The Cordova daily times. [volume] (Cordova, Alaska) 1914-1947, 1919-07-07
MONDAY, JULY Z, 1919
THE SOVIET FICTION

The political dilettanti have evolved
a delightfully."- simple theory of the
regime at Moscow. 1t runs something
like this: The sOviets constitute
form of democratic government de-
rived from peasant institutions, in
harmony with Russian political ge-
MUS, and directly responsive to pOpu-
lar will. The Bolsheviki are a politi-
cal party that has got control OF the
soviet machinery of government. They
are extremists, honest to be sure, but
attempting an impracticable economic
program. They may be displaced in
the soviets by some other party, or
they may adapt their program to the
demands of economic fact. Indeed,
their American apologists would have
us believe that they are now follow
ing the latter course and have so far
abandoned their intransigeant atti-
tude that it is possible for other peO-
pies to have relations with them. In
any case, your Russian peasant loves
his dear soviet and is ready to die in
it's defense, and any Russians who OPP
pose it are reactionaries, counter-rev-
dictionaries, imperialists, Black Hun
dreds, and every other thing in the
radical vocabulary.
This glamorOus theory of Russian
politics has only one little defect-it
is utterly false and has no foundation
in fact 1t rests on the fanciful inter
probation by unsound minds of data
furnished by a few ignorant and biased
observers, who know nothing of the
Russian people, their life and history,
and who were singularly susceptible
to the revolutionary atmosphere in
which they found themselves in Petro-
grad and Moscow.
The soviet, in the sense in which the
word is now used, is not a natural Rus
sian institution, and it has no connec-
ton whatever with the mir, or peasant
commune, as alleged by Raymond Rob
ms in the hodge-pOdge Of misrepre-
sensations that make up his OratOrical
fantasies The word is good Russian,
and means council" A board of di-
rectors is a soviet; the upper house
under the old regime was called the
Gosudarstvenny soviet, or council Of
the empire.
AS now used, the term had its orr
gin in 1905. When the revolution Of
the attempt of the WOrkingmen to
seize power For short time they
dominated PetrOgrad and Moscow. The
power naturally fell into the hands of
their labor union councils, or sOviets.
This gave the idea to Trotsky, who
later pointed out in his writings that
this afforded a handy instrument for
imposing the dictatorship Of the prole-
tariat. 1t was natural then, that when
the revolution of March, 1917, took
place, as the result of rising Of the
workmen and soldiers of Petrograd,
they should bark back to the precedent
of 1905.
The soviets of workmen and soldiers
deputies did not, however, at first con
slider themselves a governing body.
They accepted the provisional govern
ment and looked upon themselves as
charged with the duty of protecting
the interests of the workingmen and
soldiers in that government. AS the
days went by and the provisional gov
eminent showed itself incapable of
meeting the situation, the power of
the soviets grew. They at first con-
tanned a majority of Mensheviks. The
Bolsheviks used the slogan, Cali
power to the soviets," effectively, as
we'll as the universal demand for a
cessation of the war, and in November
came into full control, and the soviets
became the government organization
of Russia. Meanwhile the soviet or
ganization has been extended to the
towns and even to the villages, dis
placing the zemstvos and peasant in
situations of self-government. Theo-
retically it was supposed to be cleo
tive; practically, it was self-chosen
and was made up of the worst ele-
ments of the local population, FREE
quently including released criminals