia indicates that, SO
far as this system OF absolutism Is con-
cerned the battle seems TO be over. For the
successful revolution reported from Petro-
grad differs most radically from all previous
outbreaks and social upheavals in the Rus
sian Empire during the last century, be-
ginning with the revolt of the Decemberists,
in 1914. and ending with the revolution of
1905 The revolution of 1905 gave Russia
thirty-sx hours of freedom and the Duma.
The Duma, too. was soon reduced TO I'M
potence under the respective regimes OF
Goremkin, Stolipin, Kokovtseff and their
successors. But while deprived of actual
parliamentary power and despite the Prus-
sian system of representation introduced
by Stolipin, the Duma remained the tribune
from which the real representatives, OF the
people continued to shout their defiance at
the reaction and to demand radical reforms.
To understand why the present revolu-
ton has been successful and differs, there
fore, from all other revolutions in Russia
1t is necessary to understand the varied
social elements composing the Russian EN-
pire and the fact that above oil these ele-
ments has arisen a clas whose historic
mission II has bce:I on previous occasions
to raise the banner Of political democracy,
not merely as an abstract ideal, but as a
vital necessity to its economic advance
ment and position In society. That class
is the modern industrial and commercial
class. The present order of complex eco
nomic development came into being with
the birth of political democracy and repre-
sentative government. 1t was impossible
for It to grow and expand within the mar
~ tIaI t,ol apI
ernment, and since revolutions are the
product of changed social conditionA the
ascendency of new productive forces IN So
ciety and the rise of the trading class-the
Third Estate--made the death blow to feud-
alism in western Europe and in England in
,evitable. The French Revolution ended for
over the rule of feudal despotism in France
and the silent industrial revolution in Eng
land created the democracy of modern Great
Britain.
RUSSIA 100 YEARS BEHIND
In Russia, the appearance of the Third
Estate had been postponed for a century,
and while during tho decade prior to the
war, In the process of finding itself. it has
not been able to sever its allegiance TO
the old order. the war seems to have COM
pleted its education and made it ripe to
play the part allotted to it by social evou-
ton. At last the forces of progress IN Rus
sia seem TO have received their most es-
sential impetus-the active cooperation and
leadership of the vigorous, ambitious and
enterprising Third Estate. That Russia's
Third Estate has really found itself 10
demonstrated by the fact that It seems TO
have won the support and, sympathy of the
army and the people and that, after assum-
ing the power or government. its first move
was to order the banks and financial in
stitutions to resume business. For il Is
well to remember that the eyes that gaze
VI md
Europe and the Dardanelles are not the
eyes of the reactionary pro-Germans and
Holy Synod, but the eyes of the merchants,
manufacturers and bankers.
The Third Estate took virtually no part
in the revolution of 1905. That revolution
was sporadic, badly organized outburst
on the part of the workers in the large
cities. In large measure, as demon
strated in the general strike of 1905. the
revolution earned the enmity of the Third
Estate, for 1t was directed as much
against the Third Estate as against the
old, monarchical order. The rich land
owners, too, particularly the pro-German
landed aristocracy Of the Baltic provinces,
fought shy of the democratic agrarian
movement. The bankers, manufacturers
and merchants had little sympathy for the
trade unions in the large cities, and the
agricultural gentry looked with distinct
suspicion upon the growth of the peasant
rural organizations. None of these elements
realized that. for the time being at least
their interests We're identical; that neither
of them could make much headway under
tho old system of Czarisn1, for that system
drew its main support from medieval tradi-
ton and brutal force; that if the trade
unions and peasant organizations threatened
to cut the profits of the land and factory
owners, the old political regime because of
its apathy and inefiiciency, was not in a
position to make the development of agri-